...in his very first message to Rivest, he says that he has tried it with some small success on "small values of N". Well... so? With small enough values of N, breaking it becomes easy anyway. The trick is to find something that works against *large* values of N.
I must say, though, it is really neat to read eloquent, well written explanations of things by people who are obviously *much* more intelligent than me. If I ever run into Ron near a bar, I think I'll buy him a beer, just to listen to him explain complex mathematical concepts.
All those injuries... that's why they should have cast Jackie Chan. I think we all know that he would take all the punishment and keep on filming! He's not afraid of pain!
I haven't missed the bigger context, and I'm not dismissing the entire field. However, if I'm going to read anthropological treatises about geeks and technological culture, I'd rather do it without the cliches. And while there are people who are actively working to change things and better society (and there are those who are apparently quite evil), I think there are a lot of people who simply do what they do because they love to do it. (I usually fall into the latter category, mainly because I'm just not that great of a coder. But those working for the common good have my total respect and admiration. Me, I'm just an admin.) Technology is not their Religion. It's just a job, or a hobby, or a socially acceptable fetish.
"High-tech work takes on significance that transcends the rhetoric of efficiency, productivity and 'value added,' as it is used to make lives meaningful by aligning them with progressive forces."
Well, not for me. What makes my life meaningful are my friends, and my cats, and my girlfriend, and my music, and *then* my machines and my networks. The "rhetoric of efficiency, productivity, and 'value added'" don't really enter into it at all. Some of the time, I am just "a geek doing my job". And I'm alright with that.
I really had a hard time reading beyond the first few paragraphs. To me, these theories of "technoculture" (at least they didn't call it "e-Culture", or "CyberCulture", or something equally loathsome) seem to contain vague hints of ESR's works on Hacker culture mixed in with a lot of anthropological psychobabble. I spend time in Silicon Valley when I can. It's a nice place. There's some good bars in Sunnyvale. Traffic is bad. Lots of people work with computers. Who cares about the rest of it, really? None of the people I know consider themselves to be part of any "a progressive force for global change". They're just geeks who found good jobs. They're not seeking "legitimacy of membership", they just love to code, and they love it when people can use their work...
All I know is that sometimes I'm glad I work at a.edu.
True, but maybe now the long history of fumbling will come to a happy ending: the hardworking PARC folks will get to work for a company that will actually pay attention to their projects and do something useful with them. No more being without honor in their own company. And that wouldn't be such a bad thing.
Not really, when you consider the huge volume of "Luddite" and "Neo-Luddite" websites that are out there. Many self-described Luddites are probably reading this. (Try a google search, you might be surprised.) Now, talking about Amish people in a "cyber-column"... *that* would be silly.
Does this mean we now get the Choco-Banana Screen of Death? Because the all the Blueberry Screens of Death were starting to make my teeth hurt. Maybe this way I'll get some vitamins...
And if writing historical stuff doesn't work out, there's always the historical-fiction-with-real-people-as-characters route, a la Cryptonomicon. And I think we need more historical fiction in the geek world. I like science fiction and futurism as much as the next guy, but there's something about historical stuff that really grabs my attention. Besides, the legends of the Elder Days need to be elaborated and told so the youngsters like me will have the proper appreciation for the days of ITS and PDPs and batch processing... And a good background in Computer History would really be a good place to start on something like that.
So what's really all that new about this? That the press is apparently taking sides? That happens all the time. That another Microsoft-specific security hole is not getting much attention while a similar open-source one is? That's what happens when the press takes sides.Same old, same old...
What I would like to see is an article in some major publication that points out that anyone dumb enough to *not* change a *default* password that allows a user "god-like powers" is going to be experiencing some problems whether they are using open-source or proprietary systems. If you don't change default behavior of your machines, that isn't really the fault of the company that shipped it to you. That's just bad policy.
Shopkeeper: This monkey's paw will grant you three wishes, great or small,but...
Matt: Cool! I'll finally get a Simpsons movie!
Shopkeeper: Yes, but each wish may carry dire consequences...
Matt: They can't stop me if I use the paw!
Shopkeeper: You're not listening! Without Conan or your other old writers it won't
Matt: I wish...
Shopkeeper: No! Don't do it!
Matt:...that there will finally be a Simpsons movie!
*whoosh*
...Well, I hope it turns out to be a good film, but I'm a little skeptical. Five or six years ago would have been a much more opportune time, and they're not making episodes up to the quality of the old days. But, time will tell, I suppose...
I suppose, in a way, you could call this spamming the MPAA. Spamming for a cause. This goes on the list of things that I wish I had thought of earlier. (The only other item so far being that I wish I'd owned Sun or Motorola stock so that I could have sued them for not notifying me of the "damages" caused by Kevin Mitnick.)
They even say that "the method is commonly used in animals such as cattle", so I'm not sure why the fact that it's a monkey this time would be all that important. Maybe what makes people nervous is how close monkeys are to humans; that raises implications. ("This is essentially the method of Brave New World" might be overstating it a little, though.) Otherwise, it's already a common practice.
I suppose that, given the amount of people that, whether they would really admit it or not, actually thought something momentous would happen, this might actually have been the end of the world as we knew it. Maybe now people will really start to think in the long term. A victory for Danny Hillis. Either way, it is now 3:18 in Los Angeles, and we're all still here. Happy new year, everybody.
Slashdot Mirror
...in his very first message to Rivest, he says that he has tried it with some small success on "small values of N". Well... so? With small enough values of N, breaking it becomes easy anyway. The trick is to find something that works against *large* values of N.
I must say, though, it is really neat to read eloquent, well written explanations of things by people who are obviously *much* more intelligent than me. If I ever run into Ron near a bar, I think I'll buy him a beer, just to listen to him explain complex mathematical concepts.
All those injuries... that's why they should have cast Jackie Chan. I think we all know that he would take all the punishment and keep on filming! He's not afraid of pain!
I haven't missed the bigger context, and I'm not dismissing the entire field. However, if I'm going to read anthropological treatises about geeks and technological culture, I'd rather do it without the cliches. And while there are people who are actively working to change things and better society (and there are those who are apparently quite evil), I think there are a lot of people who simply do what they do because they love to do it. (I usually fall into the latter category, mainly because I'm just not that great of a coder. But those working for the common good have my total respect and admiration. Me, I'm just an admin.) Technology is not their Religion. It's just a job, or a hobby, or a socially acceptable fetish.
"High-tech work takes on significance that transcends the rhetoric of efficiency, productivity and 'value added,' as it is used to make lives meaningful by aligning them with progressive forces."
Well, not for me. What makes my life meaningful are my friends, and my cats, and my girlfriend, and my music, and *then* my machines and my networks. The "rhetoric of efficiency, productivity, and 'value added'" don't really enter into it at all. Some of the time, I am just "a geek doing my job". And I'm alright with that.
I really had a hard time reading beyond the first few paragraphs. To me, these theories of "technoculture" (at least they didn't call it "e-Culture", or "CyberCulture", or something equally loathsome) seem to contain vague hints of ESR's works on Hacker culture mixed in with a lot of anthropological psychobabble. I spend time in Silicon Valley when I can. It's a nice place. There's some good bars in Sunnyvale. Traffic is bad. Lots of people work with computers. Who cares about the rest of it, really? None of the people I know consider themselves to be part of any "a progressive force for global change". They're just geeks who found good jobs. They're not seeking "legitimacy of membership", they just love to code, and they love it when people can use their work... .edu.
All I know is that sometimes I'm glad I work at a
True, but maybe now the long history of fumbling will come to a happy ending: the hardworking PARC folks will get to work for a company that will actually pay attention to their projects and do something useful with them. No more being without honor in their own company. And that wouldn't be such a bad thing.
Not really, when you consider the huge volume of "Luddite" and "Neo-Luddite" websites that are out there. Many self-described Luddites are probably reading this. (Try a google search, you might be surprised.) Now, talking about Amish people in a "cyber-column"... *that* would be silly.
Does this mean we now get the Choco-Banana Screen of Death? Because the all the Blueberry Screens of Death were starting to make my teeth hurt. Maybe this way I'll get some vitamins...
And if writing historical stuff doesn't work out, there's always the historical-fiction-with-real-people-as-characters route, a la Cryptonomicon. And I think we need more historical fiction in the geek world. I like science fiction and futurism as much as the next guy, but there's something about historical stuff that really grabs my attention. Besides, the legends of the Elder Days need to be elaborated and told so the youngsters like me will have the proper appreciation for the days of ITS and PDPs and batch processing... And a good background in Computer History would really be a good place to start on something like that.
So what's really all that new about this? That the press is apparently taking sides? That happens all the time. That another Microsoft-specific security hole is not getting much attention while a similar open-source one is? That's what happens when the press takes sides.Same old, same old...
What I would like to see is an article in some major publication that points out that anyone dumb enough to *not* change a *default* password that allows a user "god-like powers" is going to be experiencing some problems whether they are using open-source or proprietary systems. If you don't change default behavior of your machines, that isn't really the fault of the company that shipped it to you. That's just bad policy.
Shopkeeper: This monkey's paw will grant you three wishes, great or small,but...
...that there will finally be a Simpsons movie!
Matt: Cool! I'll finally get a Simpsons movie!
Shopkeeper: Yes, but each wish may carry dire consequences...
Matt: They can't stop me if I use the paw!
Shopkeeper: You're not listening! Without Conan or your other old writers it won't
Matt: I wish...
Shopkeeper: No! Don't do it!
Matt:
*whoosh*
...Well, I hope it turns out to be a good film, but I'm a little skeptical. Five or six years ago would have been a much more opportune time, and they're not making episodes up to the quality of the old days. But, time will tell, I suppose...
I suppose, in a way, you could call this spamming the MPAA. Spamming for a cause. This goes on the list of things that I wish I had thought of earlier. (The only other item so far being that I wish I'd owned Sun or Motorola stock so that I could have sued them for not notifying me of the "damages" caused by Kevin Mitnick.)
But that isn't complete without...
"Homer, have you been up all night eating cheese?"
"I think I'm blind..."
They even say that "the method is commonly used in animals such as cattle", so I'm not sure why the fact that it's a monkey this time would be all that important.
Maybe what makes people nervous is how close monkeys are to humans; that raises implications. ("This is essentially the method of Brave New World" might be overstating it a little, though.) Otherwise, it's already a common practice.
I suppose that, given the amount of people that, whether they would really admit it or not, actually thought something momentous would happen, this might actually have been the end of the world as we knew it. Maybe now people will really start to think in the long term. A victory for Danny Hillis. Either way, it is now 3:18 in Los Angeles, and we're all still here. Happy new year, everybody.