I used to work in physical security (a clerical job I had in high school), and it was always fun to talk to the old-timers and hear their stories.
My favorite was about how the KGB operatives in DC in the late 50s stayed in good graces wtih their Moscow overloads with a minumum of effort:
They were supposed to keep tabs on the ongoings of the US political system by establishing inside contacts, and reporting back. So, they just summarized the political news from each day's New York Times, and kept their jobs for years.
The Americans pulled an good one on them: To spy at the Russian consolate in New York, the CIA recruited Xerox to install a minature camera in the consolate's copy equipment. When he came to do "regular maitenance" each month, he'd also replace the full tapes with new ones.
Sorry for no linkies, my source for these is an 80 year old CPP.
When I was 14, I would sign up for the "free 250 hours!" trial deals with a "checking account" I got from one of those nifty cc/bank account generaters from a local BBS. It worked great until AOL stopped accepting bad info (probably around 1995 or 1996).
And I never had the hassle of canceling the service!
At least where I went to high school, "asking what the password is" would be considered a "hacking tool" by the administration if they wanted to make life difficult for you
If it doesn't say what the "hacking tool" in question is, I'm skeptical.
Many thanks- as someone who doesn't know much about physics other than what I can get from books like In Search of Schroedinger's Cat, it's always really cool to see something explained clearly and cleverly.
My main question the article didn't answer was "how does the process work?", and you've not only shed light on the Stimulated Brillouin Scattering, but done so in a way that accessible to me, a non-physics person.
Really interesting. I'd always considered the exact oposite in terms of box size: Big boxes (say three or four to a page) really sped the action up (if the viewer is just glancing at the pictures), while lots of smaller boxes forced you (i.e. the viewer) to slow down a bit.
I hadn't even considered that pacing isn't something the author has total control over.
The article gets this funny perspective where is hails McCloud for his "vision", and then comes down on him for that vision not being fulfilled.
That "vision" is identifying the need of comics to "go digital", but then argues that those comics that have done so are fruitless, because they either resemble animation, or are still trapped in little boxes.
That seems a little odd to me. For as cool as computers are, they are limited by human perception, and if you are going to accuse any moving animation of being "really more like animated cartoons", and accuse any still comic of being trapped in a box, an limmit your horizons of criticism to that, well, I think you're stuck.
Nowhere does the article mention homestar runner. I'm not a fanboi at all, I haven't seen it in almost 2 years now, but let's be fair: Homestar runner's a "comic" that has really used what technology offers quite well.
I reckon that those comics that embrace the "digital revolution" (not my language, that's from the article, thank you) are those that use the user as part of the comic experience. While the user's input isn't much of Homsestar runner, there certainly is an element of that, and I imagine future online comics that really can offer something new are those that will make the user's experience an increasingly integral part of exposition.
Maybe something like choose your own adventures, maybe something blog-ish where user submissions/comments are included as a vital part of the comic, I dunno. Hell, maybe something where the die-hard users become characters themselves.
*Anyway*, I think the author of the article wasn't thinking too hard about this one. She seemed to have a destination in mind when she started, and didn't make too much of an effort to see where the box v. animation paradigm might be starting to break down.
Can anyone still be vegetarian if the meat is synthetic? The ethical and environmental reasons go straight out the window if it grows on trees or in a steel box.
I've got the same situation. All the content is generated in word, I need to get it live in HTML
Just copy paste the word document into play text, and open it in dreamweaver, then, it's style sheets to the rescue, as you (should) only need to enter a tiny bit of markup
It was NOVA (they are the only ones i know with the policy)... The basic rule of thumb was ignore it, don't get caught, and don't put the bosses in situations they'd rather not be in. The job's a piece of piss. Don't take it too seriously and just have fun.
first, how isn't this a violation of the first amendment garantee of freedom of assembly?
second, it's not unheard of. i was subject to a similar ban when i taught in japan. that ban was a little different, it prohibited fraternizing with students, but a similar idea. interestingly, a japanese court ruled that it wasn't legal, because employers couldn't regulate what employees do when they are off the clock
this won't be a popular position (probably), but i think it's rather unfortunate.
i don't think the journalists should be required to divulge their sources... i really don't
however, i don't think that those who try to turn their backs on NDAs for personal gains should be protected
i was kinda interested to see how the whole suit would pan out in court... i thought the EFFs argument was sound, but apple seemed to have a strong case
are you familiar with the 'social text' affair? it's hysterical... alan sokal, a physicist, fed up with this garbage in academics, published a faux article in a respected journal... here's the wikpedia write up on it... a quick google gets heaps of documents about it
everyone and his brother's probably read this by now, but How to Deconstruct Almost Anything by Chip Morningstar is about the funniest techie answer to the field. (the *only* techie answer?)
however, when the jokes (and they are good!) are done, he goes on to offer a helpful reading list for the interested
i agree with you about not going around calling people morons, that's fair enough, but let's look at the computer/car analogy at little closer:
In reality, cars do nothing more than go forward, turn left/right, go backwards and brake; fair enough. in reality, computers do nothing more than add and subtract 1s and 0s from larger strings of 1s and 0s
computers are GENERAL PURPOSE machines. We don't know what use the owner will put it to; alrighty, but so are cars: they perfor a limmited set of operation (forward, back, left, right), but the possible uses are *infintely general*: buing groceries, long trips from san diego to anchorage, doughnuts in the parking lot, drang racing, sex (when parked, hopefully), etc... and, they may be used in almost *any* weather conditions... the majority of these things are taken into account by the manufacturers, and (this next bit is really important): when they find that part of the device doesn't work in one specific set of circumstances, the product is recalled (think ford/firestone tires, that would blow if underinflated and driven too fast on warm days)
it's really the same with computers-- they have a very limmited set of functions, which can be put infinite uses depending on how those functions are performed (i.e. software)... the difference is that because lives aren't at stake, there's less motivation to patch things up when they don't work correctly.
the other place the analogy breaks down is the fact that malwear and spywear are mallicious third party creations.... to hold that up to the ford analogy, it would be like saying ford needs to do something about the kid who keeps slashing your tires....
so, yeah, the analogy isn't perfect, but i don't think it's fare to dismiss it out of hand... where it might be useful is in terms of cultural understanding of cars....
do you read john steinbeck? in east of eden and cannery row he gives *excellent* descriptions of how people approached automobiles when they first appeared in the marketplace.... it's not too different from how non-tech folks approach computers now... and, as you say, there's been 100 years, so, while most people aren't very tech-savy about cars, they have some idea of how to care for them.... let's give it 30 or 40 years, and see what happens
the article is originally in the S.F. Guardian- a weekly paper along the lines of the L.A. Weekly, the Santa Fe Reporter, the Willamette Week, or whatever your local weekly is (note they all have the same looking back page of ads?)
ANYWAY- the point is this *isn't* wired magazine; it isn't in anything geared toward a high-tech or 'in the know' audience... it's in a regular weekly rag read by tens of thousands normal folks commuting to work or with their morning coffee
it's pieces like that that change attitudes... some mid-manegerial type will be reading that on his bart train into the city, and will stick it on the photocopier, and give the copy to his IT manager with a sticky note on it that says "wadda you reckon?"
i'm not talking overnight change, but these are the kinds of things that start the ball rolling
Don't get me wrong, I'm a mac fanboy myself, and I agree 100% with most of the author's conetentions, but, some of his evidence is a bit whack:
He links to the Crack a Mac challenge, as evidence that macs are bulletproof. Fine, but read their story- most of the attempts to crack *that* mac were based on old UNIX and NT attacks, and well, duh! HOWEVER- nobody (hardly) uses macs for webserves. If we had been doing that for the past 15 years, well, perhaps there'd be heaps of *known* exploits. The Crack a Mac story doesn't prove that there aren't exploits, it proves that not many folks know what they are.
Slashdot Mirror
I used to work in physical security (a clerical job I had in high school), and it was always fun to talk to the old-timers and hear their stories.
My favorite was about how the KGB operatives in DC in the late 50s stayed in good graces wtih their Moscow overloads with a minumum of effort:
They were supposed to keep tabs on the ongoings of the US political system by establishing inside contacts, and reporting back. So, they just summarized the political news from each day's New York Times, and kept their jobs for years.
The Americans pulled an good one on them: To spy at the Russian consolate in New York, the CIA recruited Xerox to install a minature camera in the consolate's copy equipment. When he came to do "regular maitenance" each month, he'd also replace the full tapes with new ones.
Sorry for no linkies, my source for these is an 80 year old CPP.
When I was 14, I would sign up for the "free 250 hours!" trial deals with a "checking account" I got from one of those nifty cc/bank account generaters from a local BBS. It worked great until AOL stopped accepting bad info (probably around 1995 or 1996).
And I never had the hassle of canceling the service!
right, right, and right have you ever noticed that it's the really techy people who seem to blow a sizeable fraction of their income in bookshops?
At least where I went to high school, "asking what the password is" would be considered a "hacking tool" by the administration if they wanted to make life difficult for you
If it doesn't say what the "hacking tool" in question is, I'm skeptical.
Many thanks- as someone who doesn't know much about physics other than what I can get from books like In Search of Schroedinger's Cat, it's always really cool to see something explained clearly and cleverly.
My main question the article didn't answer was "how does the process work?", and you've not only shed light on the Stimulated Brillouin Scattering, but done so in a way that accessible to me, a non-physics person.
thanks!
Really interesting. I'd always considered the exact oposite in terms of box size: Big boxes (say three or four to a page) really sped the action up (if the viewer is just glancing at the pictures), while lots of smaller boxes forced you (i.e. the viewer) to slow down a bit.
I hadn't even considered that pacing isn't something the author has total control over.
The article gets this funny perspective where is hails McCloud for his "vision", and then comes down on him for that vision not being fulfilled.
That "vision" is identifying the need of comics to "go digital", but then argues that those comics that have done so are fruitless, because they either resemble animation, or are still trapped in little boxes.
That seems a little odd to me. For as cool as computers are, they are limited by human perception, and if you are going to accuse any moving animation of being "really more like animated cartoons", and accuse any still comic of being trapped in a box, an limmit your horizons of criticism to that, well, I think you're stuck.
Nowhere does the article mention homestar runner. I'm not a fanboi at all, I haven't seen it in almost 2 years now, but let's be fair: Homestar runner's a "comic" that has really used what technology offers quite well.
I reckon that those comics that embrace the "digital revolution" (not my language, that's from the article, thank you) are those that use the user as part of the comic experience. While the user's input isn't much of Homsestar runner, there certainly is an element of that, and I imagine future online comics that really can offer something new are those that will make the user's experience an increasingly integral part of exposition.
Maybe something like choose your own adventures, maybe something blog-ish where user submissions/comments are included as a vital part of the comic, I dunno. Hell, maybe something where the die-hard users become characters themselves.
*Anyway*, I think the author of the article wasn't thinking too hard about this one. She seemed to have a destination in mind when she started, and didn't make too much of an effort to see where the box v. animation paradigm might be starting to break down.
Can anyone still be vegetarian if the meat is synthetic? The ethical and environmental reasons go straight out the window if it grows on trees or in a steel box.
Yo Ho Ho Puzzle Pirates is platform independent.
I've got the same situation. All the content is generated in word, I need to get it live in HTML
Just copy paste the word document into play text, and open it in dreamweaver, then, it's style sheets to the rescue, as you (should) only need to enter a tiny bit of markup
The organizers of the Iditerod prepare for scandal worse than major league baseball and and olympic running, combined!
It was NOVA (they are the only ones i know with the policy)... The basic rule of thumb was ignore it, don't get caught, and don't put the bosses in situations they'd rather not be in. The job's a piece of piss. Don't take it too seriously and just have fun.
first, how isn't this a violation of the first amendment garantee of freedom of assembly?
second, it's not unheard of. i was subject to a similar ban when i taught in japan. that ban was a little different, it prohibited fraternizing with students, but a similar idea. interestingly, a japanese court ruled that it wasn't legal, because employers couldn't regulate what employees do when they are off the clock
Why can't the communities register broadband companies and run them in a style similar to mutual societies or worker's co-operatives?
easy- because that doesn't generate revenue for the 100 companies that run america
this won't be a popular position (probably), but i think it's rather unfortunate.
i don't think the journalists should be required to divulge their sources... i really don't
however, i don't think that those who try to turn their backs on NDAs for personal gains should be protected
i was kinda interested to see how the whole suit would pan out in court... i thought the EFFs argument was sound, but apple seemed to have a strong case
i was really curious about how that one would go
are you familiar with the 'social text' affair? it's hysterical... alan sokal, a physicist, fed up with this garbage in academics, published a faux article in a respected journal... here's the wikpedia write up on it... a quick google gets heaps of documents about it
everyone and his brother's probably read this by now, but How to Deconstruct Almost Anything by Chip Morningstar is about the funniest techie answer to the field. (the *only* techie answer?)
however, when the jokes (and they are good!) are done, he goes on to offer a helpful reading list for the interested
i agree with you about not going around calling people morons, that's fair enough, but let's look at the computer/car analogy at little closer:
In reality, cars do nothing more than go forward, turn left/right, go backwards and brake; fair enough. in reality, computers do nothing more than add and subtract 1s and 0s from larger strings of 1s and 0s
computers are GENERAL PURPOSE machines. We don't know what use the owner will put it to; alrighty, but so are cars: they perfor a limmited set of operation (forward, back, left, right), but the possible uses are *infintely general*: buing groceries, long trips from san diego to anchorage, doughnuts in the parking lot, drang racing, sex (when parked, hopefully), etc... and, they may be used in almost *any* weather conditions... the majority of these things are taken into account by the manufacturers, and (this next bit is really important): when they find that part of the device doesn't work in one specific set of circumstances, the product is recalled (think ford/firestone tires, that would blow if underinflated and driven too fast on warm days)
it's really the same with computers-- they have a very limmited set of functions, which can be put infinite uses depending on how those functions are performed (i.e. software)... the difference is that because lives aren't at stake, there's less motivation to patch things up when they don't work correctly.
the other place the analogy breaks down is the fact that malwear and spywear are mallicious third party creations.... to hold that up to the ford analogy, it would be like saying ford needs to do something about the kid who keeps slashing your tires....
so, yeah, the analogy isn't perfect, but i don't think it's fare to dismiss it out of hand... where it might be useful is in terms of cultural understanding of cars....
do you read john steinbeck? in east of eden and cannery row he gives *excellent* descriptions of how people approached automobiles when they first appeared in the marketplace.... it's not too different from how non-tech folks approach computers now... and, as you say, there's been 100 years, so, while most people aren't very tech-savy about cars, they have some idea of how to care for them.... let's give it 30 or 40 years, and see what happens
if i had mod points i'd kick 'em your way... that post totally made my day
right on! talking to windows users is like talking to smokers, they pull absolute crap justification out of nowhere:
Q: you know, that box you've got there is slow and unreliable and a liability. A: but i need windows software for my business
erm.... this isn't 1985 anymore
erm.... *why* would you run any services on an OS9 box? to prove a point?
[smiling] good question
i've been using the things for 15 years, and the only ones i know off the top of my head involve physical access...
but, give 'em to the DOD to run all of *their* services on, and in a month or two we should see some pretty well documented problems, yeah?
there might be a smidge more to it than that-
the article is originally in the S.F. Guardian- a weekly paper along the lines of the L.A. Weekly, the Santa Fe Reporter, the Willamette Week, or whatever your local weekly is (note they all have the same looking back page of ads?)
ANYWAY- the point is this *isn't* wired magazine; it isn't in anything geared toward a high-tech or 'in the know' audience... it's in a regular weekly rag read by tens of thousands normal folks commuting to work or with their morning coffee
it's pieces like that that change attitudes... some mid-manegerial type will be reading that on his bart train into the city, and will stick it on the photocopier, and give the copy to his IT manager with a sticky note on it that says "wadda you reckon?"
i'm not talking overnight change, but these are the kinds of things that start the ball rolling
Don't get me wrong, I'm a mac fanboy myself, and I agree 100% with most of the author's conetentions, but, some of his evidence is a bit whack:
He links to the Crack a Mac challenge, as evidence that macs are bulletproof. Fine, but read their story- most of the attempts to crack *that* mac were based on old UNIX and NT attacks, and well, duh! HOWEVER- nobody (hardly) uses macs for webserves. If we had been doing that for the past 15 years, well, perhaps there'd be heaps of *known* exploits. The Crack a Mac story doesn't prove that there aren't exploits, it proves that not many folks know what they are.
It looks great, to folks living in the US, but it's free/$3.99 to the continental US only. AND!!! it took quite a bit of digging to find that.