OK, I'll spell it out for you. If the government were to control all the insurance then they would have no motivation not to just charge everyone a fixed price. It cuts down on the paperwork for them, and they can pick that price so that they break even. The only reason insurance prices now are currently sensitive to things like past accidents (and smoking in the case of life insurance) is that companies realize that by charging the fewer high risk customers more they can charge the rest of their customers less. This attracts low risk customers to their business and drives the high risk ones elsewhere (or at least reduces their losses on them). Thus the insurance company makes more money, attracts more customers, and responsible people end up paying less. This is a text-book example of how free markets can accomplish good things.
There is one downside: because they aren't trying to make as much money as possible the government is less motivated to single out people at higher risk for increased premiums (and thus lowering the premiums of everyone else so as to better compete). This means that while on average everyone would still play the same the risker drivers would generally end up paying less for insurance while the safer drivers would end up paying more.
They will in response to such a security comparison, by not comparing an equivalent feature set they will say that it proves that windows has more features. You throw in Teredo, count its vulnerabilities against windows security, and they will immediately respond by making the having internet / no internet analogy. It doesn't matter how much truth there is in it, what matters is that by endorsing such a flawed methodology you are opening the door for them, and thus ruling out the possibility of the very thing you were hoping to achieve, namely making it clear that Linux was superior to windows as an operating system (which is the overall goal I think, not just proving that Linux has fewer vulnerabilities, as anyone can see the very first computers had fewer vulnerabilities, but that doesn't make them better computers).
It's not about reality, it's about what they will say, how they will spin it, if you adopt a methodology in which you compare total bugs versus bugs in comparable features.
I'll clarify my point since it seems to be flying by many of you: security assessment != security comparison; you don't do two security assessments and then compare them, rather you compare the security of comparible features, to avoid an apples v.s oranges situation that makes the comparison meaningless. This is admitted by the people defening Linux themselves as they complain that it isn't right to compare Linux + firefox to Vista - IE. The same principle is in action here, if you want to compare the security of the two you need to compare basically the same feature set or the result is meaningless.
(I have an XP box on my desk that isn't connected to the net while my OSX machine is. I guess for me that means that OSX is more vulnerable than XP. When I post that claim in response to the next security comparison article I expect all of you who disagree to the above standards of security comparison to admit the awesomeness of my XP box/sarcasm)
That doesn't change in the least what microsoft will say in response to the security comparison. Which is why comparisons should stick to comparible features, so as to avoid that kind of response completely. If the Linux community reponds that you could get all the features of windows microsoft is going to say: "windows is still better because they come with it by default", and "the security comparison is flawed because it omitted all the programs people will install for the oh-so-vital features of windows".
But, as I mentioned elswhere, if you boasst that you are better in security by these standards then Microsoft will simply respond by saying that they appear less secure only because they have so many more features. And that will make Microsoft more attractive. So if you want to convince the consumer you have to stick to comparing security on a feature by feature basis, or be open to the above argument making Linux look bad functionally.
That's an appropriate point to bring up... in a feature comparison, not a security comparison. Look, if you don't ignore features in this context when they are different than the Windows crowd can simply claim that Windows has more security problems because it has more features than Linux. You don't want them to claim that do you?
I'll clarify my point since it seems to be flying by many of you: security assessment != security comparison; you don't do two security assessments and then compare them, rather you compare the security of comparible features, to avoid an apples v.s oranges situation that makes the comparison meaningless. This is admitted by the people defening Linux themselves as they complain that it isn't right to compare Linux + firefox to Vista - IE. The same principle is in action here, if you want to compare the security of the two you need to compare basically the same feature set or the result is meaningless.
(I have an XP box on my desk that isn't connected to the net while my OSX machine is. I guess for me that means that OSX is more vulnerable than XP. When I post that claim in response to the next security comparison article I expect all of you who disagree to the above standards of security comparison to admit the awesomeness of my XP box/sarcasm)
The rest of the complaints aside it may have very well been appropriate not to count Teredo as a vulnerability. Here's why: assume that windows was technologically backwards and couln't get on the internet. Would you then agree that Linux was less secure, because the possibility exists to hack it over the internet while that possibility does not exist for windows? No, that wouldn't be an appropriate assesment of security. To evaluate security we need to in a sense "divide by" the ability of the system to access other things. Teredo gives Vista the ability to get to ipv6 from behind a NAT, so vista has the ability to access more things (in this one limited way). Thus it should not be counted as a vulnerability unless Linux has a way to do the same thing, in which case we can compare the security implications of Linux's method versus Vista's method. But until then Terendo should be set asside when doing a security comparison (vesus an independant vulnerability assesment).
Here's one way: by getting you to use their services and hosting the data on their servers they can lock you into using their services in ways that locally storing data in closed formats never could. That was one of Microsoft's key anti-competitive strategies. The other, bundling, could equally well be done by google, and they do seem keen on it (as evidenced, for example, my making deals to have the google toolbar pre-installed, and paying companies to make google search the default). So they could be plenty anti-competitive.
I already posted this in this thread, but given that it is buried where no one will read it I am going to repost it here, and hope that this self-duping won't offend greviously.
I think that is a classic libertarain mistake of not thinking carefully enough about the market for jobs (or at least I assume that your granting to employers the right to do whatever they want to employees is motivated by libertarian-esque thinking that letting the market settle such things is better than regulating them). Now if jobs were an elastic good then the market would correct for this: if all the employers started demanding something unpleasent, like hitting their employees with bats, then the supply of labor would shrink as people would be less willing to work, and thus they would have to pay their employees more. This would ensure that something unpleasent (bats, RFID) would only be universally implemented if its benefits were really worth the increased cost of hiring people.
But this analysis fails to take into account two important factors.
1- wages can't actually universally increase, they can only seem to. If everyone got paid more, proportionally, then we would simply experience inflation until real wages were the same as they previously were.
2- the labor market is actually pretty inelastic: people aren't going to stop wanting jobs, even if there are no jobs that they like, because they need money to stay alive. Thus if every employer implemented RFID people would still take those jobs, because they have no other choices, and wages wouldn't increase. Now some employers might try to get an advantage by not requiring RFID in this situation, but it wouldn't be much of an advantage for employees: what they would do is offer lower salaries, compensated by no RFID implant. Thus employees get screwed either way. So this is good for the business, but not for the workers.
I think that is a classic libertarain mistake of not thinking carefully enough about the market for jobs. Now if jobs were an elastic good then the market would correct for this: if all the employers started demanding something unpleasent, like hitting their employees with bats, then the supply of labor would shrink as people would be less willing to work, and thus they would have to pay their employees more. This would ensure that something unpleasent (bats, RFID) would only be universally implemented if its benefits were really worth the increased cost of hiring people.
But this analysis fails to take into account two important factors.
1- wages can't actually universally increase, they can only seem to. If everyone got paid more, proportionally, then we would simply experience inflation until real wages were the same as they previously were.
2- the labor market is actually pretty inelastic: people aren't going to stop wanting jobs, even if there are no jobs that they like, because they need money to stay alive. Thus if every employer implemented RFID people would still take those jobs, because they have no other choices, and wages wouldn't increase. Now some employers might try to get an advantage by not requiring RFID in this situation, but it wouldn't be much of an advantage for employees: what they would do is offer lower salaries, compensated by no RFID implant. Thus employees get screwed either way. So this is good for the business, but not for the workers.
Going to the gym, and activities like it, are not seen as addictive because people don't spend more than a couble of hours a day at them; certainly not all of their free time. And when we come across the rare individual who does behave that way (spends all their waking time at the gym) we certainly do see them as addicts, and think that they might need help. Also I would contest that WoW is mentally taxing at all, having to make rapid descisions does not tire you out in the way holding a complex plot and a number of charachters does. Rule of thumb: anything that can be done by a bot (ex: WoW grinding) is not intellectually tiring (compre to: understanding liturature). What is tiring about making many descisions, in other cases is usually the associated tension. Admittedly there is some of that in WoW, in hard fights, but it isn't the usual state of affairs. Thus people have the ability to play WoW all day long every day, while they can't engage in a similiarly inactive acitity, like reading, without feeling the need to do something different, or at least switch books. Of course people can force themselves to be at the gym all day, read all day, etc, but then these activities become unpleasent, and not something that we desire to do every day.
The cure is simple: sell your windows machine and buy a mac. Seriously, my windows machine broke and I started using a mac, and now I rarely play games now. When I do it is usually only for a short period of time, probably because the games on my mac are more aimed at having fun in short bursts than long periods of play. But I guess since WoW runs on the mac that won't solve an addition to it (unless you have the strength of will not to install it).
Those things are not thought of as addictive, I would guess, because there are natural limits on how long you can engage in them (you get tired), which prevent them from taking over anyones life. Even pleasurable intellectual activities tire the mind and force you to take breaks. Games however don't tire people in this way and so can be played as long as the person likes. Thus they have greater potential to control the person's life in an unhealthy way (the healthy life contains a balance of activities). Gambling is probably classed as addictive for similiar reasons (because it has the potential to be a serious problem), not in this case because you would waste all your time doing it, but because it can reduce people to poverty so fast.
CS is dying because it is several different disciplines wrapped up into one, making it hard for students to get the education they want (or need). Some want to focus on the mathematical and theoretical aspects of computer science. And yes, we need these people because they are the ones who come up with the new encyption methods / exponentially faster alorithems / proofs that one way to route traffic is better than another / and so on. Some want to be software engineers (learning how to program and program in groups). Still others want to focus on user interface design or software design in general, without dealing with all the programming details. And of course there are niche fields like 3D graphics and AI that are important but not really large enough to split off on thier own. In any case the point I am making is that, by cramming all these together under one degree, CS programs tend to suck because you are forced to learn stuff that you don't want to, and so the degree you earn isn't necessarily relevant to what you want to do. Students are catching on to this and are thus migrating away from the standard CS degree, some of them never to come back.
Can we just all agree that Google is about as evil as the average corporation now? Or do some of you still believe that Google really is above the rest morally?
Perl + XML what could possibly go wrong? (With Perl by itself you were only 95% likely to end up with a unreadable mess, now with XML we can push that up to 100%. Oh boy!)
But what if they are right? Sure it seems unlikely, but if we ban offering an opposing opinions we trap ourselves. Besides shouldn't we be focusing on censoring intelligent design first? (note to stupid people: I am not serious about censoring intelligent design advocated). Oh yeah, and what about the Bill of Rights. It's so annoying sometimes.
Either a) anyone who offers a patch that fixes a bug or adds a feature and doesn't charge for it (which happens all the time, for example: windows update) is breaking the law or b) Apple is delusional / wanted an excuse to charge you more money.
Slashdot Mirror
OK, I'll spell it out for you. If the government were to control all the insurance then they would have no motivation not to just charge everyone a fixed price. It cuts down on the paperwork for them, and they can pick that price so that they break even. The only reason insurance prices now are currently sensitive to things like past accidents (and smoking in the case of life insurance) is that companies realize that by charging the fewer high risk customers more they can charge the rest of their customers less. This attracts low risk customers to their business and drives the high risk ones elsewhere (or at least reduces their losses on them). Thus the insurance company makes more money, attracts more customers, and responsible people end up paying less. This is a text-book example of how free markets can accomplish good things.
There is one downside: because they aren't trying to make as much money as possible the government is less motivated to single out people at higher risk for increased premiums (and thus lowering the premiums of everyone else so as to better compete). This means that while on average everyone would still play the same the risker drivers would generally end up paying less for insurance while the safer drivers would end up paying more.
They will in response to such a security comparison, by not comparing an equivalent feature set they will say that it proves that windows has more features. You throw in Teredo, count its vulnerabilities against windows security, and they will immediately respond by making the having internet / no internet analogy. It doesn't matter how much truth there is in it, what matters is that by endorsing such a flawed methodology you are opening the door for them, and thus ruling out the possibility of the very thing you were hoping to achieve, namely making it clear that Linux was superior to windows as an operating system (which is the overall goal I think, not just proving that Linux has fewer vulnerabilities, as anyone can see the very first computers had fewer vulnerabilities, but that doesn't make them better computers).
It's not about reality, it's about what they will say, how they will spin it, if you adopt a methodology in which you compare total bugs versus bugs in comparable features.
I'll clarify my point since it seems to be flying by many of you: security assessment != security comparison; you don't do two security assessments and then compare them, rather you compare the security of comparible features, to avoid an apples v.s oranges situation that makes the comparison meaningless. This is admitted by the people defening Linux themselves as they complain that it isn't right to compare Linux + firefox to Vista - IE. The same principle is in action here, if you want to compare the security of the two you need to compare basically the same feature set or the result is meaningless. (I have an XP box on my desk that isn't connected to the net while my OSX machine is. I guess for me that means that OSX is more vulnerable than XP. When I post that claim in response to the next security comparison article I expect all of you who disagree to the above standards of security comparison to admit the awesomeness of my XP box /sarcasm)
That doesn't change in the least what microsoft will say in response to the security comparison. Which is why comparisons should stick to comparible features, so as to avoid that kind of response completely. If the Linux community reponds that you could get all the features of windows microsoft is going to say: "windows is still better because they come with it by default", and "the security comparison is flawed because it omitted all the programs people will install for the oh-so-vital features of windows".
But, as I mentioned elswhere, if you boasst that you are better in security by these standards then Microsoft will simply respond by saying that they appear less secure only because they have so many more features. And that will make Microsoft more attractive. So if you want to convince the consumer you have to stick to comparing security on a feature by feature basis, or be open to the above argument making Linux look bad functionally.
That's an appropriate point to bring up ... in a feature comparison, not a security comparison. Look, if you don't ignore features in this context when they are different than the Windows crowd can simply claim that Windows has more security problems because it has more features than Linux. You don't want them to claim that do you?
I'll clarify my point since it seems to be flying by many of you: security assessment != security comparison; you don't do two security assessments and then compare them, rather you compare the security of comparible features, to avoid an apples v.s oranges situation that makes the comparison meaningless. This is admitted by the people defening Linux themselves as they complain that it isn't right to compare Linux + firefox to Vista - IE. The same principle is in action here, if you want to compare the security of the two you need to compare basically the same feature set or the result is meaningless.
/sarcasm)
(I have an XP box on my desk that isn't connected to the net while my OSX machine is. I guess for me that means that OSX is more vulnerable than XP. When I post that claim in response to the next security comparison article I expect all of you who disagree to the above standards of security comparison to admit the awesomeness of my XP box
The rest of the complaints aside it may have very well been appropriate not to count Teredo as a vulnerability. Here's why: assume that windows was technologically backwards and couln't get on the internet. Would you then agree that Linux was less secure, because the possibility exists to hack it over the internet while that possibility does not exist for windows? No, that wouldn't be an appropriate assesment of security. To evaluate security we need to in a sense "divide by" the ability of the system to access other things. Teredo gives Vista the ability to get to ipv6 from behind a NAT, so vista has the ability to access more things (in this one limited way). Thus it should not be counted as a vulnerability unless Linux has a way to do the same thing, in which case we can compare the security implications of Linux's method versus Vista's method. But until then Terendo should be set asside when doing a security comparison (vesus an independant vulnerability assesment).
Here's one way: by getting you to use their services and hosting the data on their servers they can lock you into using their services in ways that locally storing data in closed formats never could. That was one of Microsoft's key anti-competitive strategies. The other, bundling, could equally well be done by google, and they do seem keen on it (as evidenced, for example, my making deals to have the google toolbar pre-installed, and paying companies to make google search the default). So they could be plenty anti-competitive.
Eating ... curses! I knew I forgot to do something today.
I already posted this in this thread, but given that it is buried where no one will read it I am going to repost it here, and hope that this self-duping won't offend greviously.
I think that is a classic libertarain mistake of not thinking carefully enough about the market for jobs (or at least I assume that your granting to employers the right to do whatever they want to employees is motivated by libertarian-esque thinking that letting the market settle such things is better than regulating them). Now if jobs were an elastic good then the market would correct for this: if all the employers started demanding something unpleasent, like hitting their employees with bats, then the supply of labor would shrink as people would be less willing to work, and thus they would have to pay their employees more. This would ensure that something unpleasent (bats, RFID) would only be universally implemented if its benefits were really worth the increased cost of hiring people.
But this analysis fails to take into account two important factors.
1- wages can't actually universally increase, they can only seem to. If everyone got paid more, proportionally, then we would simply experience inflation until real wages were the same as they previously were.
2- the labor market is actually pretty inelastic: people aren't going to stop wanting jobs, even if there are no jobs that they like, because they need money to stay alive. Thus if every employer implemented RFID people would still take those jobs, because they have no other choices, and wages wouldn't increase. Now some employers might try to get an advantage by not requiring RFID in this situation, but it wouldn't be much of an advantage for employees: what they would do is offer lower salaries, compensated by no RFID implant. Thus employees get screwed either way. So this is good for the business, but not for the workers.
I think that is a classic libertarain mistake of not thinking carefully enough about the market for jobs. Now if jobs were an elastic good then the market would correct for this: if all the employers started demanding something unpleasent, like hitting their employees with bats, then the supply of labor would shrink as people would be less willing to work, and thus they would have to pay their employees more. This would ensure that something unpleasent (bats, RFID) would only be universally implemented if its benefits were really worth the increased cost of hiring people.
But this analysis fails to take into account two important factors.
1- wages can't actually universally increase, they can only seem to. If everyone got paid more, proportionally, then we would simply experience inflation until real wages were the same as they previously were.
2- the labor market is actually pretty inelastic: people aren't going to stop wanting jobs, even if there are no jobs that they like, because they need money to stay alive. Thus if every employer implemented RFID people would still take those jobs, because they have no other choices, and wages wouldn't increase. Now some employers might try to get an advantage by not requiring RFID in this situation, but it wouldn't be much of an advantage for employees: what they would do is offer lower salaries, compensated by no RFID implant. Thus employees get screwed either way. So this is good for the business, but not for the workers.
Going to the gym, and activities like it, are not seen as addictive because people don't spend more than a couble of hours a day at them; certainly not all of their free time. And when we come across the rare individual who does behave that way (spends all their waking time at the gym) we certainly do see them as addicts, and think that they might need help. Also I would contest that WoW is mentally taxing at all, having to make rapid descisions does not tire you out in the way holding a complex plot and a number of charachters does. Rule of thumb: anything that can be done by a bot (ex: WoW grinding) is not intellectually tiring (compre to: understanding liturature). What is tiring about making many descisions, in other cases is usually the associated tension. Admittedly there is some of that in WoW, in hard fights, but it isn't the usual state of affairs. Thus people have the ability to play WoW all day long every day, while they can't engage in a similiarly inactive acitity, like reading, without feeling the need to do something different, or at least switch books. Of course people can force themselves to be at the gym all day, read all day, etc, but then these activities become unpleasent, and not something that we desire to do every day.
The cure is simple: sell your windows machine and buy a mac. Seriously, my windows machine broke and I started using a mac, and now I rarely play games now. When I do it is usually only for a short period of time, probably because the games on my mac are more aimed at having fun in short bursts than long periods of play. But I guess since WoW runs on the mac that won't solve an addition to it (unless you have the strength of will not to install it).
Those things are not thought of as addictive, I would guess, because there are natural limits on how long you can engage in them (you get tired), which prevent them from taking over anyones life. Even pleasurable intellectual activities tire the mind and force you to take breaks. Games however don't tire people in this way and so can be played as long as the person likes. Thus they have greater potential to control the person's life in an unhealthy way (the healthy life contains a balance of activities). Gambling is probably classed as addictive for similiar reasons (because it has the potential to be a serious problem), not in this case because you would waste all your time doing it, but because it can reduce people to poverty so fast.
CS is dying because it is several different disciplines wrapped up into one, making it hard for students to get the education they want (or need). Some want to focus on the mathematical and theoretical aspects of computer science. And yes, we need these people because they are the ones who come up with the new encyption methods / exponentially faster alorithems / proofs that one way to route traffic is better than another / and so on. Some want to be software engineers (learning how to program and program in groups). Still others want to focus on user interface design or software design in general, without dealing with all the programming details. And of course there are niche fields like 3D graphics and AI that are important but not really large enough to split off on thier own. In any case the point I am making is that, by cramming all these together under one degree, CS programs tend to suck because you are forced to learn stuff that you don't want to, and so the degree you earn isn't necessarily relevant to what you want to do. Students are catching on to this and are thus migrating away from the standard CS degree, some of them never to come back.
Can we just all agree that Google is about as evil as the average corporation now? Or do some of you still believe that Google really is above the rest morally?
Murder by remote controlled robot, the perfect crime?
Perl + XML what could possibly go wrong? (With Perl by itself you were only 95% likely to end up with a unreadable mess, now with XML we can push that up to 100%. Oh boy!)
KHAAAAAAAAAAN!
Note to editors: the man's name is Kahn, you misspelled it in the second to last sentance.
I have a hard time believing that the above was modded up to 4 given all the typos I made in my rush to say the obvious first.
But what if they are right? Sure it seems unlikely, but if we ban offering an opposing opinions we trap ourselves. Besides shouldn't we be focusing on censoring intelligent design first? (note to stupid people: I am not serious about censoring intelligent design advocated). Oh yeah, and what about the Bill of Rights. It's so annoying sometimes.
Either a) anyone who offers a patch that fixes a bug or adds a feature and doesn't charge for it (which happens all the time, for example: windows update) is breaking the law or b) Apple is delusional / wanted an excuse to charge you more money.
I know which one I believe.