Censorship is a government function; it is repression. Anti-freedom in every sense of the word, using power backed by violence. When an individual or a corporation decides it will not (or will) go somewhere, and government doesn't get in the way, that is an actual *use* of freedom.
I would not make the same decision -- I think it is the exact wrong way to go -- but it is simply wrong to call making this choice "censorship."
If you don't like it, you can always vote with your wallet, and encourage others to do so as well. But stick to the issue at hand: Apple has decided to limit information flow from its developers and content providers to its customers. Don't like it? Fine. Don't do business with them, take them to task for doing business the way they do, stand in front of HQ with rainbow signs, do business directly with the content providers, etc.
Ok, so we've established that you don't know anything about SDR software (tip: the desktop software is not doing the the same tasks as the hardware, and there is a huge amount more that can be done once the baseband data is in... dual core laptops don't have the power required to go very far down that road... and yes, I'm the author of one of the more sophisticated SDR packages out there); you don't understand what is required to make multiple compiles work *well* (tip, it's not just an option to make), you don't understand opencl's limits at *all*, nor what happens when threads collide over FPU demand, you misinterpret one function (stacking) as "specialist tool" (exact same kind of tool... that's why I compared them, the stacking is one function out of many and was brought up only to point out a use for many layers, which you promptly, again, showed you didn't understand), you don't understand what the fact that *basic* use of Logic leaves CPU to spare, which means that *advanced* use of Logic has CPU remaining to use, *and can use it*, and can take latency out of the acceptable range quite easily -- the more power you have, the more elbow room you have before that happens. In short, you're moderately to wildly confused about just about everything you wrote about.
It's plain that the plain the plane is flying above serves as a base for an infinite number of planes; which plane is it that the increased turbulence is in? Can the plane not fly above or below this plane? Can't a fella go off on a tangent around here?
There is no incentive to be innovative or productive in a monopoly situation.
The urge to maximize profit and to increase share value (really another form of the same thing) suffices to drive device costs down, functionality and efficiencies up, push service upgrades, keep up with styles, etc.
Perhaps you're confusing innovation per se with "innovation outside the monopoly."
What do people do on Macs Pro that are that processor intensive these days?
Speaking for myself, 48-bit image processing in a layer-based, non-destructive paradigm. Software defined radio -- extremely demanding, that. High speed data, maximized low latency requirements, no particular limit to the amount of processing one might like to apply to the signals / spectrum segment. I use Logic for musical performance, and that's absolutely got to stay local, again latency must be managed to then nth degree and the more processing that can be done within that bound, the better. None of this can be handed off down the network; it just wouldn't work well. Or at all.
I sure would like to see core-per-file parallel compilation, too, but instead, all of the dev environments I use keep the source and object on HD and do them one at a time, serially. Big projects take much longer than the hardware at hand could manage. XCode, QT, gcc/gmake... all serial sluggards.
The current Mac Pro maxes out at 12 cores and 64GB of RAM
Well, sort of. My understanding (which could be wrong) is that those 12 cores are all hyperthreaded, so as long as you're not requiring FPU or blowing cache a lot, you're more-or-less running 24 cores. Not sure as I have an older generation dual four-core w/o hyperthreads (but with two sets of four FPUs.) It's a fair bit of computing power; my Macbook pro, a dual core with lots of resources, can't even come close to keeping up with my older Mac pro.
Interactive video / image processing tasks tend to be offloaded to the GPU these days
That varies. We use an integer-math approach that maximizes CPU power and doesn't rely so much on the highly variable GPU capabilities of the various Mac models (not to mention having to drink more of the Apple kool-aid than really needed... we really like portable code.) There are a number of advantages to this, first among them the availability of a great deal more RAM (it's useful to stack a hundred or so 48-bit astro images, for instance) and so more layers-per-image, but also a more consistent performance for the end user. Some Macs -- the current minis, for example -- use bottom feeder Intel shared RAM GPUs. They aren't anything to write home about. Even so, the machine can be carrying a 2.6GHz i7 w/16gb. We often outperform Aperture, Apple's poster child for GPU use in image processing; can't really say why, but there it is.
Bigger jobs are best run on a load of cheap commodity hardware in a rack than on a workstation.
For some value of bigger jobs, sure. For the things that I do on my desk, no.
In any case, a Macbook isn't going to provide even close to the same level of hardware as a Mac pro, which was really my only point above.
But imho the mac pro is obsolete and has been replaced by a macbook with a thunderbolt port.
If you wanted to configure your macbook to match a *current* mac pro, you'd need 8 more full i7 cores (assuming you have four in the macbook), four hard drives, four external graphics engines, and 48 gb (I think) of RAM... all strung out on your thunderbolt cable. And a *lot* of power supply wiring. Not sure that's an equivalence that is worth much.
And add to that whatever they do with the next Mac pro upgrade they say they're working on... More cores? More ram? Faster system bus? All of the above? No, don't think your macbook is quite there, lol.
Having seen my wife turn into a paranoid schizophrenic by smoking joints
This is not a reasonable argument against pot. There are people out there who can't drink milk; who can't eat bread; who can't take aspirin, etc. The correct response to that reality is not to make milk and bread and aspirin illegal, and then to escalate such that someone who sells milk or bread or aspirin, or consumes them, goes to prison, etc.
There are people who will have severe reactions if they see flashing lights. Should we therefore make flashing lights illegal? What about peanuts? I like peanuts on my sundaes; but they will really hose some people. Should we outlaw peanut butter and all other peanut products? And then go shooting people on sight if they grow or sell peanuts?
It is an unreasonable argument to assert that these things are bad because some small percentage of the population has trouble with them. The reasonable conclusion, in fact, is that there's something unusual about that small percentage, and that is certainly worth looking at. But that's darned difficult to do when the whole thing is massively illegal and has its own ultra-violent specialized military to enforce that illegality.
Of course, that doesn't necessarily mean going to jail is the answer, but pretending that smoking joints is harmless really doesn't help.
It's harmless for the vast majority. We're quite sure of that, because the number of people who have indulged is extremely large. Pretending that your wife's experience, even if correctly attributed to marijuana use, is sufficient to categorize marijuana as generally harmful is very poor procedure. It is exactly the same kind of cognitive error that would categorize peanut butter as generally harmful because occasionally someone is found to have an adverse reaction to peanuts.
So is what you're saying that Rosa Parks should have stayed at the back of the bus? Because she was "saying "Fuck you" to the whole democratic system and was just BEGGING the judge to put her in jail"?
What you're completely missing here is that the law can be wrong. The whole system can be wrong. It can fail to respond to corrective forces, such as information or awareness of side effects, or to take civil rights into account. Even when there are large, organized groups of people carefully organizing the data and presenting it regularly to the government. Even when the government's own studies indicate the accuracy of that data. At that point, you have government out of control; not a correct expression of a democratic process, or more to the point, correct action of the republic.
You're also missing the point that it isn't about the thrill of smoking; it's about the government wrongfully repressing personal choice, and in the process, creating a whole series of side effects that do huge harm, and then refusing to admit it was wrong. Even though prohibition II has produced exactly the same problems, albeit written larger, as prohibition I did; and even though just like prohibition I, prohibition II has utterly failed to control the substances it was intended to control and the people it was intended to control. It's junk law from junk minds which does huge damage to the citizens.
I don't do a lot if recreational drugs outside of wine with dinner and a cup of coffee from time to time. I'm not personally fond of pot. But I absolutely deny that the government is correct in saying I cannot smoke pot; and it's outright evil in what it does to people it catches selling or smoking pot. As far as the DEA goes, that's a violent and corrupt force deployed against our own people to no good purpose. The government does not deserve my support in this matter, and it does not have it.
Good grief. Ok, here's the obvious example: You can sell, or smoke, a joint - a light intoxicant which does far less harm (probably none at all in most cases) than alcohol - and go to jail for years for these acts. After which, you are often considered a felon, which pretty well puts paid to your future. I'm sure you know this and you're just being disingenuous.
You're confusing your uninformed state with the idea that my statements are unfounded.
Go spend some time with Google. The DEA's actions and policies are largely a matter of record, as is the massive amount of harm they have caused.
The DEA lies about everything else. Why would this be any different? The very fact that the DEA exists is an affront to personal liberty; We have decades of detailed records of them spreading falsehoods, destroying families, in general doing far more harm than drugs ever did or ever could.
DEA Informers: They lie about who they are, what they do, what their intent is -- and just about anything else they're asked. This is who they are. Liars. But that's not all they are. They're also as dangerous as any government agent you can imagine, wholly without concern for anyone but themselves.
DEA agents: They lie about where the danger comes from; they lie about toxicity; they lie about addictiveness. They lie about consequences (they ARE the primary consequences), and they have been known to attempt to trade your personal honor for your freedom if you fall into their hands. They created the violence underlying the black market drug trade; they created the black market itself. They're not shy of interfering with other sovereign countries, nor of playing fast and loose with our own "justice" system.
So when a DEA "anything" tells you something, you're best off assuming they're lying. It's what they do. Aside from destroying families, that is. If they're not lying, they're likely trying to hurt you some other way. Get away and stay away. Nothing truly good can ever come of contact with people so bereft of personal honor -- or so outright stupid -- that they would work for the DEA.
To heck with them. And the laws they rode in on. And those who made the laws. And those in the general population who thought, and perhaps still think, agencies like the DEA were ever a good idea.
The drug war: It's a war on you and your family and your friends.
Yes, but there was that helicopter crash; the typesetting community always blamed TeX for that, and ever since then, TeX has been relegated to doing font work in the third world, charity undertakings and the like. And really, who wanted to be limited to 55 fonts per document? Some of us type in the fast lane, buddy.
Not only does my installation ensure there is earth between the panels and the sun after the day is over, I've carefully arranged it so that the back of the solar panels face the sun at night. That's how youz know i r an engeenee-er.
Oy. That's not how it works. An encrypted message contains something unknown. Any particular spending required to break it occurs prior to knowing what's in it. Once spent, then they know -- and since they *already* spent to break it, there's no need to make any further finance based decisions. If the message contains something they think is of interest, it'll go off to the people who might like to know about it without any particular commentary. This is how it works -- I'm not guessing. Not by some magical choosing of which messages to break because they know what's in them.
The entire point of any sub rosa organization, be it religious extremists, home grown anarchist bombers, counterfeiters, drug dealers or agents of snooping nations is that they are trying to operate in such a way as to look innocent. So encrypted messages from otherwise innocent looking parties aren't presumed innocent. For that matter, unencrypted messages aren't presumed innocent. This isn't speculation; this is the reality of it. The computers look at everything and if it looks like it's something of interest, it gets kicked upwards.
As for the prior AC, if you assume they haven't cracked anything in particular, you're making a serious mistake. One they'd very much like you to make.
None of which stops them from calling your LEO's office and saying, "Hi, this is your federal government; Joe Palooka, address such and such, is dealing drugs." Or whatever. At which juncture, you are now a POGI. The point is, your secrets... aren't.
IMHO, anyone who assumes they are operating in an atmosphere of privacy today is very likely wrong, even in some of the most mundane venues we encounter on a daily basis. I think acting as if one has privacy is imprudent, to say the least. Right now, if you can't stand for something to be known, then you're much better off if you don't talk about it, don't write it down, don't commit it to digital form, and don't perform any on-record acts that relate to it. Also, assume you're on-record. All the time. Unless you can prove otherwise. Which you probably can't do.
the NSA made an enormous breakthrough several years ago in its ability to cryptanalyze, or break, unfathomably complex encryption systems employed by not only governments around the world but also many average computer users in the US
Yeah... that really fits in perfectly with "can't read iMessages", lol.
So how is that different from stuff that runs on my a-bit-larger portable device (it's called a "Retina MacBook Pro") that I can walk away with?
Mine's available to me. All the time. Since I also have a macbook pro, I'm well aware of the inconvenience of dragging that thing around. As I'm also carrying a camera bag, it becomes a real logistical issue -- more than just "do I want to" but "is this really practical?" Seriously man, you just can't argue your way out of a phone or tablet being much more portable and convenient. I appreciate the effort you're making, but it's pointless, really, because you're completely wrong.
OK, your pocket's pretty big or your tablet's a bit small if your tablet fits in it.
I always carry a bag. Camera's in it, as is some other tech. But even if I were not carrying a bag, an ipod or iphone fits fine in a pocket, and they are the same device for all intents and purposes. People will carry highly portable objects more willingly than less portable objects. My tablet is portable because I've *always* got my camera, and the bag accommodates the tablet without any additional issues at all. The tablet multiplies the effective capabilities of the camera; it's a great combination. From notes to astro calcs to the portfolio, it does everything I need without the several added pounds of a laptop.
And, as long as we're going down that path, how much of that software wouldn't be that interesting on a tablet, only on a smartphone?
For me, that stuff needs to be portable; it enhances how I live. Others will have other sets of apps they want to be portable. Your urge to run on a desktop does nothing to minimize that market. You're engaged in a massive exercise of missing the point because you don't have similar needs... but the market does.
That's one of the minor apps and, if you're somewhere with sufficient connectivity
Why should I depend on the kindness of strangers, or pay for a connection, not to mention deal with connectivity issues, when I can have the apps and images right there, 100% reliably? While you might think paying the phone company, essentially forever, for something completely unnecessary is fun, I don't. And I won't. Others agree: That's why there are devices without those connectivity options. Mine actually has the cellular option, but that is only because it wasn't separable from the GPS. It's never been used, nor do I ever expect to use it.
Same thing with the "When does Jupiter rise?" app.
Yeah, no, lol. I'm out in the field in a dark sky area with my gear, there's zero free connectivity to be had. Everyone has different needs, and mine aren't what you apparently think they should be. Furthermore, if your arguments were valid (they're not), there wouldn't even be a market for these devices, much less one that snaps up faster and more capable ones at every release iteration. You can argue until you're blue in the face, and the marketplace will tell you that you are roundly wrong. Perhaps you can't see it, but the cool thing about it is, you're entitled to your opinion, but you're not entitled to your own facts.:)
If the "app" needs to do a significant amount of local processing or store a significant amount of local data, maybe there's a point to it being something other than a Web app
Yes, that's what I'm talking about. Not little java games, etc. Right now, I have CAD, structured drawing, software defined radio, manikin manipulation, astronomy software, etc. All of it runs without any connection to anything; there is no web server, nor am I much interested in any software that requires an Internet connection. As the devices power up, apps will too. Right now, for instance, the SDR program stresses the hardware to its limits; can't do any more than it's already doing. But there is way more that could be done if there were more CPU available. Image editing: Need gigs of available ram to do a decent, layered process (non-destructive) edit on a RAW camera image. See, these things aren't about java coding. They're written to the metal, and as I say, could use more hardware right now. Referring back to the putative availability of AI, I rather expect that will also require more hardware (can't be sure until we know how to make it, but I think it's a good guess.) Again, I'm not going to want to be connected. So you see, your entire first paragraph is talking about something other than what I was. Not that the things you're talking about aren't there or are irrelevant, but they're not driving things to the next core or next GB. Well, perhaps some games are, actually. Most of the games I play are on the order of chess and go, so I'm not really familiar with the high CPU/GPU demand ones, but I know they're out there.
but, at that point, how is it different from "computer software for desktops" except that it uses a touchscreen
In one very important way: It runs on my portable device and I can walk away with it. That's all tablets and smartphones give anyone. But saying "that's all" understates the value by incredible amounts. I *love* having that kind of power in my pocket. When does Jupiter rise? What's the length of an inverted vee resonant antenna for 3.800 MHz at 35 feet? At 60 feet? How much lumber will I need for this project? Hey, want to see my photo portfolio? It's all right in here. Ok, I'm out in the field with my Canon 6D to shoot auroras. But it's cold. I pop that puppy on a tripod, retire inside the car, and remote control it wirelessly using my iPad. Yeah. that's the kind of thing I'm talking about.
It sounds like Microsoft didn't so much as give up, as go around Apple. If you buy on the web, Apple doesn't get the cut. Microsoft got the app into the app store. Pretty much seems like Microsoft got most of what they wanted, and Apple got nothing other than the ability to say their policy is still unviolated. Which, considering the nature of it, isn't exactly a great marketing ploy.
Slashdot Mirror
Censorship is a government function; it is repression. Anti-freedom in every sense of the word, using power backed by violence. When an individual or a corporation decides it will not (or will) go somewhere, and government doesn't get in the way, that is an actual *use* of freedom.
I would not make the same decision -- I think it is the exact wrong way to go -- but it is simply wrong to call making this choice "censorship."
If you don't like it, you can always vote with your wallet, and encourage others to do so as well. But stick to the issue at hand: Apple has decided to limit information flow from its developers and content providers to its customers. Don't like it? Fine. Don't do business with them, take them to task for doing business the way they do, stand in front of HQ with rainbow signs, do business directly with the content providers, etc.
Ok, so we've established that you don't know anything about SDR software (tip: the desktop software is not doing the the same tasks as the hardware, and there is a huge amount more that can be done once the baseband data is in... dual core laptops don't have the power required to go very far down that road... and yes, I'm the author of one of the more sophisticated SDR packages out there); you don't understand what is required to make multiple compiles work *well* (tip, it's not just an option to make), you don't understand opencl's limits at *all*, nor what happens when threads collide over FPU demand, you misinterpret one function (stacking) as "specialist tool" (exact same kind of tool... that's why I compared them, the stacking is one function out of many and was brought up only to point out a use for many layers, which you promptly, again, showed you didn't understand), you don't understand what the fact that *basic* use of Logic leaves CPU to spare, which means that *advanced* use of Logic has CPU remaining to use, *and can use it*, and can take latency out of the acceptable range quite easily -- the more power you have, the more elbow room you have before that happens. In short, you're moderately to wildly confused about just about everything you wrote about.
Well, that was fun. Cheers. :)
It's plain that the plain the plane is flying above serves as a base for an infinite number of planes; which plane is it that the increased turbulence is in? Can the plane not fly above or below this plane? Can't a fella go off on a tangent around here?
--Geometrically Challenged Guy
The urge to maximize profit and to increase share value (really another form of the same thing) suffices to drive device costs down, functionality and efficiencies up, push service upgrades, keep up with styles, etc.
Perhaps you're confusing innovation per se with "innovation outside the monopoly."
Speaking for myself, 48-bit image processing in a layer-based, non-destructive paradigm. Software defined radio -- extremely demanding, that. High speed data, maximized low latency requirements, no particular limit to the amount of processing one might like to apply to the signals / spectrum segment. I use Logic for musical performance, and that's absolutely got to stay local, again latency must be managed to then nth degree and the more processing that can be done within that bound, the better. None of this can be handed off down the network; it just wouldn't work well. Or at all.
I sure would like to see core-per-file parallel compilation, too, but instead, all of the dev environments I use keep the source and object on HD and do them one at a time, serially. Big projects take much longer than the hardware at hand could manage. XCode, QT, gcc/gmake... all serial sluggards.
Well, sort of. My understanding (which could be wrong) is that those 12 cores are all hyperthreaded, so as long as you're not requiring FPU or blowing cache a lot, you're more-or-less running 24 cores. Not sure as I have an older generation dual four-core w/o hyperthreads (but with two sets of four FPUs.) It's a fair bit of computing power; my Macbook pro, a dual core with lots of resources, can't even come close to keeping up with my older Mac pro.
That varies. We use an integer-math approach that maximizes CPU power and doesn't rely so much on the highly variable GPU capabilities of the various Mac models (not to mention having to drink more of the Apple kool-aid than really needed... we really like portable code.) There are a number of advantages to this, first among them the availability of a great deal more RAM (it's useful to stack a hundred or so 48-bit astro images, for instance) and so more layers-per-image, but also a more consistent performance for the end user. Some Macs -- the current minis, for example -- use bottom feeder Intel shared RAM GPUs. They aren't anything to write home about. Even so, the machine can be carrying a 2.6GHz i7 w/16gb. We often outperform Aperture, Apple's poster child for GPU use in image processing; can't really say why, but there it is.
For some value of bigger jobs, sure. For the things that I do on my desk, no.
In any case, a Macbook isn't going to provide even close to the same level of hardware as a Mac pro, which was really my only point above.
They have tethers. They can be led.
+42 underrated, with "Wins The Internets" cluster.
If you wanted to configure your macbook to match a *current* mac pro, you'd need 8 more full i7 cores (assuming you have four in the macbook), four hard drives, four external graphics engines, and 48 gb (I think) of RAM... all strung out on your thunderbolt cable. And a *lot* of power supply wiring. Not sure that's an equivalence that is worth much.
And add to that whatever they do with the next Mac pro upgrade they say they're working on... More cores? More ram? Faster system bus? All of the above? No, don't think your macbook is quite there, lol.
This is not a reasonable argument against pot. There are people out there who can't drink milk; who can't eat bread; who can't take aspirin, etc. The correct response to that reality is not to make milk and bread and aspirin illegal, and then to escalate such that someone who sells milk or bread or aspirin, or consumes them, goes to prison, etc.
There are people who will have severe reactions if they see flashing lights. Should we therefore make flashing lights illegal? What about peanuts? I like peanuts on my sundaes; but they will really hose some people. Should we outlaw peanut butter and all other peanut products? And then go shooting people on sight if they grow or sell peanuts?
It is an unreasonable argument to assert that these things are bad because some small percentage of the population has trouble with them. The reasonable conclusion, in fact, is that there's something unusual about that small percentage, and that is certainly worth looking at. But that's darned difficult to do when the whole thing is massively illegal and has its own ultra-violent specialized military to enforce that illegality.
It's harmless for the vast majority. We're quite sure of that, because the number of people who have indulged is extremely large. Pretending that your wife's experience, even if correctly attributed to marijuana use, is sufficient to categorize marijuana as generally harmful is very poor procedure. It is exactly the same kind of cognitive error that would categorize peanut butter as generally harmful because occasionally someone is found to have an adverse reaction to peanuts.
So is what you're saying that Rosa Parks should have stayed at the back of the bus? Because she was "saying "Fuck you" to the whole democratic system and was just BEGGING the judge to put her in jail"?
What you're completely missing here is that the law can be wrong. The whole system can be wrong. It can fail to respond to corrective forces, such as information or awareness of side effects, or to take civil rights into account. Even when there are large, organized groups of people carefully organizing the data and presenting it regularly to the government. Even when the government's own studies indicate the accuracy of that data. At that point, you have government out of control; not a correct expression of a democratic process, or more to the point, correct action of the republic.
You're also missing the point that it isn't about the thrill of smoking; it's about the government wrongfully repressing personal choice, and in the process, creating a whole series of side effects that do huge harm, and then refusing to admit it was wrong. Even though prohibition II has produced exactly the same problems, albeit written larger, as prohibition I did; and even though just like prohibition I, prohibition II has utterly failed to control the substances it was intended to control and the people it was intended to control. It's junk law from junk minds which does huge damage to the citizens.
I don't do a lot if recreational drugs outside of wine with dinner and a cup of coffee from time to time. I'm not personally fond of pot. But I absolutely deny that the government is correct in saying I cannot smoke pot; and it's outright evil in what it does to people it catches selling or smoking pot. As far as the DEA goes, that's a violent and corrupt force deployed against our own people to no good purpose. The government does not deserve my support in this matter, and it does not have it.
We're going to need giant tubs of melted butter.
Good grief. Ok, here's the obvious example: You can sell, or smoke, a joint - a light intoxicant which does far less harm (probably none at all in most cases) than alcohol - and go to jail for years for these acts. After which, you are often considered a felon, which pretty well puts paid to your future. I'm sure you know this and you're just being disingenuous.
You're confusing your uninformed state with the idea that my statements are unfounded.
Go spend some time with Google. The DEA's actions and policies are largely a matter of record, as is the massive amount of harm they have caused.
The DEA lies about everything else. Why would this be any different? The very fact that the DEA exists is an affront to personal liberty; We have decades of detailed records of them spreading falsehoods, destroying families, in general doing far more harm than drugs ever did or ever could.
DEA Informers: They lie about who they are, what they do, what their intent is -- and just about anything else they're asked. This is who they are. Liars. But that's not all they are. They're also as dangerous as any government agent you can imagine, wholly without concern for anyone but themselves.
DEA agents: They lie about where the danger comes from; they lie about toxicity; they lie about addictiveness. They lie about consequences (they ARE the primary consequences), and they have been known to attempt to trade your personal honor for your freedom if you fall into their hands. They created the violence underlying the black market drug trade; they created the black market itself. They're not shy of interfering with other sovereign countries, nor of playing fast and loose with our own "justice" system.
So when a DEA "anything" tells you something, you're best off assuming they're lying. It's what they do. Aside from destroying families, that is. If they're not lying, they're likely trying to hurt you some other way. Get away and stay away. Nothing truly good can ever come of contact with people so bereft of personal honor -- or so outright stupid -- that they would work for the DEA.
To heck with them. And the laws they rode in on. And those who made the laws. And those in the general population who thought, and perhaps still think, agencies like the DEA were ever a good idea.
The drug war: It's a war on you and your family and your friends.
Yes, but there was that helicopter crash; the typesetting community always blamed TeX for that, and ever since then, TeX has been relegated to doing font work in the third world, charity undertakings and the like. And really, who wanted to be limited to 55 fonts per document? Some of us type in the fast lane, buddy.
Not only does my installation ensure there is earth between the panels and the sun after the day is over, I've carefully arranged it so that the back of the solar panels face the sun at night. That's how youz know i r an engeenee-er.
Oy. That's not how it works. An encrypted message contains something unknown. Any particular spending required to break it occurs prior to knowing what's in it. Once spent, then they know -- and since they *already* spent to break it, there's no need to make any further finance based decisions. If the message contains something they think is of interest, it'll go off to the people who might like to know about it without any particular commentary. This is how it works -- I'm not guessing. Not by some magical choosing of which messages to break because they know what's in them.
The entire point of any sub rosa organization, be it religious extremists, home grown anarchist bombers, counterfeiters, drug dealers or agents of snooping nations is that they are trying to operate in such a way as to look innocent. So encrypted messages from otherwise innocent looking parties aren't presumed innocent. For that matter, unencrypted messages aren't presumed innocent. This isn't speculation; this is the reality of it. The computers look at everything and if it looks like it's something of interest, it gets kicked upwards.
As for the prior AC, if you assume they haven't cracked anything in particular, you're making a serious mistake. One they'd very much like you to make.
None of which stops them from calling your LEO's office and saying, "Hi, this is your federal government; Joe Palooka, address such and such, is dealing drugs." Or whatever. At which juncture, you are now a POGI. The point is, your secrets... aren't.
IMHO, anyone who assumes they are operating in an atmosphere of privacy today is very likely wrong, even in some of the most mundane venues we encounter on a daily basis. I think acting as if one has privacy is imprudent, to say the least. Right now, if you can't stand for something to be known, then you're much better off if you don't talk about it, don't write it down, don't commit it to digital form, and don't perform any on-record acts that relate to it. Also, assume you're on-record. All the time. Unless you can prove otherwise. Which you probably can't do.
If you believe, even for a second, that the feds can't read iMessages, you are just the deathstick dealer they are looking for.
Y'all know about this, right?
Here a money quote from an article in Wired:
Yeah... that really fits in perfectly with "can't read iMessages", lol.
Mine's available to me. All the time. Since I also have a macbook pro, I'm well aware of the inconvenience of dragging that thing around. As I'm also carrying a camera bag, it becomes a real logistical issue -- more than just "do I want to" but "is this really practical?" Seriously man, you just can't argue your way out of a phone or tablet being much more portable and convenient. I appreciate the effort you're making, but it's pointless, really, because you're completely wrong.
I always carry a bag. Camera's in it, as is some other tech. But even if I were not carrying a bag, an ipod or iphone fits fine in a pocket, and they are the same device for all intents and purposes. People will carry highly portable objects more willingly than less portable objects. My tablet is portable because I've *always* got my camera, and the bag accommodates the tablet without any additional issues at all. The tablet multiplies the effective capabilities of the camera; it's a great combination. From notes to astro calcs to the portfolio, it does everything I need without the several added pounds of a laptop.
For me, that stuff needs to be portable; it enhances how I live. Others will have other sets of apps they want to be portable. Your urge to run on a desktop does nothing to minimize that market. You're engaged in a massive exercise of missing the point because you don't have similar needs... but the market does.
Why should I depend on the kindness of strangers, or pay for a connection, not to mention deal with connectivity issues, when I can have the apps and images right there, 100% reliably? While you might think paying the phone company, essentially forever, for something completely unnecessary is fun, I don't. And I won't. Others agree: That's why there are devices without those connectivity options. Mine actually has the cellular option, but that is only because it wasn't separable from the GPS. It's never been used, nor do I ever expect to use it.
Yeah, no, lol. I'm out in the field in a dark sky area with my gear, there's zero free connectivity to be had. Everyone has different needs, and mine aren't what you apparently think they should be. Furthermore, if your arguments were valid (they're not), there wouldn't even be a market for these devices, much less one that snaps up faster and more capable ones at every release iteration. You can argue until you're blue in the face, and the marketplace will tell you that you are roundly wrong. Perhaps you can't see it, but the cool thing about it is, you're entitled to your opinion, but you're not entitled to your own facts. :)
Cheers!
Yes, that's what I'm talking about. Not little java games, etc. Right now, I have CAD, structured drawing, software defined radio, manikin manipulation, astronomy software, etc. All of it runs without any connection to anything; there is no web server, nor am I much interested in any software that requires an Internet connection. As the devices power up, apps will too. Right now, for instance, the SDR program stresses the hardware to its limits; can't do any more than it's already doing. But there is way more that could be done if there were more CPU available. Image editing: Need gigs of available ram to do a decent, layered process (non-destructive) edit on a RAW camera image. See, these things aren't about java coding. They're written to the metal, and as I say, could use more hardware right now. Referring back to the putative availability of AI, I rather expect that will also require more hardware (can't be sure until we know how to make it, but I think it's a good guess.) Again, I'm not going to want to be connected. So you see, your entire first paragraph is talking about something other than what I was. Not that the things you're talking about aren't there or are irrelevant, but they're not driving things to the next core or next GB. Well, perhaps some games are, actually. Most of the games I play are on the order of chess and go, so I'm not really familiar with the high CPU/GPU demand ones, but I know they're out there.
In one very important way: It runs on my portable device and I can walk away with it. That's all tablets and smartphones give anyone. But saying "that's all" understates the value by incredible amounts. I *love* having that kind of power in my pocket. When does Jupiter rise? What's the length of an inverted vee resonant antenna for 3.800 MHz at 35 feet? At 60 feet? How much lumber will I need for this project? Hey, want to see my photo portfolio? It's all right in here. Ok, I'm out in the field with my Canon 6D to shoot auroras. But it's cold. I pop that puppy on a tripod, retire inside the car, and remote control it wirelessly using my iPad. Yeah. that's the kind of thing I'm talking about.
Same here. I own a raft of Kindle books. Zero iBooks. Apple can lick my dirty, dirty touchscreen.
Oh, that can be arranged.
It sounds like Microsoft didn't so much as give up, as go around Apple. If you buy on the web, Apple doesn't get the cut. Microsoft got the app into the app store. Pretty much seems like Microsoft got most of what they wanted, and Apple got nothing other than the ability to say their policy is still unviolated. Which, considering the nature of it, isn't exactly a great marketing ploy.
Yes, overall energy capacity, not peak power. My bad.
Ah yes, what a cogent, detailed argument you present. I bow to your obviously superior knowledge.