Finally, we are seeing the kind of news that has to be in the public's mind to make an INFORMED decision about climate change. Fundamental questions about what the climate of this planet should be cannot yet be answered with full disclosure. Sure, there are those that are reasonably sure, but I challenge you to find one of them, then ask how the polar magnetic system of this planet, or of the Sun affect that climate. Next ask them what is the long count calendar effect on climate? Should we be in a warming trend right now? I believe that it was 26 million years ago (IANAAp - I'm not an astrophysicist) when the planet was in it's current position relative to the rest of the Milky Way. It has likely never been in this position relative to the rest of the known universe. What other factors have an effect?
Now, I'm not just ragging on about how there is no man made global warming, I would like to point out that there are so very many things that we are not sure of or simply don't know. This is just one of them. In fact, the distance between the Earth and Moon is a factor that is unknown in such politically charged questions. We NEED a lot more science, and I for one am glad to welcome our knowledge bearing scientists.
The sub-prime meltdown is an example of what generally happens when you make ill-informed decisions. We need much more information if we want to save the planet. I'm glad to see that some of that information is making news headlines:)
It's not just bean counters. Many businesses went into the computer services side of their business with either no knowledge of the risk, went into it before the risks were known, or simply made bad decisions. Now, they have to have the computer side of their business to compete and they are finding out what dangers lie inside pandora's box, even as they try to put the lid back on.
Intrusion detection systems are how old? Who really is the enemy as far as the computer system can tell? If you don't know, or are not sure of the answer, you have something in common with the people that have to make decisions with the security of your financial information. I'm not saying that it's a total lost cause, but think about it, have you heard of CSO CIO or CISO? These are the guys that are supposed to make such decisions. Does your bank have any of those positions? Oh wait, is it really the bank that is fully to blame? Did your login get compromised by some software on the 'build-a-better-model-airplane' website?
Better yet, did the bank's EDI software get compromised because one of their partners has an IT guy that watches porn at work during the grueling month-end process?
The truth is that a secure system cannot trust anyone or anything. Getting to your money in a secure system will not be easy, and will be a deterrent to using computerized banking. That is just how it is. Ever since there were banks, people have been trying to rob them. Security issues should not be news. What is news is that the banks and financial institutions are reporting that they are having trouble with security in a time when just about the entire industry has been hurt by the sub-prime issue? I smell a kind of rat here.
You have made a perfect argument for why health insurance in a community should not be the equivalent of gambling.
The argument that insurance companies already discriminate against people is exactly why this system needs to change. If a private system is not able to bear the burden of risk associated with provide all people the same coverage, it is a broken system. Sure, you and they will want to complain about how unfair that is and I will continue to tell you that this should not be about fairness. Insurers use the game of having many people pay in, and only pay out to a few. This makes that coverage affordable. The problem is that this same system is 'for profit' and it drives up the cost of the covered medical treatments. The entire thing is about to crumble under it's own weight. I'd give you lots of links here but the current political campaigns have enough fodder for you to read.
If insurance companies CAN get your genetic tests, THEY WILL. It is in their best interest to do so. At that point, they have a vested interest in dropping coverage for you. What we have not yet seen is evidence that they are doing this. They are, there just is no evidence of it yet. The health system of this country is run by insurance companies. Have you looked at how much they spend lobbying the government? http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&output=googleabout&btnG=Search+our+site&q=health%20insurance%20lobby%20money Google shows 371,000 hits for this little topic.
Why? Why does a business need to spend that much money lobbying congress? It definitely is not so they can provide better service to the end users. If the health insurance system was not fundamentally broken already, it would not be a major issue in this upcoming election.
The idea that a company can deny you health insurance based on genetic testing is fundamentally a broken idea. (car anology) if you owned a Ford Edsel, would a mechanic ask you about your insurance before working on it? If you owned a Ford Pinto, would you have to pay extra to insure it? - yeah, bad example. but those same insurance companies would not pay out for the car-b-ques in the early days, and it wasn't till Ford admitted the defect that they paid out.
Now, hear we are talking about going to the insurance agent and asking to renew our policies with a full on inspection of our vehicles that includes what type of metal the brake system parts are made of, and a scientific explanation of how likely those parts are to fail under stress. It also includes all kinds of things... like how likely your vehicle is going fail before the warranty is out.
What all of these things have in common is that they are giving the bookie an unfair advantage in the wager. In the US, the bookies don't have to take your bet if it seems too much risk. Medical science is not making us safer, they are in fact putting us at risk because they are giving the bookies reasons to not want to take our bets. That is a fundamental failure of the system whose goal SHOULD be to reduce health care dangers, increase overall health of the community, and keeps us strong for the defense of the country, our economy, and general well being. Without fulfilling those goals, you might as well just go to the legendary Spartan health care system.
The system is currently broken and CANNOT support it's goals, nor can it live up to its promise to the community.
More and more, big business is failing to do what they are supposed to do. This is just another example of it.
In this case, **AA being the conglomeration of corporate entities fighting to have ALL governments enact legislation that extends/expands copyrights as well as enacts/expands legislation that makes it criminal to violate copyright.
To that end, the **AA, British and Canadian counterparts et al.
Starting with the DMCA, the US government, lobbyists began to put pressure on other governments to enact legislation to fall inline with US initiatives on copyright protections. All of which, in my mind, are to protect the business models of the **AA. The push to have equal legislation in all countries to protect copyrights etc. was fairly big news. Being an American I remember not being very proud when reading such news items.
So, while you may be confused as to what an American entity has to do with British legislation, most of the rest of us are not.
The French, British and several other countries have shown quite a disdain for their leaders who seem to be rather too fond of our Mr Bush. Personally, I don't blame them for the disdain, and wonder if theirs is anywhere near the level of hatred some Americans have for their own government?
It't not what the government wants, it's what the **AA wants.
This is one of those things that will come to a head very quickly and when the egg lands, it won't be on the faces of users or ISPs. It will be on the faces of those who enacted the law.
The trouble, as we all know, is that there is no way to determine what is illegal and what is not. There will be far too many false positives, and far too many obviously innocent people will be caught by filters and such. It will go as far as MPs will let it go. Perhaps there is a manner in which people in the UK can force MPs to download LEGAL files to show them how easy it is to be caught, and perhaps demonstrate in real life how difficult it is to find the illegal stuff by asking them to PAY for additional filtering equipment/systems for businesses, schools, hospitals etc.
There are lots of people that want to help filter out illegal content, unfortunately, they also want to get paid.
Once you get buy-in on the government paying the costs for such systems, turn to appendix F and show them how these systems will be worked around in something like 24 hours of implementation.
Or perhaps you can all chip in and buy them a whack-a-mole game for the parliamentary house restaurant?
That was just an example of why it would be useful. There are many things that fall under health care that people don't want anyone to know about:
Abortion Substance abuse Domestic violence counseling Prescriptions for drugs associated with a disease that has a bad stigma
And those are just a few examples of what people would want protected. I'm pretty sure that you would not want people to know that you are seeing a doctor about impotence? right? Perhaps you don't really want people to know that you are color blind or deaf in one ear. Maybe you are embarrassed if people know you have herpes.
Perhaps you don't want people finding out that your kids have been treated for sexual abuse (the record probably won't say it wasn't you that committed the abuse).
There are way more things that you don't want people to know than things you do. Hardly anyone goes to the doctor for something good.
But, if you want to tell the world that you have warts on your 1 inch penis, go ahead... we won't stop you.
There is more to it than that. Recently (thanks to the immigration process) I was in the unexpected position of trying to find my immunization records which are now scattered among several states, doctors, and the military. If you think gathering that information was either fun or easy, you are wrong. Having this information to hand would have been a REAL time and money saver.
The trouble is that I don't want anyone else to have it. We have technology that can go anywhere with us. You can carry a key fob that will hold it all etc. More to the point, you can carry a key fob with better security than a password with you to access, and allow access for updates by those of your choosing.
Yes, Google will make it convenient, but we need to do more about the security of it both in access to it, and what happens to it while stored somewhere other than in our homes. The mobile devices that we carry around, ordinary telephones, and other simple items make 2 part authentication easy (well easier) than you think. We should be using them.
Additionally, we already have rules about sharing health-care information. Lets use those laws, not make more, to ensure the integrity of that privacy.
Anyone here who thinks that their privacy is safe because their health care information is not yet stored by Google is completely mistaken. It's very easy to get your health care information from the current system through human error, and social engineering.
Look at the problems with muni-wifi, the failures of WiMAX, and the sheer dominance of the telcos. Community networking is in a sad state, and this study, sadly, doesn't help. (emphasis mine)
The sheer dominance of telcos is what is causing the problem with increased broadband deployment, when you include cable operators in that group. Very little is being done among that group to GROW their business. I know that Verizon is doing FTTH and that is good, and T-Mobile is doing the WiFi hand off phones which is good. The trouble is that this is a day late and a dollar short.
FTTH is not helping improve overall broadband deployment - it is there to compete with incumbent cable players. The T-Mobile WiFi hand off phones do not improve coverage, rather it offloads traffic from their wireless network to cable operator's networks.
As long as North America is plagued with companies that don't want to invest (or can't) despite the tax incentives they've been given and their incredibly draconian billing practices (well sort of draconian). Like AT&T and Comcast et al wanting to shape traffic so there are no bandwidth hogs making a bad day for ordinary users. They believe ordinary users are those that pay for 6Mbps but only use an average of 56kbps. This whole broadband game in North America is rigged, and rigged in favor of the Telcos and cable companies. If they had ample bandwidth there would be too much competition. Right now they have the markets all carved up by region, and only compete with each other if they stand to make millions off of a win.
To stay on topic, home based Internet businesses, and cost savings due to broadband use will only come when all those people are willing to pay through the nose for access. If the telcos are not reeled in on their anticompetitive practices, you will only be able to use your ISP's VoIP solution, and probably will have to pay extra to have a VPN connection to your office.
Again, THE only real block to greater broadband deployment and use is the ISPs themselves. They are clinging to their quickly-becoming-outdated business model in nearly the same way that the **AA has... dumb fuckers
Why, yes, I do have ideas on how they should and could do this, but there is not much room here and shareholders don't really want to see flat profits for 6-8 quarters.
Yeah, gaffed that, plus some bad typing in my post too. For those that want to know: http://www.usconstitution.net/constnot.html is a good reference of what is NOT in the constitution. However, I believe that my post did fairly well conveying my point.
The Internet, now matter how you slice it, is not a common space to be policed by this judge, or that cop, or those senators. It is a world stage. Any teen can run into mean comments (we used to call it flaming) from ANYWHERE in the ENTIRE WORLD while they are on the Internet.
Enacting legislation against bullying and even cyberbullying is a criminal act in and of itself. The crime? Stupidity.
Sure, the Internet played a part in that teens death. The same way that electricity did!! It was a medium for the messaging.
The crime in this case, if there was one, is that human compassion and common sense did not show through on anyone's part. There is no law against being mean. If there was half our legislators would be in jail, lets not even talk about judges and bureaucrats OR clergy.
You cannot legislate morality. ever. period. Don't give me the killing is immoral and there laws against that. Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness are in the Constitution. Freedom from mean people is not.
It's all about education people. Educate the children, don't protect them like fragile little dolls that can't take a joke, or they will become that. Explain to them that the Internet is full of mean people, and the (I know you won't believe this next part) WORLD is full of mean people. If your children, friends, or neighbors are unable to deal with life in general, enacting mean-people-suck laws will NOT save them.
In a lot of ways, we have to look at this like the human species is part of the animal kingdom. That old saying 'survival of the fittest' has more meanings than one, and it is the truth whether you think it fair or not. When diseases hit a population, weak and feeble die first. In fact, during any time of stress it is the weak and feeble that die first. There is only one person that is responsible for her death - she is. Sure, others could have helped prevent it, but lets face it, we might as well blame this on all the young boys that didn't want to be her boyfriend, and this did not prevent her subsequent actions.
I am so tired of this kind of political/legislative rhetoric. If you are seriously thinking about this, why don't we all sit down and work out how to stop corporations from being mean too? Life is not fair, get over it. One case does not create a need for law. Now, if you wanted to have the schools start a group counseling session for people who felt victimized by bullies, go ahead. That is a positive step toward helping, not a negative one toward limiting other people's rights.
You are absolutely right about the arms race. While you have physical security of the machine hacking on the RAM is unlikely.
Additionally, it might be good to remember that the PC architecture has a lot to do with the options you have for securing the machine. If your CPU allows physical separation of user memory and machine use memory there are more options. In fact, you can build a kind of sandbox for the machine to run inside of in a protected way. If your encryption is hardware based, it's possible to put the encryption software and memory in yet another physical location. In this way it is possible to treat different memory locations physically different than others. This would allow for safe wipe of memory at shutdown as well as protected memory for encryption use. Remember kids; 640K is NOT enough for everyone.
* Make solar energy affordable - Just wait till oil goes to 120/barrel
* Provide energy from fusion - isn't that solar energy?
* Develop carbon sequestration methods - I thought the atmosphere of Earth was doing a good job already?
* Manage the nitrogen cycle - Fat chance with corn farmers working over time
* Provide access to clean water - That would just ruin the coke/pepsi wars... not happening
* Restore and improve urban infrastructure - Isn't this program already underway? I understand NYC has had some renovations. (yeah, that's low)
* Advance health informatics - subcutaneous ID chips?
* Engineer better medicines - Yeah, big pharma has been doing good at this one lately - check Chantix
* Reverse-engineer the brain - Ok, this is a new idea, lets get behind this one guys, what do you say?
* Prevent nuclear terror - GW has this one covered, right, he's the decider guy.
* Secure cyberspace HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA here's your sign
* Enhance virtual reality - Why not worry about first life a bit more for a while?
* Advance personalized learning - Yes, All those free or lowered tuition costs, online resources, open course materials... those are great ideas, hope someone does that soon.
* Engineer the tools for scientific discovery - This will obviously become reality and really simple once the brain has been reverse engineered??? WTF
Ok, seriously, is it just me or does everyone else think perhaps not smoke so much weed should be on the list?
I see your point, and a flood of thoughts come to mind:
- Could flash-mob news work in real life if mixed with traditional reporting methodologies? That is to say some combination between CNN and/. or Reddit et al? Something that included free phone votes for stories seen on the small screen etc.
- Can any news agency decouple from the parent company that now owns it?
- I seriously doubt that John Stuart ever thought during his MTV days that he would grow up to be a bastion of reliable news reporting.
- The truth of the matter is that MSM has lost the plot in much the same way that the **AA have lost the plot in their markets. Selling quality goods brings the customers in, again and again. There are reports that Al Jazeera is more reliable than some of the MSM agencies. When that even comes close to making people ask 'really?' then you know MSM is fscked.
- I watch many news sources and double check what I've heard with outside-the-US news sources to be sure it is right these days. I'm seriously afraid to believe any single news source. Even though I think the Daily Show et al check their stories, show references etc. they don't do in depth on some stories. No, I don't consider them a single source for news, but they do offer intelligent counterpoint to MSM.
- I don't know the answers here, I just know we are in need of some.
Only if you are going to make the dating sites label OCD people as such, and whacko crazy people as such... Hmmm perhaps we can put up big signs outside fundamentalist christian churches that warn of the dangers the present to their members. That might work better than the protests against $cientology?
Why does EVERYTHING have to have a fscking warning label? Concrete is hard, and you would wear protective equipment when bouncing out of cars onto it. Can we get that engraved instead of water shed grooves?
Life is a terminal disease, can we get a warning for that?
Keyboards were used in nearly 100% of all Internet downloading copyright violations, can we get a warning for that too?
for a number of reasons, not the least of which is the light he sheds on the way that MSM / corporate news works these days. Even though so many of us suspect that the facts of his story were true before reading his story, it is always nice to hear an insider confirm your suspicions.
At this point, we should all be thinking about how to coerce MSM to be actual factual news outlets again? Ideas, anyone?
It's obvious that having good ratings is better than being rated highly as a reliable news source. Perhaps (new Internet meme inbound) it is time for Anonymous to start informing advertisers of MSM that we don't like the shows associated with their products?
It would seem that only money talks these days. The real question is: Is it the advertisers dollars that talk loudest, or the politically generated dollars that talk loudest? Who really are the MSM's dollar dealers?
The courts demonstrate their inability to understand the Internet as well as other technical matters. It no wonder that CSI is popular? I'm certain that lawyers are watching it to find out how crime scene science works.
Seriously, the court had to have some understanding that what they ruled on was TOTALLY ineffectual, right? If they did not know, then perhaps they should be encouraged to recuse themselves from future cases involving anything to do with the Internet, computers, or... well, anything.
Yes, IANAL and I know that the judge is not supposed to interpret the law as much as they are supposed to apply the law to the facts presented. This indicates a lack of effort on the part of the defense, but I'm not believing that for a second, especially in view of not so distant past rulings in favor of the **AA.
The sad facts here are that the 'establishment' view the Internet in vastly different ways than do the common people and the people who ARE in the know.
Sounds like this should be something brought up at every chance when a judge in your locale wants to be (re)elected?
Perhaps Anonymous can speak loudly on such issues?
There is one thing I want to know...
on
UK Report Slams EULAs
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· Score: 2, Insightful
If they revamp how EULAs are used and written, will they still include caveats for government retribution against the impossible case where they find you have done something that is illegal no matter what software you might have used?
When a foreign government or other country is not playing fair by the rules of business that your country uses, the one thing that you can leverage against them is trade, or war, perhaps both. In this particular case, the Chinese have an unfair advantage due to the fact that the US is (for some Clintonian reason) entangled with Chinese trade in such a manor that it *SEEMS* impossible to just pull the plug. While I will use few words here, this is a multifaceted problem.
The Chinese make cheap goods: 1 - Walmart needs cheap goods 2 - Clinton was on the board of Walmart 3 - Clinton signed the trade deal with China
Yes, that is minimal information, but hints at what I'm trying to convey
Now many people are relying on the cheap goods from China for business, and with recession a breath away, cheaper goods are on everyone's mind.
The trouble is that China (and other non-western countries) are not particularly concerned about the health/safety issues of manufacturing goods for the US and other western markets. Consequently, the good that western funds will bring to the Chinese economy is a net negative when you look at the environmental impacts of allowing them into the Western economic food chain. For just the Olympics, the Chinese government relocated TWO MILLION people. That should give you some taste of what they think of hardships for their own citizens. What's a little lead poisoning? What does it matter if a big manufacturer leaks a few toxic chemicals into the environment? We have plenty of people to replace those workers when they die.
Meanwhile, western manufacturers are dealing with unions, safety concerns, worker safety, and other issues which would drive up the cost of Chinese products if they also had to worry about them.
Another issue, the one at hand, is the fact that when you source your manufacturing from a country that does not respect your laws governing manufacture, proprietary property, IP, and other issues, you will find that 'all your base are belong to them' in no time.
The suggestion that we as a society not buy Chinese products is partially useful. The suggestion that Anonymous start telling western governments that WE DON'T WANT TRADE WITH CHINA is obviously more useful. Only when governments stop dealing with China will their ways change. An economic embargo to force China to play nice in the ways that western governments deem nice will work, but first you have to get the western governments to play fair.
Moral? you reap what you sew. Time to tell the Clinton's and their 'old boys network' that we don't like China anymore, and that isn't even trying to make comment on their human rights abuses issues, just on business rights issues.
A novel idea (I think) to record brainwaves and try to match them against recordings of known dreams.
We can all think of things that 'might' go wrong, or that could be misused, but aside from that I can see a whole lot of 'my dream robot/interpreter/$500 mystic told me - I should not date you anymore - rice-a-roni causes cancer - my dog/cat saw your children playing doctor/nurses - President Bush is a reptile
Yes, I can forsee some crazy shit coming out of this technology
Scare mongering IS the point. Without it, this is not a story. at. all.
I'm reasonably certain that the US and other governments pay people to look at the sky to find things, like rocks that might land on people some day, and junk floating around the planet that might destroy 'spy' satellites.
The ONLY reason this is a story is scare mongering. Anyone that had half a clue could have told you with reasonable certainty that tracking satellites was being done by hobbyists. Those with more than a clue could have pointed you to the website showing the information.
Bad news for the governments of the world: There are other groups that monitor other activities that they may or may not (wink) be involved in. At least here in the US it is still considered by many to be part of your civic duty to provide at least tacit oversight of the government, while some folks make a hobby of it.
The only embarrassment that I can see coming of this is someone having to explain what that satellite was for, and how much it cost. Oh, sorry, my bad. That is the whole oversight thing again.
Seriously, all they are doing is calling attention to the fact that they are socially inept business creatures with not one clue how to treat their customers. If you march backward in time a few decades, you will see that the business practices then were to give customers value for money, and to be the one that gave them more or something unique.
Apparently, the 'music biz' has lost touch with that entrepreneurial spirit and moved on to 'sue the fuck out of everyone till they pay us in our graves' business model.
Well, hell, by now you get the idea. Crying to the teacher that ALL the other kids on the playground are stealing from you is not going to go too far for too long. The problem of this whole situation is never really looked at correctly. In the main instance, the music business that is claiming harm here has two historical facts surrounding it:
1 - They were the ONLY way to get into big money music arena 2 - They controlled ALL of the distribution
What they are suing for is insubstantial next to the fact that what they have lost is those two things.
The intarwebtubetrucks stole their business while they were not looking, or more pointedly, while they had their heads buried in a nice tidy pile of cocaine.
What is not recognized nor even noted is the fact that they ARE in fact dinosaurs. Their business is to create fashionable music groups and advertise them. Whoops, those damned intarwebs have taken that from them. All they have left is copyrights (which by all accounts they basically bilked the artists out of) to keep them afloat in expensive lifestyles and habit forming drugs.
Now, you ask, why do I insist on intimating that they are all drug addled ass-wipes? Well, I answer: Prove that I'm wrong.
Show us one or three or even a dozen folks in the big money music business who actually are not? Then contrast and compare that to the rest of them? Go ahead, use Anonymous like efforts to uncover it all, then tell/prove me wrong. The trouble, even if you find some, is that most are exactly what I'm implying.
This leads to the sad conclusion that this small group of private businesses who are using their money to influence the rest of the world's governments. If anyone needed a bastille day, it IS the music and movie industries.
I'm not against anyone making some money, not at all. The sad fact is that the **AA do not create anything. They leach off of actual artists, using their talent to make money for distribution and popularization. In retort I send you NIN, Radiohead, and a host of indie groups that are changing how we, the people, see the entertainment industry. The sad truth is that the **AA are not innovating. They continue to want to sell the fucked up buggy whips. Damn them to hell. I can't wait till their money runs out.
Slowly but surely, people and businesses are learning the lesson, Barbara fucked up, and they need to avoid what happened to her. It is a slow process and it will take a lot more demonstrations, a lot more people in court asking the judge to force the plaintiff to defend their ridiculous damage claims.
The good news: We are getting there. There is light at the end of the tunnel. Better news is that independent artists are showing the way by taking a risk, offering their content for free or whatever you will pay. Amazingly, such experiments are successful, despite the stealing. They make money by CUTTING OUT THE BLOOD SUCKING MIDDLEMEN.
Finally, TPB is involved because they are helping to facilitate the great change that IS NEEDED for the music industry to remove itself from the collective death grip of the **AA. They are the focal point (so to speak) of this whole change. Do they deserve our support? HELL
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Finally, we are seeing the kind of news that has to be in the public's mind to make an INFORMED decision about climate change. Fundamental questions about what the climate of this planet should be cannot yet be answered with full disclosure. Sure, there are those that are reasonably sure, but I challenge you to find one of them, then ask how the polar magnetic system of this planet, or of the Sun affect that climate. Next ask them what is the long count calendar effect on climate? Should we be in a warming trend right now? I believe that it was 26 million years ago (IANAAp - I'm not an astrophysicist) when the planet was in it's current position relative to the rest of the Milky Way. It has likely never been in this position relative to the rest of the known universe. What other factors have an effect?
:)
Now, I'm not just ragging on about how there is no man made global warming, I would like to point out that there are so very many things that we are not sure of or simply don't know. This is just one of them. In fact, the distance between the Earth and Moon is a factor that is unknown in such politically charged questions. We NEED a lot more science, and I for one am glad to welcome our knowledge bearing scientists.
The sub-prime meltdown is an example of what generally happens when you make ill-informed decisions. We need much more information if we want to save the planet. I'm glad to see that some of that information is making news headlines
It's not just bean counters. Many businesses went into the computer services side of their business with either no knowledge of the risk, went into it before the risks were known, or simply made bad decisions. Now, they have to have the computer side of their business to compete and they are finding out what dangers lie inside pandora's box, even as they try to put the lid back on.
Intrusion detection systems are how old? Who really is the enemy as far as the computer system can tell? If you don't know, or are not sure of the answer, you have something in common with the people that have to make decisions with the security of your financial information. I'm not saying that it's a total lost cause, but think about it, have you heard of CSO CIO or CISO? These are the guys that are supposed to make such decisions. Does your bank have any of those positions? Oh wait, is it really the bank that is fully to blame? Did your login get compromised by some software on the 'build-a-better-model-airplane' website?
Better yet, did the bank's EDI software get compromised because one of their partners has an IT guy that watches porn at work during the grueling month-end process?
The truth is that a secure system cannot trust anyone or anything. Getting to your money in a secure system will not be easy, and will be a deterrent to using computerized banking. That is just how it is. Ever since there were banks, people have been trying to rob them. Security issues should not be news. What is news is that the banks and financial institutions are reporting that they are having trouble with security in a time when just about the entire industry has been hurt by the sub-prime issue? I smell a kind of rat here.
You have made a perfect argument for why health insurance in a community should not be the equivalent of gambling.
... like how likely your vehicle is going fail before the warranty is out.
The argument that insurance companies already discriminate against people is exactly why this system needs to change. If a private system is not able to bear the burden of risk associated with provide all people the same coverage, it is a broken system. Sure, you and they will want to complain about how unfair that is and I will continue to tell you that this should not be about fairness. Insurers use the game of having many people pay in, and only pay out to a few. This makes that coverage affordable. The problem is that this same system is 'for profit' and it drives up the cost of the covered medical treatments. The entire thing is about to crumble under it's own weight. I'd give you lots of links here but the current political campaigns have enough fodder for you to read.
If insurance companies CAN get your genetic tests, THEY WILL. It is in their best interest to do so. At that point, they have a vested interest in dropping coverage for you. What we have not yet seen is evidence that they are doing this. They are, there just is no evidence of it yet. The health system of this country is run by insurance companies. Have you looked at how much they spend lobbying the government? http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&output=googleabout&btnG=Search+our+site&q=health%20insurance%20lobby%20money Google shows 371,000 hits for this little topic.
Why? Why does a business need to spend that much money lobbying congress? It definitely is not so they can provide better service to the end users. If the health insurance system was not fundamentally broken already, it would not be a major issue in this upcoming election.
The idea that a company can deny you health insurance based on genetic testing is fundamentally a broken idea. (car anology) if you owned a Ford Edsel, would a mechanic ask you about your insurance before working on it? If you owned a Ford Pinto, would you have to pay extra to insure it? - yeah, bad example. but those same insurance companies would not pay out for the car-b-ques in the early days, and it wasn't till Ford admitted the defect that they paid out.
Now, hear we are talking about going to the insurance agent and asking to renew our policies with a full on inspection of our vehicles that includes what type of metal the brake system parts are made of, and a scientific explanation of how likely those parts are to fail under stress. It also includes all kinds of things
What all of these things have in common is that they are giving the bookie an unfair advantage in the wager. In the US, the bookies don't have to take your bet if it seems too much risk. Medical science is not making us safer, they are in fact putting us at risk because they are giving the bookies reasons to not want to take our bets. That is a fundamental failure of the system whose goal SHOULD be to reduce health care dangers, increase overall health of the community, and keeps us strong for the defense of the country, our economy, and general well being. Without fulfilling those goals, you might as well just go to the legendary Spartan health care system.
The system is currently broken and CANNOT support it's goals, nor can it live up to its promise to the community.
More and more, big business is failing to do what they are supposed to do. This is just another example of it.
In this case, **AA being the conglomeration of corporate entities fighting to have ALL governments enact legislation that extends/expands copyrights as well as enacts/expands legislation that makes it criminal to violate copyright.
To that end, the **AA, British and Canadian counterparts et al.
Starting with the DMCA, the US government, lobbyists began to put pressure on other governments to enact legislation to fall inline with US initiatives on copyright protections. All of which, in my mind, are to protect the business models of the **AA. The push to have equal legislation in all countries to protect copyrights etc. was fairly big news. Being an American I remember not being very proud when reading such news items.
So, while you may be confused as to what an American entity has to do with British legislation, most of the rest of us are not.
The French, British and several other countries have shown quite a disdain for their leaders who seem to be rather too fond of our Mr Bush. Personally, I don't blame them for the disdain, and wonder if theirs is anywhere near the level of hatred some Americans have for their own government?
It't not what the government wants, it's what the **AA wants.
This is one of those things that will come to a head very quickly and when the egg lands, it won't be on the faces of users or ISPs. It will be on the faces of those who enacted the law.
The trouble, as we all know, is that there is no way to determine what is illegal and what is not. There will be far too many false positives, and far too many obviously innocent people will be caught by filters and such. It will go as far as MPs will let it go. Perhaps there is a manner in which people in the UK can force MPs to download LEGAL files to show them how easy it is to be caught, and perhaps demonstrate in real life how difficult it is to find the illegal stuff by asking them to PAY for additional filtering equipment/systems for businesses, schools, hospitals etc.
There are lots of people that want to help filter out illegal content, unfortunately, they also want to get paid.
Once you get buy-in on the government paying the costs for such systems, turn to appendix F and show them how these systems will be worked around in something like 24 hours of implementation.
Or perhaps you can all chip in and buy them a whack-a-mole game for the parliamentary house restaurant?
That was just an example of why it would be useful. There are many things that fall under health care that people don't want anyone to know about:
Abortion
Substance abuse
Domestic violence counseling
Prescriptions for drugs associated with a disease that has a bad stigma
And those are just a few examples of what people would want protected. I'm pretty sure that you would not want people to know that you are seeing a doctor about impotence? right? Perhaps you don't really want people to know that you are color blind or deaf in one ear. Maybe you are embarrassed if people know you have herpes.
Perhaps you don't want people finding out that your kids have been treated for sexual abuse (the record probably won't say it wasn't you that committed the abuse).
There are way more things that you don't want people to know than things you do. Hardly anyone goes to the doctor for something good.
But, if you want to tell the world that you have warts on your 1 inch penis, go ahead... we won't stop you.
There is more to it than that. Recently (thanks to the immigration process) I was in the unexpected position of trying to find my immunization records which are now scattered among several states, doctors, and the military. If you think gathering that information was either fun or easy, you are wrong. Having this information to hand would have been a REAL time and money saver.
The trouble is that I don't want anyone else to have it. We have technology that can go anywhere with us. You can carry a key fob that will hold it all etc. More to the point, you can carry a key fob with better security than a password with you to access, and allow access for updates by those of your choosing.
Yes, Google will make it convenient, but we need to do more about the security of it both in access to it, and what happens to it while stored somewhere other than in our homes. The mobile devices that we carry around, ordinary telephones, and other simple items make 2 part authentication easy (well easier) than you think. We should be using them.
Additionally, we already have rules about sharing health-care information. Lets use those laws, not make more, to ensure the integrity of that privacy.
Anyone here who thinks that their privacy is safe because their health care information is not yet stored by Google is completely mistaken. It's very easy to get your health care information from the current system through human error, and social engineering.
The sheer dominance of telcos is what is causing the problem with increased broadband deployment, when you include cable operators in that group. Very little is being done among that group to GROW their business. I know that Verizon is doing FTTH and that is good, and T-Mobile is doing the WiFi hand off phones which is good. The trouble is that this is a day late and a dollar short.
FTTH is not helping improve overall broadband deployment - it is there to compete with incumbent cable players. The T-Mobile WiFi hand off phones do not improve coverage, rather it offloads traffic from their wireless network to cable operator's networks.
As long as North America is plagued with companies that don't want to invest (or can't) despite the tax incentives they've been given and their incredibly draconian billing practices (well sort of draconian). Like AT&T and Comcast et al wanting to shape traffic so there are no bandwidth hogs making a bad day for ordinary users. They believe ordinary users are those that pay for 6Mbps but only use an average of 56kbps. This whole broadband game in North America is rigged, and rigged in favor of the Telcos and cable companies. If they had ample bandwidth there would be too much competition. Right now they have the markets all carved up by region, and only compete with each other if they stand to make millions off of a win.
To stay on topic, home based Internet businesses, and cost savings due to broadband use will only come when all those people are willing to pay through the nose for access. If the telcos are not reeled in on their anticompetitive practices, you will only be able to use your ISP's VoIP solution, and probably will have to pay extra to have a VPN connection to your office.
Again, THE only real block to greater broadband deployment and use is the ISPs themselves. They are clinging to their quickly-becoming-outdated business model in nearly the same way that the **AA has... dumb fuckers
Why, yes, I do have ideas on how they should and could do this, but there is not much room here and shareholders don't really want to see flat profits for 6-8 quarters.
Yeah, gaffed that, plus some bad typing in my post too. For those that want to know: http://www.usconstitution.net/constnot.html is a good reference of what is NOT in the constitution. However, I believe that my post did fairly well conveying my point.
"The Constitution only gives people the right to pursue happiness. You have to catch it yourself."
-- Benjamin Franklin
http://www.usconstitution.net/constnot.html
The Internet, now matter how you slice it, is not a common space to be policed by this judge, or that cop, or those senators. It is a world stage. Any teen can run into mean comments (we used to call it flaming) from ANYWHERE in the ENTIRE WORLD while they are on the Internet.
Enacting legislation against bullying and even cyberbullying is a criminal act in and of itself. The crime? Stupidity.
Sure, the Internet played a part in that teens death. The same way that electricity did!! It was a medium for the messaging.
The crime in this case, if there was one, is that human compassion and common sense did not show through on anyone's part. There is no law against being mean. If there was half our legislators would be in jail, lets not even talk about judges and bureaucrats OR clergy.
You cannot legislate morality. ever. period. Don't give me the killing is immoral and there laws against that. Life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness are in the Constitution. Freedom from mean people is not.
It's all about education people. Educate the children, don't protect them like fragile little dolls that can't take a joke, or they will become that. Explain to them that the Internet is full of mean people, and the (I know you won't believe this next part) WORLD is full of mean people. If your children, friends, or neighbors are unable to deal with life in general, enacting mean-people-suck laws will NOT save them.
In a lot of ways, we have to look at this like the human species is part of the animal kingdom. That old saying 'survival of the fittest' has more meanings than one, and it is the truth whether you think it fair or not. When diseases hit a population, weak and feeble die first. In fact, during any time of stress it is the weak and feeble that die first. There is only one person that is responsible for her death - she is. Sure, others could have helped prevent it, but lets face it, we might as well blame this on all the young boys that didn't want to be her boyfriend, and this did not prevent her subsequent actions.
I am so tired of this kind of political/legislative rhetoric. If you are seriously thinking about this, why don't we all sit down and work out how to stop corporations from being mean too? Life is not fair, get over it. One case does not create a need for law. Now, if you wanted to have the schools start a group counseling session for people who felt victimized by bullies, go ahead. That is a positive step toward helping, not a negative one toward limiting other people's rights.
You are absolutely right about the arms race. While you have physical security of the machine hacking on the RAM is unlikely.
Additionally, it might be good to remember that the PC architecture has a lot to do with the options you have for securing the machine. If your CPU allows physical separation of user memory and machine use memory there are more options. In fact, you can build a kind of sandbox for the machine to run inside of in a protected way. If your encryption is hardware based, it's possible to put the encryption software and memory in yet another physical location. In this way it is possible to treat different memory locations physically different than others. This would allow for safe wipe of memory at shutdown as well as protected memory for encryption use. Remember kids; 640K is NOT enough for everyone.
The rest comes from the fact that you'd want to fucking be different too if they called you a "discordant monozygotic twin"
What? World peace is not on the list?
* Make solar energy affordable
- Just wait till oil goes to 120/barrel
* Provide energy from fusion
- isn't that solar energy?
* Develop carbon sequestration methods
- I thought the atmosphere of Earth was doing a good job already?
* Manage the nitrogen cycle
- Fat chance with corn farmers working over time
* Provide access to clean water
- That would just ruin the coke/pepsi wars... not happening
* Restore and improve urban infrastructure
- Isn't this program already underway? I understand NYC has had some renovations. (yeah, that's low)
* Advance health informatics
- subcutaneous ID chips?
* Engineer better medicines
- Yeah, big pharma has been doing good at this one lately - check Chantix
* Reverse-engineer the brain
- Ok, this is a new idea, lets get behind this one guys, what do you say?
* Prevent nuclear terror
- GW has this one covered, right, he's the decider guy.
* Secure cyberspace
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA here's your sign
* Enhance virtual reality
- Why not worry about first life a bit more for a while?
* Advance personalized learning
- Yes, All those free or lowered tuition costs, online resources, open course materials... those are great ideas, hope someone does that soon.
* Engineer the tools for scientific discovery
- This will obviously become reality and really simple once the brain has been reverse engineered??? WTF
Ok, seriously, is it just me or does everyone else think perhaps not smoke so much weed should be on the list?
I see your point, and a flood of thoughts come to mind:
/. or Reddit et al? Something that included free phone votes for stories seen on the small screen etc.
- Could flash-mob news work in real life if mixed with traditional reporting methodologies? That is to say some combination between CNN and
- Can any news agency decouple from the parent company that now owns it?
- I seriously doubt that John Stuart ever thought during his MTV days that he would grow up to be a bastion of reliable news reporting.
- The truth of the matter is that MSM has lost the plot in much the same way that the **AA have lost the plot in their markets. Selling quality goods brings the customers in, again and again. There are reports that Al Jazeera is more reliable than some of the MSM agencies. When that even comes close to making people ask 'really?' then you know MSM is fscked.
- I watch many news sources and double check what I've heard with outside-the-US news sources to be sure it is right these days. I'm seriously afraid to believe any single news source. Even though I think the Daily Show et al check their stories, show references etc. they don't do in depth on some stories. No, I don't consider them a single source for news, but they do offer intelligent counterpoint to MSM.
- I don't know the answers here, I just know we are in need of some.
Only if you are going to make the dating sites label OCD people as such, and whacko crazy people as such... Hmmm perhaps we can put up big signs outside fundamentalist christian churches that warn of the dangers the present to their members. That might work better than the protests against $cientology?
Why does EVERYTHING have to have a fscking warning label? Concrete is hard, and you would wear protective equipment when bouncing out of cars onto it. Can we get that engraved instead of water shed grooves?
Life is a terminal disease, can we get a warning for that?
Keyboards were used in nearly 100% of all Internet downloading copyright violations, can we get a warning for that too?
damn
for a number of reasons, not the least of which is the light he sheds on the way that MSM / corporate news works these days. Even though so many of us suspect that the facts of his story were true before reading his story, it is always nice to hear an insider confirm your suspicions.
At this point, we should all be thinking about how to coerce MSM to be actual factual news outlets again? Ideas, anyone?
It's obvious that having good ratings is better than being rated highly as a reliable news source. Perhaps (new Internet meme inbound) it is time for Anonymous to start informing advertisers of MSM that we don't like the shows associated with their products?
It would seem that only money talks these days. The real question is: Is it the advertisers dollars that talk loudest, or the politically generated dollars that talk loudest? Who really are the MSM's dollar dealers?
So what you are saying is that America should have heard the words:
Meh? Monica gives good head... so?
undoing a bra with one hand...
Changing tracks on an 8-tack tape is a skill?
Adjusting rabbit ears? Isn't that still used? Then why the subsidies for over broadcast digital converters?
Technically, isn't stenography a type of shorthand?
At the rate they are naming things, fsck, changing a tape in a Walkman counts.
I bet drinking a a 12 oz beer in three swallows is actually a skill? hmmm
Did they miss loading Windows from 21 floppy disks?
The courts demonstrate their inability to understand the Internet as well as other technical matters. It no wonder that CSI is popular? I'm certain that lawyers are watching it to find out how crime scene science works.
... well, anything.
Seriously, the court had to have some understanding that what they ruled on was TOTALLY ineffectual, right? If they did not know, then perhaps they should be encouraged to recuse themselves from future cases involving anything to do with the Internet, computers, or
Yes, IANAL and I know that the judge is not supposed to interpret the law as much as they are supposed to apply the law to the facts presented. This indicates a lack of effort on the part of the defense, but I'm not believing that for a second, especially in view of not so distant past rulings in favor of the **AA.
The sad facts here are that the 'establishment' view the Internet in vastly different ways than do the common people and the people who ARE in the know.
Sounds like this should be something brought up at every chance when a judge in your locale wants to be (re)elected?
Perhaps Anonymous can speak loudly on such issues?
If they revamp how EULAs are used and written, will they still include caveats for government retribution against the impossible case where they find you have done something that is illegal no matter what software you might have used?
http://sycrat.com/sycrat/screenshots/screenshot1.png NO WMDs please
Yes, I know the example is for US cases, but just the same.
When a foreign government or other country is not playing fair by the rules of business that your country uses, the one thing that you can leverage against them is trade, or war, perhaps both. In this particular case, the Chinese have an unfair advantage due to the fact that the US is (for some Clintonian reason) entangled with Chinese trade in such a manor that it *SEEMS* impossible to just pull the plug. While I will use few words here, this is a multifaceted problem.
The Chinese make cheap goods:
1 - Walmart needs cheap goods
2 - Clinton was on the board of Walmart
3 - Clinton signed the trade deal with China
Yes, that is minimal information, but hints at what I'm trying to convey
Now many people are relying on the cheap goods from China for business, and with recession a breath away, cheaper goods are on everyone's mind.
The trouble is that China (and other non-western countries) are not particularly concerned about the health/safety issues of manufacturing goods for the US and other western markets. Consequently, the good that western funds will bring to the Chinese economy is a net negative when you look at the environmental impacts of allowing them into the Western economic food chain. For just the Olympics, the Chinese government relocated TWO MILLION people. That should give you some taste of what they think of hardships for their own citizens. What's a little lead poisoning? What does it matter if a big manufacturer leaks a few toxic chemicals into the environment? We have plenty of people to replace those workers when they die.
Meanwhile, western manufacturers are dealing with unions, safety concerns, worker safety, and other issues which would drive up the cost of Chinese products if they also had to worry about them.
Another issue, the one at hand, is the fact that when you source your manufacturing from a country that does not respect your laws governing manufacture, proprietary property, IP, and other issues, you will find that 'all your base are belong to them' in no time.
The suggestion that we as a society not buy Chinese products is partially useful. The suggestion that Anonymous start telling western governments that WE DON'T WANT TRADE WITH CHINA is obviously more useful. Only when governments stop dealing with China will their ways change. An economic embargo to force China to play nice in the ways that western governments deem nice will work, but first you have to get the western governments to play fair.
Moral? you reap what you sew. Time to tell the Clinton's and their 'old boys network' that we don't like China anymore, and that isn't even trying to make comment on their human rights abuses issues, just on business rights issues.
A novel idea (I think) to record brainwaves and try to match them against recordings of known dreams.
We can all think of things that 'might' go wrong, or that could be misused, but aside from that I can see a whole lot of 'my dream robot/interpreter/$500 mystic told me
- I should not date you anymore
- rice-a-roni causes cancer
- my dog/cat saw your children playing doctor/nurses
- President Bush is a reptile
Yes, I can forsee some crazy shit coming out of this technology
Scare mongering IS the point. Without it, this is not a story. at. all.
I'm reasonably certain that the US and other governments pay people to look at the sky to find things, like rocks that might land on people some day, and junk floating around the planet that might destroy 'spy' satellites.
The ONLY reason this is a story is scare mongering. Anyone that had half a clue could have told you with reasonable certainty that tracking satellites was being done by hobbyists. Those with more than a clue could have pointed you to the website showing the information.
Bad news for the governments of the world: There are other groups that monitor other activities that they may or may not (wink) be involved in. At least here in the US it is still considered by many to be part of your civic duty to provide at least tacit oversight of the government, while some folks make a hobby of it.
The only embarrassment that I can see coming of this is someone having to explain what that satellite was for, and how much it cost. Oh, sorry, my bad. That is the whole oversight thing again.
Hmmm, let me guess, you don't date any women do you?
Seriously, all they are doing is calling attention to the fact that they are socially inept business creatures with not one clue how to treat their customers. If you march backward in time a few decades, you will see that the business practices then were to give customers value for money, and to be the one that gave them more or something unique.
Apparently, the 'music biz' has lost touch with that entrepreneurial spirit and moved on to 'sue the fuck out of everyone till they pay us in our graves' business model.
I have only these words to say:
1 - Buggy whip maker
2 - Horse Farrier
3 - Whale hunter
4 - Lamp Lighter
5 - Gold Miner
6 - Candle maker
7 - 8-track tape manufacturer
8 - DOS code writer
9 - Transatlantic passenger liner captain
10 - Japanese longshoreman...
Well, hell, by now you get the idea. Crying to the teacher that ALL the other kids on the playground are stealing from you is not going to go too far for too long. The problem of this whole situation is never really looked at correctly. In the main instance, the music business that is claiming harm here has two historical facts surrounding it:
1 - They were the ONLY way to get into big money music arena
2 - They controlled ALL of the distribution
What they are suing for is insubstantial next to the fact that what they have lost is those two things.
The intarwebtubetrucks stole their business while they were not looking, or more pointedly, while they had their heads buried in a nice tidy pile of cocaine.
What is not recognized nor even noted is the fact that they ARE in fact dinosaurs. Their business is to create fashionable music groups and advertise them. Whoops, those damned intarwebs have taken that from them. All they have left is copyrights (which by all accounts they basically bilked the artists out of) to keep them afloat in expensive lifestyles and habit forming drugs.
Now, you ask, why do I insist on intimating that they are all drug addled ass-wipes? Well, I answer: Prove that I'm wrong.
Show us one or three or even a dozen folks in the big money music business who actually are not? Then contrast and compare that to the rest of them? Go ahead, use Anonymous like efforts to uncover it all, then tell/prove me wrong. The trouble, even if you find some, is that most are exactly what I'm implying.
This leads to the sad conclusion that this small group of private businesses who are using their money to influence the rest of the world's governments. If anyone needed a bastille day, it IS the music and movie industries.
I'm not against anyone making some money, not at all. The sad fact is that the **AA do not create anything. They leach off of actual artists, using their talent to make money for distribution and popularization. In retort I send you NIN, Radiohead, and a host of indie groups that are changing how we, the people, see the entertainment industry. The sad truth is that the **AA are not innovating. They continue to want to sell the fucked up buggy whips. Damn them to hell. I can't wait till their money runs out.
Slowly but surely, people and businesses are learning the lesson, Barbara fucked up, and they need to avoid what happened to her. It is a slow process and it will take a lot more demonstrations, a lot more people in court asking the judge to force the plaintiff to defend their ridiculous damage claims.
The good news: We are getting there. There is light at the end of the tunnel. Better news is that independent artists are showing the way by taking a risk, offering their content for free or whatever you will pay. Amazingly, such experiments are successful, despite the stealing. They make money by CUTTING OUT THE BLOOD SUCKING MIDDLEMEN.
Finally, TPB is involved because they are helping to facilitate the great change that IS NEEDED for the music industry to remove itself from the collective death grip of the **AA. They are the focal point (so to speak) of this whole change. Do they deserve our support? HELL