Trusting Skype "fortunately-nobody-does-it-like-us P2P" for an emergency call? Well, at least it might get you a Darwin award...:/
As POTS replacement, I use (and would recommend) JustVoip coupled with E911 service from SIPgate (and a tiny UPS for the ATA and router/modem) =>
true emergency dialing for $2/mo.
Plus, naturally, others calls remain way cheaper than Skype given how many SIP providers there are to choose from...
So Stuxnet chatter is still observed around the planet, including in Iran and the US. Duh.
Now how exactly does this "expert" come to the conclusion that, somehow, activity from the US etc must be from infected home PCs, yet the same from Iran must be from some seekret uranium enrichment plant, which typically wound not be connected to the internet?
Oh, my bad, forgot, this comes from ScareTV... Never mind.
At the end of the day, if you don't commit a crime, the presence of a camera will not affect you.
Wrong. It affects everyone, in a lot more ways than you think. Simple example: visiting any "embarrassing" place (medical facility, sex-shop, late movie, badly rated restaurant or bar...) is perfectly legal, yet I bet most people would behave differently if the footage of a camera at such places entrance was publicly available and/or archived forever, instead of only kept by the owner and for a short time. More arguments against that stupid "If you have nothing to hide..." line
Well, unlike you [White Shade] I feel that so-called wholesale surveillance, if left unregulated, even "just" in public places, would become a threat, a violation of everyone's right to privacy and dignity. Today we have cameras. To prevent crime we're told (but studies seem to indicate that doesn't work). UK especially. More and more, networked, centralized. With now Joe Sixpack watching too (brilliant, really). Plus license plate OCR to enforce traffic restrictions, with such info logged to some big-ass database and cross-referenced to car owners details. Software also tries to analyze and pick "suspicious" behavior. Next is facial recognition (too unreliable today, but technology only improves). All in all, logging everyone's moves relatively cheaply seems doable in a not-so-distant future.
Now would you consider a detailed list of all the places you went to (e.g. stores, bars, relatives, friends, doctor's office, lawyer...) free for anyone to look at (your spouse, your ex, your boss, your parents, the government...) or just your own damn business? Where do we draw the line?
/me continuing that game: Just 'cause the crypto's lifted from peer-reviewed software doesn't mean it's used correctly. [RC4 is a good stream cipher -- yet WEP is an epic fail]
For Android, IMHO better options already exist.
Get Sipdroid + any SIP provider like CallWithUs,
justvoip (+ IPKall as DID) etc.
Look Ma, calls over 3G to many countries for free or cheaper than big-brother-Google.
There's really no need to redefine UTC -- especially if it's just because some programmers are ignorant of alternatives.
Absence of leap seconds is exactly what already-existing scales like TAI are for.
Amen to that.
I live in Palo Alto, heart of the Silicon Valley I was told. Fastest connection I can get (without having to take a 2nd mortgage, that is): 768 kbit/s. And, with a static IP, the same price as 9 years ago. WTF?!?
In the meantime, French ISPs are addressing complaints that 22 Mbit/s VDSL is a bit old-school by offering 100 Mbit/s FTTH (phone and TV included, of course), Japanese get Gigabit for ~60$/mo...
AT&T, I'm glad you're upgrading your equipment at long last... Now when can I get better than 3rd-world connection?
"I think judgment matters. If you have something that you don't want anyone to know, maybe you shouldn't be doing it in the first place, but if you really need that kind of privacy, the reality is that search engines including Google do retain this information for some time, and it's important, for example that we are all subject in the United States to the Patriot Act. It is possible that that information could be made available to the authorities."
Sorry, this does sound to me like one of those despicable and horribly misguided "if you have nothing to hide, why would you want privacy?" line.
I like Bruce Schneier's answer.
Er, Bing might not be 'as worse' as Google anymore when it comes to privacy, but I definitely wouldn't say it's "done correctly" either.
You may want to check out ixquick, a meta-search engine that doesn't log your IP etc at all -- that surely beats deleting some info after some time in my book.
(better yet, ixquick is also available over SSL, in case you're concerned about your ISP snooping too... Oh, hello Comcast...)
... Thanks to my choice (VoIP + WiFi on my "smart" linux enabled (maemo) hand set) my total cost of ownership (TCO) is less than $100 per year.... $24 per year for SkhypeIn (with SkhypePro) + $3.00 per month for unlimited calling...
Huh, if all you need is calling while next to a WiFi hotspot, "less than $100/y" remains way overpriced IMHO.
I use VoIP from my cellphone for maybe $10 to $20/y with SIPdroid + IPkall DID + JustVoip (or others) + optional: Asterisk, SIPBroker and E164.
But all this is mostly irrelevant as my reason for having a cell is to call from places other than home or work = often without WiFi.
Back on topic: VMware stuff is IMO like that VoIP/WiFi stuff: sure cool, appealing to geeks. Good for PR / publicity. But otherwise limited practical usefulness, esp for non-techies...
Seconded. Furthermore, even if the GPS averaged on a much smaller interval, quoting http://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/20081206/NEWS/812060371/1334/NEWS: "The distance between the radar reading and when he was recorded going 45 mph is great enough that Malone could have easily slowed down, Heppe testified." Game over son, you lost.
Sorry sabre307, I have to side with the author of TFA here. I suspect that the majority of Windows users at home are running as Admin (not a great idea), Linux distros offer easy root access (on-demand, better); yet somehow novices don't generally wipe system files etc, and PC manufacturers aren't all bankrupt yet. Maybe not perfect but sounds workable to me... More on-topic: I have an Android Dev Phone 1, ie "factory rooted" G1. Can you believe it's not bricked yet? Perhaps there are more dangerous things on this planet than root access...
You/kestasjk make it sound like OpenBSD had to play catch-up implementing NX. FYI, OpenBSD 3.3 was actually the first OS to ship with it (except they called this W^X, "write XOR execute"), 6.5 years ago.
I'll give you that the new "in a heck of a long time" wording in their tagline is unfortunate. It must be ~11 years now, a pretty strong track record I'd say, but feel free to convince me otherwise...
G1s aren't exactly hard to unlock, especially when one variant happens to be like that out of the box (yes, the Android dev phone 1 or ADP1). Well worth the extra $25 "Google tax" IMHO. Plus I've had a chance to try 1.5/cupcake >2 weeks before most G1 users, and I like it.
I use my ADP1 with AT&T. Yup, no 3G for me (yet?) because US carriers somehow manage to always pick their very own frequencies (wtf?!? 1700 MHz band aka AWS for T-Mobile, some 1900 flavor for AT&T even though they have a 1700/AWS license as well, and whereas the rest of the world agreed on 2100 long ago).
Anyway, I have 3 lines on a $50 +2 x $10 family plan = $23/line, or ~$26 with taxes etc... Unlimited data adds $15/mo.
Yes I'll need about 6 months to recoup the extra cost of this phone ($424) vs an iPhone with typical voice+data plan ($199 + $78-ish/mo) -- not taking into account the pennies I can save on apps (e.g. free SSH client) and on calls using VoIP/SIP.
Speaking of which, check out http://www.sipdroid.org/; it's definitely still buggy but works over 2.5G. Cupcake and open-source in general rock.
Ouch. Dude, if you need to lose 15 to 20 minutes (let alone 45) to restart your PC, something is terminally wrong with your setup. Vista on a 486? Even in such pathological case, wouldn't suspend or hibernate be an option?
I always power down my (work or home) PC when I expect to not need it for a while. Initiating hibernation takes me 2 seconds, resuming 30 to 40s in the rare instances when the machine is not already up again by the time I get back to it, or if I need to VPN into it.
I'm using Linux (Ubuntu 8.10, doesn't matter much), shutting down via 's2disk'. Basically, it's hibernate, ie all applications etc are saved to disk in whatever state they happen to be, no need to exit any etc... s2disk uses compression by default, so while it may take a bit longer for the machine to actually finish writing everything to disk and power down (who cares), resumes are/fast/.
Powering back up is usually triggered via the BIOS' RTC alarm, scheduled every weekday shortly before I'm expected to arrive at work. Worst case (say I'm there early), my PC is ready with all my apps running in less than 40s, time I may need anyway to check my voicemail etc.
Remote access via my company SonicWALL SSL-VPN is also a breeze, since this gateway can issue Wake-on-LAN to whatever one wants to get to.
Reducing waste in general is IMHO just being responsible. "We do not inherit the Earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children."
Amen to that. I gladly donate for every OpenBSD release, because this OS works great for me as bastion host, router etc. Surely I can (and will) do the same for my desktop OS; their developers/maintainers deserve more than just credit after all.
Maybe it's utopian to imagine that the Chinese government cares about its international reputation, but just in case they do (say because of the upcoming Olympics), we might be able to make a tiny bit of difference by expressing our support for the Dalaï Lama and his call for dialog, eg. here:
http://www.avaaz.org/en/tibet_end_the_violence/
Maybe I missed something but all links and references I've seen so far point back to the same paper by A.Klein, which itself only very partially quote the "OpenBSD coordinator"... If indeed Theo de Raadt wrote this (definitely plausible), why not put his name?
Also, the DNS issue is fixed in BIND 9.4.2, which is the version currently in OpenBSD's tree. I'd find it unlikely that somehow OpenBSD's developers deliberately left BIND PRNG fix out. Has anyone actually checked?
I can't help but think (sorry, I work in the field): powerful motors strapped to a person's body, combined with "wireless network gear" (although this last bit is not in TFA)... hmmm, they better make sure this "suit" is intrinsically secure, ie it cannot possibly make motions exceeding the wearer's physical limits, not matter how badly the software malfunctions or is compromised. Otherwise we could very well have someone eventually end up in intensive care because of a computer virus infection.:/ That said, in a very geeky sense (hey, this is/.), this looks cool indeed...
Slashdot Mirror
Trusting Skype "fortunately-nobody-does-it-like-us P2P" for an emergency call? Well, at least it might get you a Darwin award... :/
As POTS replacement, I use (and would recommend) JustVoip coupled with E911 service from SIPgate (and a tiny UPS for the ATA and router/modem) => true emergency dialing for $2/mo.
Plus, naturally, others calls remain way cheaper than Skype given how many SIP providers there are to choose from...
So Stuxnet chatter is still observed around the planet, including in Iran and the US. Duh.
Now how exactly does this "expert" come to the conclusion that, somehow, activity from the US etc must be from infected home PCs, yet the same from Iran must be from some seekret uranium enrichment plant, which typically wound not be connected to the internet?
Oh, my bad, forgot, this comes from ScareTV... Never mind.
Wrong. It affects everyone, in a lot more ways than you think. Simple example: visiting any "embarrassing" place (medical facility, sex-shop, late movie, badly rated restaurant or bar...) is perfectly legal, yet I bet most people would behave differently if the footage of a camera at such places entrance was publicly available and/or archived forever, instead of only kept by the owner and for a short time.
More arguments against that stupid "If you have nothing to hide..." line
Well, unlike you [White Shade] I feel that so-called wholesale surveillance, if left unregulated, even "just" in public places, would become a threat, a violation of everyone's right to privacy and dignity.
Today we have cameras. To prevent crime we're told (but studies seem to indicate that doesn't work). UK especially. More and more, networked, centralized. With now Joe Sixpack watching too (brilliant, really). Plus license plate OCR to enforce traffic restrictions, with such info logged to some big-ass database and cross-referenced to car owners details. Software also tries to analyze and pick "suspicious" behavior. Next is facial recognition (too unreliable today, but technology only improves). All in all, logging everyone's moves relatively cheaply seems doable in a not-so-distant future.
Now would you consider a detailed list of all the places you went to (e.g. stores, bars, relatives, friends, doctor's office, lawyer...) free for anyone to look at (your spouse, your ex, your boss, your parents, the government...) or just your own damn business?
Where do we draw the line?
/me continuing that game:
Just 'cause the crypto's lifted from peer-reviewed software doesn't mean it's used correctly.
[RC4 is a good stream cipher -- yet WEP is an epic fail]
For Android, IMHO better options already exist.
Get Sipdroid + any SIP provider like CallWithUs, justvoip (+ IPKall as DID) etc.
Look Ma, calls over 3G to many countries for free or cheaper than big-brother-Google.
There's really no need to redefine UTC -- especially if it's just because some programmers are ignorant of alternatives.
Absence of leap seconds is exactly what already-existing scales like TAI are for.
Please mod parent up; so far this seems the only informed comment on this thread (sigh).
Link to TFA: http://www.h-online.com/open/news/item/Canonical-clarifies-its-H-264-licence-993182.html
Amen to that.
I live in Palo Alto, heart of the Silicon Valley I was told. Fastest connection I can get (without having to take a 2nd mortgage, that is): 768 kbit/s. And, with a static IP, the same price as 9 years ago. WTF?!?
In the meantime, French ISPs are addressing complaints that 22 Mbit/s VDSL is a bit old-school by offering 100 Mbit/s FTTH (phone and TV included, of course), Japanese get Gigabit for ~60$/mo...
AT&T, I'm glad you're upgrading your equipment at long last... Now when can I get better than 3rd-world connection?
Sorry, this does sound to me like one of those despicable and horribly misguided "if you have nothing to hide, why would you want privacy?" line.
I like Bruce Schneier's answer.
Er, Bing might not be 'as worse' as Google anymore when it comes to privacy, but I definitely wouldn't say it's "done correctly" either.
You may want to check out ixquick, a meta-search engine that doesn't log your IP etc at all -- that surely beats deleting some info after some time in my book.
(better yet, ixquick is also available over SSL, in case you're concerned about your ISP snooping too... Oh, hello Comcast...)
... Thanks to my choice (VoIP + WiFi on my "smart" linux enabled (maemo) hand set) my total cost of ownership (TCO) is less than $100 per year. ... $24 per year for SkhypeIn (with SkhypePro) + $3.00 per month for unlimited calling...
Huh, if all you need is calling while next to a WiFi hotspot, "less than $100/y" remains way overpriced IMHO.
I use VoIP from my cellphone for maybe $10 to $20/y with SIPdroid + IPkall DID + JustVoip (or others) + optional: Asterisk, SIPBroker and E164. But all this is mostly irrelevant as my reason for having a cell is to call from places other than home or work = often without WiFi.
Back on topic: VMware stuff is IMO like that VoIP/WiFi stuff: sure cool, appealing to geeks. Good for PR / publicity. But otherwise limited practical usefulness, esp for non-techies...
RTT to my own resolver: microseconds
RTT to my ISP's resolver (Speakeasy = no redirect and such): ~21ms
RTT to Google's: 80+ms
No-brainer for me.
Seconded. Furthermore, even if the GPS averaged on a much smaller interval, quoting http://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/20081206/NEWS/812060371/1334/NEWS:
"The distance between the radar reading and when he was recorded going 45 mph is great enough that Malone could have easily slowed down, Heppe testified."
Game over son, you lost.
Sorry sabre307, I have to side with the author of TFA here.
I suspect that the majority of Windows users at home are running as Admin (not a great idea), Linux distros offer easy root access (on-demand, better); yet somehow novices don't generally wipe system files etc, and PC manufacturers aren't all bankrupt yet. Maybe not perfect but sounds workable to me...
More on-topic: I have an Android Dev Phone 1, ie "factory rooted" G1. Can you believe it's not bricked yet? Perhaps there are more dangerous things on this planet than root access...
You/kestasjk make it sound like OpenBSD had to play catch-up implementing NX. FYI, OpenBSD 3.3 was actually the first OS to ship with it (except they called this W^X, "write XOR execute"), 6.5 years ago.
I'll give you that the new "in a heck of a long time" wording in their tagline is unfortunate. It must be ~11 years now, a pretty strong track record I'd say, but feel free to convince me otherwise...
"The NDAd documentation for the calypso, register definition (sic) and hardware definition, was leaked [...]"
Maybe not so un-hackable after all...
Indeed, sadly enough. Last time just 2 months ago, on his way to Africa precisely...
We might be one step closer to a vaccine, great news. In the meantime, someone please tell the Pope that condoms do save lives?
G1s aren't exactly hard to unlock, especially when one variant happens to be like that out of the box (yes, the Android dev phone 1 or ADP1). Well worth the extra $25 "Google tax" IMHO. Plus I've had a chance to try 1.5/cupcake >2 weeks before most G1 users, and I like it.
I use my ADP1 with AT&T. Yup, no 3G for me (yet?) because US carriers somehow manage to always pick their very own frequencies (wtf?!? 1700 MHz band aka AWS for T-Mobile, some 1900 flavor for AT&T even though they have a 1700/AWS license as well, and whereas the rest of the world agreed on 2100 long ago).
Anyway, I have 3 lines on a $50 +2 x $10 family plan = $23/line, or ~$26 with taxes etc... Unlimited data adds $15/mo.
Yes I'll need about 6 months to recoup the extra cost of this phone ($424) vs an iPhone with typical voice+data plan ($199 + $78-ish/mo) -- not taking into account the pennies I can save on apps (e.g. free SSH client) and on calls using VoIP/SIP.
Speaking of which, check out http://www.sipdroid.org/; it's definitely still buggy but works over 2.5G. Cupcake and open-source in general rock.
Ouch. Dude, if you need to lose 15 to 20 minutes (let alone 45) to restart your PC, something is terminally wrong with your setup. Vista on a 486?
Even in such pathological case, wouldn't suspend or hibernate be an option?
I always power down my (work or home) PC when I expect to not need it for a while. Initiating hibernation takes me 2 seconds, resuming 30 to 40s in the rare instances when the machine is not already up again by the time I get back to it, or if I need to VPN into it.
I'm using Linux (Ubuntu 8.10, doesn't matter much), shutting down via 's2disk'. Basically, it's hibernate, ie all applications etc are saved to disk in whatever state they happen to be, no need to exit any etc... /fast/.
s2disk uses compression by default, so while it may take a bit longer for the machine to actually finish writing everything to disk and power down (who cares), resumes are
Powering back up is usually triggered via the BIOS' RTC alarm, scheduled every weekday shortly before I'm expected to arrive at work. Worst case (say I'm there early), my PC is ready with all my apps running in less than 40s, time I may need anyway to check my voicemail etc.
Remote access via my company SonicWALL SSL-VPN is also a breeze, since this gateway can issue Wake-on-LAN to whatever one wants to get to.
Reducing waste in general is IMHO just being responsible.
"We do not inherit the Earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children."
Amen to that. I gladly donate for every OpenBSD release, because this OS works great for me as bastion host, router etc.
Surely I can (and will) do the same for my desktop OS; their developers/maintainers deserve more than just credit after all.
Yeah, videos of that stuff, now that would be wick3d! When I see what 'their' volcanos look like, wow... :)
Maybe it's utopian to imagine that the Chinese government cares about its international reputation, but just in case they do (say because of the upcoming Olympics), we might be able to make a tiny bit of difference by expressing our support for the Dalaï Lama and his call for dialog, eg. here: http://www.avaaz.org/en/tibet_end_the_violence/
Maybe I missed something but all links and references I've seen so far point back to the same paper by A.Klein, which itself only very partially quote the "OpenBSD coordinator"... If indeed Theo de Raadt wrote this (definitely plausible), why not put his name?
Also, the DNS issue is fixed in BIND 9.4.2, which is the version currently in OpenBSD's tree. I'd find it unlikely that somehow OpenBSD's developers deliberately left BIND PRNG fix out. Has anyone actually checked?
I can't help but think (sorry, I work in the field): powerful motors strapped to a person's body, combined with "wireless network gear" (although this last bit is not in TFA)... hmmm, they better make sure this "suit" is intrinsically secure, ie it cannot possibly make motions exceeding the wearer's physical limits, not matter how badly the software malfunctions or is compromised. :/ /.), this looks cool indeed...
Otherwise we could very well have someone eventually end up in intensive care because of a computer virus infection.
That said, in a very geeky sense (hey, this is