when it comes to IT jobs, especially UNIX IT jobs. Prerequisite: CURRENT TS clearance, with Lifestyle/Polygraph (prefer "transferable").
Since DHS has decided (regretably) to hang their hat on the (less secure) Microsoft "suite" of OS and Apps, an MSCE with a TS clearance would have better luck in the Metro DC area -- homeland security and the military-industrial complex is the only IT job growth in this region.
If you don't already have a TS clearance - forget it, 'cause it takes too long and costs the new employer way too much to risk on a new hire. Basic "Catch-22": if you have it (especially transferable), your ticket is golden. Otherwise, you are sucking wind.
If I knew 15 years ago what I know today, I would have gone into electrical or plumbing journeyman- ship instead of IT (especially UNIX, which NOBODY wants without the TS clearance.) As a bonus, those jobs cannot be outsourced overseas, either. (At least until such time as broadband robotic certification goes into these fields (?).)
About time something was done. George W.'s "war on terror" is a TOTAL JOKE, considering the USA's unsecured borders and seaports. I came to the conclusion long ago that Bush's "war on terror" was little more than a pretext for the invasion of Iraq (long term OIL CONTRACTS for USA energy companies) instead of a battle against the bad guys who brought us 9-11-2001. More illegal aliens cross the USA's borders today than before 9-11 (, often with the following refrain when caught "I'm here for my amnesty."). Recently, a Pakistani woman with links to al-Qaeda was caught at the Midlands, TX, airport with wet clothing and traveling on a South African passport. She had swam across the USA's southern border, and got caught only because she decided to fly to NYC from there instead of taking a Greyhound bus (or arranging private transportation).
Microsoft decreed that any software (or drivers) that were officially allowed to be badged "Windows Compatible" had to be vetted in a Microsoft testing laboratory. As I recall, Microsoft charged some pretty big bucks ($50K - $250K) for the priviledge. I wonder just how many programs (and drivers) that went through the Microsoft vetting process were disassembled by MS for future use...
The basic problem, as I see it, is the granularity of the update database, regardless of the OS (GNU/Linux, OS X, UNIX, Win32). Shared libraries will break some code. Given the speed of the latest crop of computers, and the cheaper disk storage today, perhaps the answer lies in the use of static libraries. With static libraries, so long as an application follows a specific subdirectory path, the application could reside anywhere so long as the top level directory tree includes PATH data to other resources. (Yes, I know - code bloat.)
With the size of many OS distributions spanning multiple CDs, or even a DVD, releasing updated source code for the BSD equivalent of a "make world" seems out of the question. Binary patches offer too many opportunities for rogue code, especially considering the recent issues with MD5 hashsums. If Microsoft cannot provide working binary patches for their OS, how can anyone expect various vendors COTS software not to break -- let alone the wild and wonderful world of F/OSS?
(Former?) Ed. Secretary Paige's "success" in the Houston, TX educational system was based upon faked data. Students that did poorly were moved to another school district, while the majority of dropouts were never designated as such. Lies, damn lies, and statistics.
His "success" in Houston was the premise for Bush's "No Child Left Behind" program, which has brought little success but much turmoil to school districts across the nation. This is largely due to it being a Federal, albeit woefully underfunded, mandate.
RFID tags, particularly implanted RFID tags, for students is the wave of the future. And when many of these students do drop out of school, they will feel equally at home with a minimum wage job at their local Wal-Mart, which eventually will require their employees to be RFID-tagged, along with their stock of WMD (Wal-Mart Merchandise Dumping).
In reality, our calenders should be altered to reflect that "1984" was the start of a new epoch, rather than just a prescient sci-fi novel.
Only during the "people's mandate for Bush", that will be Canada, not the USA.
It's really too bad that 59 million voters got snookered by this bunch of Bush fascists. Apparently, those worn to uphold the US Constitution and Bill of Rights (in their oaths of office) had their fingers crossed when they had their hand on the Bible.
When the new American revolution begins, I suspect that there will be a very crowded docket in the International Criminal Court (of Bush people). They will much prefer that venue to the one the American people would provide. After prosecuting each and every one of these fascists under RICO, and stripping away all of their ill-gotten gains (back to the American people), public (and televised) hangings would be in order. Of course, that's only my personal opinion.
The only publicised cases of counterfeit drugs being found in the USA supply chain has come from corrupt pharmacists that have diluted (or substituted) life-saving drugs for HIV/AIDS and cancer treatment. These cases have been treated as "white collar crimes" like embezzlement instead of the manslaughter (or homicide) that actually occurred. RFID tags cannot prevent drug dilution or substitution in the current USA distribution chain.
The previous poster is correct in making the statement that it does serve to limit re-import of (bulk) pharmacuticals into the USA supply chain. The USA's drug supply profits can and will be made safe from those pesky Canadians horning in on the vast profits to be made from the captive USA customer/patient/victim. Not so much unlike the (oxymoron) HMO, which is designed by business plan to limit and restrict access to proper and needed medical procedures for their (supposedly non-profit) profit margin (corporate officer bonuses).
The year (in spite of what the calander says) is 1984, where doublespeak reigns supreme.
It is really quite simple (and in the best interests of USA's national security, too).
Require that each and every container cargo box from overseas be inspected prior to entering US territorial waters -- as in, at the 12 mile boundary and not at the point of origin. It is the only way to prevent WMD (WalMart Merchandise Dumping) from entering the country.
The present USA administration has pissed away billions of dollars on military hard- ware and warfare in response to a non-event. Iraq did not attack the USA, and certainly not with ballistic missles.
I fully expect that the next major terrorist attack against the USA will occur in spite of the Bush administration's half-assed efforts to "protect the homeland". It will be either a "dirty bomb" or a nuclear weapon transported across the USA's borders, or though our under- protected seaports, and not a ballistic missle. Terrorists and the countries that support them will not want to "advertise" their point of origin with a ballistic missle launch, due to the expected USA response.
The continued failure of the Bush administration to perform "due diligence" in regard to both border and seaport security will be considered weaknesses that can be exploited. The Bush administration has left the borders open for the cheap and exploitable labor their business allies want, and the seaports have been left largely unguarded because the last thing this government wants to do is hinder big business's cheap imports (read Walmart, etcetera) with inspections.
Neither North Korea nor Red China will launch a ballistic missle against the USA, but will find other means to infiltrate such WMD into the country. The new ABM initiatives, including Boeing's mobile laser system, will not stop the next big attack on the USA's territory. An equivalent expenditure on border and seaport security would, but the Border Patrol is not part of the military-industrial complex.
Ever since their announcement of a inkjet printer that can print up to 20 layer PWB using conductive (silver?) ink, I have been having strange dreams at night. A PostScript dream. With an Autorouter daemon dancing in my head.
Whoa! Way too much caffeine! Must stop drinking so much Starbucks java... Ssst! Connection broken...
SGI has made a bad habit of betting on the wrong technology more than once. (Don't get me wrong -- SGI has been a company of high quality servers and workstations, with inovative technology from brilliant staff.) They have had a tendency to buy other company's at a very high price, and sell them at the bottom of the market. SGI sold off MIPS a long time ago, sadly, as well as Cray Research. Their foray into WinNT workstations was a total disaster, not due to a lack of superiority but because of not knowing the marketplace -- they were high priced high performance machines at the start of the commodity pricing wars.
I could never understand SGI dropping the MIPS processor in favor of the Intel Itanium ia64. The MIPS processor was great for both 32bit and 64bit code, which Itanium really sucks at. I hope that SGI has a tiger team working on the adoption of the AMD Opteron processor, since it isn't likely they will wholeheartly re-adopt MIPS for their product line. Too bad, because their IRIX OS rocked, and their compilers and development systems were top notch.
Intel made the pitch for the Itanium that both HP and SGI swallowed, to their detriment. Both the ALPHA and the MIPS processors offered better technology than the ia64, but they were dropped because of perceived future market share.
Microsoft had adopted (halfheartly) the ALPHA, the MIPS, and the PPC processors, but never came out with the broad product line to back it up. Their dropping the Itanium is no big surprise -- they have a history of pulling the rug out from under a processor family.
First, there was... "SPAM".
Then, there was... "SPIM".
Now, we have...... "SPAT".
('Cause a one minute dramatic episode sure
isn't a "mopisode", but is a "trailer".)
Am I really missing something here? Is this something that people need from their cell phones? (Okay, a one minute episode of p0rn might be interesting, but not if it's used to sell automobiles or laundry soap.) FOX needs to pull their heads out of that dark stinky place, and put the kabosh on this brainfart.
The distraction of driving while using a cell phone has already drawn the legal ire of a number of states and localities, and rightly so. Watching a FOX "mopisode" could be deadly.
(I wonder if they have run this past their
legal department, instead of just marketing.
It sounds like a good way to lose way more
revenue from lawsuits than they would ever
get from advertising.)
Banks have a fiduciary obligation to protect their assets (and cover their asses), as well as provide a service to their customers (which they frequently charge for).
Banks are like many other mega-corporations, OTOH, that derive a financial benefit from lobbying Congress and the Executive to craft legislation and tax code in their favor. The politicians that they paid for with their good money are sometimes swayed (around re-election time) by the conflict that arises between what they have been paid (far beyond their salary) to do, and getting re-elected.
Electronic voting (as it exists today, with no paper/audit trail) has been geared towards short-circuiting the will of the politicians "public" constituents in favor of their "corporate" constituents. By disenfranchising their "public", they have cut the tenuous ties to politics amd the re-election process. The future does not bode well for any democracy whose right to vote has been abrogated. Of course, history IS WRITTEN by the VICTORS, not the LOSERS.
If public polling data (by commercial ventures) is corrupted and broadcast as "news", and then an election's results (by whatever method) has been compromised to re-enforce that polling data, the voting public would be none the wiser. These electronic voting machines, and the backend electronic "aggegators" only made voting fraud that much easier.
The best bet for the continuity of democratic principles is a voting process that is simple and verifiable. Paper ballots, or even OCR- scanned paper ballots, that can be manually re-counted is required.
I wouldn't trust my bank to count my vote under any circumstances. Hell, with the new "Check-21" process, I'm not so sure I trust them with my money anymore, either.
This same liability versus cost mentality is also what drives the FAA, airlines, and airline manufacturers when considering safety. The FAA only started installing wind shear radar at some airports after a number of airline crashes.
BTW: the FAA considers a passenger dead because of known but uncorrected problems to be worth $2.5 million USD.
A nine year sentence for fraud, as a result from a massive amount of spamming? This is quite long enough only if the convicted felon has been sentenced to hard labor, like breaking large stones into gravel 10 hours a day.
The same sentence (proportionaly) that should be given to those who commit identity theft. The amount of pain and suffering of the victim (or somewhat less pain and suffering of millions of victims) of spam and resultant fraud must be attoned for.
The soon-to-be-former Attorney General John Ashcroft made note in his letter of resignation that no further terrorist attacks have occurred "on his watch" since the USA Patriot Act (I) was passed. Unfortunately, history refutes his claim to little more than bullhockey. The al-Qaeda terrorist organization took from 1993 to 2001 before attacking the WTC again. Looks like those bastards were more successful this time.
When Ashcroft (and DHS's Ridge, and CIA's Tenet) can come out in public and state that "It is not a matter of IF the terrorists will strike in the USA again, but merely of WHEN", they are leaving a great big backdoor to any/all claims of success. There are more illegal aliens NOW that cross our borders than BEFORE 9/11, and our government has decided that commerce and free enterprise cannot/should not be hindered by better seaport and air cargo security. A Pakistani woman with ties to al-Qaeda swam across the Rio Grande River about a month ago from Mexico (while traveling on a South African passport). The only reason she got caught was because she decided to fly from Midlands Airport (TX) to NYC, instead of taking a Greyhound Bus or arranging private transportation.
So, not better border security and not better cargo security, but way better encroachment of American civil liberties. What part of his oath of office (to uphold the US Constitution and Bill of Rights) has he NOT BROKEN (not unlike some of the other GW Bush stormtroopers)?
I am an unemployed IT worker in the Metro DC area, and you are so full of it (BS)! The Washington Post (largest local paper) has been posting the SAME job ads for various government contractors for more than 1-1/2 years. They want IT workers with CURRENT & TRANSFERABLE security clearances (TS w/Poly- Lifestyle is best). Such clearances now take from 12 to 18 months to get, and can cost the employer $15K - $25K for the background check and vetting. These contractors DO NOT WANT an overpaid janitor for up to 18 months until they can get that security clearance, so they don't hire -- no security clearance, no job.
It is a real cluster-fsck of a Catch-22.
If you have the clearance, you have the job (plus a nice fat pay raise). But if you don't already have the clearance, they aren't really interested. The only people that benefit from the current demand for security clearances are those who are leaving government service (like military or civilian DoD switching to civilian contracting.)
While the "official" unemployment rate in the Metro DC area is about 03%, they don't count people who have fallen off the unemployment rolls, nor do they count people who are now working 3 or 4 part-time jobs in place of the decent IT job they used to have. I know all this -- why? -- because I have lived it!
The Bush/Cheney administration is making use of
USA Patriot Act (I) and the DMCA to suppress
information that might be considered "harmful"
to their "message". Many corporations are now
doing the same thing. "Self-policing" of
detrimental information IS STILL CENSORSHIP.
Of course, corporations that do not comply
the "guidelines" suggested by the government
will not have a good year -- an extra tax audit
here, or a government contract pulled there,
and now here we are.
The United Kingdom implimented something called
"D-Notices" back during WW-II in order to limit
information that might be of use to the enemy.
The laws that enabled this policy are still in
effect in the UK, and are still being enforced.
Looks like the "land of the free and the home of
the brave" (aka USA) has adopted these tactics.
The signs (or the lack of such signs) have been
in the USA's press since the beginning of the
Bush administration. War correspondents in
Iraq getting mistaken for enemy combatants,
the entire Abu Ghraib scandal, pictures of flag-
draped coffins returning to Dover AFB, etc., all
fit neatly into the same definition of censorship.
Welcome to Aldous Huxley's "Brave New World".
The tactic that Microsoft is employing is more basic than merely FUD. (Yes, I RTFA.) If their claim of IP over 130 different internet standards goes unchallenged, their subsequent steps will be: (1) personal "free-to-use" license, and then (2) license with royalty payment. Accepting their claim to the core IP is both shortsighted and dangerous.
It also points out some serious problems with the BSD license strategy, which Microsoft has milked for all it is worth. Apparently, the USPTO has not seen any software patent submission that it doesn't like -- keep those fees rolling in. WTF ever happened to "prior art"?
One thing this move does clarify however -- Al Gore didn't invent the internet, Microsoft did! (Too bad that I am old enough to remember that SUN and SGI adopted WWW technologies long before Microsoft ever had a fscking clue.)
The people who coughed up the money for these dubious "projects" should be put up against a wall and shot. (That is one tax- payer expense I would be happy to cover.)
But the previous/. poster is correct -- really, really assinine projects are often a cover to fund other "black" projects. The "Iran Hostage/Exchanged For/Military Spare Parts" quickly morphed into covert funding for the Contras. Once a big chunk of money is "off the books", it becomes much easier to hide from the US Congress and the taxpayer. In the past, our "government- within-a-government" has used such methods to fund the assassination of Latin American leaders, the overthrow of governments, and even an invasion or two (Bay of Pigs?).
Considering how money earmarked for the war against terror in Afghanistan was siphoned off for the run-up to the war in Iraq, one might ask exactly where has the huge sum of money earmarked for the reconstruction of Iraq gone? It sure hasn't gone to where the US Congress earmarked it. Consider all the internet "background chatter" from neo-cons regarding Venezuela, the "oil worker revolt" there, and the recall election that Chavez won. The over- throw of a left-of-center regime that has had the temerity to support Castro's Cuba with cheap oil sounds like a bonafide Bush/Cheney operation.
Between the veil of secrecy (post 9-11) and the USA Patriot Act (I), not much info slips into the press to cause public blowback. If you try to begome a "whistleblower" on some of these shennanigans, you are likely to disappear into Gitmo Bay (not unlike the "vanished" in Argentina).
California (aka Peoples Democratic Republic of California) is in the habit of banning tools (eg. certain types of guns) based upon fantasy (their violent movie industry) rather than either reality, or more specifially statistics. If they used statistics instead of getting so wrapped up in their own (movie) propaganda, they would have banned knives, baseball bats, and autos.
Not so very long ago, major rioting errupted in the LA area. Law abiding citizens who had not previously purchased any weapons immediately saw some benefit in making the leap -- but CA had already instituted a 2 week waiting period on all firearms purchases. SOL. Instead, the TV news crews showed LA county law officers going out of their way to avoid any showdown with the rioters. National Guard troops were put on the streets, but they were not issued any ammunition.
Lawsuits from across the country by victims of violent crimes against their local governments (or law enforcement agencies) for failure to come to their aid have all been rejected by the courts -- it turns out that law abiding citizens have no right to expect the protection of their law officers. That "thin blue line" that keeps getting used in the press is pure BS. Citizens can expect only to do their best to protect themselves and their property, because the law is not there for them. My best advice: If you must, arm yourself. But make certain that you become proficient with the weapon, and make certain that you understand the legal ramifications of the use of deadly force. Personally, I would rather be tried by 12 (jury) than be carried by 6 (pall bearers). Oh, and because of our sue-happy civilization, don't let the perpetrator live -- headshots count.
I would rather teach my children how to obey the law, and have a healthy respect for guns (including proficiency with the same), instead of the BS of trigger locks (which leaves the kids defenseless at home if alone), or worse yet, these electronic "locks" that NJ is working on.
Slashdot Mirror
when it comes to IT jobs, especially UNIX
IT jobs. Prerequisite: CURRENT TS clearance,
with Lifestyle/Polygraph (prefer "transferable").
Since DHS has decided (regretably) to hang their
hat on the (less secure) Microsoft "suite" of
OS and Apps, an MSCE with a TS clearance would
have better luck in the Metro DC area -- homeland
security and the military-industrial complex is
the only IT job growth in this region.
If you don't already have a TS clearance - forget
it, 'cause it takes too long and costs the new
employer way too much to risk on a new hire.
Basic "Catch-22": if you have it (especially
transferable), your ticket is golden. Otherwise,
you are sucking wind.
If I knew 15 years ago what I know today, I would
have gone into electrical or plumbing journeyman-
ship instead of IT (especially UNIX, which NOBODY
wants without the TS clearance.) As a bonus,
those jobs cannot be outsourced overseas, either.
(At least until such time as broadband robotic
certification goes into these fields (?).)
About time something was done. George W.'s
"war on terror" is a TOTAL JOKE, considering
the USA's unsecured borders and seaports. I
came to the conclusion long ago that Bush's
"war on terror" was little more than a pretext
for the invasion of Iraq (long term OIL
CONTRACTS for USA energy companies) instead of
a battle against the bad guys who brought us
9-11-2001. More illegal aliens cross the USA's
borders today than before 9-11 (, often with
the following refrain when caught "I'm here for
my amnesty."). Recently, a Pakistani woman with
links to al-Qaeda was caught at the Midlands, TX,
airport with wet clothing and traveling on a
South African passport. She had swam across the
USA's southern border, and got caught only
because she decided to fly to NYC from there
instead of taking a Greyhound bus (or arranging
private transportation).
Microsoft decreed that any software (or ...
drivers) that were officially allowed to
be badged "Windows Compatible" had to be
vetted in a Microsoft testing laboratory.
As I recall, Microsoft charged some pretty
big bucks ($50K - $250K) for the priviledge.
I wonder just how many programs (and drivers)
that went through the Microsoft vetting process
were disassembled by MS for future use
The basic problem, as I see it, is the
granularity of the update database,
regardless of the OS (GNU/Linux, OS X,
UNIX, Win32). Shared libraries will
break some code. Given the speed of the
latest crop of computers, and the cheaper
disk storage today, perhaps the answer lies
in the use of static libraries. With static
libraries, so long as an application follows
a specific subdirectory path, the application
could reside anywhere so long as the top level
directory tree includes PATH data to other
resources. (Yes, I know - code bloat.)
With the size of many OS distributions
spanning multiple CDs, or even a DVD,
releasing updated source code for the
BSD equivalent of a "make world" seems
out of the question. Binary patches
offer too many opportunities for rogue
code, especially considering the recent
issues with MD5 hashsums. If Microsoft
cannot provide working binary patches for
their OS, how can anyone expect various
vendors COTS software not to break -- let
alone the wild and wonderful world of
F/OSS?
what is SCOX's position on this new
standard for their code base? It
can't be an acceptable standard until
ALL the major linux players embrace it.
(Former?) Ed. Secretary Paige's "success" in
the Houston, TX educational system was based
upon faked data. Students that did poorly
were moved to another school district, while
the majority of dropouts were never designated
as such. Lies, damn lies, and statistics.
His "success" in Houston was the premise for
Bush's "No Child Left Behind" program, which
has brought little success but much turmoil
to school districts across the nation. This
is largely due to it being a Federal, albeit
woefully underfunded, mandate.
RFID tags, particularly implanted RFID tags,
for students is the wave of the future. And
when many of these students do drop out of
school, they will feel equally at home with a
minimum wage job at their local Wal-Mart, which
eventually will require their employees to be
RFID-tagged, along with their stock of WMD
(Wal-Mart Merchandise Dumping).
In reality, our calenders should be altered
to reflect that "1984" was the start of a new
epoch, rather than just a prescient sci-fi
novel.
Oh, yeah!
Only during the "people's mandate for Bush",
that will be Canada, not the USA.
It's really too bad that 59 million voters
got snookered by this bunch of Bush fascists.
Apparently, those worn to uphold the US
Constitution and Bill of Rights (in their
oaths of office) had their fingers crossed
when they had their hand on the Bible.
When the new American revolution begins, I
suspect that there will be a very crowded
docket in the International Criminal Court
(of Bush people). They will much prefer that
venue to the one the American people would
provide. After prosecuting each and every
one of these fascists under RICO, and stripping
away all of their ill-gotten gains (back to
the American people), public (and televised)
hangings would be in order. Of course, that's
only my personal opinion.
The only publicised cases of counterfeit
drugs being found in the USA supply chain
has come from corrupt pharmacists that have
diluted (or substituted) life-saving drugs
for HIV/AIDS and cancer treatment. These
cases have been treated as "white collar
crimes" like embezzlement instead of the
manslaughter (or homicide) that actually
occurred. RFID tags cannot prevent drug
dilution or substitution in the current
USA distribution chain.
The previous poster is correct in making the
statement that it does serve to limit re-import
of (bulk) pharmacuticals into the USA supply
chain. The USA's drug supply profits can and
will be made safe from those pesky Canadians
horning in on the vast profits to be made from
the captive USA customer/patient/victim. Not
so much unlike the (oxymoron) HMO, which is
designed by business plan to limit and restrict
access to proper and needed medical procedures
for their (supposedly non-profit) profit margin
(corporate officer bonuses).
The year (in spite of what the calander says)
is 1984, where doublespeak reigns supreme.
A government by, of, and for the corporation.
Welcome to the USA, circa 2000!
It is really quite simple (and in the best
interests of USA's national security, too).
Require that each and every container cargo
box from overseas be inspected prior to
entering US territorial waters -- as in,
at the 12 mile boundary and not at the
point of origin. It is the only way to
prevent WMD (WalMart Merchandise Dumping)
from entering the country.
The present USA administration has pissed
away billions of dollars on military hard-
ware and warfare in response to a non-event.
Iraq did not attack the USA, and certainly
not with ballistic missles.
I fully expect that the next major terrorist
attack against the USA will occur in spite of
the Bush administration's half-assed efforts
to "protect the homeland". It will be either
a "dirty bomb" or a nuclear weapon transported
across the USA's borders, or though our under-
protected seaports, and not a ballistic missle.
Terrorists and the countries that support them
will not want to "advertise" their point of
origin with a ballistic missle launch, due to
the expected USA response.
The continued failure of the Bush administration
to perform "due diligence" in regard to both
border and seaport security will be considered
weaknesses that can be exploited. The Bush
administration has left the borders open for the
cheap and exploitable labor their business allies
want, and the seaports have been left largely
unguarded because the last thing this government
wants to do is hinder big business's cheap imports
(read Walmart, etcetera) with inspections.
Neither North Korea nor Red China will launch
a ballistic missle against the USA, but will
find other means to infiltrate such WMD into the
country. The new ABM initiatives, including
Boeing's mobile laser system, will not stop the
next big attack on the USA's territory. An
equivalent expenditure on border and seaport
security would, but the Border Patrol is not
part of the military-industrial complex.
Ever since their announcement of a inkjet
... ...
printer that can print up to 20 layer PWB
using conductive (silver?) ink, I have been
having strange dreams at night. A PostScript
dream. With an Autorouter daemon dancing in
my head.
Whoa! Way too much caffeine! Must stop
drinking so much Starbucks java
Ssst! Connection broken
SGI has made a bad habit of betting on the
wrong technology more than once. (Don't
get me wrong -- SGI has been a company of
high quality servers and workstations, with
inovative technology from brilliant staff.)
They have had a tendency to buy other company's
at a very high price, and sell them at the
bottom of the market. SGI sold off MIPS a
long time ago, sadly, as well as Cray Research.
Their foray into WinNT workstations was a total
disaster, not due to a lack of superiority but
because of not knowing the marketplace -- they
were high priced high performance machines at
the start of the commodity pricing wars.
I could never understand SGI dropping the MIPS
processor in favor of the Intel Itanium ia64.
The MIPS processor was great for both 32bit
and 64bit code, which Itanium really sucks at.
I hope that SGI has a tiger team working on
the adoption of the AMD Opteron processor, since
it isn't likely they will wholeheartly re-adopt
MIPS for their product line. Too bad, because
their IRIX OS rocked, and their compilers and
development systems were top notch.
Intel made the pitch for the Itanium that both
HP and SGI swallowed, to their detriment. Both
the ALPHA and the MIPS processors offered better
technology than the ia64, but they were dropped
because of perceived future market share.
Microsoft had adopted (halfheartly) the ALPHA,
the MIPS, and the PPC processors, but never came
out with the broad product line to back it up.
Their dropping the Itanium is no big surprise --
they have a history of pulling the rug out from
under a processor family.
Oh, yeah. Just what we need now.
... "SPAM". ... "SPIM". ...... "SPAT".
First, there was
Then, there was
Now, we have
('Cause a one minute dramatic episode sure
isn't a "mopisode", but is a "trailer".)
Am I really missing something here? Is this
something that people need from their cell
phones? (Okay, a one minute episode of p0rn
might be interesting, but not if it's used to
sell automobiles or laundry soap.) FOX needs
to pull their heads out of that dark stinky
place, and put the kabosh on this brainfart.
The distraction of driving while using a cell
phone has already drawn the legal ire of a
number of states and localities, and rightly
so. Watching a FOX "mopisode" could be deadly.
(I wonder if they have run this past their
legal department, instead of just marketing.
It sounds like a good way to lose way more
revenue from lawsuits than they would ever
get from advertising.)
Wrong perspective!
Banks have a fiduciary obligation to protect
their assets (and cover their asses), as well
as provide a service to their customers (which
they frequently charge for).
Banks are like many other mega-corporations,
OTOH, that derive a financial benefit from
lobbying Congress and the Executive to craft
legislation and tax code in their favor. The
politicians that they paid for with their good
money are sometimes swayed (around re-election
time) by the conflict that arises between what
they have been paid (far beyond their salary)
to do, and getting re-elected.
Electronic voting (as it exists today, with no
paper/audit trail) has been geared towards
short-circuiting the will of the politicians
"public" constituents in favor of their
"corporate" constituents. By disenfranchising
their "public", they have cut the tenuous ties
to politics amd the re-election process. The
future does not bode well for any democracy whose
right to vote has been abrogated. Of course,
history IS WRITTEN by the VICTORS, not the LOSERS.
If public polling data (by commercial ventures)
is corrupted and broadcast as "news", and then
an election's results (by whatever method) has
been compromised to re-enforce that polling
data, the voting public would be none the wiser.
These electronic voting machines, and the backend
electronic "aggegators" only made voting fraud
that much easier.
The best bet for the continuity of democratic
principles is a voting process that is simple
and verifiable. Paper ballots, or even OCR-
scanned paper ballots, that can be manually
re-counted is required.
I wouldn't trust my bank to count my vote
under any circumstances. Hell, with the new
"Check-21" process, I'm not so sure I trust them
with my money anymore, either.
This same liability versus cost mentality is
also what drives the FAA, airlines, and airline
manufacturers when considering safety. The FAA
only started installing wind shear radar at some
airports after a number of airline crashes.
BTW: the FAA considers a passenger dead because
of known but uncorrected problems to be worth
$2.5 million USD.
A nine year sentence for fraud, as a result
from a massive amount of spamming? This
is quite long enough only if the convicted
felon has been sentenced to hard labor, like
breaking large stones into gravel 10 hours a
day.
The same sentence (proportionaly) that should
be given to those who commit identity theft.
The amount of pain and suffering of the victim
(or somewhat less pain and suffering of millions
of victims) of spam and resultant fraud must be
attoned for.
Oh yeah.
The soon-to-be-former Attorney General John
Ashcroft made note in his letter of resignation
that no further terrorist attacks have occurred
"on his watch" since the USA Patriot Act (I)
was passed. Unfortunately, history refutes
his claim to little more than bullhockey. The
al-Qaeda terrorist organization took from 1993
to 2001 before attacking the WTC again. Looks
like those bastards were more successful this
time.
When Ashcroft (and DHS's Ridge, and CIA's Tenet)
can come out in public and state that "It is
not a matter of IF the terrorists will strike
in the USA again, but merely of WHEN", they are
leaving a great big backdoor to any/all claims
of success. There are more illegal aliens NOW
that cross our borders than BEFORE 9/11, and
our government has decided that commerce and
free enterprise cannot/should not be hindered
by better seaport and air cargo security. A
Pakistani woman with ties to al-Qaeda swam
across the Rio Grande River about a month ago
from Mexico (while traveling on a South African
passport). The only reason she got caught was
because she decided to fly from Midlands Airport
(TX) to NYC, instead of taking a Greyhound Bus
or arranging private transportation.
So, not better border security and not better
cargo security, but way better encroachment of
American civil liberties. What part of his oath
of office (to uphold the US Constitution and
Bill of Rights) has he NOT BROKEN (not unlike
some of the other GW Bush stormtroopers)?
I am an unemployed IT worker in the Metro DC
area, and you are so full of it (BS)! The
Washington Post (largest local paper) has
been posting the SAME job ads for various
government contractors for more than 1-1/2
years. They want IT workers with CURRENT &
TRANSFERABLE security clearances (TS w/Poly-
Lifestyle is best). Such clearances now take
from 12 to 18 months to get, and can cost the
employer $15K - $25K for the background check
and vetting. These contractors DO NOT WANT
an overpaid janitor for up to 18 months until
they can get that security clearance, so they
don't hire -- no security clearance, no job.
It is a real cluster-fsck of a Catch-22.
If you have the clearance, you have the job
(plus a nice fat pay raise). But if you don't
already have the clearance, they aren't really
interested. The only people that benefit from
the current demand for security clearances are
those who are leaving government service (like
military or civilian DoD switching to civilian
contracting.)
While the "official" unemployment rate in the
Metro DC area is about 03%, they don't count
people who have fallen off the unemployment
rolls, nor do they count people who are now
working 3 or 4 part-time jobs in place of the
decent IT job they used to have. I know all
this -- why? -- because I have lived it!
The Bush/Cheney administration is making use of USA Patriot Act (I) and the DMCA to suppress information that might be considered "harmful" to their "message". Many corporations are now doing the same thing. "Self-policing" of detrimental information IS STILL CENSORSHIP. Of course, corporations that do not comply the "guidelines" suggested by the government will not have a good year -- an extra tax audit here, or a government contract pulled there, and now here we are. The United Kingdom implimented something called "D-Notices" back during WW-II in order to limit information that might be of use to the enemy. The laws that enabled this policy are still in effect in the UK, and are still being enforced. Looks like the "land of the free and the home of the brave" (aka USA) has adopted these tactics. The signs (or the lack of such signs) have been in the USA's press since the beginning of the Bush administration. War correspondents in Iraq getting mistaken for enemy combatants, the entire Abu Ghraib scandal, pictures of flag- draped coffins returning to Dover AFB, etc., all fit neatly into the same definition of censorship. Welcome to Aldous Huxley's "Brave New World".
The tactic that Microsoft is employing is
more basic than merely FUD. (Yes, I RTFA.)
If their claim of IP over 130 different
internet standards goes unchallenged, their
subsequent steps will be:
(1) personal "free-to-use" license, and then
(2) license with royalty payment.
Accepting their claim to the core IP is both
shortsighted and dangerous.
It also points out some serious problems with
the BSD license strategy, which Microsoft has
milked for all it is worth. Apparently, the
USPTO has not seen any software patent submission
that it doesn't like -- keep those fees rolling
in. WTF ever happened to "prior art"?
One thing this move does clarify however --
Al Gore didn't invent the internet, Microsoft
did! (Too bad that I am old enough to remember
that SUN and SGI adopted WWW technologies long
before Microsoft ever had a fscking clue.)
The people who coughed up the money for
/. poster is correct --
these dubious "projects" should be put up
against a wall and shot. (That is one tax-
payer expense I would be happy to cover.)
But the previous
really, really assinine projects are often
a cover to fund other "black" projects.
The "Iran Hostage/Exchanged For/Military
Spare Parts" quickly morphed into covert
funding for the Contras. Once a big chunk
of money is "off the books", it becomes much
easier to hide from the US Congress and the
taxpayer. In the past, our "government-
within-a-government" has used such methods
to fund the assassination of Latin American
leaders, the overthrow of governments, and
even an invasion or two (Bay of Pigs?).
Considering how money earmarked for the war
against terror in Afghanistan was siphoned
off for the run-up to the war in Iraq, one might
ask exactly where has the huge sum of money
earmarked for the reconstruction of Iraq gone?
It sure hasn't gone to where the US Congress
earmarked it. Consider all the internet
"background chatter" from neo-cons regarding
Venezuela, the "oil worker revolt" there, and
the recall election that Chavez won. The over-
throw of a left-of-center regime that has had
the temerity to support Castro's Cuba with
cheap oil sounds like a bonafide Bush/Cheney
operation.
Between the veil of secrecy (post 9-11) and the
USA Patriot Act (I), not much info slips into
the press to cause public blowback. If you
try to begome a "whistleblower" on some of these
shennanigans, you are likely to disappear into
Gitmo Bay (not unlike the "vanished" in
Argentina).
Almost got it right, but you forgot the fake Texas drawl ... try again.
California (aka Peoples Democratic Republic of
California) is in the habit of banning tools
(eg. certain types of guns) based upon fantasy
(their violent movie industry) rather than either
reality, or more specifially statistics. If they
used statistics instead of getting so wrapped up
in their own (movie) propaganda, they would have
banned knives, baseball bats, and autos.
Not so very long ago, major rioting errupted
in the LA area. Law abiding citizens who had
not previously purchased any weapons immediately
saw some benefit in making the leap -- but CA
had already instituted a 2 week waiting period
on all firearms purchases. SOL. Instead, the
TV news crews showed LA county law officers
going out of their way to avoid any showdown
with the rioters. National Guard troops were
put on the streets, but they were not issued
any ammunition.
Lawsuits from across the country by victims of
violent crimes against their local governments
(or law enforcement agencies) for failure to
come to their aid have all been rejected by
the courts -- it turns out that law abiding
citizens have no right to expect the protection
of their law officers. That "thin blue line"
that keeps getting used in the press is pure BS.
Citizens can expect only to do their best to
protect themselves and their property, because
the law is not there for them. My best advice:
If you must, arm yourself. But make certain
that you become proficient with the weapon,
and make certain that you understand the legal
ramifications of the use of deadly force.
Personally, I would rather be tried by 12 (jury)
than be carried by 6 (pall bearers). Oh, and
because of our sue-happy civilization, don't
let the perpetrator live -- headshots count.
I would rather teach my children how to obey
the law, and have a healthy respect for guns
(including proficiency with the same), instead
of the BS of trigger locks (which leaves the
kids defenseless at home if alone), or worse
yet, these electronic "locks" that NJ is working
on.
it should be re-released as GPL
and live forever, on SourceForge!