Leeway for the submitter? Okay. But whoever approved it to go on the front page needs to make a correction as quickly as possible. The headline and summary are just plain wrong. Seriously. 180 degrees.
I didn't see it posted as a "mysterious future" article or I would have e-mailed the editor to say, "Hey, this is extremely incorrect, and you need to not post it..."
The exact same argument could be used to pass a law making it illegal to build a campfire in the passenger seat of your car while driving. It's impractical to make laws to prevent every stupid thing a person may do while driving. At some point, you have to say, "You know what? We're going to trust you to use a little bit of common sense. If we find that you've got a bit of a lapse of it, though, and you do something dangerous, we're going to pull you over and give you a ticket."
Yes, some people will still do stupid things. They always will. It's impossible to outlaw them all.
What you can do is make a judgment about which are particularly dangerous. Drunk driving fits into that category, evidenced by the enormous number of accidents and fatalities caused by drunk drivers. Driving while drunk is also a special case in my mind because drinking specifically causes your judgment to be impaired. Texting on a Blackberry, to my knowledge, doesn't make one more stupid than they already are.
That why I was wonder exactly how many "Blackberry pile-ups" there are. If the answer is thousands, then yeah, passing a law against it would probably be a Good Thing®. If it's a few fluke fender-benders, then it's no big deal, and should be well-covered by existing laws regarding paying attention (or in this case, not) while on the road.
So that politicians can look like they're doing something about this grave new threat to everyone's safety.
Seriously, aside from the fact that driving carelessly is already against the law, exactly how many "Blackberry pile-ups" have their been? I'm guessing it's a miniscule number caused by either flukes or by people who drive so stupidly that they would have had an accident whatever they were doing.
Do we really need a law to prevent, what, a dozen or so at the most accidents a year? Would those dozen or so people who cause those accident really not send text messages while driving because of it?
The game isn't meant to say, "This is exactly how evolution works." Not having played it, this is a guess, but it's supposed to illustrate some of the basic principles and let kids have some fun while learning it.
Animals also don't evolve as you go outside and look at the real thing; it's a process that typically takes millions of years. And I'm sorry, but David Attenborough is boring.
If you want your kids playing outside instead of playing video games, that's fine, I encourage it too, and more power to you. But I find it a little snooty to look down on something that is trying to be a little more intelligent than your typical Grand Theft Auto or Doom game that so many other kids are playing these days.
Maybe it won't change the world, but at least it's a step in the right direction.
The problem is that it's impractical for Dell, or any other company, to support every distribution and version of GNU/Linux that's out there. It's also impractical for them to test every hardware configuration with all of those distributions. They've got to pick one. Or two. Or five. Or whatever practical number their support people can handle. (Which I'm guess will end up being one or two at the most.)
Personally, I think they should go with Ubuntu, as it is extremely popular and arguably the most user-friendly distribution. If you want a different distribution, you're free to install it, and it will probably work since you know that the Ubuntu drivers will work on their hardware. But if you get a Dell with Linux, along with their support and guarantee that it will work on their hardware, you'll have to go with the distribution they've actually tested and that they support.
The open-source community will not be able to make a better Windows than Microsoft. At most, they're likely to make a better NT 4.0 sometime in the next 3-5 years. By this point, Windows will be well ahead. I think we need to put this into perspective- this project will be a welcome way for Linux-based companies to preserve LEGACY Windows support in Virtual Machines at decent speed, etc. - possibly to be a virtualized solution to Wine. Otherwise, this is not going to be adopted by the masses... EVER. If you think this, then you really don't understand the consumer market.
The hardware manufacturing sector will not be able to make a better IBM computer than IBM. At most, they're likely to make a better PS/2 sometime in the next 3-5 years. By this point, IBM will be well ahead. I think we need to put this into perspective-this project will be a welcome way for IBM clone companies to preserve LEGACY IBM hardware support in clones at decent speed, etc... Otherwise, this is not going to be adopted by the masses... EVER. If you think this, then you really don't understand the consumer market.
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Seriously, there are plenty of cases where a company or organization has made a better (and highly successful!) mousetrap than the original. Look at what AMD is doing to Intel, or what Firefox is doing to Internet Explorer. I think it's naive to think say that it's impossible for anyone to make a better Windows than Microsoft.
Plus, when you think about it, no one really has to. What exactly is going to run on Windows Vista, for example, that doesn't run on Windows XP? 99.9% of everything that everyone uses on Windows will actually still run on Windows 2000. If they're successful in cloning Windows XP (which is their goal), they don't have to keep up with Microsoft. Hell, I'll actually be pleased if they don't; not cloning UAC is more than fine with me!
Aw, hell, this is as good a post to reply to as any.
Myst. It was artistically gorgeous, and it was rather unique in that it just tossed you in with no fancy instruction manual or tutorial. Hell, you didn't even know what the objective of the game. It was just kind of like, "Here, play this. Don't know what to do? Well, you're smart, figure it out."
I have customers who have asked us to do this, and we usually work to talk them out of it.
I have no mod points, but I'm modding you up in spirit.
<soapbox>
I absolutely cannot stand it when employers filter content. The thing is, even if people are wasting too much time at work browsing MySpace (or the Internet in general), that is a management problem, not a technical one. If you take away their MySpace or whatever it is they're browsing, they're just going to move on and browse some other site. If you put a whitelist in place, they'll just find some other way to goof off. The problem isn't that the Internet is distracting, it's that the employee is easily distracted.
I work at a big company as a contractor. It just recently blocked access to the big Internet e-mail services (Gmail, Yahoo Mail, etc.) because it didn't like employees wasting time with their personal e-mail at work. Of course, being a contractor, it doesn't take into account that I use my personal e-mail to communicate with my contract agency about stuff that I'd rather not have stored on company e-mail servers. It's easy to say, "Well, you shouldn't use company resources for that type of stuff," but practically speaking, my ability to communicate effectively with my contract agency is essential to me doing a good job for them. It also totally ignores the fact that I keep personal stuff like vacations and such on my personal Gmail calendar to know when I should ask for time off, when my coworker's birthday is, and so on.
The company spends a fortune on content filtering. There's the hardware itself, the update service, the support contract, the personnel cost for the guy who maintains it, the internal support costs of handling trouble tickets related to it, the cost of Internet downtime due to it periodically failing, the cost of packaging the software end of it and deploying it to the workstations (so that you can't browse them at home on your laptop, of course!), and so on ad nauseum. Just as one example, some of our customers are casinos. So we can't just put a rule in that says, "block gambling sites," because our marketing and sales folks have to be able to access their sites. No, we have to have rules that say things like, "This group can access these sites, that group can access those sites, everyone else can't access any of the sites,..."
Even in the extreme case of porn sites, the answer to controlling it is to make a company policy prohibiting browsing them, and if you catch someone doing it, fire them for it. If you try to block them all, you're just setting yourself up for someone saying something like, "Well, it wasn't blocked, so I thought it was okay to go there!" I've found that if you treat people like 12-year-olds, they tend to not disappoint you. When policies like this go into place, you're also going to have the contingent of people who deliberately goof off more as a form of passive-aggressive rebellion. It's just stupid, you're only causing more problems, and there's no need.
I know that some of you will probably reply, "But you have to filter content to avoid sexual harassment lawsuits!" No, you don't. As long as you make a company policy about it and you take the appropriate action when someone breaks that policy, you'll win any lawsuit that someone may file. The law does not require you to spend a fortune to be a babysitter, it only requires that you take reasonable action to prevent a hostile work environment. The reason we have content filtering in the first place is because managers, in general, are lazy and don't want to do it themselves. The people who would sue you for not content filtering will sue you anyway. The only important thing is whether or not you'll win. Besides, at my company, the cost of defending itself against such frivolous lawsuits is negligible compared to the cost of maintaining our content filtering services.
Qwest is one of the companies speaking out against net neutrality. The CEO even went as far as to call it "really silly." Could it be that the CTO's comments are politically motivated?
(I'm not kidding. I'm not asking for your home address, just tell me enough info so that I can find and call the store where you saw this. I'd like to check out this wonderful place that has managed to keep Wiis in stock for more than a few hours, something no store I've checked in Atlanta has done in months.)
You are right, but you are also arguing against a zealot.
Wow! Did I just get called a Nintendo zealot?
I don't even own a Nintendo! I own an Xbox 360 which is pretty neat, an old PS2 that I don't play any more, and a PSP which I haven't played after the first couple of months of getting it. (Talk about unfulfilled expectations!)
The last piece of Nintendo equipment I owned was an old—THE ORIGINAL!—Nintendo Entertainment System console, which I sold used over 15 years ago.
The reason I want a Wii so badly is because 1) I have an Xbox 360, and though it's fun to play with sometimes, it's really not that special, 2) I have seen absolutely nothing from the PS3 that merits any attention whatsoever (let alone $600 of my hard-earned cash!), and 3) the Wii looks like a lot of fun and a lot different from the ho-hum games that I'm so bored with now. Maybe I'm wrong, but according to what my friends who have managed to procure one say, I'm not.
Heh. A guy who hasn't owned a Nintendo console in over a decade and a half gets called a zealot because he wants a Wii and points out how well they're selling. That's a good one.
Hardware sales were brisk as well, with the Wii selling around 436,000 units. Trailing behind were Microsoft and Sony, with 360 hitting 294,000 units sold and the PS3 selling 244,000 units.
This in itself is good story. Keep in mind that Sony PS3's and Microsoft Xbox 360's are widely available and on stores shelves everywhere, while the Wii's are still in short supply. In spite of that, the Wii is still outselling both. If you're Microsoft, you can always claim that it's because the 360 has been out for a year, and it's total sales are (of course) much higher at this point.
As I offered in another reply to one of your weird posts, you figure out a way to set up escrow, and I'll take you up on that.
Actually, every example the original poster gave appeared to be an outright lie. I doubt he even *has* Vista.
I can show you my receipt, if you want me to. In fact, if you're willing to give me what I paid for it, I'll be more than willing to sell you my copy. (Not an OEM or upgrade, so the license is freely transferable.) Although, honestly, thanks to the foresight of making an OS partition image, I am indeed no longer actually running Vista. (Back and happily using Windows XP.)
[blah, blah, blah...] if he doesn't have permissions to write on the removable hard drive.
Nope, everyone has full control permissions on the drive, though I am running as a non-administrator account while trying to perform file operations on it. I'm sorry if I conveyed the idea that I'm some kind of computer newbie; I'm actually very familiar with how permissions and security (and most other features of OSes, both Windows and Linux) work, having been an MCSE-certified Windows systems admin for over eleven years (since Windows NT 3.51), and performed various levels of end-user workstation support as well.
If you're not receiving UAC warnings for moving stuff among drives, I'd be much more inclined to think that you are the one logging in as administrator, not me.
I'm also sorry if I conveyed the impression that I'm anti-Microsoft. I'm not, and though I use both Ubuntu Linux and Windows XP at home, I use the latter far more frequently. I will, however, admit that after a few hours of rigorous use, I am strongly anit-Vista.
But to anyone who's reading this, don't believe me. And certainly don't believe this yahoo. Talk to people you know and trust who have used it. Try it out for yourself if possible. Read what the media is saying about it. Once you have experience the endlessly irritating world of Windows Vista for yourself, well, you'll see who's lying and who actually knows what they're talking about.
Since this Randolpho guy seems to have no idea what he's talking about, and I'm just as much a stranger to you, do this.
Don't trust either of us. Talk to your friends that have recently bought computers with Vista and ask them what they think. Read what the media is saying about it. Go try it out yourself on someone's computer who will let you tinker with it as if it were your own for an hour or two. Then decide for yourself which one of us is drinking Kool-Aid.
Oh, and if you're not too busy, come back here and let us know what you decided and what your impressions are. I'm in the mood for a little vindication today.;-)
My luck is pretty bad.
It's not your luck, and it's not my copy of Vista. It's a hideously broken OS.
I'll tell you what. If you can figure out some kind of way that we can have a trusted escrow, I'll bet you a large sum of money that I'm not lying and can supply evidence of such.
No, the guy just took his anti-MS kool-aid then lied through his teeth. That doesn't happen, period.
Actually, it's just the opposite. You seem to be wearing pro-MS rosy-color-glasses, and have no idea what you're talking about. If you're not experiencing these issues with Vista, I'd say that you are the one who hasn't even tried it, as it's common knowledge—and yes, personal experience—that it is, indeed, this bad.
At least, I hope not. Free speech is something that we shouldn't have a double standard about.
I admit it—I was bullied when I was a kid. And yet, I still don't believe that government should step in to force kids (or anyone, for that matter) to take down their personal, non-school web sites.
I'm not sure why you're assuming that/.'ers will in general put overprotectionism over free speech. I'd guess the exact opposite.
if you had RTFA you might have learned a few things. Besides, most people probably don't even care/know how to disable UAC, so I doubt that will be a big problem...
My sarcasm detector is a little wonky today, so I apologize in advance if that's what that comment was. Otherwise...
Did you RTFA? If you did, it vehemently disagrees with what you said.
In fact, UAC is the most complained-about new feature of Vista, and most people are disabling it as soon as possible. Why? Because MS still encourages the owner to set himself up as the admin, and work from that account. And when you're running in an admin account, UAC is nothing but a bother. Every time you try to take an action, and this could be as simple as opening something in Control Panel, UAC disables your screen and pops up a little dialog asking you if you really want to do what you just did. A pointless irritant that will cause the vast majority of Vista users to disable UAC, because the vast majority of Vista users will, unfortunately, be running as admins, thanks to MS's stubborn refusal to try to put everyone into a user account to the extent possible.
My main problem with Vista security is that it is an OS that cries wolf. When I installed Vista, I had to click no less than 50 security confirmation dialog boxes (it's important to note that these were security dialog boxes) within the first hour or so in order to do simple, stupid stuff that clearly should not have needed confirmation. Stuff like changing my desktop background. Stuff like moving some documents around on a removable hard drive. Stuff like copying a line of text from an IE7 edit box. Stuff like pasting that line of text into a different IE7 edit box. Stuff like creating a new text file on my removable hard drive. And so on, and so on, ad nauseum.
This isn't security. This is constant aggravation, and yes, I cannot imagine any normal user calling their geek friend after five minutes and saying, "How do I turn this damn thing off?" Even if they don't, they "mentally" disable it by simply clicking Allow without thinking. Hell, I'm a computer expert, and I did it. "You are installing the pwnzj00 virus." Allow. "You are sending your bank account numbers to Nigeria." Allow, allow, allow, dammit! Leave me alone!
I try to give Microsoft the benefit of a doubt. I'm not a zealot or a Microsoft basher, seriously. I think they've put out some good software, but on this point, I have to agree with the folks who are saying that Microsoft isn't serious about security, they're simply trying to push the blame for when things go wrong onto the users.
There's no way in hell that they could have conducted any usability tests and found the currently scheme acceptable. But they still let it out the door, most likely to meet some sort of artificial management deadline to keep the OS from shipping any later than it already had.
So now, we've gone from OSes that never alert you to potential security risks to an OS that is even worse because it alerts you to everything, security risk or not.
I'll be interested to see how Microsoft tries to fix this mess, both from a technical standpoint and a PR standpoint.
It doesn't matter how comfortable you feel that you've completely locked things down. Unless you hire a person for each computer you have to stand behind it and watch over people's shoulders while they're tapping away on their keyboard, they will find ways to do things that you don't know about and probably wouldn't like very much if you did.
I think it's pretty funny that you seem to be archetype that the article talks about: The IT manager who jumps through a billion hoops locking things down, who smugly sits back comfortably thinking that they've got it all under control because they've completely removed any way for users to customize their computing experience. The users are intimidated by you, and that makes you happy. But when they need to get something done that's not allowed by you, what you think happens and what actually happens are two completely different things.
You think that they simply give up and go their merry way, because Travoltus would have a conniption if they tried anything novel with their workstation. What actually happens is they go behind your back to other people who can help them get their job done. Their geek buddy, their daughter who knows computers, their co-worker who managed to sneak something by you, etc. This is what the "Shadow IT" is, and again, because you still don't seem to understand this: There is nothing you can do to shut it down. It's not a matter of whether or not it exists, it's a matter of whether or not you're able to see it.
Please, for the love of god (and your customers), read the article, this time without your hands securely covering your eyes. It's actually quite insightful and tells you how to keep people from even wanting to resort to using their "Shadow IT" (the only measure of control you have over it) and provide better service to your customers, not worse.
/doesn't have much hope that you actually will... /doesn't really care...
The point of the article is not that you should or shouldn't try to lock things down. It is that that no matter how much you try to lock things down, your users will find ways to open it up to get their work done.
If you're smart, you'll figure out ways that you can both get what you want: Your security and manageability, and their productivity and ease-of-use. Handing edicts from on high is a pretty stupid idea. The point of the article is that you're not shutting down what they call "Shadow IT," you're simply driving it underground where it's harder to see and deal with.
But, you know, it's your property and your rules, so by all means, do with it what you will, and good luck with that.
If you have a problem with it, I'd be more than happy to settle it for you.
Brave words... from an Anonymous Coward.
There is absolutely NO REASON to be dodging and weaving in traffic, passing in front of cars with less than 2 ft. of clearance, ON RESIDENTIAL STREETS.
First of all, you have no idea how the hell I drive. Second of all, if people like you wouldn't be such assholes trying to enforce the law doing stupid shit like "blocking your ass somewhere in Cobb County" (which, by the way, is much more dangerous than almost any speeder and, as I pointed out, illegal), most people wouldn't have a reason to be dodging and weaving in traffic.
Last, but not least, it all boils down to people being stupid. It's entirely possible to drive 60 miles per hour on Johnson's Ferry in a safe and reasonable manner. If the roads are dry and with good visibility and low traffic volume, there's no reason not to. It's also entirely possible to be driving extremely dangerously 40 miles per hour on Johnson's Ferry, if there's a heavy rain at night with medium to high traffic volume.
But there are no conditions—none at all—under which it is acceptable to, as you said, "routinely fuck with speeders." It's extremely dangerous, and if you cause a wreck doing it, I can assure you that the last thing you'll have to worry about is someone losing their license.
So go ahead and beat your chest some more. Go ahead and mess with someone and cause a wreck, I dare you. I can't wait to see the news story about the lame-ass loser who was driving a blue Cavalier or a red first gen RX7 who was killed in a car wreck or thrown in jail for manslaughter because he decided to "settle it" with someone on the road.
Hmm, should I end with calling you a moron or just a troll? With the astounding stupidity you've shown in your post, I'm afraid I've got to go with...
I won't tell you how to mod the parent, but I can throw my 2 cent's worth of experience in.
It is 100% true that English isn't a second language in the Philippines, it's a primary language. I work in a 24x7 datacenter, and a year or so ago, a new support center was opened in the Philippines to handle our night shift. I thought they were going to let a bunch of people go, but it turned out, they were expanding our operations, not replacing them. (Thank goodness!)
I was very skeptical that this would work. I had many of the same fears. Would we be able to understand their accent? Would they be undertrained an incompetent? Would there be any culture clashes?
The answers, to my surprise, were: They have no discernible accent—none. They're very smart and easily keep up with our local folks, and have often gone far above and beyond the call of duty to help us out. And yes, they are very familiar with our culture and ways of doing things. In fact, a nice bonus about the Filipino support center is that a lot of our night shift calls were coming from Asia-Pacific countries (since, duh, they were open at that time of night), and a lot of those clients feel much more comfortable dealing with our Filipino support center than our American night shift folks.
By now, you're probably thinking, "Right, you're just a management goober," but I assure you, I'm not. In fact, I was certain that I was going to lose my job due to Filipino outsourcing, but that never happened, since we weren't really outsourcing. And after working with them for a while at our shift turnover and seeing the quality of the work they did for us, I can honestly say that hiring our Filipino friends has turned out to be one of the few times management actually did something right at my company, and it's been a win-win situation for everyone.
I'm not saying that every Filipino person is smart and capable and a perfect joy to work with. Just like dealing with all people, your mileage may vary. But I can say that anyone who thinks that good customer service can't be provided by support centers in the Philippines is either stupid or doesn't know enough Filipino people, if any at all.
Slashdot Mirror
Leeway for the submitter? Okay. But whoever approved it to go on the front page needs to make a correction as quickly as possible. The headline and summary are just plain wrong. Seriously. 180 degrees.
I didn't see it posted as a "mysterious future" article or I would have e-mailed the editor to say, "Hey, this is extremely incorrect, and you need to not post it..."
The exact same argument could be used to pass a law making it illegal to build a campfire in the passenger seat of your car while driving. It's impractical to make laws to prevent every stupid thing a person may do while driving. At some point, you have to say, "You know what? We're going to trust you to use a little bit of common sense. If we find that you've got a bit of a lapse of it, though, and you do something dangerous, we're going to pull you over and give you a ticket."
Yes, some people will still do stupid things. They always will. It's impossible to outlaw them all.
What you can do is make a judgment about which are particularly dangerous. Drunk driving fits into that category, evidenced by the enormous number of accidents and fatalities caused by drunk drivers. Driving while drunk is also a special case in my mind because drinking specifically causes your judgment to be impaired. Texting on a Blackberry, to my knowledge, doesn't make one more stupid than they already are.
That why I was wonder exactly how many "Blackberry pile-ups" there are. If the answer is thousands, then yeah, passing a law against it would probably be a Good Thing®. If it's a few fluke fender-benders, then it's no big deal, and should be well-covered by existing laws regarding paying attention (or in this case, not) while on the road.
So that politicians can look like they're doing something about this grave new threat to everyone's safety.
Seriously, aside from the fact that driving carelessly is already against the law, exactly how many "Blackberry pile-ups" have their been? I'm guessing it's a miniscule number caused by either flukes or by people who drive so stupidly that they would have had an accident whatever they were doing.
Do we really need a law to prevent, what, a dozen or so at the most accidents a year? Would those dozen or so people who cause those accident really not send text messages while driving because of it?
The game isn't meant to say, "This is exactly how evolution works." Not having played it, this is a guess, but it's supposed to illustrate some of the basic principles and let kids have some fun while learning it.
Animals also don't evolve as you go outside and look at the real thing; it's a process that typically takes millions of years. And I'm sorry, but David Attenborough is boring.
If you want your kids playing outside instead of playing video games, that's fine, I encourage it too, and more power to you. But I find it a little snooty to look down on something that is trying to be a little more intelligent than your typical Grand Theft Auto or Doom game that so many other kids are playing these days.
Maybe it won't change the world, but at least it's a step in the right direction.
The problem is that it's impractical for Dell, or any other company, to support every distribution and version of GNU/Linux that's out there. It's also impractical for them to test every hardware configuration with all of those distributions. They've got to pick one. Or two. Or five. Or whatever practical number their support people can handle. (Which I'm guess will end up being one or two at the most.)
Personally, I think they should go with Ubuntu, as it is extremely popular and arguably the most user-friendly distribution. If you want a different distribution, you're free to install it, and it will probably work since you know that the Ubuntu drivers will work on their hardware. But if you get a Dell with Linux, along with their support and guarantee that it will work on their hardware, you'll have to go with the distribution they've actually tested and that they support.
The hardware manufacturing sector will not be able to make a better IBM computer than IBM. At most, they're likely to make a better PS/2 sometime in the next 3-5 years. By this point, IBM will be well ahead. I think we need to put this into perspective-this project will be a welcome way for IBM clone companies to preserve LEGACY IBM hardware support in clones at decent speed, etc... Otherwise, this is not going to be adopted by the masses... EVER. If you think this, then you really don't understand the consumer market.
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Seriously, there are plenty of cases where a company or organization has made a better (and highly successful!) mousetrap than the original. Look at what AMD is doing to Intel, or what Firefox is doing to Internet Explorer. I think it's naive to think say that it's impossible for anyone to make a better Windows than Microsoft.
Plus, when you think about it, no one really has to. What exactly is going to run on Windows Vista, for example, that doesn't run on Windows XP? 99.9% of everything that everyone uses on Windows will actually still run on Windows 2000. If they're successful in cloning Windows XP (which is their goal), they don't have to keep up with Microsoft. Hell, I'll actually be pleased if they don't; not cloning UAC is more than fine with me!
Aw, hell, this is as good a post to reply to as any.
Myst. It was artistically gorgeous, and it was rather unique in that it just tossed you in with no fancy instruction manual or tutorial. Hell, you didn't even know what the objective of the game. It was just kind of like, "Here, play this. Don't know what to do? Well, you're smart, figure it out."
Very cool game.
I have no mod points, but I'm modding you up in spirit.
<soapbox>
I absolutely cannot stand it when employers filter content. The thing is, even if people are wasting too much time at work browsing MySpace (or the Internet in general), that is a management problem, not a technical one. If you take away their MySpace or whatever it is they're browsing, they're just going to move on and browse some other site. If you put a whitelist in place, they'll just find some other way to goof off. The problem isn't that the Internet is distracting, it's that the employee is easily distracted.
I work at a big company as a contractor. It just recently blocked access to the big Internet e-mail services (Gmail, Yahoo Mail, etc.) because it didn't like employees wasting time with their personal e-mail at work. Of course, being a contractor, it doesn't take into account that I use my personal e-mail to communicate with my contract agency about stuff that I'd rather not have stored on company e-mail servers. It's easy to say, "Well, you shouldn't use company resources for that type of stuff," but practically speaking, my ability to communicate effectively with my contract agency is essential to me doing a good job for them. It also totally ignores the fact that I keep personal stuff like vacations and such on my personal Gmail calendar to know when I should ask for time off, when my coworker's birthday is, and so on.
The company spends a fortune on content filtering. There's the hardware itself, the update service, the support contract, the personnel cost for the guy who maintains it, the internal support costs of handling trouble tickets related to it, the cost of Internet downtime due to it periodically failing, the cost of packaging the software end of it and deploying it to the workstations (so that you can't browse them at home on your laptop, of course!), and so on ad nauseum. Just as one example, some of our customers are casinos. So we can't just put a rule in that says, "block gambling sites," because our marketing and sales folks have to be able to access their sites. No, we have to have rules that say things like, "This group can access these sites, that group can access those sites, everyone else can't access any of the sites, ..."
Even in the extreme case of porn sites, the answer to controlling it is to make a company policy prohibiting browsing them, and if you catch someone doing it, fire them for it. If you try to block them all, you're just setting yourself up for someone saying something like, "Well, it wasn't blocked, so I thought it was okay to go there!" I've found that if you treat people like 12-year-olds, they tend to not disappoint you. When policies like this go into place, you're also going to have the contingent of people who deliberately goof off more as a form of passive-aggressive rebellion. It's just stupid, you're only causing more problems, and there's no need.
I know that some of you will probably reply, "But you have to filter content to avoid sexual harassment lawsuits!" No, you don't. As long as you make a company policy about it and you take the appropriate action when someone breaks that policy, you'll win any lawsuit that someone may file. The law does not require you to spend a fortune to be a babysitter, it only requires that you take reasonable action to prevent a hostile work environment. The reason we have content filtering in the first place is because managers, in general, are lazy and don't want to do it themselves. The people who would sue you for not content filtering will sue you anyway. The only important thing is whether or not you'll win. Besides, at my company, the cost of defending itself against such frivolous lawsuits is negligible compared to the cost of maintaining our content filtering services.
Content filtering is no substitute f
Qwest is one of the companies speaking out against net neutrality. The CEO even went as far as to call it "really silly." Could it be that the CTO's comments are politically motivated?
I, for one, think so.
You mean, people actually still buy movies on physical media?
In that case, where are you!!?
(I'm not kidding. I'm not asking for your home address, just tell me enough info so that I can find and call the store where you saw this. I'd like to check out this wonderful place that has managed to keep Wiis in stock for more than a few hours, something no store I've checked in Atlanta has done in months.)
Let me know if you want one. They've got pallets of them at my local Fry's. (Atlanta, GA)
Wow! Did I just get called a Nintendo zealot?
I don't even own a Nintendo! I own an Xbox 360 which is pretty neat, an old PS2 that I don't play any more, and a PSP which I haven't played after the first couple of months of getting it. (Talk about unfulfilled expectations!)
The last piece of Nintendo equipment I owned was an old—THE ORIGINAL!—Nintendo Entertainment System console, which I sold used over 15 years ago.
The reason I want a Wii so badly is because 1) I have an Xbox 360, and though it's fun to play with sometimes, it's really not that special, 2) I have seen absolutely nothing from the PS3 that merits any attention whatsoever (let alone $600 of my hard-earned cash!), and 3) the Wii looks like a lot of fun and a lot different from the ho-hum games that I'm so bored with now. Maybe I'm wrong, but according to what my friends who have managed to procure one say, I'm not.
Heh. A guy who hasn't owned a Nintendo console in over a decade and a half gets called a zealot because he wants a Wii and points out how well they're selling. That's a good one.
This in itself is good story. Keep in mind that Sony PS3's and Microsoft Xbox 360's are widely available and on stores shelves everywhere, while the Wii's are still in short supply. In spite of that, the Wii is still outselling both. If you're Microsoft, you can always claim that it's because the 360 has been out for a year, and it's total sales are (of course) much higher at this point.
But if you're Sony, that's just got to hurt.
/still wants a Wii...
As I offered in another reply to one of your weird posts, you figure out a way to set up escrow, and I'll take you up on that.
I can show you my receipt, if you want me to. In fact, if you're willing to give me what I paid for it, I'll be more than willing to sell you my copy. (Not an OEM or upgrade, so the license is freely transferable.) Although, honestly, thanks to the foresight of making an OS partition image, I am indeed no longer actually running Vista. (Back and happily using Windows XP.)
Nope, everyone has full control permissions on the drive, though I am running as a non-administrator account while trying to perform file operations on it. I'm sorry if I conveyed the idea that I'm some kind of computer newbie; I'm actually very familiar with how permissions and security (and most other features of OSes, both Windows and Linux) work, having been an MCSE-certified Windows systems admin for over eleven years (since Windows NT 3.51), and performed various levels of end-user workstation support as well.
If you're not receiving UAC warnings for moving stuff among drives, I'd be much more inclined to think that you are the one logging in as administrator, not me.
I'm also sorry if I conveyed the impression that I'm anti-Microsoft. I'm not, and though I use both Ubuntu Linux and Windows XP at home, I use the latter far more frequently. I will, however, admit that after a few hours of rigorous use, I am strongly anit-Vista.
But to anyone who's reading this, don't believe me. And certainly don't believe this yahoo. Talk to people you know and trust who have used it. Try it out for yourself if possible. Read what the media is saying about it. Once you have experience the endlessly irritating world of Windows Vista for yourself, well, you'll see who's lying and who actually knows what they're talking about.
Since this Randolpho guy seems to have no idea what he's talking about, and I'm just as much a stranger to you, do this.
Don't trust either of us. Talk to your friends that have recently bought computers with Vista and ask them what they think. Read what the media is saying about it. Go try it out yourself on someone's computer who will let you tinker with it as if it were your own for an hour or two. Then decide for yourself which one of us is drinking Kool-Aid.
Oh, and if you're not too busy, come back here and let us know what you decided and what your impressions are. I'm in the mood for a little vindication today. ;-)
It's not your luck, and it's not my copy of Vista. It's a hideously broken OS.
I'll tell you what. If you can figure out some kind of way that we can have a trusted escrow, I'll bet you a large sum of money that I'm not lying and can supply evidence of such.
Actually, it's just the opposite. You seem to be wearing pro-MS rosy-color-glasses, and have no idea what you're talking about. If you're not experiencing these issues with Vista, I'd say that you are the one who hasn't even tried it, as it's common knowledge—and yes, personal experience—that it is, indeed, this bad.
At least, I hope not. Free speech is something that we shouldn't have a double standard about.
I admit it—I was bullied when I was a kid. And yet, I still don't believe that government should step in to force kids (or anyone, for that matter) to take down their personal, non-school web sites.
I'm not sure why you're assuming that /.'ers will in general put overprotectionism over free speech. I'd guess the exact opposite.
It's not what you're looking for, but it might be at least something:
linky
My sarcasm detector is a little wonky today, so I apologize in advance if that's what that comment was. Otherwise...
Did you RTFA? If you did, it vehemently disagrees with what you said.
(emphasis mine)
This is exactly what Vista security is.
My main problem with Vista security is that it is an OS that cries wolf. When I installed Vista, I had to click no less than 50 security confirmation dialog boxes (it's important to note that these were security dialog boxes) within the first hour or so in order to do simple, stupid stuff that clearly should not have needed confirmation. Stuff like changing my desktop background. Stuff like moving some documents around on a removable hard drive. Stuff like copying a line of text from an IE7 edit box. Stuff like pasting that line of text into a different IE7 edit box. Stuff like creating a new text file on my removable hard drive. And so on, and so on, ad nauseum.
This isn't security. This is constant aggravation, and yes, I cannot imagine any normal user calling their geek friend after five minutes and saying, "How do I turn this damn thing off?" Even if they don't, they "mentally" disable it by simply clicking Allow without thinking. Hell, I'm a computer expert, and I did it. "You are installing the pwnzj00 virus." Allow. "You are sending your bank account numbers to Nigeria." Allow, allow, allow, dammit! Leave me alone!
I try to give Microsoft the benefit of a doubt. I'm not a zealot or a Microsoft basher, seriously. I think they've put out some good software, but on this point, I have to agree with the folks who are saying that Microsoft isn't serious about security, they're simply trying to push the blame for when things go wrong onto the users.
There's no way in hell that they could have conducted any usability tests and found the currently scheme acceptable. But they still let it out the door, most likely to meet some sort of artificial management deadline to keep the OS from shipping any later than it already had.
So now, we've gone from OSes that never alert you to potential security risks to an OS that is even worse because it alerts you to everything, security risk or not.
I'll be interested to see how Microsoft tries to fix this mess, both from a technical standpoint and a PR standpoint.
You don't get to choose to shut it down.
It doesn't matter how comfortable you feel that you've completely locked things down. Unless you hire a person for each computer you have to stand behind it and watch over people's shoulders while they're tapping away on their keyboard, they will find ways to do things that you don't know about and probably wouldn't like very much if you did.
I think it's pretty funny that you seem to be archetype that the article talks about: The IT manager who jumps through a billion hoops locking things down, who smugly sits back comfortably thinking that they've got it all under control because they've completely removed any way for users to customize their computing experience. The users are intimidated by you, and that makes you happy. But when they need to get something done that's not allowed by you, what you think happens and what actually happens are two completely different things.
You think that they simply give up and go their merry way, because Travoltus would have a conniption if they tried anything novel with their workstation. What actually happens is they go behind your back to other people who can help them get their job done. Their geek buddy, their daughter who knows computers, their co-worker who managed to sneak something by you, etc. This is what the "Shadow IT" is, and again, because you still don't seem to understand this: There is nothing you can do to shut it down. It's not a matter of whether or not it exists, it's a matter of whether or not you're able to see it.
Please, for the love of god (and your customers), read the article, this time without your hands securely covering your eyes. It's actually quite insightful and tells you how to keep people from even wanting to resort to using their "Shadow IT" (the only measure of control you have over it) and provide better service to your customers, not worse.
/doesn't have much hope that you actually will...
/doesn't really care...
The point of the article is not that you should or shouldn't try to lock things down. It is that that no matter how much you try to lock things down, your users will find ways to open it up to get their work done.
If you're smart, you'll figure out ways that you can both get what you want: Your security and manageability, and their productivity and ease-of-use. Handing edicts from on high is a pretty stupid idea. The point of the article is that you're not shutting down what they call "Shadow IT," you're simply driving it underground where it's harder to see and deal with.
But, you know, it's your property and your rules, so by all means, do with it what you will, and good luck with that.
Brave words... from an Anonymous Coward.
First of all, you have no idea how the hell I drive. Second of all, if people like you wouldn't be such assholes trying to enforce the law doing stupid shit like "blocking your ass somewhere in Cobb County" (which, by the way, is much more dangerous than almost any speeder and, as I pointed out, illegal), most people wouldn't have a reason to be dodging and weaving in traffic.
Last, but not least, it all boils down to people being stupid. It's entirely possible to drive 60 miles per hour on Johnson's Ferry in a safe and reasonable manner. If the roads are dry and with good visibility and low traffic volume, there's no reason not to. It's also entirely possible to be driving extremely dangerously 40 miles per hour on Johnson's Ferry, if there's a heavy rain at night with medium to high traffic volume.
But there are no conditions—none at all—under which it is acceptable to, as you said, "routinely fuck with speeders." It's extremely dangerous, and if you cause a wreck doing it, I can assure you that the last thing you'll have to worry about is someone losing their license.
So go ahead and beat your chest some more. Go ahead and mess with someone and cause a wreck, I dare you. I can't wait to see the news story about the lame-ass loser who was driving a blue Cavalier or a red first gen RX7 who was killed in a car wreck or thrown in jail for manslaughter because he decided to "settle it" with someone on the road.
Hmm, should I end with calling you a moron or just a troll? With the astounding stupidity you've shown in your post, I'm afraid I've got to go with...
Moron.
I won't tell you how to mod the parent, but I can throw my 2 cent's worth of experience in.
It is 100% true that English isn't a second language in the Philippines, it's a primary language. I work in a 24x7 datacenter, and a year or so ago, a new support center was opened in the Philippines to handle our night shift. I thought they were going to let a bunch of people go, but it turned out, they were expanding our operations, not replacing them. (Thank goodness!)
I was very skeptical that this would work. I had many of the same fears. Would we be able to understand their accent? Would they be undertrained an incompetent? Would there be any culture clashes?
The answers, to my surprise, were: They have no discernible accent—none. They're very smart and easily keep up with our local folks, and have often gone far above and beyond the call of duty to help us out. And yes, they are very familiar with our culture and ways of doing things. In fact, a nice bonus about the Filipino support center is that a lot of our night shift calls were coming from Asia-Pacific countries (since, duh, they were open at that time of night), and a lot of those clients feel much more comfortable dealing with our Filipino support center than our American night shift folks.
By now, you're probably thinking, "Right, you're just a management goober," but I assure you, I'm not. In fact, I was certain that I was going to lose my job due to Filipino outsourcing, but that never happened, since we weren't really outsourcing. And after working with them for a while at our shift turnover and seeing the quality of the work they did for us, I can honestly say that hiring our Filipino friends has turned out to be one of the few times management actually did something right at my company, and it's been a win-win situation for everyone.
I'm not saying that every Filipino person is smart and capable and a perfect joy to work with. Just like dealing with all people, your mileage may vary. But I can say that anyone who thinks that good customer service can't be provided by support centers in the Philippines is either stupid or doesn't know enough Filipino people, if any at all.