I think the point was to generate press coverage. Greenpeace's greatest cause is self-promotion.
Close. Greenpeace's main tactic is publicity: Doing showy stunts that bring popular attention to issues they deem to be important.
So yeah, they want press coverage. That's their schtick.
I worked for Greenpeace in the 1980s, and let me tell you, there is a LOT to complain about with this organisation. But this action is not one of them. It's a classic hacker tactic, showing with a single action what a thousand words of dry exposition could never convey: Civilian nuclear technology in France is not adequately secured.
Everybody seems to focus on the 'Green' part of their name and ignore the 'Peace'. Greenpeace was actually founded by a bunch of folks on the West Coast of Canada who wanted to block underground nuclear tests in a tectonically unstable section of Alaska. Rather than march and Occupy and write letters and etc., they just got into a boat and sailed toward the test site. The front pages were covered with headlines to the effect of 'Who Are These Wackos', but in the process they got people to think about the dangers of nuclear testing in a geologically unsuitable location.
I have no truck whatsoever with the insanely stupid 'Save the Seals' crap that Paul Watson and co. brought into the organisation. Personally, I think their take on environmentalism is crushingly stupid, for the most part. But their campaigns for nuclear security are often smart, focused and, while they're fraught with histrionics, they generally make a valid point.
Funny. Maybe I've been working with databases too long that it's affected my mind (or maybe I got *into* databases because that was *already* how my mind worked) but I've *always* wanted to be able to say things like "show me all messages from my mom, dad, or sister, that arrived in 2005 and had attachments, and sort with the biggest at the top."
Oh, don't get me wrong, I love that kind of stuff too. I once worked on a product that allowed you to construct queries along the lines of 'Show me every speech by every West Coast politician who spoke about the salmon fishery between July and September, 2009, translated into French.' But here's the thing: It didn't use a relational database.
I love finding clever ways to mangle data. It's my bread and butter. But I do NOT love relational databases enough to use them for everything, all the time.
It's the backend. When you have too many connections on too few servers, with not enough storage
you usually see this kinda issue.
I see it as yet another failure for the client/single server model.
It surprises me that people are still investing so much time and effort on centralisation of services when obviously the most practical technical[*] answer is the opposite. Simple, common protocols and decentralised infrastructure are the most robust model for overall survival of a communications system. DARPA proved that some time ago, but we seem intent on forgetting as much of that lesson as possible.
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[*] Okay, I don't want to be disingenuous about this. The reasons for centralisation are financial and organisational. It's more costly to spread IT capacity through the breadth of an organisation, and it's hell on wheels in administrative terms. But past a certain point, you would think that IT would finally earn the right to have some input into the discussion about how best to manage an organisation's information. Unfortunately, IT managers are not always the best ones to advocate for a different approach because they're the ones who've made their mark by proving (or pretending) they could manage these big, ugly 'enterprise' systems.
I have often longed for a "generic email database format" which could be a universal format for all email programs out there in some way. Pretty much a dream which is long over-due... about 10 years past-due. Perhaps there is already something like that and it has escaped me all these years but I seriously hate migrating email from one format another.
Take a look at Maildir. It's not perfect, but it is generic, simple and easily transferred from one location to another.
RANT: Over the course of my (far too many) years of working in technology, I've often been amazed just how enamoured everyone is with databases. There are some things that databases do well, granted, but just because something needs an index doesn't mean it needs a relational database./RANT.
Let me say it again: Privacy is for human beings. Transparency is for organizational entities that are not human.
You didn't read the linked article, did you?
The problem with privacy is that everyone has to respect it. What you say about corporate bodies is valid, as far as it goes. But the thing that everyone - yourself included - seems to overlook is that the same information technologies that make it easy for organisations to abuse their knowledge also makes it easy for individuals to find out more about you than ever before.
Living with the Internet means composing an indelible journal of words, images and opinions that, for the most part, never goes away. I can find out who my current partner used to shag, I can find their weepy high school poems, their drunken university antics, their political screeds... just about anything they've ever done online.
Being circumspect with what you post online is one thing, but you have to rely on others to be circumspect as well. Which is the fundamental point I was trying to make when I talked about the necessity for a sort of neo-Victorianism in modern society.
In short, we're going to have to learn to be far more respectful of other people's privacy and far more tolerant about humanity's inherent foolishness and weakness of character if we're going to live our lives online.
$1m spent on iPads only comes to ~2,000 iPads at most (assuming the cheapest model at around $500 each). According to Microsoft's handy little Capacity Planner (Exch 2010), it shouldn't take but perhaps (very rough calc here) 5 or 10 servers at most to handle that, unless they're also allowing every school employee to latch on their personal gear as well.
I'm guessing that something's missing from the story here...
Sorry, 5-10 servers to handle a mere 2000 clients?
Look, I'm not going to be so foolish as to claim that there's a really viable FOSS alternative to Exchange. (There is, but it requires a fundamental change in how IT operates, which makes it unrealistic for 'enterprise' IT.) But still, can we not admit that requiring that kind of hardware for a simple thing like data synchronisation, email and event handling is a little absurd?
I could be wrong in my assumptions, of course, but it seems to me that 2000 clients, each sync'ing, say, every half hour and transferring a nominal amount of data, shouldn't be a heavy load at all. Assuming an even distribution from minute to minute (which, admittedly, is not what happens in real life), you'd be looking at one or two transactions a second, each with a duration of... what? Say, 3-4 seconds? With 5 servers (again, for simplicity's sake, assuming an even distribution), that's about 1 session at a time.
The systems programmer in me wants to scream that that's absurdly wasteful.
But... I'm open to counter-arguments. Can anyone point to any empirical data that can make a reasonable case for these resource requirements?
I have never been so happy as to have a shit-stirrer of Al Franken's quality in our government. I think we need more cynical comedians in politics, just because they have some of the most eloquent BS detectors in the world. Murray/Akroyd 2012!
the vanilla Android devices (Nexus line) don't ship with the CarrierIQ software, which means that either the handset manufacturers or, much more likely given the US-centric focus, the carriers are responsible for installing it.
...Which is a very good point. Google gives not only end users but also manufacturers and carriers relatively free reign over Android phones. Apple retains much more control over the iPhone.
While it's easy to see how Apple's strategy can hurt power users, Google's strategy can hurt users also.
Between iOS and Android, you're just trading one bucket of problems for another. Siri will find you a dentist if you tell it you broke a tooth and point you to the nearest escort agency if you're looking for one, but it won't help you if you need to renew your birth control prescription refilled. If you tell it you've been raped, it blithely replies, "Really!"
Apple and Wolfram Alpha can say what they like about the service's beta status; the likeliest reason for this is that they didn't want to touch one aspect of societal behaviour because it might upset parents and affect sales to teens.
Google errs on the other side, empowering handset providers, allowing them to indulge their baser instincts when it comes to how they view customers on their networks. For telcos, the customer is the commodity.
In both cases, corporate entities feel entitled to decide what we are allowed to know about them and what they are allowed to know about us. The contrast between the two couldn't be stronger.
The only way to square this circle is to remove the dichotomy altogether. Paradoxically, the only way we can be sure that others aren't abusing our private data is through transparency, which requires less, not more, privacy. In the end, the best we can hope for is a kind of neo-Victorianism, in which we are more willing to accept polite behaviour at face value and overlook all but the more egregious failings. Ultimately, we will have to learn to accept that we are all no better than we should be.
I have no faith whatsoever that American society will be able to accomplish this. The Protestant ethic of probity and respect has long since been extinguished in favour of a mix of fundamentalist, moralistic witch-hunts and ugly prurience.
Using sharing as an analogy- suppose you are sharing a park or a basketball court. If someone hogs the resource charging for it so you can finance a new park makes sense.
Perhaps, but the problem is that network-owners would rather hike their rates until usage falls within existing capacity than build new capacity.
From a telco's perspective, why not wring additional profits out of existing infrastructure without incurring the long-term risks of increased capital expenditure?
So the corollary to your logic is a perverse result: Access to the park becomes more limited, not less, because of increased fees.
Until government draws a distinction between network operators and data service providers, inertia will win out over momentum. If network owners were required to open their pipes to all comers on an equitable basis (i.e. charge the same amount for access, no matter who is buying it), then market forces could be brought to bear on the situation. Peering agreements based on capacity (rather than usage-based charges) would become the norm, because such arrangements would give a competitive advantage to those who participated in them.
As with long-distance fees, which have fallen precipitously since the barriers to entry were dropped, data usage sales would see a race to the bottom, and demand for additional capacity would increase radically, because the best way to cope with lower prices is to increase volume.
Of course, a model like this runs directly counter to so-called vertical integration, typified by the Comcast/NBC deal. Network-owners want tighter integration with content-creators, because this gives them more opportunities to indulge in rent-seeking behaviour, which they so love.
"They don't need a bug report. Trust me on this. They seem to feel that they need different users."
So no, I think the die is cast on this issue. GNOME devs have decided that they know better than their users, and if we would just open our minds to enlightenment (sorry), we'd all get along better.
Again, many people don't even have a huge problem with GNOME deciding what we need; it's the fact that they've removed a bunch of things that they've arbitrarily decided we don't need that's getting everyone's panties in a twist.
Aw man, I just know I'm going to get grammar nazi'd on my misuse of "you're" instead of "your" if I don't say something first. Perhaps even after I do.
That's 'grammar nazied' or 'grammar nazi'ed', bitch.
The Agenda here is to point out that Linux isn't the God of OS. It has its problems just like Windows and the others.
Fine, but that's an inaccurate statement. To say that it 'has its problems just like Windows' implies that it has the same problems as Windows. That's a perfect example of false equivalence.
For decades now, Windows has had systemic problems with security. Its ecosystem is fundamentally weakened by malware due to a legacy of flagrant disregard to security. (Unix once suffered from the same naiveté, but happily managed to move past it, by and large.) The problem runs so deep, in fact, that even relatively secure versions of the software (those produced in the last two years or so) are still burdened by the deficiency of the environment in which they operate, and the culture of complacency and ignorance that pervades MS systems administration.
In fact, things have got so bad that black hats sometimes overlook the low-hanging Linux fruit, instead spending inordinate amounts of time and effort to break into an increasingly secure Windows environment.
My organisation is in the middle of a Exchange upgrade as I write this, and if this experience is any guide, there are fundamental differences between how people administering Microsoft systems approach change management and how grey-haired old *nix farts like me approach it. These differences are cultural in part, but the respective cultures derive from the design philosophy, which in turn dictates the toolkits and approaches taken.
And yes, the Linux philosophy (and approach and toolkit) does have flaws. Here's just one example. But they have very little in common with Windows. The single most important difference is that Linux's flaws have not yet led to systemic dysfunction. I'm not saying they won't; I'm saying they haven't. Yet.
The problem with not allowing root to ssh in with a fresh install is that a fresh install only creates the user "root", so you physically have to be at the machine to log in and setup the system if you don't allow root to ssh in.
Is this true? I haven't installed plain CentOS in years and years, but I don't recall seeing this behaviour back when I was using RedHat (1990s - early 2000s), and it absolutely never happens with Debian.
But even if it is true, it's not difficult at all to customise one's installer so that it runs a script to create a second user account, add it to sudoers, and then disallow remote root login. It's as easy as adding a single RPM to the install image. Given the security risk that root login creates, something like this would surely be worth the effort for any company running more than a trivial number of servers.
So, unless you're willing either to pay me or put out, kindly stop trying to tell me what to do.
Just fork your own version of GNOME then. Given the number of complainers about the direction GNOME is going, I'm surprised no slashdot stories covering GNOME forks have surfaced.
Given the time and opportunity, I would. But if GNOME weren't so condescending in their approach, deciding on my behalf what constitutes a proper workflow, I wouldn't have to.
I do a lot of UI-related work, mostly in web interfaces and business automation. I spend a lot of time creating workspaces that are designed to reflect the needs of the people using them. What I look for in a desktop environment is one that provides me with the flexibility to reformat it to my precise needs for a particular role. GNOME used to be my desktop of choice for exactly this reason.
I don't particularly object to their desire for simplicity - it's one of the main reasons I've used GNOME since its inception. What I do object to, however, is their holier-than-thou decision not simply to hide some features, but to remove them entirely from the UI. To make matters worse, the folks at Canonical seem to have lost their way as well, creating something that's anathema to me: a unified, one size fits all window manager.
I do a lot of different things in the course of my work, from coding systems-level software to UI building and testing to report writing to graphics work (and web browsing and reading and email and...). I can only conclude that anyone who thinks they can provide me with a single, inflexible UI that is appropriate for all of these is not only wrong but willfully ignoring the error of their ways.
I'll be the first to admit that I'm very hard to please when it comes to my working environment. The closest I've ever come to actually liking my desktop UI was on GNOME 2 with Compiz. Now that the GNOME devs have not only turned their backs on what made GNOME good, but actually made it impossible to keep those things, I feel I have the right to bitch a little.
I'll be evaluating Mint in the weeks to come. If they fare well, I'll recommend we go to them when we move from Ubuntu 10.04.
'The Shell is designed in order to minimize distraction and interruption and to enable users to focus on the task at hand. A persistent window list or dock would interfere with this goal, serving as a constant temptation to switch focus.'
Jesus Christ, GNOME! You're not my boss and you're definitely not my wife. So, unless you're willing either to pay me or put out, kindly stop trying to tell me what to do.
Unfortunately the worst penalty the cop is likely to face is either a paid vacation known as "administrative leave" or maybe the loss of his job....
The worst penalty from his boss, yes. But he can also expect to be sued out of his underwear, under a section 1983 lawsuit. Say what you will about our government, the fact that you can sue cops for breaking your Constitutional Rights is an *amazing* feature.
Not to mention having to walk down the street each day knowing that every single person who either knows you or recognises you thinks you're a sadistic shithead.
Don't underestimate the power of societal disapproval. It's usually one of the strongest levers against repressive action by the state. The desertion of large numbers of military and police in Libya pretty much guaranteed the outcome. Likewise, Syria seems doomed to fall for the same reason: the rank and file are driven to reject their role in oppressing the people.
In Iran, the Basiji were members of a distinctly different social grouping (mostly rural, un- or under-educated) from the people who were protesting (mostly urban intelligentsia). It was therefore possible for them to sustain their brutality over the months it took to reduce the protests to background noise.
The reason for the kind of preemptive attack suffered by the UC Davis students was to quell discontent before it had time to coalesce into an all-out confrontation where significantly more violent tactics would be required. Well, that's what the manual said, anyway. But what the manual neglected to mention was that a lot of Americans may be able to rationalise their way to accepting a violent police response, but they cannot tolerate unprovoked, gratuitous violence meted out as punishment.
In the schoolyard, everyone knows to let the other guy throw the first punch. The students at Davis were remarkably canny in that regard, and the police remarkably, stupidly naive. With luck, other police forces across the country will take a lesson from this and avoid pissing off the population they're supposed to be protecting.
Whether you agree or disagree with the question of human affected climate change you really can't deny the fact that these folks are heavily biased toward a specific outcome for their research.
Who the fuck cares?
Since when did bias have anything to do with science? You perform your measurements according to a predefined methodology and you publish your results. Other scientists check your data and your methodology and either confirm the results or refute them, or something in between. Virtually every scientist in the world expects a certain set of results. That's why they perform the fucking experiment.
... Unless you're trying to suggest that these particular scientists were cheating. Is that what you mean? Because that's not science at all. That's just making shit up. And if that is what you're suggesting, I suppose you have evidence, because you really wouldn't want to be accused of making shit up yourself, would you?
There's plenty to question even if you agree with the basic scientific premise (as most do, I think).
As long as the basic scientific premise is that the climate change we're seeing is largely driven by human activity, we can have a reasonable conversation. Pretending that we had nothing to do with it leads directly to the assertion that there's nothing we can do about it, except adapt. But that adaptation cannot include reducing CO2 output, because human industrial activity had nothing to do with it.
You're right that any reasonably intelligent person does not dispute the basic facts of climate change. I'm absolutely certain that, even in the oil company boardrooms and think tanks where this campaign of Doubt is being orchestrated, people don't seriously doubt that the climate is changing and that human activity is a large contributor to the effect.
Oil companies and other industries who stand to benefit from the status quo are simply playing for time.
Back in days gone by when scientists first discovered the ozone hole over the Antarctic continent and determined that CFCs caused significant ozone depletion, Dupont fought tooth and nail to discredit them. When they were finally dragged kicking and screaming into the courtroom, they settled into a legal war of attrition that lasted years. Within weeks of the court's decision to ban the use of CFCs, they began producing HCFCs in significant quantities.
They'd been sitting on a product that causes orders of magnitude less damage to the ozone layer for years, but needed to play for time to get their manufacturing processes ramped up, and to maximise the return on their investment in CFCs.
Likewise, the fame for oil companies and their ilk is to delay the political and regulatory process for as long as possible in order first to squeeze as much value as possible out of their existing assets and second to buy time to reposition themselves so that they remain dominant in an economy that is much less reliant on burning fossil fuels.
Casting aspersions on the leading lights of the debate, pandering to the ignorance of the uneducated and buying off politicians, pseudo-scientists and lobbyists are all just tactics in this larger strategy.
And they're incredibly effective. As long as objections are being raised, they can plead that more time is needed, that there''s no consensus yet, and therefore no political mandate, and in doing so stall the entire policy debate before it can take even baby steps.
If we were smart, society would simply move ahead with the debate and ignore these intrusions. That's ultimately what happened with tobacco, the bought scientists continued to deny deny deny, but society at large just scoffed at them and went ahead with its efforts to reduce the impact of the drug on people's lives.
We're very close to that point with climate change. Australia has already passed a carbon tax, countries are already investing in alternatives (whether wisely or not is a secondary issue) and beginning to promote policies that move us away from undue dependence on burning hydrocarbons for fuel.
The comedy in the ass-kissing episode of the Miller's Tale does NOT arise from a character's willingness to debase himself.
He has no clue that he going to kiss an anus. The scene takes place in the middle of the night, in total darkness. The butt of the joke THINKS he is going to kiss his crush on her lips, but she hangs her butt cheeks out the window for kissing instead.
He only becomes suspicious when he feels her pubic hair, which he mistakes for a beard.
Heh, it's been 20+ years since I last opened that book. My apologies for mis-remembering and thanks for setting me straight.
And ass-kissing has been around since Chaucer's time.
You're referring to the Miller's tale? That's a different type of ass-kissing. The tale uses ass-kissing as a joke (the comedy is in the confusion of a bearded man) not in a pandering-to-the-boss sense. But if you know Chaucer, you know this.
True, the specific context has changed, but the reason we laugh at the act in the Miller's Tale is because one person debases himself by kissing the ass of another. Part of the comedy is that he's willing to do that even to a woman in order to win her affections. The ass-kisser is a risible creature from the start.
And by the bye, the green-eyed monster is hardly ever referenced any more, but envy is still associated with green. We don't go in so much for comparing women to a summer's day any more, but we still call them hot.
My point is not that language doesn't change; it's that it changes in unpredictable ways. Some turns of phrase remain with us for centuries, while other, arguably more deserving elements of the language disappear. I defy anyone to provide a coherent explanation.
Slashdot Mirror
I think the point was to generate press coverage. Greenpeace's greatest cause is self-promotion.
Close. Greenpeace's main tactic is publicity: Doing showy stunts that bring popular attention to issues they deem to be important.
So yeah, they want press coverage. That's their schtick.
I worked for Greenpeace in the 1980s, and let me tell you, there is a LOT to complain about with this organisation. But this action is not one of them. It's a classic hacker tactic, showing with a single action what a thousand words of dry exposition could never convey: Civilian nuclear technology in France is not adequately secured.
Everybody seems to focus on the 'Green' part of their name and ignore the 'Peace'. Greenpeace was actually founded by a bunch of folks on the West Coast of Canada who wanted to block underground nuclear tests in a tectonically unstable section of Alaska. Rather than march and Occupy and write letters and etc., they just got into a boat and sailed toward the test site. The front pages were covered with headlines to the effect of 'Who Are These Wackos', but in the process they got people to think about the dangers of nuclear testing in a geologically unsuitable location.
I have no truck whatsoever with the insanely stupid 'Save the Seals' crap that Paul Watson and co. brought into the organisation. Personally, I think their take on environmentalism is crushingly stupid, for the most part. But their campaigns for nuclear security are often smart, focused and, while they're fraught with histrionics, they generally make a valid point.
Funny. Maybe I've been working with databases too long that it's affected my mind (or maybe I got *into* databases because that was *already* how my mind worked) but I've *always* wanted to be able to say things like "show me all messages from my mom, dad, or sister, that arrived in 2005 and had attachments, and sort with the biggest at the top."
Oh, don't get me wrong, I love that kind of stuff too. I once worked on a product that allowed you to construct queries along the lines of 'Show me every speech by every West Coast politician who spoke about the salmon fishery between July and September, 2009, translated into French.' But here's the thing: It didn't use a relational database.
I love finding clever ways to mangle data. It's my bread and butter. But I do NOT love relational databases enough to use them for everything, all the time.
It's the backend. When you have too many connections on too few servers, with not enough storage you usually see this kinda issue.
I see it as yet another failure for the client/single server model.
It surprises me that people are still investing so much time and effort on centralisation of services when obviously the most practical technical[*] answer is the opposite. Simple, common protocols and decentralised infrastructure are the most robust model for overall survival of a communications system. DARPA proved that some time ago, but we seem intent on forgetting as much of that lesson as possible.
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[*] Okay, I don't want to be disingenuous about this. The reasons for centralisation are financial and organisational. It's more costly to spread IT capacity through the breadth of an organisation, and it's hell on wheels in administrative terms. But past a certain point, you would think that IT would finally earn the right to have some input into the discussion about how best to manage an organisation's information. Unfortunately, IT managers are not always the best ones to advocate for a different approach because they're the ones who've made their mark by proving (or pretending) they could manage these big, ugly 'enterprise' systems.
I have often longed for a "generic email database format" which could be a universal format for all email programs out there in some way. Pretty much a dream which is long over-due... about 10 years past-due. Perhaps there is already something like that and it has escaped me all these years but I seriously hate migrating email from one format another.
Take a look at Maildir. It's not perfect, but it is generic, simple and easily transferred from one location to another.
RANT: Over the course of my (far too many) years of working in technology, I've often been amazed just how enamoured everyone is with databases. There are some things that databases do well, granted, but just because something needs an index doesn't mean it needs a relational database. /RANT.
Let me say it again: Privacy is for human beings. Transparency is for organizational entities that are not human.
You didn't read the linked article, did you?
The problem with privacy is that everyone has to respect it. What you say about corporate bodies is valid, as far as it goes. But the thing that everyone - yourself included - seems to overlook is that the same information technologies that make it easy for organisations to abuse their knowledge also makes it easy for individuals to find out more about you than ever before.
Living with the Internet means composing an indelible journal of words, images and opinions that, for the most part, never goes away. I can find out who my current partner used to shag, I can find their weepy high school poems, their drunken university antics, their political screeds... just about anything they've ever done online.
Being circumspect with what you post online is one thing, but you have to rely on others to be circumspect as well. Which is the fundamental point I was trying to make when I talked about the necessity for a sort of neo-Victorianism in modern society.
In short, we're going to have to learn to be far more respectful of other people's privacy and far more tolerant about humanity's inherent foolishness and weakness of character if we're going to live our lives online.
Wow. Someone's getting mileage out of their Word a Day calendar.
No, someone is making use of 4 years of post-secondary education in a 'useless' English degree programme.
$1m spent on iPads only comes to ~2,000 iPads at most (assuming the cheapest model at around $500 each). According to Microsoft's handy little Capacity Planner (Exch 2010), it shouldn't take but perhaps (very rough calc here) 5 or 10 servers at most to handle that, unless they're also allowing every school employee to latch on their personal gear as well.
I'm guessing that something's missing from the story here...
Sorry, 5-10 servers to handle a mere 2000 clients?
Look, I'm not going to be so foolish as to claim that there's a really viable FOSS alternative to Exchange. (There is, but it requires a fundamental change in how IT operates, which makes it unrealistic for 'enterprise' IT.) But still, can we not admit that requiring that kind of hardware for a simple thing like data synchronisation, email and event handling is a little absurd?
I could be wrong in my assumptions, of course, but it seems to me that 2000 clients, each sync'ing, say, every half hour and transferring a nominal amount of data, shouldn't be a heavy load at all. Assuming an even distribution from minute to minute (which, admittedly, is not what happens in real life), you'd be looking at one or two transactions a second, each with a duration of... what? Say, 3-4 seconds? With 5 servers (again, for simplicity's sake, assuming an even distribution), that's about 1 session at a time.
The systems programmer in me wants to scream that that's absurdly wasteful.
But... I'm open to counter-arguments. Can anyone point to any empirical data that can make a reasonable case for these resource requirements?
I have never been so happy as to have a shit-stirrer of Al Franken's quality in our government. I think we need more cynical comedians in politics, just because they have some of the most eloquent BS detectors in the world. Murray/Akroyd 2012!
Indeed. Better comedians than clowns.
the vanilla Android devices (Nexus line) don't ship with the CarrierIQ software, which means that either the handset manufacturers or, much more likely given the US-centric focus, the carriers are responsible for installing it.
...Which is a very good point. Google gives not only end users but also manufacturers and carriers relatively free reign over Android phones. Apple retains much more control over the iPhone.
While it's easy to see how Apple's strategy can hurt power users, Google's strategy can hurt users also.
Between iOS and Android, you're just trading one bucket of problems for another. Siri will find you a dentist if you tell it you broke a tooth and point you to the nearest escort agency if you're looking for one, but it won't help you if you need to renew your birth control prescription refilled. If you tell it you've been raped, it blithely replies, "Really!"
Apple and Wolfram Alpha can say what they like about the service's beta status; the likeliest reason for this is that they didn't want to touch one aspect of societal behaviour because it might upset parents and affect sales to teens.
Google errs on the other side, empowering handset providers, allowing them to indulge their baser instincts when it comes to how they view customers on their networks. For telcos, the customer is the commodity.
In both cases, corporate entities feel entitled to decide what we are allowed to know about them and what they are allowed to know about us. The contrast between the two couldn't be stronger.
In fairness, this is a common human failing. When it's my information at stake, we call it privacy. When it's someone else's, we call it secrecy.
The only way to square this circle is to remove the dichotomy altogether. Paradoxically, the only way we can be sure that others aren't abusing our private data is through transparency, which requires less, not more, privacy. In the end, the best we can hope for is a kind of neo-Victorianism, in which we are more willing to accept polite behaviour at face value and overlook all but the more egregious failings. Ultimately, we will have to learn to accept that we are all no better than we should be.
I have no faith whatsoever that American society will be able to accomplish this. The Protestant ethic of probity and respect has long since been extinguished in favour of a mix of fundamentalist, moralistic witch-hunts and ugly prurience.
Using sharing as an analogy- suppose you are sharing a park or a basketball court. If someone hogs the resource charging for it so you can finance a new park makes sense.
Perhaps, but the problem is that network-owners would rather hike their rates until usage falls within existing capacity than build new capacity.
From a telco's perspective, why not wring additional profits out of existing infrastructure without incurring the long-term risks of increased capital expenditure?
So the corollary to your logic is a perverse result: Access to the park becomes more limited, not less, because of increased fees.
Until government draws a distinction between network operators and data service providers, inertia will win out over momentum. If network owners were required to open their pipes to all comers on an equitable basis (i.e. charge the same amount for access, no matter who is buying it), then market forces could be brought to bear on the situation. Peering agreements based on capacity (rather than usage-based charges) would become the norm, because such arrangements would give a competitive advantage to those who participated in them.
As with long-distance fees, which have fallen precipitously since the barriers to entry were dropped, data usage sales would see a race to the bottom, and demand for additional capacity would increase radically, because the best way to cope with lower prices is to increase volume.
Of course, a model like this runs directly counter to so-called vertical integration, typified by the Comcast/NBC deal. Network-owners want tighter integration with content-creators, because this gives them more opportunities to indulge in rent-seeking behaviour, which they so love.
Now that they will have statistics to show which extensions are most used (i.e. what users are missing the most). Will GNOME undo the mess?
To quote Linus:
So no, I think the die is cast on this issue. GNOME devs have decided that they know better than their users, and if we would just open our minds to enlightenment (sorry), we'd all get along better.
Again, many people don't even have a huge problem with GNOME deciding what we need; it's the fact that they've removed a bunch of things that they've arbitrarily decided we don't need that's getting everyone's panties in a twist.
So LAWFUL=RIGHT?
Given that you're using an assignment operator, then if you're government, the answer is 'yes'
But if you meant $LAWFUL == $RIGHT, then the answer is 'no'.
Aw man, I just know I'm going to get grammar nazi'd on my misuse of "you're" instead of "your" if I don't say something first. Perhaps even after I do.
That's 'grammar nazied' or 'grammar nazi'ed', bitch.
8^)
The Agenda here is to point out that Linux isn't the God of OS. It has its problems just like Windows and the others.
Fine, but that's an inaccurate statement. To say that it 'has its problems just like Windows' implies that it has the same problems as Windows. That's a perfect example of false equivalence.
For decades now, Windows has had systemic problems with security. Its ecosystem is fundamentally weakened by malware due to a legacy of flagrant disregard to security. (Unix once suffered from the same naiveté, but happily managed to move past it, by and large.) The problem runs so deep, in fact, that even relatively secure versions of the software (those produced in the last two years or so) are still burdened by the deficiency of the environment in which they operate, and the culture of complacency and ignorance that pervades MS systems administration.
In fact, things have got so bad that black hats sometimes overlook the low-hanging Linux fruit, instead spending inordinate amounts of time and effort to break into an increasingly secure Windows environment.
My organisation is in the middle of a Exchange upgrade as I write this, and if this experience is any guide, there are fundamental differences between how people administering Microsoft systems approach change management and how grey-haired old *nix farts like me approach it. These differences are cultural in part, but the respective cultures derive from the design philosophy, which in turn dictates the toolkits and approaches taken.
And yes, the Linux philosophy (and approach and toolkit) does have flaws. Here's just one example. But they have very little in common with Windows. The single most important difference is that Linux's flaws have not yet led to systemic dysfunction. I'm not saying they won't; I'm saying they haven't. Yet.
Is this true? I haven't installed plain CentOS in years and years, but I don't recall seeing this behaviour back when I was using RedHat (1990s - early 2000s), and it absolutely never happens with Debian.
But even if it is true, it's not difficult at all to customise one's installer so that it runs a script to create a second user account, add it to sudoers, and then disallow remote root login. It's as easy as adding a single RPM to the install image. Given the security risk that root login creates, something like this would surely be worth the effort for any company running more than a trivial number of servers.
This whole post was typed with my right hand only, on my iPhone 4.
So you're left handed then? 8)
Down-modded?!?
Man, left-handed people really can't take a joke, I guess. 8^)
So you're left handed then? 8)
So, unless you're willing either to pay me or put out, kindly stop trying to tell me what to do.
Just fork your own version of GNOME then. Given the number of complainers about the direction GNOME is going, I'm surprised no slashdot stories covering GNOME forks have surfaced.
Given the time and opportunity, I would. But if GNOME weren't so condescending in their approach, deciding on my behalf what constitutes a proper workflow, I wouldn't have to.
I do a lot of UI-related work, mostly in web interfaces and business automation. I spend a lot of time creating workspaces that are designed to reflect the needs of the people using them. What I look for in a desktop environment is one that provides me with the flexibility to reformat it to my precise needs for a particular role. GNOME used to be my desktop of choice for exactly this reason.
I don't particularly object to their desire for simplicity - it's one of the main reasons I've used GNOME since its inception. What I do object to, however, is their holier-than-thou decision not simply to hide some features, but to remove them entirely from the UI. To make matters worse, the folks at Canonical seem to have lost their way as well, creating something that's anathema to me: a unified, one size fits all window manager.
I do a lot of different things in the course of my work, from coding systems-level software to UI building and testing to report writing to graphics work (and web browsing and reading and email and...). I can only conclude that anyone who thinks they can provide me with a single, inflexible UI that is appropriate for all of these is not only wrong but willfully ignoring the error of their ways.
I'll be the first to admit that I'm very hard to please when it comes to my working environment. The closest I've ever come to actually liking my desktop UI was on GNOME 2 with Compiz. Now that the GNOME devs have not only turned their backs on what made GNOME good, but actually made it impossible to keep those things, I feel I have the right to bitch a little.
I'll be evaluating Mint in the weeks to come. If they fare well, I'll recommend we go to them when we move from Ubuntu 10.04.
'The Shell is designed in order to minimize distraction and interruption and to enable users to focus on the task at hand. A persistent window list or dock would interfere with this goal, serving as a constant temptation to switch focus.'
Jesus Christ, GNOME! You're not my boss and you're definitely not my wife. So, unless you're willing either to pay me or put out, kindly stop trying to tell me what to do.
where has he been any ways?
Going and going... and gone.
Unfortunately the worst penalty the cop is likely to face is either a paid vacation known as "administrative leave" or maybe the loss of his job. ...
The worst penalty from his boss, yes. But he can also expect to be sued out of his underwear, under a section 1983 lawsuit. Say what you will about our government, the fact that you can sue cops for breaking your Constitutional Rights is an *amazing* feature.
Not to mention having to walk down the street each day knowing that every single person who either knows you or recognises you thinks you're a sadistic shithead.
Don't underestimate the power of societal disapproval. It's usually one of the strongest levers against repressive action by the state. The desertion of large numbers of military and police in Libya pretty much guaranteed the outcome. Likewise, Syria seems doomed to fall for the same reason: the rank and file are driven to reject their role in oppressing the people.
In Iran, the Basiji were members of a distinctly different social grouping (mostly rural, un- or under-educated) from the people who were protesting (mostly urban intelligentsia). It was therefore possible for them to sustain their brutality over the months it took to reduce the protests to background noise.
The reason for the kind of preemptive attack suffered by the UC Davis students was to quell discontent before it had time to coalesce into an all-out confrontation where significantly more violent tactics would be required. Well, that's what the manual said, anyway. But what the manual neglected to mention was that a lot of Americans may be able to rationalise their way to accepting a violent police response, but they cannot tolerate unprovoked, gratuitous violence meted out as punishment.
In the schoolyard, everyone knows to let the other guy throw the first punch. The students at Davis were remarkably canny in that regard, and the police remarkably, stupidly naive. With luck, other police forces across the country will take a lesson from this and avoid pissing off the population they're supposed to be protecting.
Whether you agree or disagree with the question of human affected climate change you really can't deny the fact that these folks are heavily biased toward a specific outcome for their research.
Who the fuck cares?
Since when did bias have anything to do with science? You perform your measurements according to a predefined methodology and you publish your results. Other scientists check your data and your methodology and either confirm the results or refute them, or something in between. Virtually every scientist in the world expects a certain set of results. That's why they perform the fucking experiment.
... Unless you're trying to suggest that these particular scientists were cheating. Is that what you mean? Because that's not science at all. That's just making shit up. And if that is what you're suggesting, I suppose you have evidence, because you really wouldn't want to be accused of making shit up yourself, would you?
That would be embarrassing.
There's plenty to question even if you agree with the basic scientific premise (as most do, I think).
As long as the basic scientific premise is that the climate change we're seeing is largely driven by human activity, we can have a reasonable conversation. Pretending that we had nothing to do with it leads directly to the assertion that there's nothing we can do about it, except adapt. But that adaptation cannot include reducing CO2 output, because human industrial activity had nothing to do with it.
You're right that any reasonably intelligent person does not dispute the basic facts of climate change. I'm absolutely certain that, even in the oil company boardrooms and think tanks where this campaign of Doubt is being orchestrated, people don't seriously doubt that the climate is changing and that human activity is a large contributor to the effect.
Oil companies and other industries who stand to benefit from the status quo are simply playing for time.
Back in days gone by when scientists first discovered the ozone hole over the Antarctic continent and determined that CFCs caused significant ozone depletion, Dupont fought tooth and nail to discredit them. When they were finally dragged kicking and screaming into the courtroom, they settled into a legal war of attrition that lasted years. Within weeks of the court's decision to ban the use of CFCs, they began producing HCFCs in significant quantities.
They'd been sitting on a product that causes orders of magnitude less damage to the ozone layer for years, but needed to play for time to get their manufacturing processes ramped up, and to maximise the return on their investment in CFCs.
Likewise, the fame for oil companies and their ilk is to delay the political and regulatory process for as long as possible in order first to squeeze as much value as possible out of their existing assets and second to buy time to reposition themselves so that they remain dominant in an economy that is much less reliant on burning fossil fuels.
Casting aspersions on the leading lights of the debate, pandering to the ignorance of the uneducated and buying off politicians, pseudo-scientists and lobbyists are all just tactics in this larger strategy.
And they're incredibly effective. As long as objections are being raised, they can plead that more time is needed, that there''s no consensus yet, and therefore no political mandate, and in doing so stall the entire policy debate before it can take even baby steps.
If we were smart, society would simply move ahead with the debate and ignore these intrusions. That's ultimately what happened with tobacco, the bought scientists continued to deny deny deny, but society at large just scoffed at them and went ahead with its efforts to reduce the impact of the drug on people's lives.
We're very close to that point with climate change. Australia has already passed a carbon tax, countries are already investing in alternatives (whether wisely or not is a secondary issue) and beginning to promote policies that move us away from undue dependence on burning hydrocarbons for fuel.
The comedy in the ass-kissing episode of the Miller's Tale does NOT arise from a character's willingness to debase himself. He has no clue that he going to kiss an anus. The scene takes place in the middle of the night, in total darkness. The butt of the joke THINKS he is going to kiss his crush on her lips, but she hangs her butt cheeks out the window for kissing instead. He only becomes suspicious when he feels her pubic hair, which he mistakes for a beard.
Heh, it's been 20+ years since I last opened that book. My apologies for mis-remembering and thanks for setting me straight.
And ass-kissing has been around since Chaucer's time.
You're referring to the Miller's tale? That's a different type of ass-kissing. The tale uses ass-kissing as a joke (the comedy is in the confusion of a bearded man) not in a pandering-to-the-boss sense. But if you know Chaucer, you know this.
True, the specific context has changed, but the reason we laugh at the act in the Miller's Tale is because one person debases himself by kissing the ass of another. Part of the comedy is that he's willing to do that even to a woman in order to win her affections. The ass-kisser is a risible creature from the start.
And by the bye, the green-eyed monster is hardly ever referenced any more, but envy is still associated with green. We don't go in so much for comparing women to a summer's day any more, but we still call them hot.
My point is not that language doesn't change; it's that it changes in unpredictable ways. Some turns of phrase remain with us for centuries, while other, arguably more deserving elements of the language disappear. I defy anyone to provide a coherent explanation.