The correct term is "gallows humor". Apparently you missed the/. memo regarding the recommended 2nd degree for a Comp-Sci student: plumbing -- because it is one profession that will not quickly be offshore outsourced. That said, there is some "strategic" advantage to having a US-based call center, after all, like not having a swarm of Wahabist militants running around with explosives (, at least not yet).
I wouldn't call it "a bit insensitive" if some of these MBA "salary and bonus-whores" running American corporations that are doing so much offshore outsourcing had THEIR jobs outsourced too. Imagine! - an Indian or Chinese CEO of an American company that was compensated at 6 - 10% of what their American counterpart demanded, and liked it! I would find such a situation deliciously ironic instead of "a bit insensitive".
Instead, the USA actively promotes the "Peter Principle". How else to explain Carley Fiorina getting $45 Million USD in compensation after leaving HP in such a shambles? I understand that Fiorina is lined up for a sweet job in Dubya's regime (instead of a prolonged visit to Camp XRay for sabatoging a good chunk of American technological prowness).
Even worse than what you think -- the DHS (Dept. of Homeland Security) is the umbrella organization for a lot of government agencies, post 9-11. Some "brainiac" at DHS decided to standardize on MSFT OSes and Apps for their entire organization, to the tune of a >$6 Billion USD multi-year contract. This decision was made in spite of warnings from numerous independent IT security experts beforehand.
The only thing I can figure is that it was either (1) rank stupidity, or (2) a payoff to MSFT for leaving gaping security holes in their OSes and Apps (for the spooks). IMHO, it makes the DHS even more oxymoronic than their name & policies imply. I base this on: US Patriot Act == GOOD; MATRIX == GOOD; secure borders != GOOD; secure seaports != GOOD; (...the list goes on ad nauseum).
All they have to do is get those titanium armoured SSTs (space shuttle transports) back from US Air Force Space Command. You know, those armoured shuttles that didn't get destroyed on the doomsday asteroid that they nuked to save Earth.
Microsoft is now embracing Apple Computer's use of the "Data" and "Resource" forks in their OS, circa 1995? I am so impressed. NOT!
MSFT, as a convicted (and largely unpunished) monopolist, might well back port the WinFS support to XP and WS2003, if only for the following reason:
Between MSFT's huge IP software patent portfolio (largely bogus due to prior art), and the DMCA they will be able to leverage their monopoly OS and FS to short-circuit the advances made by Kerberos/OpenLDAP/Samba at a time when linux is gaining corporate mindshare. Expect MSFT to furnish restricted API's and "MS Open Source" in order to lock out competition.
Unfortunately, you have a high probability of being correct in drawing this conclusion. Both common sense AND a sense of fair play (eg. level playing field for competition) seem to be in very short supply with the current regime.
This is definately OT, but I am reminded of a small Kansas meatpacking company that spent millions of dollars to build a new facility. Their goal was to test each and every cow for BSE, in order to cater to the beef import markets of Japan and Korea. Dubya's USDA and FDA forbade this company from proceeding with their plans, no doubt due to pressure from the big meatpacking companies that will never submit to such a rigid testing program. Dubya's notion of free enterprise only applies to the "big boys" that can afford to buy their politicians.
No need to be coy here. Senator (R) Stevens of Alaska hasn't won his "decency everywhere" fight yet.
When I read the/. posting for Windows Cluster Server, I blew my coffee out my nose as I tried to recompose myself. Imagine if you can, a hijacked Windows Cluster as a mail relay server! The correct and most appropriate term to apply: "a Cluster fuck of BSODs".
I wouldn't want to be characterized as a cheer- leader for MSFT in any case, including Eolas.
Imagine, MSFT is using the case of "prior art" to fight a software patent that might cause them financial harm! All of this boils down to is a battle between one group of lawyers and another. The general rule in such cases is "The litigant with the deepest pockets wins".
The ideal solution to this lawsuit is for the appeals process to wind its way up to the US Supreme Court, where the entire notion of software patents can be killed off for good.
Unfortunately, the "creationists" hold the reins of power in Washington these days, so the "evolutionists" don't stand much of a chance.
Actually, Powell is stepping down from being the head of the FCC, so perhaps we can hate the FCC just a bit less. OTOH, his replacement will also be a stooge for Dubya's big corporate interests, so belay that suggestion.
While I did not RTFT (thesis - 100K PDF), I remain skeptical about using ONLY clock skew to uniquely identify any computer on the internets. I would like to see some hard empirical data from the wild to back up this claim.
First, not every computer on the internet uses NTP or SNTP to obtain its timekeeping. This is generally more useful with servers, or with workstations/laptops in a rigid (eg. corporate) environment. Use of local timekeeping, or use of an atomic clock (RF) signal should shoot this procedure down.
Second, any computer process that requires distinct timeslices can be altered, particularly with the incorporation of modern power saving technologies that slow the processor clock down. This technique isn't BIOS independent, but is OS independent. Merely altering a program or process "niceness" in modern unices would alter the fingerprint. Open source PRNG and entropy gathering can be readily employed to alter any number of process parameters, should that be desirable. Even the incorporation of a local (machine local) proxy server should shroud the machine identity.
Third, altering maximum packet size, switching network adaptors, switching or modifying drivers, or even incorporating different encryption algorythms, could cause enough variance in network traffic analysis to throw off this method of analysis.
That being said, I will read the full text of this thesis paper off-line, to broaden my vision. But I will remain skeptical.
Not really, since it can and will be selectively enforced. This action by the FEC comes on the heels of (1) Howard Dean being apponted to head of the DNC, and (2) Dubya's "big" propaganda push for Social Security reform.
Howard Dean's 2004 internet-based campaign showed the power of the internet in (a) generating funds, and (b) gathering recruits. It marked a paradigm shift in campaign methods. While Dubya&Co were busy spending big bucks with TV ads and the USPS with political junk mail, Dean was gathering recruits with blogs and emailed blog links.
Dubya cannot afford to lose momentum, or to lose face, in his neocon agenda to push for Social Security reform. You know that it is a very big deal for him when he pulls out the big guns of the Swift Boat gang to assault the AARP over this. To lose the SS reform issue, Dubya would risk becoming the lame duck that he is - and Dubya is not done altering the US political landscape yet. This would risk sunsetting the most onerous parts of the US Patriot Act(I), and the neocon hold on power.
Conspiracy theorists would have you believe that 9-11-2001 was really cooked up to fan the flames of war against Iraq, and to consolidate the GOP hold on power. Ridiculous in the extreme. We don't have a president that wraps himself in the flag, uses propaganda in the press to alter public opinion, or streatch international law to the breaking point. We don't have a president that threatens to delay elections in this country, or use "national security" issues to crack down on dissent while keeping the borders open for his source of "slave labor" for his political allies. We don't have a leader that attacks labor unions (eg. the airlines), or strips pension funds for money (eg. airlines, SS) for his big business buddies. This country is still a democracy, or rather a democratic republic, and not some Corporate National Socialist state. Welcome to the (people's) democratic republic of the United States of America (,Republican)!
but a look at the future. If you are a member of the WTO and have small/fledgling national industries to protect from unplanned for (and unregulated) competition, you make it illegal.
You might say that Costa Rica has adopted the very same measures that the USA's "**AA" have implimented in the face of new media distribution modes, and similar tactics that the big regional USA phone companies have adopted (with big government help) to protect them from government/ community WiFi competition.
That being said, it seems a shame that a democracy with a constiuentcy that has a 98% literacy rate should find the need to penalize its citizens for the sake of a corporate (nationalized?) entity. These are the kinds of tactics that a government with a much lower literacy rate (65%), and can influence its citizens with massive propaganda campaigns would be expected to use - like the USA.
- it just isn't "quite" free. AFAIK, both SUN Microsystems and Apple use OpenBIOS. Each of these vendors, of course, use a different implimentation which is at least partially dependent upon the hardware supported. In each case, it is possible to modify boot parameters in a (more or less) English readable format, at the boot console level. At the core of OpenBIOS (OpenBOOT) is a Forth language bootstrap, which by definition is extensible. (Various Forth gurus state that the entire Forth language can be built from 13 or 15 core commands.) It is quite possible to extend the OpenBIOS/BOOT core to support new hardware not envisioned during OEM R&D.
Given the memory densities currently available, there is no reason why any system board or chip level manufacturer, including Intel, could not offer their customers the flexibility of OpenBIOS.
IMHO, it really boils down to greed of certain manufacturers - closed source and closed APIs results in more new motherboard sales. This is no different, really, than software OEMs that push upgrades on their customers in leu of the patches needed to fix bugs and vulnerabilities.
If I were shopping for an OEM system board for any project that required long term support (like aviation, spaceflight, military, financial), I would tend to favor a hardware platform that had the flexibility and extensibility of OpenBIOS.
Of course, under those conditions, he might find it a bit difficult to update his website, let alone talk to his family, o rtalk to legal representation. And one of the more onerous facits of the USA Patriot Act (I) is that the US government can also slap a gag order on you to prevent you're revealing exactly what has happened to you. (This policy is unlikely to change until the USA Patriot Act (I) is "sunseted", since the former US AG J. Ashcroft has only been following the directions/legal opinions of the current US AG A.Gonzales.)
The amount of rote information that each student needs as the basis for the rest of their education can only be absorbed through assimilation (and augmentation). As usual, science fiction has provided the roadmap for this needed change of course in the educational system. The two authors and books that have shown the "golden path" are:
(1) Auldus Huxley's "Brave New World", and
(2) George Orwell's "1984". Our politicians have spent far too much time with the elevation of George Orwell to near diety, instead of reforming the National Academy of Science and the Department of Education with these two books in mind. For students, obtaining their rote information core should be no more difficult than "plugging into the hive" during rest cycles. The rest of their time should be devoted to the task of learning how to learn. Of course, the other problem will crop up from time to time, that "the future of society" might actually learn how to think independently. Our politicians have been busy attempting to breed this trait out of the population, with mixed results. Hence, the recent big push by government and corporate interests in propaganda, overt and covert.
thanks to our pro-big business government's recent successful attempt to limit the venue and the damages for any future class action lawsuits - the Tort Reform Act was just signed into law.
Isn't it just amazing that mere days after this legislation passes:
(1) CheckPoint reveals 150 million users
information has been compromised,
(2) Microsoft accepts $5.00/incident liability
for their bugs causing data loss, and
(3) Bank of America loses backup tapes that
compromises 1.2 million (+) Federal
employees' account information.
The FBI's "Carnivore" program has been phased out because new COTS software (and the ISPs that will use it) is a better solution. The DHS's "TIPPS" (air travelers' info) database is drawn from commercial entities. And the DoD's "TIA" program was scrapped in favor of the DHS's "MATRIX" program, which is a collaboration between industry (including CheckPoint) and government.
Does anyone else besides me starting to have high anxiety about the accuracy, safety, and security of information about us all out in the wild?
I perfected such a "coin match/ odd-even" back in junior high school. And I made a substantial amount of money (for that time), until my school mates got tired of losing their lunch money AND their video game money. The technique is quite simple, really, but I'll never reveal my secret.
Any technique that Apple uses to generate a pseudo-random playlist hopefully employes a PRNG and a seed number generated by better entropy gathering than something like a master song list. Otherwise, distinct and repeatable patterns of song play will emerge. The answer for PRNGs in general is to change the size of the entropy gathering data, or the scope of its gathering, in order to generate unique seed numbers.
so there really isn't any reason why that greenhouse can't be put to good use, for growing crops (especially with a somewhat shorter growing season in Canada).
Lettuce and tomatoes in October, plus power. It sounds like an expensive, but doubly useful (and green) experiment. The biggest problem with the comparison to nuclear power is that only the contruction costs are quoted. Once spent fuel rod disposal, low & medium grade radioactive waste, and plant de-commissioning after 30 years of use are all taken into account, that greenhouse doesn't look so bad. And I'll wager that the high tech & deadly security force needed to protect that nuke plant hasn't been factored in, either. All of this pushes the nuclear plant's TCO way off the top of the charts.
While you would appear to be correct in your assumption that MSFT has finally admitted responsibility for possible data loss, its only 500 pennies worth of liability.
It is interesting to note that nary a single MSFT EULA admits to any responsibility for bugs, lost data, etc. While the Terms and Conditions of EULAs have been ruled to be illegal and non-binding in several states, please pay attention to other (perhaps related?) news - the Tort Reform Act of 2005 moves virtually ALL class action lawsuits into Federal courts, AND places strict limits on any damages awarded.
Do not forget that the Federal government, and especially that government as ruled by the CRIP (current regime in power), favors large corporate interests, not the consumer.
So, MSFT lost all my data, and all they are willing to do is buy me a golden arches "happy meal"? Oh, gee, thanks Steve & Bill!
There were several older/. articles about how Intel's new Cetrino chip would NOT use China's WAPI security paradigm for WiFi. China has been protecting their IP in this regard - only Chinese companies are permitted to sub-license the WAPI IP. So, China, arguably one of the biggest offenders in regards to OPIP (Other People's IP), is now using their market share to make their own standards to generate royalties - what a concept!
Their original claims that Western WiFi security models were flawed (well, we know that, right?) as their justification for espousing their very own security standard. Is WAPI a better standard? I cannot answer that question, but it could be. (But I also cannot discount the possibility that they have also created their own "backdoors" into the protocol stack.)
Between China's internal market share (100%) and their share of global manufacturing for WiFi (as much as 50%), they may well be able to enforce their own security standard on the rest of the world. I suspect that if this issue escalates up to the WTO, the Chinese will win the argument.
One might hope, however, that the Chinese do not follow the Microsoft "model of business practice" that has so recently emerged in the news...
I want to preface my response with the assertion that IANAL.
The mere breaking of DRM is a crime, regardless of the value of the content, in the same manner a thief breaking into an empty house is a crime. In this case, the thief isn't necessarily a thief, but the crime is "breaking and entering", as well as "criminal trespass". And if physical damage of any sort were incurred, also "vandalism" or "destruction of property". If two or more people engage in the planning of such an act, then yet another crime unfolds - "conspiracy to commit". (Isn't this what the owner/operator of a P2P website finally copped a plea to - "conspiracy"?)
We may disagree on the value of the content of a song, or the worthiness of its author. That is really a matter for the the critics or, in civil court, the damages awarded. But your question was directed at criminal consequences, I believe.
Slashdot Mirror
The correct term is "gallows humor". Apparently you missed the /. memo regarding the recommended 2nd degree for a Comp-Sci student: plumbing -- because it is one profession that will not quickly be offshore outsourced. That said, there is some "strategic" advantage to having a US-based call center, after all, like not having a swarm of Wahabist militants running around with explosives (, at least not yet).
I wouldn't call it "a bit insensitive" if some of these MBA "salary and bonus-whores" running American corporations that are doing so much offshore outsourcing had THEIR jobs outsourced too. Imagine! - an Indian or Chinese CEO of an American company that was compensated at 6 - 10% of what their American counterpart demanded, and liked it! I would find such a situation deliciously ironic instead of "a bit insensitive".
Instead, the USA actively promotes the "Peter Principle". How else to explain Carley Fiorina getting $45 Million USD in compensation after leaving HP in such a shambles? I understand that Fiorina is lined up for a sweet job in Dubya's regime (instead of a prolonged visit to Camp XRay for sabatoging a good chunk of American technological prowness).
Even worse than what you think -- the DHS (Dept. of Homeland Security) is the umbrella organization for a lot of government agencies, post 9-11. Some "brainiac" at DHS decided to standardize on MSFT OSes and Apps for their entire organization, to the tune of a >$6 Billion USD multi-year contract. This decision was made in spite of warnings from numerous independent IT security experts beforehand.
...the list goes on ad nauseum).
The only thing I can figure is that it was either (1) rank stupidity, or (2) a payoff to MSFT for leaving gaping security holes in their OSes and Apps (for the spooks). IMHO, it makes the DHS even more oxymoronic than their name & policies imply. I base this on: US Patriot Act == GOOD; MATRIX == GOOD; secure borders != GOOD; secure seaports != GOOD; (
(1) Computer Science degree
(2) Law degree (preferably patent)
(3) MBA
(4) ???
(5) profit
(6) corporate boardroom
(7) really, really profit!
All they have to do is get those titanium
armoured SSTs (space shuttle transports) back
from US Air Force Space Command. You know,
those armoured shuttles that didn't get destroyed
on the doomsday asteroid that they nuked to save
Earth.
Microsoft is now embracing Apple Computer's
use of the "Data" and "Resource" forks in
their OS, circa 1995? I am so impressed. NOT!
MSFT, as a convicted (and largely unpunished)
monopolist, might well back port the WinFS
support to XP and WS2003, if only for the
following reason:
Between MSFT's huge IP software patent portfolio
(largely bogus due to prior art), and the DMCA
they will be able to leverage their monopoly
OS and FS to short-circuit the advances made
by Kerberos/OpenLDAP/Samba at a time when linux
is gaining corporate mindshare. Expect MSFT to
furnish restricted API's and "MS Open Source"
in order to lock out competition.
At least, that's what my dad used to say, so
I don't get my meat where I get my bread.
I have missed some great opportunities for
some "recreation" with co-workers, but have
never suffered from (AFAIK) the down-side.
Unfortunately, you have a high probability of being correct in drawing this conclusion. Both common sense AND a sense of fair play (eg. level playing field for competition) seem to be in very short supply with the current regime.
This is definately OT, but I am reminded of a small Kansas meatpacking company that spent millions of dollars to build a new facility. Their goal was to test each and every cow for BSE, in order to cater to the beef import markets of Japan and Korea. Dubya's USDA and FDA forbade this company from proceeding with their plans, no doubt due to pressure from the big meatpacking companies that will never submit to such a rigid testing program. Dubya's notion of free enterprise only applies to the "big boys" that can afford to buy their politicians.
Yawn!
Wake me up when I can get my very own robotic
"guard dog" velociraptor, with teeth and claws.
Somehow, I don't think it will be a Japanese
product, but maybe a Korean one. I can't wait...
No need to be coy here. Senator (R) Stevens
/. posting for Windows Cluster
of Alaska hasn't won his "decency everywhere"
fight yet.
When I read the
Server, I blew my coffee out my nose as I tried
to recompose myself. Imagine if you can, a
hijacked Windows Cluster as a mail relay server!
The correct and most appropriate term to apply:
"a Cluster fuck of BSODs".
I wouldn't want to be characterized as a cheer-
leader for MSFT in any case, including Eolas.
Imagine, MSFT is using the case of "prior art"
to fight a software patent that might cause them
financial harm! All of this boils down to is a
battle between one group of lawyers and another.
The general rule in such cases is "The litigant
with the deepest pockets wins".
The ideal solution to this lawsuit is for the
appeals process to wind its way up to the US
Supreme Court, where the entire notion of
software patents can be killed off for good.
Unfortunately, the "creationists" hold the reins
of power in Washington these days, so the
"evolutionists" don't stand much of a chance.
Actually, Powell is stepping down from being
the head of the FCC, so perhaps we can hate
the FCC just a bit less. OTOH, his replacement
will also be a stooge for Dubya's big corporate
interests, so belay that suggestion.
While I did not RTFT (thesis - 100K PDF), I remain
skeptical about using ONLY clock skew to uniquely
identify any computer on the internets. I would
like to see some hard empirical data from the wild
to back up this claim.
First, not every computer on the internet uses
NTP or SNTP to obtain its timekeeping. This
is generally more useful with servers, or with
workstations/laptops in a rigid (eg. corporate)
environment. Use of local timekeeping, or use
of an atomic clock (RF) signal should shoot this
procedure down.
Second, any computer process that requires
distinct timeslices can be altered, particularly
with the incorporation of modern power saving
technologies that slow the processor clock down.
This technique isn't BIOS independent, but is
OS independent. Merely altering a program or
process "niceness" in modern unices would alter
the fingerprint. Open source PRNG and entropy
gathering can be readily employed to alter any
number of process parameters, should that be
desirable. Even the incorporation of a local
(machine local) proxy server should shroud the
machine identity.
Third, altering maximum packet size, switching
network adaptors, switching or modifying drivers,
or even incorporating different encryption
algorythms, could cause enough variance in
network traffic analysis to throw off this
method of analysis.
That being said, I will read the full text of
this thesis paper off-line, to broaden my
vision. But I will remain skeptical.
Give a man a phish, and he'll not starve that
day. But teach a man to phish, and he'll never
starve again (in prison).
Not really, since it can and will be selectively
enforced. This action by the FEC comes on the
heels of (1) Howard Dean being apponted to head
of the DNC, and (2) Dubya's "big" propaganda push
for Social Security reform.
Howard Dean's 2004 internet-based campaign showed
the power of the internet in (a) generating funds,
and (b) gathering recruits. It marked a paradigm
shift in campaign methods. While Dubya&Co were
busy spending big bucks with TV ads and the USPS
with political junk mail, Dean was gathering
recruits with blogs and emailed blog links.
Dubya cannot afford to lose momentum, or to lose
face, in his neocon agenda to push for Social
Security reform. You know that it is a very big
deal for him when he pulls out the big guns of
the Swift Boat gang to assault the AARP over this.
To lose the SS reform issue, Dubya would risk
becoming the lame duck that he is - and Dubya is
not done altering the US political landscape yet.
This would risk sunsetting the most onerous parts
of the US Patriot Act(I), and the neocon hold on
power.
Conspiracy theorists would have you believe that
9-11-2001 was really cooked up to fan the flames
of war against Iraq, and to consolidate the GOP
hold on power. Ridiculous in the extreme. We
don't have a president that wraps himself in the
flag, uses propaganda in the press to alter public
opinion, or streatch international law to the
breaking point. We don't have a president that
threatens to delay elections in this country, or
use "national security" issues to crack down on
dissent while keeping the borders open for his
source of "slave labor" for his political allies.
We don't have a leader that attacks labor unions
(eg. the airlines), or strips pension funds for
money (eg. airlines, SS) for his big business
buddies. This country is still a democracy, or
rather a democratic republic, and not some
Corporate National Socialist state. Welcome to
the (people's) democratic republic of the United
States of America (,Republican)!
but a look at the future. If you are a member
of the WTO and have small/fledgling national
industries to protect from unplanned for (and
unregulated) competition, you make it illegal.
You might say that Costa Rica has adopted the
very same measures that the USA's "**AA" have
implimented in the face of new media distribution
modes, and similar tactics that the big regional
USA phone companies have adopted (with big
government help) to protect them from government/
community WiFi competition.
That being said, it seems a shame that a democracy
with a constiuentcy that has a 98% literacy rate
should find the need to penalize its citizens for
the sake of a corporate (nationalized?) entity.
These are the kinds of tactics that a government
with a much lower literacy rate (65%), and can
influence its citizens with massive propaganda
campaigns would be expected to use - like the USA.
"The US Congress is the best government money can buy." -- Mark Twain.
- it just isn't "quite" free. AFAIK, both
SUN Microsystems and Apple use OpenBIOS. Each
of these vendors, of course, use a different
implimentation which is at least partially
dependent upon the hardware supported. In each
case, it is possible to modify boot parameters
in a (more or less) English readable format, at
the boot console level. At the core of OpenBIOS
(OpenBOOT) is a Forth language bootstrap, which
by definition is extensible. (Various Forth
gurus state that the entire Forth language can
be built from 13 or 15 core commands.) It is
quite possible to extend the OpenBIOS/BOOT core
to support new hardware not envisioned during
OEM R&D.
Given the memory densities currently available,
there is no reason why any system board or chip
level manufacturer, including Intel, could not
offer their customers the flexibility of OpenBIOS.
IMHO, it really boils down to greed of certain
manufacturers - closed source and closed APIs
results in more new motherboard sales. This is
no different, really, than software OEMs that
push upgrades on their customers in leu of the
patches needed to fix bugs and vulnerabilities.
If I were shopping for an OEM system board for
any project that required long term support (like
aviation, spaceflight, military, financial), I
would tend to favor a hardware platform that had
the flexibility and extensibility of OpenBIOS.
Of course, under those conditions, he might
find it a bit difficult to update his website,
let alone talk to his family, o rtalk to legal
representation. And one of the more onerous
facits of the USA Patriot Act (I) is that the
US government can also slap a gag order on you
to prevent you're revealing exactly what has
happened to you. (This policy is unlikely to
change until the USA Patriot Act (I) is
"sunseted", since the former US AG J. Ashcroft
has only been following the directions/legal
opinions of the current US AG A.Gonzales.)
BorgBill IS RIGHT!
The amount of rote information that each student
needs as the basis for the rest of their education
can only be absorbed through assimilation (and
augmentation). As usual, science fiction has
provided the roadmap for this needed change of
course in the educational system. The two
authors and books that have shown the "golden
path" are:
(1) Auldus Huxley's "Brave New World", and
(2) George Orwell's "1984".
Our politicians have spent far too much time with
the elevation of George Orwell to near diety,
instead of reforming the National Academy of Science
and the Department of Education with these
two books in mind. For students, obtaining their
rote information core should be no more difficult
than "plugging into the hive" during rest cycles.
The rest of their time should be devoted to the
task of learning how to learn. Of course, the
other problem will crop up from time to time,
that "the future of society" might actually learn
how to think independently. Our politicians
have been busy attempting to breed this trait
out of the population, with mixed results. Hence,
the recent big push by government and corporate
interests in propaganda, overt and covert.
All hail BorgBill and King George!
thanks to our pro-big business government's
recent successful attempt to limit the venue
and the damages for any future class action
lawsuits - the Tort Reform Act was just signed
into law.
Isn't it just amazing that mere days after this
legislation passes:
(1) CheckPoint reveals 150 million users
information has been compromised,
(2) Microsoft accepts $5.00/incident liability
for their bugs causing data loss, and
(3) Bank of America loses backup tapes that
compromises 1.2 million (+) Federal
employees' account information.
The FBI's "Carnivore" program has been phased out
because new COTS software (and the ISPs that will
use it) is a better solution. The DHS's "TIPPS"
(air travelers' info) database is drawn from
commercial entities. And the DoD's "TIA" program
was scrapped in favor of the DHS's "MATRIX" program,
which is a collaboration between industry
(including CheckPoint) and government.
Does anyone else besides me starting to have
high anxiety about the accuracy, safety, and
security of information about us all out in the
wild?
I perfected such a "coin match/ odd-even" back
in junior high school. And I made a substantial
amount of money (for that time), until my school
mates got tired of losing their lunch money AND
their video game money. The technique is quite
simple, really, but I'll never reveal my secret.
Any technique that Apple uses to generate a
pseudo-random playlist hopefully employes a
PRNG and a seed number generated by better
entropy gathering than something like a master
song list. Otherwise, distinct and repeatable
patterns of song play will emerge. The answer
for PRNGs in general is to change the size of
the entropy gathering data, or the scope of its
gathering, in order to generate unique seed
numbers.
so there really isn't any reason why that
greenhouse can't be put to good use, for
growing crops (especially with a somewhat
shorter growing season in Canada).
Lettuce and tomatoes in October, plus power.
It sounds like an expensive, but doubly useful
(and green) experiment. The biggest problem
with the comparison to nuclear power is that
only the contruction costs are quoted. Once
spent fuel rod disposal, low & medium grade
radioactive waste, and plant de-commissioning
after 30 years of use are all taken into account,
that greenhouse doesn't look so bad. And I'll
wager that the high tech & deadly security force
needed to protect that nuke plant hasn't been
factored in, either. All of this pushes the
nuclear plant's TCO way off the top of the charts.
While you would appear to be correct in your
assumption that MSFT has finally admitted
responsibility for possible data loss, its only
500 pennies worth of liability.
It is interesting to note that nary a single
MSFT EULA admits to any responsibility for
bugs, lost data, etc. While the Terms and
Conditions of EULAs have been ruled to be illegal
and non-binding in several states, please pay
attention to other (perhaps related?) news -
the Tort Reform Act of 2005 moves virtually ALL
class action lawsuits into Federal courts, AND
places strict limits on any damages awarded.
Do not forget that the Federal government, and
especially that government as ruled by the CRIP
(current regime in power), favors large corporate
interests, not the consumer.
So, MSFT lost all my data, and all they are
willing to do is buy me a golden arches "happy
meal"? Oh, gee, thanks Steve & Bill!
of business monopolies - "embrace and extend"!
/. articles about how
There were several older
Intel's new Cetrino chip would NOT use China's
WAPI security paradigm for WiFi. China has been
protecting their IP in this regard - only Chinese
companies are permitted to sub-license the WAPI
IP. So, China, arguably one of the biggest
offenders in regards to OPIP (Other People's IP),
is now using their market share to make their own
standards to generate royalties - what a concept!
Their original claims that Western WiFi security
models were flawed (well, we know that, right?)
as their justification for espousing their very
own security standard. Is WAPI a better standard?
I cannot answer that question, but it could be.
(But I also cannot discount the possibility that
they have also created their own "backdoors" into
the protocol stack.)
Between China's internal market share (100%) and
their share of global manufacturing for WiFi (as
much as 50%), they may well be able to enforce
their own security standard on the rest of the
world. I suspect that if this issue escalates
up to the WTO, the Chinese will win the argument.
One might hope, however, that the Chinese do not
follow the Microsoft "model of business practice"
that has so recently emerged in the news...
I want to preface my response with the assertion
that IANAL.
The mere breaking of DRM is a crime, regardless
of the value of the content, in the same manner
a thief breaking into an empty house is a crime.
In this case, the thief isn't necessarily a thief,
but the crime is "breaking and entering", as well
as "criminal trespass". And if physical damage
of any sort were incurred, also "vandalism" or
"destruction of property". If two or more people
engage in the planning of such an act, then yet
another crime unfolds - "conspiracy to commit".
(Isn't this what the owner/operator of a P2P
website finally copped a plea to - "conspiracy"?)
We may disagree on the value of the content of a
song, or the worthiness of its author. That is
really a matter for the the critics or, in civil
court, the damages awarded. But your question
was directed at criminal consequences, I believe.
Again, IANAL, but that is MHO.