They also didn't prove that the files were downloaded by anyone, or if they were, how many times they were downloaded. The first case basically fined her for "making available"
Because programmer A who cares writes the data collection and mining code, and is told it's used to keep a lid on the bad guys. It is, but then Manager B says, let's start collecting internal to external stuff. Programmer C says, "Ok". Then Someone D says, "But we need to watch just these two internal bad guys, "Think of the Children!!". Then, the head of the NSA just says, "Might as well watch everything now."
"Any tool's usefulness as a tool, is proportional to it's usefulness as a weapon"
- Niven's Law
Should we stop developing Linux because it might be running the NSA's computers?
Governments already do this. (Minus the throw-away accounts)
One of the ways of noticing that something is going down, is to note an increase in encrypted traffic. To keep the enemy from gleaning information from increased traffic, any two points in your network constantly stream bogus messages until there's something important to send.
If the people doing the oversight aren't independent, then you might as well not have oversight. Yes, the NSA might be doing what the President wants, but that may not be what the People want.
It's analogous to the audit firms that were paid by the same banks they were auditing. If they turned in a really bad report, they'd be out a job.
Don't blame the Supreme Court. The justices bounced it back to Congress to actually decide when human life begins. So far Congress has been unable to decide this, even though both parties have had overwhelming majorities while their guy was in the White House.
C'mon people. This isn't that hard. Just decide. (And back up your decision with facts)
This one wasn't decided by the people, but by a court of unelected, lifetime tenured justices,
But, they didn't actually decide it. They said under current law, this is the way. Then they bounced it back to Congress to actually decide when human life begins.
So, blame your congresscritters. It's up to them to make the real, substantive decision here.
"Never Say Anything" can do anything they like, because there's no effective oversight. They, and the CIA, are secret organizations, you don't even know who works for them. You can't have oversight of a secret organization.
Congress can bluster all the want, but all that really going to happen in the end is the TLA in question will say. "We promise not to get caught again"
Right. Unless he had a huge cache of old coins, he was buying the coins at over face value, paying them to employees, then reporting and withholding based on face value. That's tax fraud.
If an old guy had a kid mow his lawn for $20, then paid the kid in a $20 gold piece, the kid would only have to report $20 of income until he sold the coin, then report the difference as income.
If the kid uses the coin to buy $20 worth of merchandise, he's ok, it's up the the next guy to sell the coin at a profit and claim the income.
If an employer routinely tried to use this to game the system, it's fraud.
The problem is that he was only doing reporting and withholding on the face value. Since he was probably buying the coins over face value, that's fraud.
am I the only one who thinks we should blow everything up *here* before we start blowing everything up elsewhere?
Hell no! There's a whole lot more elsewhere than there is here. I say we ban all explosions on the earth until we have blown the rest of the Universe up.
...before capitulating to pressure to eliminate the eye and hair color screenings.
Medical records are supposed to be confidential, so when a set of parents asked for their embryos to be screened for hair and eye color who is going to know. Most likely, the clinic will just stop advertising this service. Much like the way doctors practice euthanasia in states that don't allow it.
Beside, having blue eyes are a medical problem. Blue eyed folks have more eye problems than brown eyed folk.
And what happens when you have broadcasts coming in from multiple directions?
Get a smart antenna. I have the DTA-5000, but I'm sure there will be others on the market soon. Some of the converter boxes have smart antenna connections, and I'm sure HDTVs and HD capture boards will have them soon.
My smart antenna has 4 stubby antennas, and does phase tricks to steer the signal.
The smart antenna protocol is supposed to be able to steer an antenna rotator as well.
I wouldn't suggest Java as an example as a good language, but yes, given a BNF for Java, you could produce a Turing machine that would parse Java several trillion levels deep. You would need lots of space and several trillion time units.
On the other hand, I don't know that parsing Fortran has been proven Turing computable. I do know that back in the 80's people tried to develop a BNF grammar for it, and decided it couldn't be done. A quick google shows at least one BNF for Fortran 90 but it has this caveat "The BNF forms do not provide a complete description of the syntax; additional constraints are described with text."
Fortran is best parsed ad-hoc rather than by a strict grammar.
So we can tell today's young'ns what *real* programming was like. Back in my day we didn't have this new-fangled Internet, we had to walk to the terminal room. Uphill, in the snow, both ways...
One of the staff at Purdue (back in the 80's) was a Fortran guru. He had never seen a true fortran complier, i.e. one that would pass all the standards tests. I don't know if this is any different today, but I doubt there's a compiler that will compile any and all arbitrary Fortran programs.
Besides, just write your code in a real language (one with a real grammar) and link it to the time tested Fortran libraries. What value is there in actually writing in the language?
Re:Poor intro but good book
on
Wired for War
·
· Score: 1
Consider the dark side. If we can be assured of winning a war, with absolutely zero casualties, who would oppose us?
Discuss...
Re:At all skynet references:
on
Wired for War
·
· Score: 1
Robot killing machines are already here. The DMZ in Korea has automatic fire weapons. The person who "Pushed The Button", is whoever walked into the zone of fire.
Re:rock or a UAV
on
Wired for War
·
· Score: 3, Informative
Already happened. The former Soviets had a published doctrine that if attacked by any nuclear weapons, they would go all out and launch the ICBMs. But they were developing and deploying (?) chemical weapons. The US published doctrine was to have tactical nuclear weapons available, but we would not deploy chemical weapons.
So, if it came down to a land war in Europe, and the Soviets launched chemical weapons, our commanders had no choice, but to use tach nukes. They would then launch the ICBMs, the US would launch its ICBMs and send the bombers, and WWIII would be over in 30 minutes.
The MAD doctrine was insane, but it kept chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons from being used.
As far as taboos against certain weapons. They don't exist. The biggest reason we don't use any particular weapon is that it won't accomplish its objective. Bio is hard to deploy and slow, Chem has a tendency to blow back in your face, and Nuclear is hard to clean up after. Bullets and bombs are quick, to the point, and relatively easy to clean up.
Re:But what of using robots on civilians
on
Wired for War
·
· Score: 1
Branding is what corporations use to add perceived value to merchandise. People will pay more for "Disney" brand shoes than the same shoe with "Bob" brand. Disney might not even sell the shoe, Bob may have paid Disney for use of it's brand.
Alternately, Bob could make better shoes to add value to it's shoes. Unfortunately, the consumer can't always see this value. People won't pay more for unperceived value. Unless Bob wants to build his brand as a high quality product, he can make more money paying Disney for their logo
This would be difficult to apply to "Free Software", because there's so much of it out there, of mixed quality. If it ever took off, and people began associating "Free Software" with quality, anyone could misappropriate the brand, and it's perceived value would fall.
A new brand is in order. Something like LibertySoft(tm) or FSFsoft(tm) that would apply to projects that met certain levels of quality and had a free enough license. Some organization like the FSF would have to own the trademark, and police misuses of the brand.
But then the banks couldn't upgrade all their machine remotely. They have to send a tech to each and every ATM in order to add new features like the "Send All Your Money to a Criminal" button.
Slashdot Mirror
They also didn't prove that the files were downloaded by anyone, or if they were, how many times they were downloaded. The first case basically fined her for "making available"
Because programmer A who cares writes the data collection and mining code, and is told it's used to keep a lid on the bad guys. It is, but then Manager B says, let's start collecting internal to external stuff. Programmer C says, "Ok". Then Someone D says, "But we need to watch just these two internal bad guys, "Think of the Children!!". Then, the head of the NSA just says, "Might as well watch everything now."
"Any tool's usefulness as a tool, is proportional to it's usefulness as a weapon"
- Niven's Law
Should we stop developing Linux because it might be running the NSA's computers?
Governments already do this. (Minus the throw-away accounts)
One of the ways of noticing that something is going down, is to note an increase in encrypted traffic. To keep the enemy from gleaning information from increased traffic, any two points in your network constantly stream bogus messages until there's something important to send.
Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?
- Juvenal
Ok, I should have said "effective oversight"
If the people doing the oversight aren't independent, then you might as well not have oversight. Yes, the NSA might be doing what the President wants, but that may not be what the People want.
It's analogous to the audit firms that were paid by the same banks they were auditing. If they turned in a really bad report, they'd be out a job.
Don't blame the Supreme Court. The justices bounced it back to Congress to actually decide when human life begins. So far Congress has been unable to decide this, even though both parties have had overwhelming majorities while their guy was in the White House.
C'mon people. This isn't that hard. Just decide. (And back up your decision with facts)
This one wasn't decided by the people, but by a court of unelected, lifetime tenured justices,
But, they didn't actually decide it. They said under current law, this is the way. Then they bounced it back to Congress to actually decide when human life begins.
So, blame your congresscritters. It's up to them to make the real, substantive decision here.
"Never Say Anything" can do anything they like, because there's no effective oversight. They, and the CIA, are secret organizations, you don't even know who works for them. You can't have oversight of a secret organization.
Congress can bluster all the want, but all that really going to happen in the end is the TLA in question will say. "We promise not to get caught again"
Right. Unless he had a huge cache of old coins, he was buying the coins at over face value, paying them to employees, then reporting and withholding based on face value. That's tax fraud.
If an old guy had a kid mow his lawn for $20, then paid the kid in a $20 gold piece, the kid would only have to report $20 of income until he sold the coin, then report the difference as income. If the kid uses the coin to buy $20 worth of merchandise, he's ok, it's up the the next guy to sell the coin at a profit and claim the income.
If an employer routinely tried to use this to game the system, it's fraud.
The problem is that he was only doing reporting and withholding on the face value. Since he was probably buying the coins over face value, that's fraud.
The Government is required by LAW to recognize American currency at face value.
Only paper money is "legal tender for all debts, public and private".
Coinage is different, under a different set of laws.
am I the only one who thinks we should blow everything up *here* before we start blowing everything up elsewhere?
Hell no! There's a whole lot more elsewhere than there is here. I say we ban all explosions on the earth until we have blown the rest of the Universe up.
Medical records are supposed to be confidential, so when a set of parents asked for their embryos to be screened for hair and eye color who is going to know. Most likely, the clinic will just stop advertising this service. Much like the way doctors practice euthanasia in states that don't allow it.
Beside, having blue eyes are a medical problem. Blue eyed folks have more eye problems than brown eyed folk.
And what happens when you have broadcasts coming in from multiple directions?
Get a smart antenna. I have the DTA-5000, but I'm sure there will be others on the market soon. Some of the converter boxes have smart antenna connections, and I'm sure HDTVs and HD capture boards will have them soon.
My smart antenna has 4 stubby antennas, and does phase tricks to steer the signal.
The smart antenna protocol is supposed to be able to steer an antenna rotator as well.
I wouldn't suggest Java as an example as a good language, but yes, given a BNF for Java, you could produce a Turing machine that would parse Java several trillion levels deep. You would need lots of space and several trillion time units.
On the other hand, I don't know that parsing Fortran has been proven Turing computable. I do know that back in the 80's people tried to develop a BNF grammar for it, and decided it couldn't be done. A quick google shows at least one BNF for Fortran 90 but it has this caveat "The BNF forms do not provide a complete description of the syntax; additional constraints are described with text."
Fortran is best parsed ad-hoc rather than by a strict grammar.
So we can tell today's young'ns what *real* programming was like. Back in my day we didn't have this new-fangled Internet, we had to walk to the terminal room. Uphill, in the snow, both ways...
One of the staff at Purdue (back in the 80's) was a Fortran guru. He had never seen a true fortran complier, i.e. one that would pass all the standards tests. I don't know if this is any different today, but I doubt there's a compiler that will compile any and all arbitrary Fortran programs.
Besides, just write your code in a real language (one with a real grammar) and link it to the time tested Fortran libraries. What value is there in actually writing in the language?
Consider the dark side. If we can be assured of winning a war, with absolutely zero casualties, who would oppose us?
Discuss...
Check this out: "Robot Cannon Kills 9, Wounds 14" http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2007/10/robot-cannon-ki/
Systems like these aren't very intelligent, but that's the problem.
Robot killing machines are already here. The DMZ in Korea has automatic fire weapons. The person who "Pushed The Button", is whoever walked into the zone of fire.
Already happened. The former Soviets had a published doctrine that if attacked by any nuclear weapons, they would go all out and launch the ICBMs. But they were developing and deploying (?) chemical weapons. The US published doctrine was to have tactical nuclear weapons available, but we would not deploy chemical weapons.
So, if it came down to a land war in Europe, and the Soviets launched chemical weapons, our commanders had no choice, but to use tach nukes. They would then launch the ICBMs, the US would launch its ICBMs and send the bombers, and WWIII would be over in 30 minutes.
The MAD doctrine was insane, but it kept chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons from being used.
As far as taboos against certain weapons. They don't exist. The biggest reason we don't use any particular weapon is that it won't accomplish its objective. Bio is hard to deploy and slow, Chem has a tendency to blow back in your face, and Nuclear is hard to clean up after. Bullets and bombs are quick, to the point, and relatively easy to clean up.
Already happened: "Robot Cannon Kills 9, Wounds 14" http://www.wired.com/dangerroom/2007/10/robot-cannon-ki/
Machines don't need sentience to kill. They might need it to refrain from killing though...
This was asked about nuclear weapons.
How about we build some weapons that aren't supposed to kill, just maim. Do the ethics change?
Quick answer. Yes.
Branding is what corporations use to add perceived value to merchandise. People will pay more for "Disney" brand shoes than the same shoe with "Bob" brand. Disney might not even sell the shoe, Bob may have paid Disney for use of it's brand.
Alternately, Bob could make better shoes to add value to it's shoes. Unfortunately, the consumer can't always see this value. People won't pay more for unperceived value. Unless Bob wants to build his brand as a high quality product, he can make more money paying Disney for their logo
This would be difficult to apply to "Free Software", because there's so much of it out there, of mixed quality. If it ever took off, and people began associating "Free Software" with quality, anyone could misappropriate the brand, and it's perceived value would fall.
A new brand is in order. Something like LibertySoft(tm) or FSFsoft(tm) that would apply to projects that met certain levels of quality and had a free enough license. Some organization like the FSF would have to own the trademark, and police misuses of the brand.
The guys who graduated in the 80's became the quants on Wall Street in the 90's and 2000's. We all know how that party ended...
But then the banks couldn't upgrade all their machine remotely. They have to send a tech to each and every ATM in order to add new features like the "Send All Your Money to a Criminal" button.