I think he is talking about reliability in that every email sent gets to its destination. Right now, email can be blocked as spam. It doesn't matter whether you do the blocking at the SMTP level or not, it is still being blocked including some legitimate emails. If legitimate email is being blocked for any reason, it means the service is not reliable. Your caveat "As long as YOUR email admin handles error messages in any sane way" doesn't solve anything since the person sending the email is usually not responsible for how their email server is configured. Meaning that for them, the service is either reliable or it isn't. This ultimately means that if someone's legitimate email gets blocked by you/your server for some erroneous reason, that your email server is not reliable, and less so than in 1998. The article is saying our current anti spam counter measures are what is making email less reliable.
Do civil rights attorneys bother you? Consumer rights attorneys? How about the lawyers who argued Brown v. Board of Education? How about Clarence Darrow (argued for the defense in the Scopes Trial)? What about John Adams (Founding Father)? What about Ray Beckerman (aka: NewYorkCountryLawyer [
Ummmmmm... yes. Until such time as they start writing laws in a language that the average person can read and understand and so, can defend themselves. Of course it would require much clearer and more straight forward laws and rules with less chance for built in loop holes for weasels to find their way through. There is a reason they get well paid... it takes forever to learn how to wade through the self made bullshit. I don't trust any self regulating industry very much. Yeah someone will make the 'don't you trust doctors' comment. Two things: the human body is complex on its own, the doctors can't help that and aren't the ones responsible for it being complex. But I still don't like the fact that they are the only ones on disciplinary committees. There is too much tendency to 'protect your own' than in taking a guilty party to task. Lawyers on the other hand work with legislators to word our laws such that simple ideas and other things are too complex for the common man to understand. Job security.
How about someone with a shit load of money and resources like Shuttleworth asking if he can sell them to thousands of people online? It would have more effect than me bitching at some faceless company.
Jesus H. Fucking Christ. 99.9999999% of all companies just want to buy a tool that works. They don't want to build the fucking thing. They don't even want to fix it. That's why they buy the support license. This whole 'we can customize the code if we want' is a huge stinking load of specious crap. Companies of any size BUY their software because they don't want to customize software they don't have to. Like office software. Customizing a huge billing system is one thing (if you are a big enough company to warrant doing that), but why would an insurance company, or a local widget maker, or a medical clinic want to become an email server programming company???? Get a grip. They'll go out and buy exchange or lotus notes or whatever because they just want the frickin tool. And if it is buggy so what? It works for the most part and they don't have hire programmers or keep programmers around to fix bugs that said programmers introduced when they screwed around with the source code. It's cheaper to pay for the licence for a year than to pay for an unneeded programmer for a year.
Before complaining, ask why they asked for the change. Did it have to do with usability or some other reason. Then ask, what changes for the people using it? Do they get to learn technology, become computer literate, when they otherwise would not have? Or are they still behind where the rest of the world is?
If you are helping someone that is what is important. If the country believes a specific direction will help them more, then go with it. If you don't like it, don't help. But don't push your views and ideologies on others in turn for your help (if it were helping prevent genocide or human rights abuses that is one thing, but this is teaching someone what a computer is and what it can do for you). It is like saying to someone, I'll give you first aid if you pray to my God and not yours, even though it doesn't really matter which, as long as you help make them better.
When I hear complaints like this, I think of De gaul's line (paraphrased to be sure): "patriotism is good, nationalism is bad." One is being proud of your country, the other is being fanatical. One leads to healthy competition and raises everyone's standards and levels, and the other to narrow minded confrontation, war, and nothing good comes of it. Don't let your "computer nationalism" cloud over the fact that the end result is that they are still teaching people 21rst century skills and helping improve their lives through education and enabling further education.
To some people Drudge might be a heck of an endorsement. To the ones who want him to be. There are groups to whom different people will place greater emphasis on credibility than on others. For example, the people who like Drudge likely won't think much of the New York Times newspaper, a source many people would trust. I don't think the endorsements thing would work for this reason. There are enough people out there who will support anything. If it did anything at all, it would act to label and easily find the sites and groups who espouse one's own thinking, and keep you in only those groups. So if you are easily lead to believe vaccines gave your kid autism, given human nature you will look for people of like mind and look for groups endorsed by them. So in the end, this would be worse for the web with regard to getting people to look outside their own group. It would make it more likely that people won't look outside. At least now, when you search the web for vaccine and autism, you might hit a link saying that there is no connection between the two as much as hitting a link where it supports some people's wishful thinking; mainly because there is not an easy way to see if the site is from a person like minded as you.
I suppose the patent would still be valid in the U.S. but what are the ramifications if they are doing this outside of U.s. waters? Never mind the fact that this sounds like another bullshit patent anyway.
If I'd just made a billion-dollar deal for my company, I'd sure look long and hard
If you'd just made a billion dollars, you would look long and hard to most women out there!... money... the best aphrodisiac! Just like The Professor says. w00t! for 101
VOIP providers provide e911 numbers to their subscribers. The users have to provide their service address, and the provisioning systems will map an e911 number to the VOIP service for that service address. However, since you can take your VOIP router with you where-ever you go, it is important to update your VOIP service provider when you move (if you are billed automatically by credit card, people can overlook doing this). MOST IMPORTANTLY, you need to VERIFY the e911 number is updated too! Some tragic events have happened because this was neglected, overlooked, or not even realized by the subscribers. In Canada, this resulted in the death of a little boy earlier this year or late last year. An ambulance was dispatched to an old address... the original service address for the account. Meanwhile the family had moved halfway across the country.
This Godwin principle is a way for people who don't like the truth to rationalize that they are on the winning side of an argument. Many times, the Nazi comparison is apt. Those who forget history are doomed to repeat it. Idiots who yell "GODWIN" are intellectually 'forgetting' history because they don't like or agree with a particular point, even if it might be true. Kind of like the ridiculous American legal system throwing out literal smoking guns in a murder investigation on technicalities. Intellectually blinding oneself to reality, throwing away truth, and in at least one of the cases, encouraging legality over justice. In both cases it often results in people getting away with murder when people dogmatically and purposefully ignore truths. (For those morons who want to change the subject, there are better ways to make up for police ignoring civil rights: like punishing the police for illegal searches when they find a murder weapon without a warrant for example... and not punishing society... no criminal should go free to possibly murder again if it can be proved in any way they are guilty... the people who break laws should be punished no matter what... including police who do illegal searches... and no-one should not be given a free ride no matter what.)
Granted, some make the comparison to Nazis too quickly, but Godwin enthusiasts throw those points away, way too quickly too. I think the latter often lack critical thinking skills more than the former as they rely on blind dogma and the resulting intellectual laziness to proclaim to all that they won the argument. Something along the lines of, "even though a Nazi comparison might be true I don't have to think, I can just shout 'Godwin', and I win the argument... I'm soooo smart [then pats self on the back in a self congratulatory manner]."
The ISPs can direct the packets where they want, but after the first hop they have no control on where the next server(s) in the chain sends it. But it's something I guess.
Indeed, Internet industry executives and government officials have acknowledged that Internet traffic passing through the switching equipment of companies based in the United States has proved a distinct advantage for American intelligence agencies. In December 2005, The New York Times reported that the National Security Agency had established a program with the cooperation of American telecommunications firms that included the interception of foreign Internet communications.
Some Internet technologists and privacy advocates say those actions and other government policies may be hastening the shift in Canadian and European traffic away from the United States.
I'm not a dummy when it comes to IT and programming so I was wondering what they were talking about with that paragraph. Given what the consensus is, I think it is misleading in a way. I don't believe governments and companies can dictate and enforce policies that routers and switches be instructed to route packets away from U.S; so this has to be market driven.
It might have been better to say that companies in other countries probably don't want to use American IT infrastructure (database servers, web servers, etc.) as much because of privacy concerns and, from what they are saying, backward technology (when other countries are running fibre and the U.S. is still mostly copper... 'nough said). That is, instead of saying that they are directing traffic away from the U.S. More like they aren't taking their infrastructure business there.
As for Canada, it would have to be privacy issue alone. I just moved back to Ontario and am appalled at the poor choices for Internet providers. I am in the Waterloo area (where RIM is located... I'm not working there (another tech company), but you would think it would be as state of the art a community as any on the globe with those types of companies in the area) and the choices are terrible. The major players (Bell and Rogers) are absolute monopolistic gougers who seem to be reducing service rather than improve technology (traffic shaping, less than 100 gig caps for many of the services offered, some as low as 2 gig max download / $25/ month (infamous Rogers), mediocre performance per cost, expanding high speed service areas, etc.). Truthfully, it felt extremely 'backward' here when I was looking for home Internet. So it can't be because the American technology is worse. [big grin]
I'm also wondering if this is just a preliminary sign that the United States is slipping economically in the world. The rest of the world is less reliant on the United States. Especially since the U.S. has sent so much of their high tech jobs elsewhere. Other countries that might have hosted infrastructure in the U.S. are now hosting them in India et al. Especially as the U.S. economy is increasingly generating mainly low paying service jobs. Why bother hosting business servers in a country where they people can't buy as much as they used to? Like I said, a possible sign that the U.S. is slipping in the world economy. I'm no dummy, and know the U.S. economy is still a strong world driver... but if the internet is an important indicator of business, and less data is flowing to the U.S.... Occam's razor.
Not really knowing network technology as in depth as some around here.... is there a way to ensure your IP traffic doesn't pass through the United States? If I wanted to email someone in Brazil from Canada, is there a way I could explicitly route my email message around the U.S.A? Or is all this talk just that, for the little guy?
For now. It will probably suck in the future. I remember getting excited over getting a hard drive over a MB (I know, I should have got a life [grin]).
Slashdot Mirror
From what I can tell, Google groups is just a front end to the text side of Usenet.
I think he is talking about reliability in that every email sent gets to its destination. Right now, email can be blocked as spam. It doesn't matter whether you do the blocking at the SMTP level or not, it is still being blocked including some legitimate emails. If legitimate email is being blocked for any reason, it means the service is not reliable. Your caveat "As long as YOUR email admin handles error messages in any sane way" doesn't solve anything since the person sending the email is usually not responsible for how their email server is configured. Meaning that for them, the service is either reliable or it isn't. This ultimately means that if someone's legitimate email gets blocked by you/your server for some erroneous reason, that your email server is not reliable, and less so than in 1998. The article is saying our current anti spam counter measures are what is making email less reliable.
Ummmmmm ... yes. Until such time as they start writing laws in a language that the average person can read and understand and so, can defend themselves. Of course it would require much clearer and more straight forward laws and rules with less chance for built in loop holes for weasels to find their way through. There is a reason they get well paid... it takes forever to learn how to wade through the self made bullshit. I don't trust any self regulating industry very much. Yeah someone will make the 'don't you trust doctors' comment. Two things: the human body is complex on its own, the doctors can't help that and aren't the ones responsible for it being complex. But I still don't like the fact that they are the only ones on disciplinary committees. There is too much tendency to 'protect your own' than in taking a guilty party to task. Lawyers on the other hand work with legislators to word our laws such that simple ideas and other things are too complex for the common man to understand. Job security.
That is being racially intolerant of his mother. Or does black plus white equal black?
How about someone with a shit load of money and resources like Shuttleworth asking if he can sell them to thousands of people online? It would have more effect than me bitching at some faceless company.
and then it mixes with water in the aquifer and forms carbonic acid and dissolves the earth and we are all left floating in space.
I wish they would sell wireless drivers there too.
OK ... I'm better now.
Jesus H. Fucking Christ. 99.9999999% of all companies just want to buy a tool that works. They don't want to build the fucking thing. They don't even want to fix it. That's why they buy the support license. This whole 'we can customize the code if we want' is a huge stinking load of specious crap. Companies of any size BUY their software because they don't want to customize software they don't have to. Like office software. Customizing a huge billing system is one thing (if you are a big enough company to warrant doing that), but why would an insurance company, or a local widget maker, or a medical clinic want to become an email server programming company???? Get a grip. They'll go out and buy exchange or lotus notes or whatever because they just want the frickin tool. And if it is buggy so what? It works for the most part and they don't have hire programmers or keep programmers around to fix bugs that said programmers introduced when they screwed around with the source code. It's cheaper to pay for the licence for a year than to pay for an unneeded programmer for a year.
Before complaining, ask why they asked for the change. Did it have to do with usability or some other reason. Then ask, what changes for the people using it? Do they get to learn technology, become computer literate, when they otherwise would not have? Or are they still behind where the rest of the world is?
If you are helping someone that is what is important. If the country believes a specific direction will help them more, then go with it. If you don't like it, don't help. But don't push your views and ideologies on others in turn for your help (if it were helping prevent genocide or human rights abuses that is one thing, but this is teaching someone what a computer is and what it can do for you). It is like saying to someone, I'll give you first aid if you pray to my God and not yours, even though it doesn't really matter which, as long as you help make them better.
When I hear complaints like this, I think of De gaul's line (paraphrased to be sure): "patriotism is good, nationalism is bad." One is being proud of your country, the other is being fanatical. One leads to healthy competition and raises everyone's standards and levels, and the other to narrow minded confrontation, war, and nothing good comes of it. Don't let your "computer nationalism" cloud over the fact that the end result is that they are still teaching people 21rst century skills and helping improve their lives through education and enabling further education.
To some people Drudge might be a heck of an endorsement. To the ones who want him to be. There are groups to whom different people will place greater emphasis on credibility than on others. For example, the people who like Drudge likely won't think much of the New York Times newspaper, a source many people would trust. I don't think the endorsements thing would work for this reason. There are enough people out there who will support anything. If it did anything at all, it would act to label and easily find the sites and groups who espouse one's own thinking, and keep you in only those groups. So if you are easily lead to believe vaccines gave your kid autism, given human nature you will look for people of like mind and look for groups endorsed by them. So in the end, this would be worse for the web with regard to getting people to look outside their own group. It would make it more likely that people won't look outside. At least now, when you search the web for vaccine and autism, you might hit a link saying that there is no connection between the two as much as hitting a link where it supports some people's wishful thinking; mainly because there is not an easy way to see if the site is from a person like minded as you.
Or as I like to say: "Never underestimate the power of human stupidity."
You mean like a site purporting that the earth is six thousand years old can be endorsed by say, Drudge? LOL... quis custodiet ipsos custodes
I've been using the WWW for years now.
I suppose the patent would still be valid in the U.S. but what are the ramifications if they are doing this outside of U.s. waters? Never mind the fact that this sounds like another bullshit patent anyway.
If you'd just made a billion dollars, you would look long and hard to most women out there!... money... the best aphrodisiac! Just like The Professor says. w00t! for 101
VOIP providers provide e911 numbers to their subscribers. The users have to provide their service address, and the provisioning systems will map an e911 number to the VOIP service for that service address. However, since you can take your VOIP router with you where-ever you go, it is important to update your VOIP service provider when you move (if you are billed automatically by credit card, people can overlook doing this). MOST IMPORTANTLY, you need to VERIFY the e911 number is updated too! Some tragic events have happened because this was neglected, overlooked, or not even realized by the subscribers. In Canada, this resulted in the death of a little boy earlier this year or late last year. An ambulance was dispatched to an old address... the original service address for the account. Meanwhile the family had moved halfway across the country.
I have have an Ewok fur coat. And I belong to the animal welfare group, People Eating Tasty Animals. We believe in the welfare of humans. :P
This Godwin principle is a way for people who don't like the truth to rationalize that they are on the winning side of an argument. Many times, the Nazi comparison is apt. Those who forget history are doomed to repeat it. Idiots who yell "GODWIN" are intellectually 'forgetting' history because they don't like or agree with a particular point, even if it might be true. Kind of like the ridiculous American legal system throwing out literal smoking guns in a murder investigation on technicalities. Intellectually blinding oneself to reality, throwing away truth, and in at least one of the cases, encouraging legality over justice. In both cases it often results in people getting away with murder when people dogmatically and purposefully ignore truths. (For those morons who want to change the subject, there are better ways to make up for police ignoring civil rights: like punishing the police for illegal searches when they find a murder weapon without a warrant for example... and not punishing society... no criminal should go free to possibly murder again if it can be proved in any way they are guilty... the people who break laws should be punished no matter what... including police who do illegal searches... and no-one should not be given a free ride no matter what.)
Granted, some make the comparison to Nazis too quickly, but Godwin enthusiasts throw those points away, way too quickly too. I think the latter often lack critical thinking skills more than the former as they rely on blind dogma and the resulting intellectual laziness to proclaim to all that they won the argument. Something along the lines of, "even though a Nazi comparison might be true I don't have to think, I can just shout 'Godwin', and I win the argument... I'm soooo smart [then pats self on the back in a self congratulatory manner]."
The ISPs can direct the packets where they want, but after the first hop they have no control on where the next server(s) in the chain sends it. But it's something I guess.
It was a hypothetical question. From the article:
I'm not a dummy when it comes to IT and programming so I was wondering what they were talking about with that paragraph. Given what the consensus is, I think it is misleading in a way. I don't believe governments and companies can dictate and enforce policies that routers and switches be instructed to route packets away from U.S; so this has to be market driven.
It might have been better to say that companies in other countries probably don't want to use American IT infrastructure (database servers, web servers, etc.) as much because of privacy concerns and, from what they are saying, backward technology (when other countries are running fibre and the U.S. is still mostly copper... 'nough said). That is, instead of saying that they are directing traffic away from the U.S. More like they aren't taking their infrastructure business there.
As for Canada, it would have to be privacy issue alone. I just moved back to Ontario and am appalled at the poor choices for Internet providers. I am in the Waterloo area (where RIM is located... I'm not working there (another tech company), but you would think it would be as state of the art a community as any on the globe with those types of companies in the area) and the choices are terrible. The major players (Bell and Rogers) are absolute monopolistic gougers who seem to be reducing service rather than improve technology (traffic shaping, less than 100 gig caps for many of the services offered, some as low as 2 gig max download / $25/ month (infamous Rogers), mediocre performance per cost, expanding high speed service areas, etc.). Truthfully, it felt extremely 'backward' here when I was looking for home Internet. So it can't be because the American technology is worse. [big grin]
I'm also wondering if this is just a preliminary sign that the United States is slipping economically in the world. The rest of the world is less reliant on the United States. Especially since the U.S. has sent so much of their high tech jobs elsewhere. Other countries that might have hosted infrastructure in the U.S. are now hosting them in India et al. Especially as the U.S. economy is increasingly generating mainly low paying service jobs. Why bother hosting business servers in a country where they people can't buy as much as they used to? Like I said, a possible sign that the U.S. is slipping in the world economy. I'm no dummy, and know the U.S. economy is still a strong world driver... but if the internet is an important indicator of business, and less data is flowing to the U.S. ... Occam's razor.
Not really knowing network technology as in depth as some around here.... is there a way to ensure your IP traffic doesn't pass through the United States? If I wanted to email someone in Brazil from Canada, is there a way I could explicitly route my email message around the U.S.A? Or is all this talk just that, for the little guy?
I was just going to Whoosh myself... smacked my forehead like a V8 soon as I clicked submit... yeah... famous Gatesism [bows head in shame]
For now. It will probably suck in the future. I remember getting excited over getting a hard drive over a MB (I know, I should have got a life [grin]).
It's like hiring an Amish guy to design the next generation fuel cell sports car racer.