"If these countries were truly looking for nuclear power, why not just buy light water reactors from the U.S.?"
And there was me thinking that "protecting domestic jobs" was a good thing, from how you hear the US government describe it when they put "US sources only" on government purchasing programs...
What does the ease of turning it off have to do with anything? The browser by default, connects to the internet without asking you or telling you what it's doing, downloads, installs, and runs software on your machine.
I expect most slashdotters would be protesting in the streets if proprietary software did something like that...
"Firefox is nice enough to download it and install it the next time I start the browser"
Firefox just randomly opens a connection to the web and starts downloading stuff without telling you what it's doing, then pops-up a message saying "hey! I downloaded a new browser". That's the sort of behaviour you expect when your computer is infected with a virus.
Try calling tech support and saying that you were just browsing when your internet connection suddenly got saturated and you don't know why. It's the sort of thing that sends people off on a network security investigation for no good reason.
I guess protest signs wouldn't look so scary if they complained that the US spent 1.6% of its Federal budget on weapons.
I thought you said that the feds were spending over 2 trillion pounds per year?
So even tiny percentages of that are important enough to examine carefully. ("what are you complaining about, it's only 40 billion pounds of your money...")
"I'd actually argue that although some of the wire racks pictured look nice they're unusable - you'd have to snip all of those zip-ties to trace a cable."
Why not just look-up the cable's ID number if you want to know where it goes?
"Having worked for a telecom (one that might just have had the biggest bankruptcy in history), I went to one of their main voice switching centers and was shown an entire room that looked like this. When I asked why in the world we had an entire room that was just cable loops that went from a DEMUX board to a MUX board, he told me that federal law requires them to break out every signal that travels through the data center down to the DS1 level (that's about 25 phone lines) so that the FBI can still use their 1950's based equipment to tap the phone lines."
I remember learning in high school about how East Germany and the USSR used to do things like this. It was being used as an example of how evil those countries were, if I remember correctly (that they spent more on wiretapping than they did on the phone system itself)
"Badnark and the Green party guy got arrested because they tried to make a speech at a place that was already being used for speeches."
It was a debate for presidential candiates. They were presidential candidates.
Basically what happened is that some group decided that only candidates with x% of the previous vote were allowed to be heard, then increased x until only their two favorite candidates were allowed to speak. A shockingly corrupt use of public money by people organizing a public meeting.
"there is a more practical reason why source access to drivers is handy"
As if being able to run OpenGL on a default ubuntu install wasn't reason enough...
or some new linux user getting the black screen of death when nVidia'a proprietary graphics drivers screw-up the whole system after a dist-upgrade
Who cares what frame-rate nVidia claims with their windows drivers? if their cards can't achieve that frame-rate using open-source drivers, they're not worth shit.
The US is still a democracy. Revolutions are simple. Get more then 50% of the vote.
OK, start with the simplest question: when elections are decided by constant media coverage, how does somebody get elected if the television companies refuse to admit their existance?
Do you just walk around to every house in america and tell the ones who don't shoot you about your ideas? When the television is telling everyone that you're a loony or terrorist-sympathiser?
How about when you go to make a campaign speech and get arrested for not belonging to the republicrat party, like several of the presidential candidates in the last election?
The time for voting boxes and soap boxes is long gone...
"How can the police be sure that the photos aren't going to be used to identify police officers for later revenge attacks?"
Because (at least in the UK), policemen wear terrorist-style ski masks to hide their faces. Have a look at some photos from a recent May Day demonstration...
"Probably the two biggest issues that many have with Ubuntu are that it takes extra work to install MP3 support - not to mention every other codec or player."
If the MP3 designers had wanted their format to be included in Ubuntu, then they shouldn't have patented it!
Really, it's silly to request government protection and monopoly powers on an algorithm, then complain when people have trouble legally distributing it...
"I just finished spending about 3 hours on a test install on my IBM Thinkpad notebook."
I installed Ununtu Breezy on a thinkpad a few weeks ago, and it took maybe 10 minutes + time to download updates. Probably the easiest OS installation I've seen (and that's comparing it to quite a few competitors)
The thing I don't get is how you can download a 400MB CD, install it, and then it requires more than 400MB of software updates... (this isn't just a Linux problem b.t.w. - my Mac OS requires so many updates that I can't afford to download them all (would take about 20 days of continuous downloading to get the Mac up-to-date))
"The vast majority of PC's that "Grandma" are using are Dell's, Compaq/HP's, Gateway's or Sony's These all come PRE-INSTALLED with MP3 Support, DVD Support, and Multimedia CODECS."
Dell PCs also come preconfigured in such a way that they will be unusable within weeks due to virus activity (e.g. using Internet Explorer by default and no firewall) -- What was your point, that this is desirable for less-experienced computer users?
p.s. my preinstalled Windows 2000 machine didn't play WMV files that Ubuntu had no trouble with. What were you saying about codecs?
"Lots of people complaining about X breaking, and I had the same problem (and a load of others) -- then I realised I ran "apt-get upgrade" instead of "apt-get dist-upgrade"
The other thing to watch-out for: if you've installed the proprietary, non-free NVidia drivers, then upgrading Ubuntu will leave you without a graphical desktop.
"if they're doing such a lousy job, don't you find it curious that there has NOT been another successful attack in four and a half years, despite repeated hate-filled threats from Bin Laden and others like him? Either we're just lucky, or DHS has something going right."
The elephant-repellant spray is working...
Back on-topic, from what I've read of translated OBL speeches, he talks of the damage that america will do to itself, i.e. taking the piss of your comical elections, the suppression of the american people by their government, the slide into despotism, etc., rather than threats that his group will attack again. So in that sense, OBL is completely right, and the Department of Homeland Security is helping Bin Laden's cause.
Who needs another 9/11, when American people are regularly being held at gunpoint by stormtroopers? Could you even devise an attack that would scare people more than the threat of being tortured at Guantanemo Bay (or secret prisons without their constitutional rights) if they speak-out against the government?
Slashdot Mirror
when's Thunderbird going to let you specify your From address without having to set it up in advance?
"If these countries were truly looking for nuclear power, why not just buy light water reactors from the U.S.?"
And there was me thinking that "protecting domestic jobs" was a good thing, from how you hear the US government describe it when they put "US sources only" on government purchasing programs...
"because its not like they have a cheap, abundant source of power anywhere."
So burning oil unnecessarily is a good thing?
"When I think of Sony, I think of rootkits, exploding batteries and a delayed PS3"
Don't forget the digital music player that couldn't play MP3s
"Even if the second admendment included tanks and stuff"
Why wouldn't it?
"It's very very hard to turn off too! /sarcasm"
What does the ease of turning it off have to do with anything? The browser by default, connects to the internet without asking you or telling you what it's doing, downloads, installs, and runs software on your machine.
I expect most slashdotters would be protesting in the streets if proprietary software did something like that...
"Let MSFT open its bug database open to public, the way bugzilla is open"
Doesn't bugzilla conceal security-related vulnerabilities?
"Firefox is nice enough to download it and install it the next time I start the browser"
Firefox just randomly opens a connection to the web and starts downloading stuff without telling you what it's doing, then pops-up a message saying "hey! I downloaded a new browser". That's the sort of behaviour you expect when your computer is infected with a virus.
Try calling tech support and saying that you were just browsing when your internet connection suddenly got saturated and you don't know why. It's the sort of thing that sends people off on a network security investigation for no good reason.
I guess protest signs wouldn't look so scary if they complained that the US spent 1.6% of its Federal budget on weapons.
I thought you said that the feds were spending over 2 trillion pounds per year?
So even tiny percentages of that are important enough to examine carefully. ("what are you complaining about, it's only 40 billion pounds of your money...")
"I'd actually argue that although some of the wire racks pictured look nice they're unusable - you'd have to snip all of those zip-ties to trace a cable."
Why not just look-up the cable's ID number if you want to know where it goes?
"Having worked for a telecom (one that might just have had the biggest bankruptcy in history), I went to one of their main voice switching centers and was shown an entire room that looked like this. When I asked why in the world we had an entire room that was just cable loops that went from a DEMUX board to a MUX board, he told me that federal law requires them to break out every signal that travels through the data center down to the DS1 level (that's about 25 phone lines) so that the FBI can still use their 1950's based equipment to tap the phone lines."
I remember learning in high school about how East Germany and the USSR used to do things like this. It was being used as an example of how evil those countries were, if I remember correctly (that they spent more on wiretapping than they did on the phone system itself)
"And the guilty members are stepping down"
;)
You misspelled "staying on as a boardmember and continuing the same activities"
http://news.zdnet.com/2100-9584_22-6114655.html
"After that point, Dunn will remain on the board as a director."
"To say it again: You have to wipe the complete drive. You have to sacrifice your installation."
Or just pop your hard drive out and replace it with one containing a clean-looking system.
"Badnark and the Green party guy got arrested because they tried to make a speech at a place that was already being used for speeches."
It was a debate for presidential candiates. They were presidential candidates.
Basically what happened is that some group decided that only candidates with x% of the previous vote were allowed to be heard, then increased x until only their two favorite candidates were allowed to speak. A shockingly corrupt use of public money by people organizing a public meeting.
"Rather naive, to believe that North Korea and Iran would abide by this "No Military Use" restriction."
, 00.html?tw=wn_story_page_prev2
Or that the UK or USA militaries would let license agreements prevent them doing whatever they wanted:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eminent_domain
e.g. remember the guy whose patented invention was used by the US Navy without being compensated for it? http://www.wired.com/news/technology/0,1282,68894
"there is a more practical reason why source access to drivers is handy"
As if being able to run OpenGL on a default ubuntu install wasn't reason enough...
or some new linux user getting the black screen of death when nVidia'a proprietary graphics drivers screw-up the whole system after a dist-upgrade
Who cares what frame-rate nVidia claims with their windows drivers? if their cards can't achieve that frame-rate using open-source drivers, they're not worth shit.
The US is still a democracy. Revolutions are simple. Get more then 50% of the vote.
OK, start with the simplest question: when elections are decided by constant media coverage, how does somebody get elected if the television companies refuse to admit their existance?
Do you just walk around to every house in america and tell the ones who don't shoot you about your ideas? When the television is telling everyone that you're a loony or terrorist-sympathiser?
How about when you go to make a campaign speech and get arrested for not belonging to the republicrat party, like several of the presidential candidates in the last election?
The time for voting boxes and soap boxes is long gone...
"How can the police be sure that the photos aren't going to be used to identify police officers for later revenge attacks?"
Because (at least in the UK), policemen wear terrorist-style ski masks to hide their faces. Have a look at some photos from a recent May Day demonstration...
In a cellar somewhere:
"I'll only tell you my name, rank and number"
"Nevermind, we bought all the information we needed from a credit bureau. How is Sharon anyway? Shall we post them a photo of you?"
"Probably the two biggest issues that many have with Ubuntu are that it takes extra work to install MP3 support - not to mention every other codec or player."
If the MP3 designers had wanted their format to be included in Ubuntu, then they shouldn't have patented it!
Really, it's silly to request government protection and monopoly powers on an algorithm, then complain when people have trouble legally distributing it...
"I just finished spending about 3 hours on a test install on my IBM Thinkpad notebook."
I installed Ununtu Breezy on a thinkpad a few weeks ago, and it took maybe 10 minutes + time to download updates. Probably the easiest OS installation I've seen (and that's comparing it to quite a few competitors)
The thing I don't get is how you can download a 400MB CD, install it, and then it requires more than 400MB of software updates... (this isn't just a Linux problem b.t.w. - my Mac OS requires so many updates that I can't afford to download them all (would take about 20 days of continuous downloading to get the Mac up-to-date))
"The vast majority of PC's that "Grandma" are using are Dell's, Compaq/HP's, Gateway's or Sony's These all come PRE-INSTALLED with MP3 Support, DVD Support, and Multimedia CODECS."
Dell PCs also come preconfigured in such a way that they will be unusable within weeks due to virus activity (e.g. using Internet Explorer by default and no firewall) -- What was your point, that this is desirable for less-experienced computer users?
p.s. my preinstalled Windows 2000 machine didn't play WMV files that Ubuntu had no trouble with. What were you saying about codecs?
"I don't think grandma would do too well installing XP either."
Grandma: Look! if you move the mouse, then the pointer on screen moves around!
Windows XP installer: Please agree to the following 37-page contract
"Lots of people complaining about X breaking, and I had the same problem (and a load of others) -- then I realised I ran "apt-get upgrade" instead of "apt-get dist-upgrade"
The other thing to watch-out for: if you've installed the proprietary, non-free NVidia drivers, then upgrading Ubuntu will leave you without a graphical desktop.
"if they're doing such a lousy job, don't you find it curious that there has NOT been another successful attack in four and a half years, despite repeated hate-filled threats from Bin Laden and others like him? Either we're just lucky, or DHS has something going right."
The elephant-repellant spray is working...
Back on-topic, from what I've read of translated OBL speeches, he talks of the damage that america will do to itself, i.e. taking the piss of your comical elections, the suppression of the american people by their government, the slide into despotism, etc., rather than threats that his group will attack again. So in that sense, OBL is completely right, and the Department of Homeland Security is helping Bin Laden's cause.
Who needs another 9/11, when American people are regularly being held at gunpoint by stormtroopers? Could you even devise an attack that would scare people more than the threat of being tortured at Guantanemo Bay (or secret prisons without their constitutional rights) if they speak-out against the government?