Global Warming: The Y2K Scare for the New Century.
Absolutely. People realised well before the crisis occurred that remedial action was necessary to address shortcomings in human-designed systems whose effects, while difficult to quantify (and the subject of wild speculation), were known to be adverse.
While some efforts began well in advance of the crisis itself, consensus concerning action didn't arise immediately. The result was a late push toward a technical fix that ended up costing businesses and governments more, because once-plentiful resources were now in high demand.
The difference between Y2K and Climate Change, of course, is that one only required that a date field be fixed, and the systems we were modeling were entirely of human creation. Our sense of the scope of the problem, and therefore our predictive capability, was much better. This didn't stop an ill-informed media from announcing the Apocalypse and helping drive a millennial fervour among many, but those in this know were nonetheless able to concentrate on the task at hand and, for the most part, remedy it before it became a problem.
Our understanding of the scope and nature of Climate Change, on the other hand, is based on observation of a nearly infinitely more complex natural system. Achieving a clear understanding of the scope and exact nature of the problem is therefore exceedingly difficult. Scientific speculation about possible effects has led to an ill-informed media announcing the Apocalypse and helped drive a (Mayan) millennial fervour among many.
Those in the know are thwarted by competing economic interests who see mere acceptance of the concept of global climate change as a threat to their profitability. They have therefore recruited numerous 'public relations' companies to subvert the credibility of said researchers and to use any means necessary to cast doubt on the research itself. This has hampered efforts to win public support for action, which in turn has made it politically difficult to commit to anything but often meaningless half measures (e.g. cap-and-trade).
... But aside from the differences, yeah, they're exactly alike. 8^)
So when are you going to be part of the solution rather than part of the problem? Mischaracterizing your opponents isn't scientific either. Sure there's probably a group inimical to science who is doing as you say. And there's cynicism here as everywhere else.
I've posted a slightly longer consideration of the issue here. I think it explains a little more clearly what I'm pointing at. I think you'll agree that the trend I'm describing is real. It's not universal, thank heavens, otherwise I'd lose all faith in humanity. It is, however, a dominant element in the current social dynamic.
But distrust doesn't spring from just ideology. It also comes from failing to deliver.
I'd venture to suggest that yes, distrust of Science does necessarily come from ideology. By definition, if you're able to understand the principles of the scientific method and still fail see how they correct for personal bias, then you are either a victim of ignorance or willful self-deception.
By 'failing to deliver'. I'm going to assume you mean, 'failing to deliver good science.' Anything else would be accusing you of confirmation bias, and I don't think that's the case.
If that's true, then the solution is more science, not less. Distrust individual sources if experience teaches you that they're unreliable, but do not discredit Science just because of a few incompetents.
In my view, the science of climate has been taken over by a bunch of characters more interested in the politics than the science (or pragmatic matters of what do with that knowledge). The scandal of climate change is simply that the science is remarkably sloppy given the stakes.
So you're willing to argue that, because a subset of scientists are drawing conclusions that you feel the data doesn't support or even misusing their findings to pursue political agendas that this somehow subverts scientists as a class? Climate science is a small (but admittedly prominent) sector of Science as a whole.
I'm quite sure that you and I could have a reasonable discussion about the failings of Climate policy, and I'm pretty sure that's not what you mean. If you do feel that way, then you had better take a step back and consider the implications.
[T]here's argument by consensus rather than by science (who in the scientific community should be convinced by the argument that tens of thousands of scientists (the vast majority who don't have any more a clue than I do) have a certain opinion?)
Come on, don't start tilting at straw men. You're smarter than that. You know perfectly well that the argument from consensus is that the vast majority of climate scientists are finding data that meshes well with what others are finding. The fact that a bunch of people less qualified to know also agree neither adds nor subtracts from that contention.
I'm not denying that anyone in favour of action on climate hasn't said something as silly as that. I'm saying that they're part of the problem, because they're no less willfully ignorant than the rest. See where I'm going with this? The Know-Nothing, fear-driven, us-against-them, the-world-is-ending bullshit affects all of us, regardless of our political stance. Anti-intellectualism and resentment of Smart People generally is an equal opportunity subversive.
If what you really meant was that the data is based on too few sources, so the consensus itself is flawed, then that's easily verified, isn't it? And equally easily refuted. So let's have that argument instead. It won't be nearly as frustrating.
And P.S. You're wrong on that count. While the predictive capability of current climate science is necessarily limited (see cloud formation for an example of how complex the systems are that we're attempting to character
From the article, "Republicans who are college graduates are considerably less likely to accept the scientific consensus on climate change than those who have received less education."
That's the crux of the problem right there. No, not Republicans - irrationality, distrust and dishonesty. It's not communication skills that we're short on, it's moral and intellectual honesty.
The reason scientists are not believed now is because there is a deliberate campaign in place to discredit them by any means. Because they know most people can't or won't read the actual journals, the same cynical geniuses who bald-faced lied about the effects of smoking are teaching a new generation that scientists as a class are motivated by the same venality, mendacity and say-anything-to-get-approval motivations as are the rest of the world.
It's pretty easy for people to believe this, because we recognise that there's some of this in all of us. Indeed, it's trivially easy to find individual examples of greed, jealousy, laziness and other human weaknesses in any field. But it's a lie, of course, because it's not true of scientists as a class, and therefore not true of Science. Science, by definition, is the removal of these weaknesses from the pursuit of knowledge.
The problem is that doubt is a stronger weed than trust. When we are no longer honest as a society, we cannot conceive of honesty in others, let alone in systems.
This problem can't be fixed by explaining or communicating better, because anyone with the patience to listen is almost certainly not part of the problem group. The problem is that those with an unreasoning, idée fixe view of the world are no longer focused on the redeeming elements of human nature such as charity, kindness and respect. They've been transformed into crusaders [sic] against everything that's wrong in the world. As a result the dominant elements of modern culture today are intolerance, distrust, and cynicism deeper than we've seen in generations.
The biggest problem facing scientists today, therefore, is bad timing. They're trying to save a world that doesn't trust them to help.
No, that's kinda what you implied, but you left the door open for people to infer that you also meant that a zero-day was when a researcher announced a potential exploit without warning anyone else.
[First, thanks for having the patience to explain what must be stunningly obvious to you.]
Claim differentiation, while it may seem completely absurd to those who don't understand the purpose, is a valuable technique for future litigation, but means absolutely nothing for or against patentability.
My assertion is that claim differentiation is effectively meaningless when applied to software, first because of the difficulty of creating an unambiguous definition and second because it's difficult (some would say impossible) to provide ostensive proof of just what the claim actually means in practical terms.
As a consequence, software patents tend to include claims that are written as broadly as possible, which, as I mentioned, tend to ring-fence whole areas of technological development. And this is why I find the practice (and indeed the principle) of patents as a method of legal protection for software to be fundamentally wrong-headed.
With physical devices, one can simply point to the thing when questions of ambiguity (e.g. claim differentiation) arise. I'm arguing from ignorance again, but it seems reasonable to expect that being able to point to two devices or objects and point out their similarities could have an extremely salutary effect on even the most unsophisticated jury. (Obviously the quality of the lawyer -or whoever does the pointing out- plays a significant role here as well.)
With software, on the other hand, the first person to invent the software equivalent of a plow not only receives a patent on his plow, but also (effectively) receives a patent on some sort of Platonic Plow, and therefore on the act of plowing itself.
Claim differentiation may serve to protect the initial applicant, but in practice it does so all too well. It's just too hard to explain how my (software) plow is distinct from someone else's plow.
I'll agree that my argument is weaker where algorithms, etc. are concerned[*], but when it comes to functionality, I find it troubling to say the least to assert that because I found a way to do X using software, you can no longer perform the same task (well, not without coming to an understanding with me first).
------------
[*] I oppose the patentability of algorithms for other reasons, which don't need to enter into this already overlong thread.
Thank you for demonstrating so clearly why software patents are such a mind-fuckingly stupid idea.
... care to elaborate? The above is simply a prosaic description of a Venn diagram. If the Venn diagram encompasses set U, and a circle within the Venn diagram encompasses A, then if set U is larger, it must include ~A. Anyone attempting to complain about software patents should be able to understand basic set theory.
Sorry, I'm not suggesting you haven't explained clearly how patents work; quite to the contrary. What I'm suggesting is that the implications raised by the use of such language and logic subvert the very premise that patenting is an appropriate and viable approach in this field of knowledge.
I'm no expert and could easily be wrong on this count, but where physical patents are concerned, is it not sufficient to describe the device in sufficient detail? For example: I invent a new turbojet and state in my patent application that 'this is a new turbojet design'.
Someone comes along and patents exactly the same object and, when challenged, says, "Oh no, that patent was for airplane turbojets! This identical object is for ground vehicle turbojets!
An examination of the two objects would (one hopes) objectively establish that the devices were identical, and the second was therefore not patentable.
(Now, I'm aware that pharmaceutical companies regularly make use of a related loophole: re-patenting drugs for different purposes. I would venture that this behaviour is another supporting argument for my contention that the current patent regime is mind-fuckingly stupid.)
I'm also aware that the example is not entirely useful, because the real patent application would simply characterise the new turbojet as a propulsion device, making it difficult for someone to replicate the design and patent it for another purpose. I chose the analogy precisely because it echoes your example and because it really is the essence of numerous 'X on the Internet' patent applications.
The example you so clearly elaborated (my thanks were sincere) is completely absurd because of the impossibility of an unambiguous description software and business processes. Any sufficiently complete description becomes indistinguishable from copyright, and any lower standard of description raises significant doubt about the originality of the 'invention' as well as creating the impression that, rather than fostering invention, software patents have exactly the opposite effect, because they ring-fence huge areas of functionality with their broad, ambiguous terms.
I'm not stating anything new, of course. The shortcomings of patent Law and practice have been rehashed endlessly here on Slashdot and elsewhere. Which is why I was content to consider the argument made and simply to state that 'software patents are such a mind-fuckingly stupid idea.'
For example, say my independent claim is a new forward error connection scheme that involves receiving packets from a network, processing them using my revolutionary new error correction system and appending some sort of advanced hash to them [note: I personally haven't invented it yet, so please don't criticize me by saying "but error correction and hashes are known". This is just for example], and then transmitting the appended packets over the network. Then, in a dependent claim, I say, "The method of claim 1, wherein the network is the internet." Because the two claims, by definition, cover different things, the addition of the dependent claim means that the networks in the independent claim include the internet, but also include other networks - local networks, private networks, metropolitan area networks, wireless networks, wired networks, token ring networks, etc. It's purely useful in a litigation sense so that someone can't say "well, you were thinking of the internet when you said 'network' so when I do it over my corporate intranet, it's different and I'm not infringing."
Thank you for demonstrating so clearly why software patents are such a mind-fuckingly stupid idea.
Right, that's why there are no serious projects written in PHP.
Except for Facebook, Wikipedia, Yahoo!, Digg, Joomla, eZ Publish, WordPress, YouTube in its early stages, Drupal and Moodle, and thousands others.
You're welcome to make the point that PHP is adequate (although I don't share that view), but please, you're not doing yourself any favours by including Facebook and Joomla in that list. Joomla especially is an outstanding case of Cargo Cult development. Read the first sentence of the linked section and tell me it's not true of Joomla.
It has to be said: Don't use PHP if you value security or maintainability.
Seconded.
I was part of a team coding and maintaining one of those classic apps that went straight from proof-of-concept to production (much to our chagrin). I'll never forget the time a security advisory was released for PHP and, when we found 4 other vulnerabilities in the same section of code (a single function), we were first told that they weren't relevant to the immediate fix and then that these were 'only' DoS bugs, therefore not security vulnerabilities.
I campaigned for months to get the manpower to refactor the application in a Real Language (which had been the plan, at some stage), but by then we had several months of work invested and about 50,000 lines of code committed. Management expressed their sympathy and said, effectively, 'Not a chance.'
Given that you are Management in this case, I'd urge you not to make the same mistake we did.
Yes, you can build a decent framework on top of PHP, so that you won't be vulnerable to SQL injections. By the time you do, you lose any speed advantage (or "ease-of-use" advantage) PHP had over Ruby on Rails. Given that, if you think Rails is too slow, your only real alternative is something like Java, and I'm not even sure Java with a full stack is any better.
This is the wrong way to go about things. Don't move to a technology because it protects you from making silly mistakes. Choose a technology that fits you best, factoring in security as one aspect of its overall performance. And even when you choose a language/framework that offers protections like those above, you're still not exempted from checking your inputs and outputs. No matter what language you choose, you still need to secure your code base. If the language offers you nice hooks to do it with, so much the better, but that should never remove your obligation to think through what happens to every byte your app handles.
Oh, another thing . . . governments like to slip in "legal" spies in their embassies, usually with such titles as "Under-Secretary for Agricultural Exchange", or something like that.
Cultural Attaché, usually.
How do you spot one of these? From The Economist, "Look for someone who is obviously much too clever for his job."
Bear in mind that these ones aren't really hiding. They won't admit to any espionage role; they assume you know what they are. They're in place to handle information on the cusp between public and secret and in many cases to provide security/protection for those whose identity is a very carefully kept secret. Think of them as a combination stalking horse / beard / doorman for the 'real' spies.
how about because other countries do EXACTLY the same thing, this is only news because it is google. countries all over the world (including the US) have restrictions on everything from foreign investment, foreign ownership and foreign imports and many even with the exact same laws requiring local partners in many sectors.
Which is why the WTO has this thing called Most Favoured Nation status. It's designed to say that you've got to do unto all others as you do unto your best friend. In a nutshell, the most favourable trading conditions (i.e. for them, not you) that you've negotiated to date with other nations must be made available to any other nation that asks. In practical terms, it's done a lot to undermine the kind of protectionist practices such as the above.
I won't pretend to be a trade expert, but I strongly suspect that there might actually be grounds for action through the WTO.
... Making the WTO's decision stick, of course, is entirely another issue.
There are techniques for doing man-in-the-middle attacks against the SSL session which allows for inspection of SSL traffic. It's a premium feature though and I imagine schools don't want to pay for too much extra.
Well, here's a slightly less costly alternative, then:
Stand where you can see the student's screens.
*sigh* When did morals and ethical behaviour become a technological problem?
interface like that offered by 500px.com [...] just about every design and editorial decision is made to enhance our appreciation of photography as art and craft.
Funny, I wasn't aware that forcing horizontal scrolling enhanced anything.
Good point. I didn't mean to suggest that they're perfect. I do, however, see valid reasons behind their choices. I used that particular example because it demonstrates how even small changes from their existing UI could make Flickr immensely better.
The biggest difference between the two sites, though, is editorial. 500px is one of the few sites on the Web that I bother to view full screen. The overall quality of the photos there makes it worth the effort.
Flickr never cared about professional photographers. It's possibly the worst imaginable interface for viewing photos, debasing just about everything that makes photography interesting and engaging.
Contrast this with an interface like that offered by 500px.com. This site was also founded in Torionto by a few guys who are genuinely passionate about photography. While it consciously apes Flickr in some respects, just about every design and editorial decision is made to enhance our appreciation of photography as art and craft.
Flickr drives virtually no traffic to my websites, in spite of my having some interesting and unique photos (I live in a part of the world few have visited). Since I moved to 500px, I haven't even thought about it. Oh it's perfectly fine for sharing snapshots, but any professional, talented photographer who think Flickr is going to help their career is labouring under a delusion.
That's what's bugging me here as well. Who cares how the footage was released?
I do. I care a lot. Why does someone have to face a lifetime in prison just to allow us to discuss 'WHY we have soldiers killing unarmed civilians'?
The fact that it took someone breaking the law to show a commonplace incident in the so-called War on Terror can be viewed as a sad commentary on the state of censorship in our time, or (if you're an optimist) an affirmation that, despite a culture of secrecy, information really does want to be free.
In either case, Greenwald's conjecture is that Manning really was genuinely motivated by his conscience and that his 'confessor' Lamo rewarded his honesty with lies, venality and betrayal. I find his case as presented compelling but not conclusive.
Greenwald's larger point about wikileaks, however, is irrefutable:
The reason this story matters so much -- aside from the fact that it may be the case that a truly heroic, 22-year-old whistle-blower is facing an extremely lengthy prison term -- is the unique and incomparably valuable function WikiLeaks is fulfilling. Even before the Apache helicopter leak, I wrote at length about why they are so vital, and won't repeat all of that here. Suffice to say, there are very few entities, if there are any, which pose as much of a threat to the ability of governmental and corporate elites to shroud their corrupt conduct behind an extreme wall of secrecy.
As others will no doubt suggest, whistle blowers should understand the consequences of their actions, accepting the sometimes inevitable retribution that follows in order to serve the public good. That does not, however, excuse what Greenwald characterises as 'despicable' behaviour by Lamo. If this account proves true, then Lamo really is a sick, sorry individual.
I find this whole story compelling precisely because it demonstrates the stakes involved in something as simple as telling the truth. Secrecy and Transparency are equally costly and dangerous as we wander too far towards either end of the continuum. Stories like Manning's allow us the opportunity to gauge where we are in that continuum.
There's always the question, how long the APIs will remain open. They can disappear any time at the retailers wish and you're stuck with your development effort. I'd be wary.
Indeed.
McAllister writes:
Ask any company that hosts an open source software project how many outsiders actually commit code changes on a regular basis and you're likely to hear a discouraging figure.
His conclusion is that low uptake makes opening APIs a high risk activity. That's as may be, but isn't it equally possible that these organisations aren't successful because they're doing it wrong?
Unless I have some kind of moral ownership stake in the project (such as I might have if I maintained a GPLed Linux software package, for example) what incentive to I have to invest my time? I understand the reasons for it, but many large businesses today are notoriously unreliable when it comes to strategy. Driven as they are by quarterly returns and subject to the whim of an increasingly sociopathic class of managers driven by MBA culture to abstract all decisions into monetary terms, why in the hell should I, the lowly FOSS developer, want to hitch my wagon to their star?
(More accurately, they're asking me to hitch my horse to their wagon, without giving me any say on the destination or even the route.)
There are a few organisations who really get how community relations and management work, but they are a tiny minority. The overwhelming majority baulk when they come to the realisation that FOSS means sharing ownership and control.
None of this is news to anyone here at slashdot. What gets me riled up about this article is that someone who should know better spends his time chiding FOSS for being inappropriate to business status quo instead of explaining to business how they've got to adapt to a new set of circumstances.
But the reason McAllister doesn't want to say that is because he's holding out for a new set of actors in the online world: Middlemen who build out standardised (but presumably proprietary) API and data management services for small and medium businesses so they can keep up with the Amazons and Tescos of the world without having to build their own data infrastructure.
McAllister is, in other words, trying to reinvent the distributor in an environment that was invented precisely to remove the need for intermediaries. My only response is to apply an aphorism from another age of commercially appropriated social phenomena: 'You've come a long way, baby.'
Slashdot Mirror
fucking protons, how do they work?
Based on the size of your dick, you shouldn't have any problems.
(Sorry, couldn't resist.)
Global Warming: The Y2K Scare for the New Century.
Absolutely. People realised well before the crisis occurred that remedial action was necessary to address shortcomings in human-designed systems whose effects, while difficult to quantify (and the subject of wild speculation), were known to be adverse.
While some efforts began well in advance of the crisis itself, consensus concerning action didn't arise immediately. The result was a late push toward a technical fix that ended up costing businesses and governments more, because once-plentiful resources were now in high demand.
The difference between Y2K and Climate Change, of course, is that one only required that a date field be fixed, and the systems we were modeling were entirely of human creation. Our sense of the scope of the problem, and therefore our predictive capability, was much better. This didn't stop an ill-informed media from announcing the Apocalypse and helping drive a millennial fervour among many, but those in this know were nonetheless able to concentrate on the task at hand and, for the most part, remedy it before it became a problem.
Our understanding of the scope and nature of Climate Change, on the other hand, is based on observation of a nearly infinitely more complex natural system. Achieving a clear understanding of the scope and exact nature of the problem is therefore exceedingly difficult. Scientific speculation about possible effects has led to an ill-informed media announcing the Apocalypse and helped drive a (Mayan) millennial fervour among many.
Those in the know are thwarted by competing economic interests who see mere acceptance of the concept of global climate change as a threat to their profitability. They have therefore recruited numerous 'public relations' companies to subvert the credibility of said researchers and to use any means necessary to cast doubt on the research itself. This has hampered efforts to win public support for action, which in turn has made it politically difficult to commit to anything but often meaningless half measures (e.g. cap-and-trade).
... But aside from the differences, yeah, they're exactly alike. 8^)
"Starker! Zis is die CAOCIPHER! The CAOCIPHER doesn't go 'PHTHHHHBBBBTTT!!!'"
"But Siegfried, look. See, right here betveen ze CHGFYTTSSXHS und ze KJHJHLRUUIGE."
"Ah. Yes. Vell zen, carry on."
[It's funnier when you say it out loud. Trust me. Your workmates will love you for it.]
I've posted a slightly longer consideration of the issue here. I think it explains a little more clearly what I'm pointing at. I think you'll agree that the trend I'm describing is real. It's not universal, thank heavens, otherwise I'd lose all faith in humanity. It is, however, a dominant element in the current social dynamic.
I'd venture to suggest that yes, distrust of Science does necessarily come from ideology. By definition, if you're able to understand the principles of the scientific method and still fail see how they correct for personal bias, then you are either a victim of ignorance or willful self-deception.
By 'failing to deliver'. I'm going to assume you mean, 'failing to deliver good science.' Anything else would be accusing you of confirmation bias, and I don't think that's the case.
If that's true, then the solution is more science, not less. Distrust individual sources if experience teaches you that they're unreliable, but do not discredit Science just because of a few incompetents.
So you're willing to argue that, because a subset of scientists are drawing conclusions that you feel the data doesn't support or even misusing their findings to pursue political agendas that this somehow subverts scientists as a class? Climate science is a small (but admittedly prominent) sector of Science as a whole.
I'm quite sure that you and I could have a reasonable discussion about the failings of Climate policy, and I'm pretty sure that's not what you mean. If you do feel that way, then you had better take a step back and consider the implications.
Come on, don't start tilting at straw men. You're smarter than that. You know perfectly well that the argument from consensus is that the vast majority of climate scientists are finding data that meshes well with what others are finding. The fact that a bunch of people less qualified to know also agree neither adds nor subtracts from that contention.
I'm not denying that anyone in favour of action on climate hasn't said something as silly as that. I'm saying that they're part of the problem, because they're no less willfully ignorant than the rest. See where I'm going with this? The Know-Nothing, fear-driven, us-against-them, the-world-is-ending bullshit affects all of us, regardless of our political stance. Anti-intellectualism and resentment of Smart People generally is an equal opportunity subversive.
If what you really meant was that the data is based on too few sources, so the consensus itself is flawed, then that's easily verified, isn't it? And equally easily refuted. So let's have that argument instead. It won't be nearly as frustrating.
And P.S. You're wrong on that count. While the predictive capability of current climate science is necessarily limited (see cloud formation for an example of how complex the systems are that we're attempting to character
From the article, "Republicans who are college graduates are considerably less likely to accept the scientific consensus on climate change than those who have received less education."
That's the crux of the problem right there. No, not Republicans - irrationality, distrust and dishonesty. It's not communication skills that we're short on, it's moral and intellectual honesty.
The reason scientists are not believed now is because there is a deliberate campaign in place to discredit them by any means. Because they know most people can't or won't read the actual journals, the same cynical geniuses who bald-faced lied about the effects of smoking are teaching a new generation that scientists as a class are motivated by the same venality, mendacity and say-anything-to-get-approval motivations as are the rest of the world.
It's pretty easy for people to believe this, because we recognise that there's some of this in all of us. Indeed, it's trivially easy to find individual examples of greed, jealousy, laziness and other human weaknesses in any field. But it's a lie, of course, because it's not true of scientists as a class, and therefore not true of Science. Science, by definition, is the removal of these weaknesses from the pursuit of knowledge.
The problem is that doubt is a stronger weed than trust. When we are no longer honest as a society, we cannot conceive of honesty in others, let alone in systems.
This problem can't be fixed by explaining or communicating better, because anyone with the patience to listen is almost certainly not part of the problem group. The problem is that those with an unreasoning, idée fixe view of the world are no longer focused on the redeeming elements of human nature such as charity, kindness and respect. They've been transformed into crusaders [sic] against everything that's wrong in the world. As a result the dominant elements of modern culture today are intolerance, distrust, and cynicism deeper than we've seen in generations.
The biggest problem facing scientists today, therefore, is bad timing. They're trying to save a world that doesn't trust them to help.
Universal translator, here we come!
Cool! Can I bring it into my next marketing meeting?
That he is a computer simulation fooling all of us for over 50 years...
But how could we know for sure?
Even if he proves it, it doesn't mean it actually worked....
Isn't that kinda what I said?
No, that's kinda what you implied, but you left the door open for people to infer that you also meant that a zero-day was when a researcher announced a potential exploit without warning anyone else.
Zero day bugs are where some guy says "surprise look what I found" on his blog without any warning despite how long a bug takes to fix.
No, zero-day exploits are are... (wait for it) actively exploited in the wild before the first 'look what I found' ever appears.
Yeah, everyone seems to be ready to drop flash for video playback, but what codec will their videos be encoded with?
Answer: Whatever codec they choose, the world will adopt it.
Never underestimate the promise of even simulated sex as a motivator. if there were porn on the moon, we'd already have a colony established.
[First, thanks for having the patience to explain what must be stunningly obvious to you.]
Claim differentiation, while it may seem completely absurd to those who don't understand the purpose, is a valuable technique for future litigation, but means absolutely nothing for or against patentability.
My assertion is that claim differentiation is effectively meaningless when applied to software, first because of the difficulty of creating an unambiguous definition and second because it's difficult (some would say impossible) to provide ostensive proof of just what the claim actually means in practical terms.
As a consequence, software patents tend to include claims that are written as broadly as possible, which, as I mentioned, tend to ring-fence whole areas of technological development. And this is why I find the practice (and indeed the principle) of patents as a method of legal protection for software to be fundamentally wrong-headed.
With physical devices, one can simply point to the thing when questions of ambiguity (e.g. claim differentiation) arise. I'm arguing from ignorance again, but it seems reasonable to expect that being able to point to two devices or objects and point out their similarities could have an extremely salutary effect on even the most unsophisticated jury. (Obviously the quality of the lawyer -or whoever does the pointing out- plays a significant role here as well.)
With software, on the other hand, the first person to invent the software equivalent of a plow not only receives a patent on his plow, but also (effectively) receives a patent on some sort of Platonic Plow, and therefore on the act of plowing itself.
Claim differentiation may serve to protect the initial applicant, but in practice it does so all too well. It's just too hard to explain how my (software) plow is distinct from someone else's plow.
I'll agree that my argument is weaker where algorithms, etc. are concerned[*], but when it comes to functionality, I find it troubling to say the least to assert that because I found a way to do X using software, you can no longer perform the same task (well, not without coming to an understanding with me first).
------------
[*] I oppose the patentability of algorithms for other reasons, which don't need to enter into this already overlong thread.
Sorry, I'm not suggesting you haven't explained clearly how patents work; quite to the contrary. What I'm suggesting is that the implications raised by the use of such language and logic subvert the very premise that patenting is an appropriate and viable approach in this field of knowledge.
I'm no expert and could easily be wrong on this count, but where physical patents are concerned, is it not sufficient to describe the device in sufficient detail? For example: I invent a new turbojet and state in my patent application that 'this is a new turbojet design'.
Someone comes along and patents exactly the same object and, when challenged, says, "Oh no, that patent was for airplane turbojets! This identical object is for ground vehicle turbojets!
An examination of the two objects would (one hopes) objectively establish that the devices were identical, and the second was therefore not patentable.
(Now, I'm aware that pharmaceutical companies regularly make use of a related loophole: re-patenting drugs for different purposes. I would venture that this behaviour is another supporting argument for my contention that the current patent regime is mind-fuckingly stupid.)
I'm also aware that the example is not entirely useful, because the real patent application would simply characterise the new turbojet as a propulsion device, making it difficult for someone to replicate the design and patent it for another purpose. I chose the analogy precisely because it echoes your example and because it really is the essence of numerous 'X on the Internet' patent applications.
The example you so clearly elaborated (my thanks were sincere) is completely absurd because of the impossibility of an unambiguous description software and business processes. Any sufficiently complete description becomes indistinguishable from copyright, and any lower standard of description raises significant doubt about the originality of the 'invention' as well as creating the impression that, rather than fostering invention, software patents have exactly the opposite effect, because they ring-fence huge areas of functionality with their broad, ambiguous terms.
I'm not stating anything new, of course. The shortcomings of patent Law and practice have been rehashed endlessly here on Slashdot and elsewhere. Which is why I was content to consider the argument made and simply to state that 'software patents are such a mind-fuckingly stupid idea.'
Hope that clarifies things. 8^)
Thank you for demonstrating so clearly why software patents are such a mind-fuckingly stupid idea.
Right, that's why there are no serious projects written in PHP.
Except for Facebook, Wikipedia, Yahoo!, Digg, Joomla, eZ Publish, WordPress, YouTube in its early stages, Drupal and Moodle, and thousands others.
You're welcome to make the point that PHP is adequate (although I don't share that view), but please, you're not doing yourself any favours by including Facebook and Joomla in that list. Joomla especially is an outstanding case of Cargo Cult development. Read the first sentence of the linked section and tell me it's not true of Joomla.
Seconded.
I was part of a team coding and maintaining one of those classic apps that went straight from proof-of-concept to production (much to our chagrin). I'll never forget the time a security advisory was released for PHP and, when we found 4 other vulnerabilities in the same section of code (a single function), we were first told that they weren't relevant to the immediate fix and then that these were 'only' DoS bugs, therefore not security vulnerabilities.
I campaigned for months to get the manpower to refactor the application in a Real Language (which had been the plan, at some stage), but by then we had several months of work invested and about 50,000 lines of code committed. Management expressed their sympathy and said, effectively, 'Not a chance.'
Given that you are Management in this case, I'd urge you not to make the same mistake we did.
This is the wrong way to go about things. Don't move to a technology because it protects you from making silly mistakes. Choose a technology that fits you best, factoring in security as one aspect of its overall performance. And even when you choose a language/framework that offers protections like those above, you're still not exempted from checking your inputs and outputs. No matter what language you choose, you still need to secure your code base. If the language offers you nice hooks to do it with, so much the better, but that should never remove your obligation to think through what happens to every byte your app handles.
Cultural Attaché, usually.
Bear in mind that these ones aren't really hiding. They won't admit to any espionage role; they assume you know what they are. They're in place to handle information on the cusp between public and secret and in many cases to provide security/protection for those whose identity is a very carefully kept secret. Think of them as a combination stalking horse / beard / doorman for the 'real' spies.
how about because other countries do EXACTLY the same thing, this is only news because it is google. countries all over the world (including the US) have restrictions on everything from foreign investment, foreign ownership and foreign imports and many even with the exact same laws requiring local partners in many sectors.
Which is why the WTO has this thing called Most Favoured Nation status. It's designed to say that you've got to do unto all others as you do unto your best friend. In a nutshell, the most favourable trading conditions (i.e. for them, not you) that you've negotiated to date with other nations must be made available to any other nation that asks. In practical terms, it's done a lot to undermine the kind of protectionist practices such as the above.
I won't pretend to be a trade expert, but I strongly suspect that there might actually be grounds for action through the WTO.
... Making the WTO's decision stick, of course, is entirely another issue.
"WITH" not "FROM"
And here I was, ready to comment with:
That's nothing. I've breathed air from way worse places than that!
Which would have got us a whole thread of hilarious queef jokes, and more.
... Spoil-sport.
Well, here's a slightly less costly alternative, then:
Stand where you can see the student's screens.
*sigh* When did morals and ethical behaviour become a technological problem?
How many people has the California Milk Processor Board sued for the literally hundreds of infringements of their "Got ____?" Trademark?
Dunno. Got Citation?
interface like that offered by 500px.com [...] just about every design and editorial decision is made to enhance our appreciation of photography as art and craft.
Funny, I wasn't aware that forcing horizontal scrolling enhanced anything.
Good point. I didn't mean to suggest that they're perfect. I do, however, see valid reasons behind their choices. I used that particular example because it demonstrates how even small changes from their existing UI could make Flickr immensely better.
The biggest difference between the two sites, though, is editorial. 500px is one of the few sites on the Web that I bother to view full screen. The overall quality of the photos there makes it worth the effort.
OSX is based on UNIX (and is a certified UNIX OS) Linux is Not UNIX and although compatible is quite different to OSX
Slightly OT, but amusing:
Linux Is Not UniX ia a (near-perfect) recursive acronym.
Flickr never cared about professional photographers. It's possibly the worst imaginable interface for viewing photos, debasing just about everything that makes photography interesting and engaging.
Contrast this with an interface like that offered by 500px.com. This site was also founded in Torionto by a few guys who are genuinely passionate about photography. While it consciously apes Flickr in some respects, just about every design and editorial decision is made to enhance our appreciation of photography as art and craft.
Flickr drives virtually no traffic to my websites, in spite of my having some interesting and unique photos (I live in a part of the world few have visited). Since I moved to 500px, I haven't even thought about it. Oh it's perfectly fine for sharing snapshots, but any professional, talented photographer who think Flickr is going to help their career is labouring under a delusion.
I do. I care a lot. Why does someone have to face a lifetime in prison just to allow us to discuss 'WHY we have soldiers killing unarmed civilians'?
The fact that it took someone breaking the law to show a commonplace incident in the so-called War on Terror can be viewed as a sad commentary on the state of censorship in our time, or (if you're an optimist) an affirmation that, despite a culture of secrecy, information really does want to be free.
In either case, Greenwald's conjecture is that Manning really was genuinely motivated by his conscience and that his 'confessor' Lamo rewarded his honesty with lies, venality and betrayal. I find his case as presented compelling but not conclusive.
Greenwald's larger point about wikileaks, however, is irrefutable:
As others will no doubt suggest, whistle blowers should understand the consequences of their actions, accepting the sometimes inevitable retribution that follows in order to serve the public good. That does not, however, excuse what Greenwald characterises as 'despicable' behaviour by Lamo. If this account proves true, then Lamo really is a sick, sorry individual.
I find this whole story compelling precisely because it demonstrates the stakes involved in something as simple as telling the truth. Secrecy and Transparency are equally costly and dangerous as we wander too far towards either end of the continuum. Stories like Manning's allow us the opportunity to gauge where we are in that continuum.
There's always the question, how long the APIs will remain open. They can disappear any time at the retailers wish and you're stuck with your development effort. I'd be wary.
Indeed.
McAllister writes:
His conclusion is that low uptake makes opening APIs a high risk activity. That's as may be, but isn't it equally possible that these organisations aren't successful because they're doing it wrong?
Unless I have some kind of moral ownership stake in the project (such as I might have if I maintained a GPLed Linux software package, for example) what incentive to I have to invest my time? I understand the reasons for it, but many large businesses today are notoriously unreliable when it comes to strategy. Driven as they are by quarterly returns and subject to the whim of an increasingly sociopathic class of managers driven by MBA culture to abstract all decisions into monetary terms, why in the hell should I, the lowly FOSS developer, want to hitch my wagon to their star?
(More accurately, they're asking me to hitch my horse to their wagon, without giving me any say on the destination or even the route.)
There are a few organisations who really get how community relations and management work, but they are a tiny minority. The overwhelming majority baulk when they come to the realisation that FOSS means sharing ownership and control.
None of this is news to anyone here at slashdot. What gets me riled up about this article is that someone who should know better spends his time chiding FOSS for being inappropriate to business status quo instead of explaining to business how they've got to adapt to a new set of circumstances.
But the reason McAllister doesn't want to say that is because he's holding out for a new set of actors in the online world: Middlemen who build out standardised (but presumably proprietary) API and data management services for small and medium businesses so they can keep up with the Amazons and Tescos of the world without having to build their own data infrastructure.
McAllister is, in other words, trying to reinvent the distributor in an environment that was invented precisely to remove the need for intermediaries. My only response is to apply an aphorism from another age of commercially appropriated social phenomena: 'You've come a long way, baby.'