People tend to avoid smoking marijuana in bars and on the street because it's illegal. It's the same reason why I carry out all my murders at home. There are fewer witnesses around.
It's true that DoS techniques could go further underground but a stand has to be taken somewhere. The alternative is to allow state-sanctioned vandalism and blackmail.
Virus writing is a relatively underground past-time but we can still examine the techniques used and improve our defences. My main hope with the law is that it'll deter the "me to" script kiddies who are looking for a few minutes of notoriety.
You're right that this won't stop all of them. The big boys who have real gains to make from these attacks will continue to find new and imaginative ways to hose a server.
If you wander in to a bar or take a walk in to town, how many smokers do you see wandering around smoking Marijuana? Sure, you'll find some but the fact that there aren't that many around would suggest one of two possibilities.
1) The vast majority of smokers don't like marijuana, they prefer tobacco.
or
2) The vast majority of smokers don't smoke habitually marijuana because it's illegal. This could be because they don't want legal hassle or perhaps they can't easily buy it.
Even if you can't eliminate a crime, the majority will tend to obey it unless they've a very compelling reason to do otherwise.
Same situation as just about any crime. Just because some people will be smart enough to carry out tax fraud, doesn't mean there's no need for laws against it.
At least making it illegal will hopefully catch the sloppy operations and make the angry geek at home think twice about attacking a site.
The pay-per-click scamming is an interesting point. My old site was getting forum spammed in to oblivion by the old UMAXPPC search sites. Would have been nice at the time if there was legal recourse since the sites were hosted by EV and they don't seem to give a shit about what they're hosting.
Not that unlikely because it is a net effect. The lost sales due to people downloading instead of buying gets almost offset by people buying because they have downloaded an mp3 but want decent quality or bought a copy because they heard it because someone else who had downloaded it playing it.
This is an effect that the record companies would be wise to investigate. From personal experience, I've gone on to buy music from artists that I'd never have heard about if it weren't for people sharing their MP3 collections. It's not a legal justification but if this can be used to drive sales, record companies have a legal obligation to their shareholders to explore this.
Yep, the Windows UI is not something to aspire to. It's better to see opensource UIs trying something innovative and intuitive, not just copying the bad decisions of Microsoft.
Seems that (in the UK), the safest thing to do is provide the bare minimum but avoid refusing to provide a reference or mentioning negative things. I'm sure that a decent HR person could get the message across though in a perfectly legal way.
When someone gives me notice, I send them home that day and usually pay out the rest of the week.
When I fire someone, I usually pay out the rest of the week; if they get paid the week after they work, I'll get them their last check as early as possible.
But once someone says "I'm leaving in two weeks", I cannot expect them to put 100% into their work -- and I certainly don't want them hanging around telling all my customers and employees about their great new job. Hmm, straight from the book "10 Habits of Dickensian Workhouse Owners".
Some people will goof around once they've resigned but there are plenty who will continue to do their job well since they want to leave with a decent reference. No point in blowing 2 years of exception service just so you can hang around the coffee machines for two weeks. Also, some people just have a decent work-ethic or they don't want to leave their colleagues in the lurch.
Shame to see good employees being punished simply for wanting a new job. If someone has been good and given two weeks notice (or even a month), they may end up going without pay for 1 or more weeks because they wanted to help you by allowing time to replace them.
If I knew my employee operated this way, I'm not exactly motivated to give 100%, even before my resignation.
Yep, that's the nice legal way to give someone the kiss of death, we have that in Europe as well. HR people have their own little language and "He worked here but we decline to make any further comments" is just a legal way of saying that you didn't leave under the best of circumstances.
Saying negative things in a reference is highly illegal.
Sounds harsh. In the UK the employer couldn't do this. If you hand in a resignation, the company has to pay you for the notice period unless you specifically consent to leaving earlier forgoing the pay for the period you would have worked.
If you handed in your resignation and you're on a permanent contract, if the company tried to then sack or terminate you earlier, you can sue them.
Notice periods can be enforced though, it depends on the contract you signed originally. Most of the time though, if you decide to run off without completing the notice it'll just result in no reference and they won't pay you whatever you're owed for holiday you never took.
Advertising is also about generating demand, making us buy things we didn't really think we needed. It's like the clever arrangement of chocolate bars at the supermarket checkout. I didn't intend to buy a Twix but since I'm standing there in the queue, I'll see them standing within reach and I'll chuck it in the basket.
Yep, the ability to switch of sigs is nice. There are a few people who still paste their sig in to their post to get around this but they tend to go on the foes list so I won't see them again. The sig abuse on Slashdot really seemed to reach it's peak with those "Click here to help me get a free .
Yep, I agree with you regarding tracing. As long as I know who's sending me junk and I know how to unsubscribe, I don't mind receiving the mail. It's the fraudulent emails that are the issue.
I agree with you, these are just names. Personally I'd like to see an end to religion but I would definitely not want to see the stories and myths simply vanish. There's rich history there and some pretty entertaining stories to be found.
I'm sure that most people there are normal, some are very good and some are total shits - just like any group of people.
Comparing anti-MS feeling to racial hatred is a bit of stretch but I see where you're coming from. The irrational reason to hate Microsoft is "coz m$ r evil big company taking money from ppl". This is pretty silly, just like the rednecks who'd dress up as ghosts and go hurt people for no good reason.
The rational reason to dislike Microsoft would have to be their business practices. On one hand the company claims that it wants interoperability but then it specifically tries to ensure this all happens on Microsofts terms. They are asked to disclose API information to allow others to compete, which they do, but they include licence terms that seem designed to stop open source projects from competing.
Microsoft have been dragged in to court more than once regarding abuse of their monopoly position, they never seem to learn from this. That's the repeated message that we see. After years of screwing consumers and it's competitors, they then have to cheek to complain when they enter markets where others have a defacto monopoly.
Bill Gates is doing a lot of good with his donations but that doesn't change the fact that many see the money as being 'dirty'. Ultimately he will succeed, most people will overlook the shady business practices.
It reminds me of gangsters. As long as they spread their money around the neighbourhood, people don't ask where the money is coming from, they just love the gangsters.
Renaming them "BCE" and "CE" is just stupid and from my point of view infinitely more insulting to a non-christian.
I don't really see how either would be insulting. It's just a unit of measurement, no different to miles and kilometres. It just happens that this one was created by Christians but it's all just mythology anyway, not like using the phrase BC carries with it an endorsement of the claim that a bloke was born to the son of a virgin and went on to rise from the dead and inspire people to be incredibly irritating for thousands of years afterwards.
AD and BC are sensible conventions. We can't change the fact that this date was chosen for religious reasons and there's no obvious need to try. I'd sooner spend the time keeping religion out of government than out of measurements.
They aren't as big, but nothing can compare to touching a man-made structure older than the bible;
That's not too hard actually. Depending on which denomination a Christian is in, their Bible may be less than 500 years old. The Bible itself is nowhere near as old as people commonly claim it to be.
A mail application can benefit from multithreading. While you're busy composing a mail, it can have a thread handling the updating of the mail databse. This is a very common desktop app.
With decent state management and locks, it should be safe enough.
I'm just dipping my toe in to the world of programming so bear with me if this is silly.
Couldn't the programs inherit the benefits of a multi-core system if the APIs they call are written to distribute the work to the cores? I know this probably isn't optimal but there must be some benefits from this.
I could take an old library (QuickDraw for example) and totally rewrite it to take advantage of a new architecture as long as it accepts the old calls and returns the expected results. This is probably an over-simplification though.
Slashdot Mirror
Never, what's your point? Just because it hasn't happened, it won't happen?
People tend to avoid smoking marijuana in bars and on the street because it's illegal. It's the same reason why I carry out all my murders at home. There are fewer witnesses around.
What percentage of denial of service attacks on Swedish computers do you suppose actually occur within Sweden?
No idea in all honesty. At least if someone decides to carry out a major DoS attack on a Swedish server, there is the possibility of extradition.
It's true that DoS techniques could go further underground but a stand has to be taken somewhere. The alternative is to allow state-sanctioned vandalism and blackmail.
Virus writing is a relatively underground past-time but we can still examine the techniques used and improve our defences. My main hope with the law is that it'll deter the "me to" script kiddies who are looking for a few minutes of notoriety.
You're right that this won't stop all of them. The big boys who have real gains to make from these attacks will continue to find new and imaginative ways to hose a server.
Looks like I found a place for my next holiday.
Yeah, I should have been mentioned that it depends on the location really.
If you wander in to a bar or take a walk in to town, how many smokers do you see wandering around smoking Marijuana? Sure, you'll find some but the fact that there aren't that many around would suggest one of two possibilities.
1) The vast majority of smokers don't like marijuana, they prefer tobacco.
or
2) The vast majority of smokers don't smoke habitually marijuana because it's illegal. This could be because they don't want legal hassle or perhaps they can't easily buy it.
Even if you can't eliminate a crime, the majority will tend to obey it unless they've a very compelling reason to do otherwise.
Same situation as just about any crime. Just because some people will be smart enough to carry out tax fraud, doesn't mean there's no need for laws against it.
At least making it illegal will hopefully catch the sloppy operations and make the angry geek at home think twice about attacking a site.
The pay-per-click scamming is an interesting point. My old site was getting forum spammed in to oblivion by the old UMAXPPC search sites. Would have been nice at the time if there was legal recourse since the sites were hosted by EV and they don't seem to give a shit about what they're hosting.
Not that unlikely because it is a net effect. The lost sales due to people downloading instead of buying gets almost offset by people buying because they have downloaded an mp3 but want decent quality or bought a copy because they heard it because someone else who had downloaded it playing it.
This is an effect that the record companies would be wise to investigate. From personal experience, I've gone on to buy music from artists that I'd never have heard about if it weren't for people sharing their MP3 collections. It's not a legal justification but if this can be used to drive sales, record companies have a legal obligation to their shareholders to explore this.
I remember when we used to settle our disputes through dance.
You Got Served
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ad_hominem
Yep, the Windows UI is not something to aspire to. It's better to see opensource UIs trying something innovative and intuitive, not just copying the bad decisions of Microsoft.
It it weren't for sierrapete, I never would have realised that Micro$oft is interested in making money.
Pete, are there any other large corporations interested in making money? The people have the right to know!
You might be right actually. Technically it seems to be legal but very dangerous to say negative things.
i d=310
http://www.11kbw.com/index.php?category_id=6&art_
Seems that (in the UK), the safest thing to do is provide the bare minimum but avoid refusing to provide a reference or mentioning negative things. I'm sure that a decent HR person could get the message across though in a perfectly legal way.
When I fire someone, I usually pay out the rest of the week; if they get paid the week after they work, I'll get them their last check as early as possible.
But once someone says "I'm leaving in two weeks", I cannot expect them to put 100% into their work -- and I certainly don't want them hanging around telling all my customers and employees about their great new job. Hmm, straight from the book "10 Habits of Dickensian Workhouse Owners".
Some people will goof around once they've resigned but there are plenty who will continue to do their job well since they want to leave with a decent reference. No point in blowing 2 years of exception service just so you can hang around the coffee machines for two weeks. Also, some people just have a decent work-ethic or they don't want to leave their colleagues in the lurch.
Shame to see good employees being punished simply for wanting a new job. If someone has been good and given two weeks notice (or even a month), they may end up going without pay for 1 or more weeks because they wanted to help you by allowing time to replace them.
If I knew my employee operated this way, I'm not exactly motivated to give 100%, even before my resignation.
Yep, that's the nice legal way to give someone the kiss of death, we have that in Europe as well. HR people have their own little language and "He worked here but we decline to make any further comments" is just a legal way of saying that you didn't leave under the best of circumstances.
Saying negative things in a reference is highly illegal.
Sounds harsh. In the UK the employer couldn't do this. If you hand in a resignation, the company has to pay you for the notice period unless you specifically consent to leaving earlier forgoing the pay for the period you would have worked.
If you handed in your resignation and you're on a permanent contract, if the company tried to then sack or terminate you earlier, you can sue them.
Notice periods can be enforced though, it depends on the contract you signed originally. Most of the time though, if you decide to run off without completing the notice it'll just result in no reference and they won't pay you whatever you're owed for holiday you never took.
Advertising is also about generating demand, making us buy things we didn't really think we needed. It's like the clever arrangement of chocolate bars at the supermarket checkout. I didn't intend to buy a Twix but since I'm standing there in the queue, I'll see them standing within reach and I'll chuck it in the basket.
Yep, the ability to switch of sigs is nice. There are a few people who still paste their sig in to their post to get around this but they tend to go on the foes list so I won't see them again. The sig abuse on Slashdot really seemed to reach it's peak with those "Click here to help me get a free .
Yep, I agree with you regarding tracing. As long as I know who's sending me junk and I know how to unsubscribe, I don't mind receiving the mail. It's the fraudulent emails that are the issue.
Yeah, sorry I was being a bit cheeky there.
I agree with you, these are just names. Personally I'd like to see an end to religion but I would definitely not want to see the stories and myths simply vanish. There's rich history there and some pretty entertaining stories to be found.
I'm sure that most people there are normal, some are very good and some are total shits - just like any group of people.
Comparing anti-MS feeling to racial hatred is a bit of stretch but I see where you're coming from. The irrational reason to hate Microsoft is "coz m$ r evil big company taking money from ppl". This is pretty silly, just like the rednecks who'd dress up as ghosts and go hurt people for no good reason.
The rational reason to dislike Microsoft would have to be their business practices. On one hand the company claims that it wants interoperability but then it specifically tries to ensure this all happens on Microsofts terms. They are asked to disclose API information to allow others to compete, which they do, but they include licence terms that seem designed to stop open source projects from competing.
Microsoft have been dragged in to court more than once regarding abuse of their monopoly position, they never seem to learn from this. That's the repeated message that we see. After years of screwing consumers and it's competitors, they then have to cheek to complain when they enter markets where others have a defacto monopoly.
Bill Gates is doing a lot of good with his donations but that doesn't change the fact that many see the money as being 'dirty'. Ultimately he will succeed, most people will overlook the shady business practices.
It reminds me of gangsters. As long as they spread their money around the neighbourhood, people don't ask where the money is coming from, they just love the gangsters.
Renaming them "BCE" and "CE" is just stupid and from my point of view infinitely more insulting to a non-christian.
I don't really see how either would be insulting. It's just a unit of measurement, no different to miles and kilometres. It just happens that this one was created by Christians but it's all just mythology anyway, not like using the phrase BC carries with it an endorsement of the claim that a bloke was born to the son of a virgin and went on to rise from the dead and inspire people to be incredibly irritating for thousands of years afterwards.
AD and BC are sensible conventions. We can't change the fact that this date was chosen for religious reasons and there's no obvious need to try. I'd sooner spend the time keeping religion out of government than out of measurements.
January, February, etc.
Monday, Tuesday, etc.
Most calendars have these printed on them so you can use one if you want to find out what the remaining months and days are called.
They aren't as big, but nothing can compare to touching a man-made structure older than the bible;
That's not too hard actually. Depending on which denomination a Christian is in, their Bible may be less than 500 years old. The Bible itself is nowhere near as old as people commonly claim it to be.
A mail application can benefit from multithreading. While you're busy composing a mail, it can have a thread handling the updating of the mail databse. This is a very common desktop app.
With decent state management and locks, it should be safe enough.
I'm just dipping my toe in to the world of programming so bear with me if this is silly.
Couldn't the programs inherit the benefits of a multi-core system if the APIs they call are written to distribute the work to the cores? I know this probably isn't optimal but there must be some benefits from this.
I could take an old library (QuickDraw for example) and totally rewrite it to take advantage of a new architecture as long as it accepts the old calls and returns the expected results. This is probably an over-simplification though.