Perhaps the new owners will finally fix the massively broken and stupid moderation system that the previous and current owners have left bereft of badly needed attention:
o Moderators can't post with ID. Stupid. Utterly, completely, stupid. Pointless. Ridiculous. o Moderators have zero accountability for what they've done -- only for what they might do later o Absolutely no effective mechanism to remove bad moderation (and that really screws up threads here) o AC's unjustly penalized, many of the site's best posts never rise above the noise level o Trolls go un-handled -- the AC low-runging is a punt at not having to work at moderation. But it doesn't work. o Perversely limited set of mod types leaves moderators unable to moderate reasonably o Limits on mod ranges penalize the very best posts (and don't adequately address the trolls, either, because... o On slashdot, troll is effectively equal to AC with one person disagreeing, and... o Because we can't attribute the "disagree" to the mod, it can't be remediated except by the... o Random and future-behavior-only-focused meta moderation system.
And then we have:
o Ridiculous delays between posts for ACs AND for logged-in users. Big convo? Too bad for you. o Inability STILL to handle many character entities after all these years. Not to mention UTF-*8, omg. o Retarded signature limits. C'mon. Bad sigs should be moderated. It takes a lot of chars to use HTML.
And of course there are the short-bus elephants in the room:
o "Editors" that know nothing about editing. Or writing. Or what constitutes a "story" o The "firehose", a way to vote up stuff that won't get posted -- can be a total waste of time o And the continuous mucking about with the parts that worked, making them NOT work,
while all of the above, which ACTUALLY needs fixing, goes unfixed.
It doesnt matter if those countries get 100 bucks if 99 of them end up going back to cost of manufacturing.
Part of "cost of manufacturing" is paying workers. There and here. So it does matter. When my $100 goes there instead of here, our economy takes a hit. Tiny, sure, but when it's thousands or tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of "whatever", then it's no longer a tiny hit.
How do you get shell access on your average Mac without physical access? SSH isn't enabled by default as has been pointed out. In fact, it's been a real PITA to get the versions of OS X I've configured to play nice on the network for the command line. I doubt one user in a thousand has done it -- slashdot mac users not being significantly representative of the average mac users, of course. My macs have SSH available, but the port isn't open to the Intertubes outside of my LAN, so it doesn't concern me very much.
So this essentially resolves to a "you have to be there" exploit.
Bees are all over the place at my home (basically at the center of a small town in rural Montana.) We have quite a few planters full of flowers on our largish deck (about 1000' sq), and it is not uncommon to go out there and see a very large number of bees going about their business. They are nearly zero threat. Well, unless you sit on one.:) We try not to do that.
There are no obvious hives anywhere nearby, and they seem to come and go from all points of the compass.
Sortof-kinda related, there are local honey merchants, and the honey is just lovely.
Think of the football player from this planet! They would be about 3 feet high and enormously strong
Yeah, but if it did that to them, it'd do the same thing to the cheerleaders, then there would be no reason to watch the game -- unless you have a gnome fetish.
Furthermore, local access pretty much is the end of the road anyway. Boot from the right CD with a custom filesystem that ignores HD filesystem permissions and yet allows you to set them any way you want, system is now wide open. Replace a few choice commands that you know are going to run, and bang, fully compromised. And that's just one of the many easy ways in to access as the system stands. You can also copy off the entire HD, or for that matter, erase it. Or both. You can compromise a command for a way in, copy an otherwise encrypted volume and walk off with it, break the encryption at your leisure, then use the previously installed compromise to get in and cause mayhem.
If you don't have physical security and there is any kind of local threat of compromise, you could become toast at any time. These kinds of "threats" are insignificant in the larger scheme of things. If you need local security, the only sufficient mechanism is to physically deny access to the computer.
HPV is listed as an STD, and really only becomes an issue when two or more incompatible strains interact - meaning, multiple partners within relatively short periods, again - a lifestyle choice.
Because you can quite easily get HPV sexually, that makes it an STD -- a "Sexually Transmitted Disease." But you can also get it via casual contact. Which you cannot control. Also, and rather finally, as you can't control other people's behavior or contacts, nor promise your behavior or contacts will keep you clear of this, it needs vaccination. Just the numbers alone tell you HPV needs vaccination: A 50% infection rate in the general population. No set of excuses can make that number go away. But vaccination can.
I strongly suspect that if "everyone" were to get on Google+, by which I mean to imply a Facebook-level of adoption, it would pretty much automatically ruin itself.
But I've been wrong before. Why, I remember back in 1959 when I thought I'd left my panda bear on the bed, but actually it was in the playroom. I was totally wrong. What a lesson that was!
society breaks down in 50 years and is utterly gone in 100 years, if no one has children
Who said anything about "no one having children"? There are some countries with (barely) negative population growth, but that is not even close to "no one having children."
people who raise children deserve credit: they are investing in the future of civilization
Meh. Civilization, in the sense of "people today, different people tomorrow, in an overall sense, is driven -- hard -- by the instinct to breed. I don't see it as something you should get "credit" for. If that's how you want to roll, fine.
What I'm talking about is the ability to exert control over your own reproductive system. You're a working person, you have a kid, likely you're no longer qualified to be a working person, because you now have a whole new set of responsibilities. If you are wealthy enough to slough those off on someone else (nannies, etc.) that's fine. Or if you're supporting a spouse who will carry that load. Otherwise, you're basically crippling your ability to be productive at work. From long nights up with baby to a whole slew of other responsibilities and necessities, some of which will extend past a decade, you will be less effective at your job, only assuming you were effective at it in the first place.
Birth control gives people a choice: They can pursue normal life without abstinence, yet slew the odds strongly in favor of not getting pregnant. It's no longer a general given that the mating process means high odds of pregnancy. Instead, we can control the when, and thereby large portions of the quality of the outcome.
Personally, I reserve giving "credit" to those people who plan the raising of children such that they are available, secure and ready for the task when they undertake it. Not when they punch a hole in the middle of their job responsibilities by pulling the "preggers" card. Furthermore, I think bringing an unwanted child into the world is downright awful.
While I am all for workplace equality, I see it as going both ways: If you do something that makes you less good at what you do than someone you could be replaced by, your job is at risk, and legitimately so in my view. Pregnancy, drug intoxication on the job (and that includes alcohol), not being where you're supposed to be when you're supposed to be, etc.
I have met many heteros who, thinking (I don't know why) that I want to hear about it (perhaps because I am hetero), like to confide details of all kinds of out-of-work issues, right down to their sex life, or lack thereof. Doesn't bother me, though I really don't find myself inclined to reciprocate on the level of specifics.
If people aren't telling you these things, perhaps you're simply not that approachable. Doesn't mean they aren't telling them to other people. It's ubiquitous in both white- and blue-collar environments.
Hetero or not, I am no more offended by a gay pride shirt than I am a football jersey or Old Navy branded tee, or someone wearing 3D jewelry depicting Christ nailed to a cross. Nor would I decline a gay pride ribbon at this point in time -- or a polygamy / polyamory pride ribbon, come to that. It's past time to push back. Hard.
The difference is that friendship isn't one of society's formal mechanisms to provide income, and thereby access to improving one's security and stability. Working is. So when it's okay for a company to say "no blacks" or "no gays" or "no women" or "no one over 35" or whatever -- basically discrimination by class unrelated to capacity to perform the work -- then we get into a situation where aggregate behaviors of this type result in whole classes being disenfranchised.
I have known a few [gay people], some throw it in your face, others keep it to themselves.
Yeah, I've known heteros like that too. It's shocking how they just act like it's "okay" to talk about the opposite-sex people they care most about in life. They should really know better and keep that damned hetero stuff in the closet.
Next thing you know, it'll be okay to say "wife" or "husband" in the office. It's a damned slippery slope, I tell you. Next thing you know, people will be acting like it's reasonable to talk about their kids. Next thing you know, they'll think it's okay to, you know, actually bring them to the office for a visit!
I'm sorry, I have to sit down and fan myself for a moment now. I'm just soooo upset.
Those who keep it to themselves are welcome to work for me. Those who don't, wouldn't get along with me anyway. Since I've never employed more than 20 people at a time, everyone who works for me more or less has to get along with me.
Thank God we have people like you working to make sure that these things Just Don't Happen On Your Watch. You, sir, are a true hero.
By "lifestyle", you imply choice, which is an incorrect analysis of threat vectors for HPV. In any case, even if it were only sexual behavior that resulted in HPV transmission (it isn't), sexuality is hardly a "lifestyle." The vast majority of people engage in it, and of the remainder, a large number are trying to or intend to.
Combine that fact with the knowledge that HPV 16 and 18 cause about 70% of cervical cancers and that these can be passed non-sexually -- now it is obvious we need to vaccinate.
No. It isn't the same. Vaccines serve to reduce everyone's risk. Your immunity helps the little baby next door who is too young to vaccinate, and the lady down the street who is allergic to albumen or whatever. Then there's herd immunity -- once a certain proportion of an inter-social group are immune, it becomes much more difficult for a disease to really get any momentum going, and that helps everyone. We share our air, and it's very worthy that we don't share it in such a way that is dangerous insofar as we can avoid it.
Vaccination is a very, very good thing. Intentionally avoiding vaccination when vaccination is possible is an act of aggression -- or stupidity.
The only reason it's being "shoved" down people's throats is because there are clueless idiots (cough/Jenny McCarthy/cough) out there spreading dangerous unscientific nonsense and fomenting unrest with regard to this in any way they can. People were not getting vaccinated who definitely should have been getting vaccinated. It was bad for everyone. So, just as we don't let idiots take a crap on the sidewalks even if they might like to, we aren't going to let idiots (or their children) become transmission vectors for disease, either.
Buck up and go get stuck, and encourage everyone you know to do so as well. It's the right thing to do.
If you can encourage others by honestly explaining the benefits of your life experience, please do so!
I try to do so. I write software I hope people will get good use out of; I write about social issues, superstition, AI issues and more. I keep an oar in around here most of the time as well, as you'll see if you navigate my comment history.
I'm old and creaky now, so these are the things I can realistically do.
Slashdot Mirror
Perhaps the new owners will finally fix the massively broken and stupid moderation system that the previous and current owners have left bereft of badly needed attention:
o Moderators can't post with ID. Stupid. Utterly, completely, stupid. Pointless. Ridiculous.
o Moderators have zero accountability for what they've done -- only for what they might do later
o Absolutely no effective mechanism to remove bad moderation (and that really screws up threads here)
o AC's unjustly penalized, many of the site's best posts never rise above the noise level
o Trolls go un-handled -- the AC low-runging is a punt at not having to work at moderation. But it doesn't work.
o Perversely limited set of mod types leaves moderators unable to moderate reasonably
o Limits on mod ranges penalize the very best posts (and don't adequately address the trolls, either, because...
o On slashdot, troll is effectively equal to AC with one person disagreeing, and...
o Because we can't attribute the "disagree" to the mod, it can't be remediated except by the...
o Random and future-behavior-only-focused meta moderation system.
And then we have:
o Ridiculous delays between posts for ACs AND for logged-in users. Big convo? Too bad for you.
o Inability STILL to handle many character entities after all these years. Not to mention UTF-*8, omg.
o Retarded signature limits. C'mon. Bad sigs should be moderated. It takes a lot of chars to use HTML.
And of course there are the short-bus elephants in the room:
o "Editors" that know nothing about editing. Or writing. Or what constitutes a "story"
o The "firehose", a way to vote up stuff that won't get posted -- can be a total waste of time
o And the continuous mucking about with the parts that worked, making them NOT work,
while all of the above, which ACTUALLY needs fixing, goes unfixed.
I'd fire the bloody lot of them, frankly.
Part of "cost of manufacturing" is paying workers. There and here. So it does matter. When my $100 goes there instead of here, our economy takes a hit. Tiny, sure, but when it's thousands or tens of thousands or hundreds of thousands of "whatever", then it's no longer a tiny hit.
That remark was hackneyed.
This. A thousands times this. Should be modded to positive infinity.
How do you get shell access on your average Mac without physical access? SSH isn't enabled by default as has been pointed out. In fact, it's been a real PITA to get the versions of OS X I've configured to play nice on the network for the command line. I doubt one user in a thousand has done it -- slashdot mac users not being significantly representative of the average mac users, of course. My macs have SSH available, but the port isn't open to the Intertubes outside of my LAN, so it doesn't concern me very much.
So this essentially resolves to a "you have to be there" exploit.
Exactly so.
Clearly, that's not what I said.
Random data point == random data point
not
Random data point == confirmation of "there's no problem" stance
Try for comprehension next time. You'd be amazed what you can learn if you actually, you know, understand what you read.
Bees are all over the place at my home (basically at the center of a small town in rural Montana.) We have quite a few planters full of flowers on our largish deck (about 1000' sq), and it is not uncommon to go out there and see a very large number of bees going about their business. They are nearly zero threat. Well, unless you sit on one. :) We try not to do that.
There are no obvious hives anywhere nearby, and they seem to come and go from all points of the compass.
Sortof-kinda related, there are local honey merchants, and the honey is just lovely.
Yeah, but if it did that to them, it'd do the same thing to the cheerleaders, then there would be no reason to watch the game -- unless you have a gnome fetish.
Seems like it is: "the attacker already has to have local access"
That's what I was working off of, anyway.
Network-imposed exploits are something else entirely.
Furthermore, local access pretty much is the end of the road anyway. Boot from the right CD with a custom filesystem that ignores HD filesystem permissions and yet allows you to set them any way you want, system is now wide open. Replace a few choice commands that you know are going to run, and bang, fully compromised. And that's just one of the many easy ways in to access as the system stands. You can also copy off the entire HD, or for that matter, erase it. Or both. You can compromise a command for a way in, copy an otherwise encrypted volume and walk off with it, break the encryption at your leisure, then use the previously installed compromise to get in and cause mayhem.
If you don't have physical security and there is any kind of local threat of compromise, you could become toast at any time. These kinds of "threats" are insignificant in the larger scheme of things. If you need local security, the only sufficient mechanism is to physically deny access to the computer.
Because you can quite easily get HPV sexually, that makes it an STD -- a "Sexually Transmitted Disease." But you can also get it via casual contact. Which you cannot control. Also, and rather finally, as you can't control other people's behavior or contacts, nor promise your behavior or contacts will keep you clear of this, it needs vaccination. Just the numbers alone tell you HPV needs vaccination: A 50% infection rate in the general population. No set of excuses can make that number go away. But vaccination can.
I strongly suspect that if "everyone" were to get on Google+, by which I mean to imply a Facebook-level of adoption, it would pretty much automatically ruin itself.
But I've been wrong before. Why, I remember back in 1959 when I thought I'd left my panda bear on the bed, but actually it was in the playroom. I was totally wrong. What a lesson that was!
Who said anything about "no one having children"? There are some countries with (barely) negative population growth, but that is not even close to "no one having children."
Meh. Civilization, in the sense of "people today, different people tomorrow, in an overall sense, is driven -- hard -- by the instinct to breed. I don't see it as something you should get "credit" for. If that's how you want to roll, fine.
What I'm talking about is the ability to exert control over your own reproductive system. You're a working person, you have a kid, likely you're no longer qualified to be a working person, because you now have a whole new set of responsibilities. If you are wealthy enough to slough those off on someone else (nannies, etc.) that's fine. Or if you're supporting a spouse who will carry that load. Otherwise, you're basically crippling your ability to be productive at work. From long nights up with baby to a whole slew of other responsibilities and necessities, some of which will extend past a decade, you will be less effective at your job, only assuming you were effective at it in the first place.
Birth control gives people a choice: They can pursue normal life without abstinence, yet slew the odds strongly in favor of not getting pregnant. It's no longer a general given that the mating process means high odds of pregnancy. Instead, we can control the when, and thereby large portions of the quality of the outcome.
Personally, I reserve giving "credit" to those people who plan the raising of children such that they are available, secure and ready for the task when they undertake it. Not when they punch a hole in the middle of their job responsibilities by pulling the "preggers" card. Furthermore, I think bringing an unwanted child into the world is downright awful.
While I am all for workplace equality, I see it as going both ways: If you do something that makes you less good at what you do than someone you could be replaced by, your job is at risk, and legitimately so in my view. Pregnancy, drug intoxication on the job (and that includes alcohol), not being where you're supposed to be when you're supposed to be, etc.
I have met many heteros who, thinking (I don't know why) that I want to hear about it (perhaps because I am hetero), like to confide details of all kinds of out-of-work issues, right down to their sex life, or lack thereof. Doesn't bother me, though I really don't find myself inclined to reciprocate on the level of specifics.
If people aren't telling you these things, perhaps you're simply not that approachable. Doesn't mean they aren't telling them to other people. It's ubiquitous in both white- and blue-collar environments.
Hetero or not, I am no more offended by a gay pride shirt than I am a football jersey or Old Navy branded tee, or someone wearing 3D jewelry depicting Christ nailed to a cross. Nor would I decline a gay pride ribbon at this point in time -- or a polygamy / polyamory pride ribbon, come to that. It's past time to push back. Hard.
I have to admit, that does seem to explain the serious problems with Google Base, youtube, GMail, Google+ and Adwords.
You made me laugh. Good for you. I like to start my days that way. :)
In a post entitled: "Re: child rearing impacts women disproportionately", AC says:
There's an entire industry that recognizes this specific serious social problem. That industry is the condom and other birth control manufacturers.
The difference is that friendship isn't one of society's formal mechanisms to provide income, and thereby access to improving one's security and stability. Working is. So when it's okay for a company to say "no blacks" or "no gays" or "no women" or "no one over 35" or whatever -- basically discrimination by class unrelated to capacity to perform the work -- then we get into a situation where aggregate behaviors of this type result in whole classes being disenfranchised.
Yeah, I've known heteros like that too. It's shocking how they just act like it's "okay" to talk about the opposite-sex people they care most about in life. They should really know better and keep that damned hetero stuff in the closet.
Next thing you know, it'll be okay to say "wife" or "husband" in the office. It's a damned slippery slope, I tell you. Next thing you know, people will be acting like it's reasonable to talk about their kids. Next thing you know, they'll think it's okay to, you know, actually bring them to the office for a visit!
I'm sorry, I have to sit down and fan myself for a moment now. I'm just soooo upset.
Thank God we have people like you working to make sure that these things Just Don't Happen On Your Watch. You, sir, are a true hero.
"Obama's America"?
So, people weren't working with people they hated, wasting away their lives, needing money, under Bush-II? Clinton? Bush-I? Etc.?
By "lifestyle", you imply choice, which is an incorrect analysis of threat vectors for HPV. In any case, even if it were only sexual behavior that resulted in HPV transmission (it isn't), sexuality is hardly a "lifestyle." The vast majority of people engage in it, and of the remainder, a large number are trying to or intend to.
HPV presently has about a 50% incidence in the US population.
Combine that fact with the knowledge that HPV 16 and 18 cause about 70% of cervical cancers and that these can be passed non-sexually -- now it is obvious we need to vaccinate.
No. It isn't the same. Vaccines serve to reduce everyone's risk. Your immunity helps the little baby next door who is too young to vaccinate, and the lady down the street who is allergic to albumen or whatever. Then there's herd immunity -- once a certain proportion of an inter-social group are immune, it becomes much more difficult for a disease to really get any momentum going, and that helps everyone. We share our air, and it's very worthy that we don't share it in such a way that is dangerous insofar as we can avoid it.
Vaccination is a very, very good thing. Intentionally avoiding vaccination when vaccination is possible is an act of aggression -- or stupidity.
The only reason it's being "shoved" down people's throats is because there are clueless idiots (cough/Jenny McCarthy/cough) out there spreading dangerous unscientific nonsense and fomenting unrest with regard to this in any way they can. People were not getting vaccinated who definitely should have been getting vaccinated. It was bad for everyone. So, just as we don't let idiots take a crap on the sidewalks even if they might like to, we aren't going to let idiots (or their children) become transmission vectors for disease, either.
Buck up and go get stuck, and encourage everyone you know to do so as well. It's the right thing to do.
I believe you've determined the precise value of your remarks. Zero. :)
I try to do so. I write software I hope people will get good use out of; I write about social issues, superstition, AI issues and more. I keep an oar in around here most of the time as well, as you'll see if you navigate my comment history.
I'm old and creaky now, so these are the things I can realistically do.
Ok, then and users bitten by new OS versions that break the user's software have no right to complain either, amirite?
"no right"... don't think that means what you think it means.