Having lived in SF, I have a deep hatred of parking cops. The city puts in meters with a 1 hour max time next to restaurants. Then, as the lunch hour is ending, they ticket everyone who runs 2 minutes over.
Knowing how these people act, they will wait in the shadows for the person to leave their car to walk to the "smart meter". Your car will be parked without a proper parking receipt on the dash for 30 seconds as you walk to the "smart meter", and you will be ticketed. All written appeals will be automatically rejected - as they are in SF. You'll need to actually get in front of a judge with no connection to the parking system to get a fair ruling.
The only thing most cities do efficiently is pursue writing parking tickets.
To clarify, proving that a section of random bits of data on my hard drive is NOT an encrypted file is equivalent to proving that I am NOT a witch.
This could be easily abused by the police. All they have to do is find a section of random data on a hard drive. Then, the police ask you for a key. When you don't provide one ( because there is no key ), you get convicted on "Refusing To Decrypt Data" charges.
It isn't possible to say with certainty what is random data and what is encrypted data.
Suppose I have TrueCrypt installed on my machine, but I don't have anything encrypted. What stops to police from accusing me of having encrypted files and demanding a key? How do I prove random bits of data on my HD are random bits of data and not super secret encrypted files? I doubt I even need Truecrypt installed for the police to use this to get a guaranteed 2 or 5 year conviction.
I'm sorry but I would have to respectfully disagree. Like many things in life, China is not all bad, and the US is not all good. I have lived in China for 2 years, and I tell you for working with the Chinese government that the Chinese government generally does want to do the right thing and often does try its best. Does it fail at times, yes. Is is subject to problems with bribery, yes. Does it occasionally do some really, really bad things, yes.
The western media will ignore 10,000 good things that happen in China and focus on the one bad thing. I know, this is how news works. The same is true in the US. However, if all you knew about the US was what you read in the news, you would think people in the US all carry guns and live in fear of being shot. That does not make up for Chinese government's bad behavior, but I do get tired of these westerns who think China is purely evil. It isn't. Life here in China is actually pretty good. I go about my business, and no one bothers me. All my employees go about their lives and never have any trouble with government. They know everything the government does because the government has almost no control over news and the internet ( Everyone uses proxies to read the foreign news in Chinese. Foreign news in English is almost never blocked - including slashdot and articles highly critical of China. ) Please stop acting like the Chinese government is the same as it was under Mao. It isn't.
Lithium-ion batteries are not ready for this task. They are not easy to make. That is why they cost a fortune. I don't think I am alone, but I have never had a Li-ion laptop battery make it more than 1 year in a laptop. After about 1 year the run time on the battery goes from 2 hours ( new ) down to 30-45 minutes. Plus, I don't run on battery power that often. Less than 2 hours a week. This tech is not ready to be put in mass produced cars. I know all the new claims about longevity. I bet the those who believe those claims also believe the claims Lenovo made about the battery in my current laptop. Battery life claims are notoriously unreliable.
One issue is that Li-ion batteries are very sensitive to heat. Leave them out in the sun, and their capacity will drop like a rock - even if you do not use them. This is going to be a huge problem anywhere where it is sunny through much of the year. Heat kills a Li-ion battery's longevity. Parking a car under the LA sun is a perfect way to quickly kill an electric car.
I don't know how much the Nissan battery pack will cost, but a Tesla battery pack runs about $30,000. If you replace it every 2 years, the cost quickly gets out of hand. My guess is that Nissan will not make an binding promises about warranting the battery pack. If it fails ( drops to less than 50% initial capacity ) in less than 3 years, you will be SOL.
I did see an article in the WSJ ( Wall Street Journal ) about an electric lawn mover about 2 months ago. The company clearly stated that the $800 battery pack would have to be replaced approximately every 2 years. Sadly, I think this is the brutal reality when it comes to battery powered vehicles. Massive piles of batteries that will require disposal, and the expense of purchasing new while disposing on the old.
I think a better solution is a supercharged engine that is 1.5 liters or less. Add to that capacitors and electric motors for acceleration. Capacitors are light, so they don't weigh down a car like batteries do. When and only when accelerating, the capacitors power the electric motors to give acceptable acceleration. When cruising, a 1.5 liter supercharge engine should be able to carry most light cars along at 100 mph or less no problem. Massive power is only needed for high speeds ( 100+ mph ) and rapid acceleration. When cruising at constant speed, it does not matter if you have 600 hp or 90 hp. During cruising and braking, the capacitors can be recharged. The capacitors only need enough power for short bursts. They discharge quickly, but also recharge quickly. Start and stop traffic might wear down the power in the capacitors fast than the system can recharge. However, you can accelerate on the engine alone in start and stop traffic. You generally don't need rapid acceleration in start and stop traffic.
Keep in mind coal power production is not exactly what one would call efficient ( less than 50% ). Nor is power transmission ( 10% or more loss ). Nor is turning electricity back into forward momentum. Also, high efficiency batteries are going to require a lot of rare earth metals. Unfortunately, world supply is limited.
Good point. I would love to hear what the Florida State Bar Association has to say. He did offer to pay for research that could help the prosecution.
I don't see any positive comments here on Slashdot. We should all look on the bright side. The more time lawyers spend fighting each other, the better the odds for a peaceful and harmonious society.:)
I live in Shanghai. If you are on the subway during rush hour in the morning or evening, I challenge you to look around and not see someone with an iPhone. They are everywhere here. There are stores within 200 meters of my apartment that have iPhones for sale. This is a silly argument. The iPhone is readily available in China.
Here is the more interesting point. The iPhones here are all smuggled in, mostly through Hong Kong. Since they have been smuggled in, you don't have to pay import taxes. If Apple gets permission to sell an "official" iPhone, no one will buy it because you will still be able to buy a gray market iPhone for 30% less. Why would anyone pay extra for an official iPhone?
Honestly, how stupid are people? I really don't understand. Wikipedia is an amazing source of information. Anyone who wants an introduction to a topic that they know nothing about can start with Wikipedia. I honestly don't know a better way to get an introduction on most topics. That said, people should believe, but verify what they read on Wikipedia. Wikipedia is not perfect, but the error rate is lower than most sources. Furthermore, the Wikipedia error rate in some cases can be lower than retaining a consultant who is an expert on a subject. It all depends on what the expert is being paid to say. If money or people's lives depend on the answer, it is especially important to verify Wikipedia's information. At this point, I would find fault with someone doing research and did not review Wikipedia's entry.
"Trust but verify" It doesn't get any more simple than that.
Besides, Wikipedia's entries are rarely exhaustive. Wikipedia provides good overviews of subjects with an error rate lower than most other sources of information. The key word here is overview. Anyone interested in a deep understanding of topic should read the Wikipedia entry and then dig deeper.
I doubt the Chinese are interested in building Hummers. However, they are very very interested in owning the intellectual property rights to certain components such as engines and transmissions. Once they are legally in the clear and have a good design, they will be able to build and sell a car for the US market.
I hate to say this, but you sound like a paid microsoft poster. Raids? In China? Have you ever been to China? Honestly. Please don't spread FUD. Trust me. I live here.
I would worry about trojans, spyware. These are legitimate concerns.
Another concern is that a lot of development in China takes place on very old slow machines. You want to do development here? Plan on using Microsoft VCC 6.0. Want to buy a copy? Forget it. Microsoft dropped that one about a decade ago. ( actually it is amazing how these kids get so much done working little on 17 inch monitors )
Iâve seen a lot people here using pirated software that is three generations old and no older available. But, it runs 10 times as fast as the new versions, and still seems slow on the old machines here.
Now that we have that out of the way, I really don't feel the American government should be telling Australian government how to rule their own country ( This statement does not apply to things such as are killing political dissidents ). However, I would have no problem if the US government made it illegal for US government agencies to purchase equipment from any company who supplied a foreign country with this kind of filtering technology. The ban could be extended to any organization who receives any form of government support ( most of the collages in the US and for the next few years the entire US financial system ). Then, companies like Cisco would have to decide if they are going with China and Australia or the US.
There are ways to get what you want ( or this case, to do the right thing ) without directly going to another country, getting in their face, acting like arrogant Americans and telling them that they don't know what is best for their own country.
So another arrogant American who has never lived in India and is completely snug in his own perfection looks down on India as a bunch or backwards animals.
It is as if a person talked about the ferocious beast that hunted him for days and eventually cornered him and attacked him. Then the truth comes out. He left his front door open because he is too dumb to close it, and the killer was a bunny rabbit ( but not one of those British types - those are really nasty! ).
The military comes of looking as if they are easily defeated with trivial attacks, and they are a bunch of lying cry babies. No wonder they wet their pants when they think about the Chinese.
The US Military's computer systems were bought to its knees by a bloody hairdresser?
Honestly, I think this is a sign that anyone with any shred of dignity left should simply bid the US a fair farewell and migrate to Canada or England or any other nice, not so completely inept country.
Damn it! Will someone arrest this guy? I've been doing this for years. How can he go out an publicly disclose something like this? This is criminal! How much longer will this trick work? Another month or two? This is going to cost me. CA gas prices are already too high. I pay plenty of taxes on the gas, I really don't want to have to pay this also.
Awwwwwww, one of the few symbols that all of humanity can understand and relate to. This is an inspired and deeply symbolic part of the opening ceremony that truly captures the trials and struggles we all face.
I doubt many western reports will have problems. If you work for a company of any size, the company has a VPN. You log into the company VPN. ( I promise you China does not block them. I live here. ) Once you are logged into your VPN, you surf where ever you want. Plus, it is encrypted - so no spying.
One problem that is not commonly discussed is what I call the "great American firewall". For better or worse, a lot of western sites block all requests from China. It is really annoying if you want to make a few online purchases and you aren't trying to hack their site. I should start to compile a list of specific examples.
Forgetting the ethics of what this guy did, when will people learn that there are limits to anonymity online? I'm surprised how this keeps happening. People should know by now that they can be tracked.
People who are more technically inclined should know to use proxies. Especially those based in countries that are unlikely to give the UK access to their logs - read: China/Russia. What about Tor? Honestly, posting stuff online that could get you in trouble directly from your home computer is on the same level of intelligence as robbing a bank with a big sign bearing your name, address and phone number.
It's sad. I often travel between the US and China on business ( I live on the China side ). I've always been careful with sensitive data, but now I'm absolutely fascist. Why? I have no fear of the Chinese government. Besides, I work for a Chinese company. I fear my own country illegally accessing files to which they have absolutely no rights whatsoever.
Honestly. If someone works for the US government, pulls some CEO's laptop at the boarder for "inspection" and gets free access to all the company financials, would they do the right thing? How many semi-intelligent people wouldn't be tempted to start buying stock options or call their best friend with a really good "tip"? Even if they SEC investigated, they would never find the link.
Over the last several years, I've always been treated very respectfully inside China and going to and from. It is in the US, my own country, where I'm treated as if I'm already guilty.
Back to the topic at hand. TrueCrypt is a wonderful product. Everyone should be using it.
Remind him that this button-down, Oxford-cloth psycho might just snap, and then stalk from office to office with an Armalite AR-10 carbine gas-powered semi-automatic weapon, pumping round after round into colleagues and co-workers. This might be someone you've known for years. Someone very, very close to you.
What scares me is more than one western educated Chinese has told me things like this:
"Don't believe what ever Dalailama said in the western world!! He kills, tortures the ppl in Tibet in the way that no human can bear.
For his birthday, he requires ppl to give him human Eyeballs, skin, hands as a gift! He treats all the ppl there as slave!
The only reason why he wants Tibet to be independed is bcs he wants that power back! And he is supported by the western extreme...He was abandoned from China bcs the goverment and the ppl there can't bear his cruelty!
"Free" Tibet back the murder?? Don't be fooled by him!!!! He kills without thinking!!!!!"
They fully believe it is true and have websites with pictures to prove it. I live in China. I want to see Chinese think for themselves. But when this type of mis-information is take as truth, I'm at a complete loss. Well educated Chinese will argue these points as if they where defending their family's honor.
Slashdot Mirror
Repeat after me:
lesson 1.
"Ni hao" = Hello.
lesson 2.
"Wo men shi dou ni de ji di"=All your base are belong to us.
Having lived in SF, I have a deep hatred of parking cops. The city puts in meters with a 1 hour max time next to restaurants. Then, as the lunch hour is ending, they ticket everyone who runs 2 minutes over.
Knowing how these people act, they will wait in the shadows for the person to leave their car to walk to the "smart meter". Your car will be parked without a proper parking receipt on the dash for 30 seconds as you walk to the "smart meter", and you will be ticketed. All written appeals will be automatically rejected - as they are in SF. You'll need to actually get in front of a judge with no connection to the parking system to get a fair ruling.
The only thing most cities do efficiently is pursue writing parking tickets.
To clarify, proving that a section of random bits of data on my hard drive is NOT an encrypted file is equivalent to proving that I am NOT a witch.
This could be easily abused by the police. All they have to do is find a section of random data on a hard drive. Then, the police ask you for a key. When you don't provide one ( because there is no key ), you get convicted on "Refusing To Decrypt Data" charges.
It isn't possible to say with certainty what is random data and what is encrypted data.
Suppose I have TrueCrypt installed on my machine, but I don't have anything encrypted. What stops to police from accusing me of having encrypted files and demanding a key? How do I prove random bits of data on my HD are random bits of data and not super secret encrypted files?
I doubt I even need Truecrypt installed for the police to use this to get a guaranteed 2 or 5 year conviction.
I'm sorry but I would have to respectfully disagree. Like many things in life, China is not all bad, and the US is not all good. I have lived in China for 2 years, and I tell you for working with the Chinese government that the Chinese government generally does want to do the right thing and often does try its best. Does it fail at times, yes. Is is subject to problems with bribery, yes. Does it occasionally do some really, really bad things, yes.
The western media will ignore 10,000 good things that happen in China and focus on the one bad thing. I know, this is how news works. The same is true in the US. However, if all you knew about the US was what you read in the news, you would think people in the US all carry guns and live in fear of being shot. That does not make up for Chinese government's bad behavior, but I do get tired of these westerns who think China is purely evil. It isn't. Life here in China is actually pretty good. I go about my business, and no one bothers me. All my employees go about their lives and never have any trouble with government. They know everything the government does because the government has almost no control over news and the internet ( Everyone uses proxies to read the foreign news in Chinese. Foreign news in English is almost never blocked - including slashdot and articles highly critical of China. ) Please stop acting like the Chinese government is the same as it was under Mao. It isn't.
I would not disagree with you.
Lithium-ion batteries are not ready for this task. They are not easy to make. That is why they cost a fortune. I don't think I am alone, but I have never had a Li-ion laptop battery make it more than 1 year in a laptop. After about 1 year the run time on the battery goes from 2 hours ( new ) down to 30-45 minutes. Plus, I don't run on battery power that often. Less than 2 hours a week. This tech is not ready to be put in mass produced cars. I know all the new claims about longevity. I bet the those who believe those claims also believe the claims Lenovo made about the battery in my current laptop. Battery life claims are notoriously unreliable.
One issue is that Li-ion batteries are very sensitive to heat. Leave them out in the sun, and their capacity will drop like a rock - even if you do not use them. This is going to be a huge problem anywhere where it is sunny through much of the year. Heat kills a Li-ion battery's longevity. Parking a car under the LA sun is a perfect way to quickly kill an electric car.
I don't know how much the Nissan battery pack will cost, but a Tesla battery pack runs about $30,000. If you replace it every 2 years, the cost quickly gets out of hand. My guess is that Nissan will not make an binding promises about warranting the battery pack. If it fails ( drops to less than 50% initial capacity ) in less than 3 years, you will be SOL.
I did see an article in the WSJ ( Wall Street Journal ) about an electric lawn mover about 2 months ago. The company clearly stated that the $800 battery pack would have to be replaced approximately every 2 years. Sadly, I think this is the brutal reality when it comes to battery powered vehicles. Massive piles of batteries that will require disposal, and the expense of purchasing new while disposing on the old.
I think a better solution is a supercharged engine that is 1.5 liters or less. Add to that capacitors and electric motors for acceleration. Capacitors are light, so they don't weigh down a car like batteries do. When and only when accelerating, the capacitors power the electric motors to give acceptable acceleration. When cruising, a 1.5 liter supercharge engine should be able to carry most light cars along at 100 mph or less no problem. Massive power is only needed for high speeds ( 100+ mph ) and rapid acceleration. When cruising at constant speed, it does not matter if you have 600 hp or 90 hp. During cruising and braking, the capacitors can be recharged. The capacitors only need enough power for short bursts. They discharge quickly, but also recharge quickly. Start and stop traffic might wear down the power in the capacitors fast than the system can recharge. However, you can accelerate on the engine alone in start and stop traffic. You generally don't need rapid acceleration in start and stop traffic.
Keep in mind coal power production is not exactly what one would call efficient ( less than 50% ). Nor is power transmission ( 10% or more loss ). Nor is turning electricity back into forward momentum. Also, high efficiency batteries are going to require a lot of rare earth metals. Unfortunately, world supply is limited.
Oddly enough, we already have facilities in highly questionable locations.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biosafety_Level
Look for:
"National Biocontainment Facility"
"Shope Laboratory"
These are Biosafety level 4 facilities in Galveston, Texas.
They have hurricanes in Galveston... Big ones...
How do I mod you beyond 5?!?!?!?!
I have tears in my eyes.
Good point. I would love to hear what the Florida State Bar Association has to say. He did offer to pay for research that could help the prosecution.
I don't see any positive comments here on Slashdot. We should all look on the bright side. The more time lawyers spend fighting each other, the better the odds for a peaceful and harmonious society. :)
I live in Shanghai. If you are on the subway during rush hour in the morning or evening, I challenge you to look around and not see someone with an iPhone. They are everywhere here. There are stores within 200 meters of my apartment that have iPhones for sale. This is a silly argument. The iPhone is readily available in China.
Here is the more interesting point. The iPhones here are all smuggled in, mostly through Hong Kong. Since they have been smuggled in, you don't have to pay import taxes. If Apple gets permission to sell an "official" iPhone, no one will buy it because you will still be able to buy a gray market iPhone for 30% less. Why would anyone pay extra for an official iPhone?
Honestly, how stupid are people? I really don't understand. Wikipedia is an amazing source of information. Anyone who wants an introduction to a topic that they know nothing about can start with Wikipedia. I honestly don't know a better way to get an introduction on most topics. That said, people should believe, but verify what they read on Wikipedia. Wikipedia is not perfect, but the error rate is lower than most sources. Furthermore, the Wikipedia error rate in some cases can be lower than retaining a consultant who is an expert on a subject. It all depends on what the expert is being paid to say. If money or people's lives depend on the answer, it is especially important to verify Wikipedia's information.
At this point, I would find fault with someone doing research and did not review Wikipedia's entry.
"Trust but verify" It doesn't get any more simple than that.
Besides, Wikipedia's entries are rarely exhaustive. Wikipedia provides good overviews of subjects with an error rate lower than most other sources of information. The key word here is overview. Anyone interested in a deep understanding of topic should read the Wikipedia entry and then dig deeper.
I doubt the Chinese are interested in building Hummers. However, they are very very interested in owning the intellectual property rights to certain components such as engines and transmissions. Once they are legally in the clear and have a good design, they will be able to build and sell a car for the US market.
Disclosure - I live in China.
I hate to say this, but you sound like a paid microsoft poster. Raids? In China? Have you ever been to China? Honestly. Please don't spread FUD. Trust me. I live here.
I would worry about trojans, spyware. These are legitimate concerns.
Another concern is that a lot of development in China takes place on very old slow machines. You want to do development here? Plan on using Microsoft VCC 6.0. Want to buy a copy? Forget it. Microsoft dropped that one about a decade ago. ( actually it is amazing how these kids get so much done working little on 17 inch monitors )
Iâve seen a lot people here using pirated software that is three generations old and no older available. But, it runs 10 times as fast as the new versions, and still seems slow on the old machines here.
Disclosure: I am American.
Now that we have that out of the way, I really don't feel the American government should be telling Australian government how to rule their own country ( This statement does not apply to things such as are killing political dissidents ). However, I would have no problem if the US government made it illegal for US government agencies to purchase equipment from any company who supplied a foreign country with this kind of filtering technology. The ban could be extended to any organization who receives any form of government support ( most of the collages in the US and for the next few years the entire US financial system ). Then, companies like Cisco would have to decide if they are going with China and Australia or the US.
There are ways to get what you want ( or this case, to do the right thing ) without directly going to another country, getting in their face, acting like arrogant Americans and telling them that they don't know what is best for their own country.
So another arrogant American who has never lived in India and is completely snug in his own perfection looks down on India as a bunch or backwards animals.
Gosh, what a surprise.
The military is really doing itself a disservice.
It is as if a person talked about the ferocious beast that hunted him for days and eventually cornered him and attacked him. Then the truth comes out. He left his front door open because he is too dumb to close it, and the killer was a bunny rabbit ( but not one of those British types - those are really nasty! ).
The military comes of looking as if they are easily defeated with trivial attacks, and they are a bunch of lying cry babies. No wonder they wet their pants when they think about the Chinese.
The US Military's computer systems were bought to its knees by a bloody hairdresser?
Honestly, I think this is a sign that anyone with any shred of dignity left should simply bid the US a fair farewell and migrate to Canada or England or any other nice, not so completely inept country.
Damn it! Will someone arrest this guy? I've been doing this for years. How can he go out an publicly disclose something like this? This is criminal! How much longer will this trick work? Another month or two? This is going to cost me. CA gas prices are already too high. I pay plenty of taxes on the gas, I really don't want to have to pay this also.
Awwwwwww, one of the few symbols that all of humanity can understand and relate to. This is an inspired and deeply symbolic part of the opening ceremony that truly captures the trials and struggles we all face.
I doubt many western reports will have problems. If you work for a company of any size, the company has a VPN. You log into the company VPN. ( I promise you China does not block them. I live here. ) Once you are logged into your VPN, you surf where ever you want. Plus, it is encrypted - so no spying.
One problem that is not commonly discussed is what I call the "great American firewall". For better or worse, a lot of western sites block all requests from China. It is really annoying if you want to make a few online purchases and you aren't trying to hack their site. I should start to compile a list of specific examples.
Forgetting the ethics of what this guy did, when will people learn that there are limits to anonymity online? I'm surprised how this keeps happening. People should know by now that they can be tracked.
People who are more technically inclined should know to use proxies. Especially those based in countries that are unlikely to give the UK access to their logs - read: China/Russia. What about Tor? Honestly, posting stuff online that could get you in trouble directly from your home computer is on the same level of intelligence as robbing a bank with a big sign bearing your name, address and phone number.
It's sad. I often travel between the US and China on business ( I live on the China side ). I've always been careful with sensitive data, but now I'm absolutely fascist. Why? I have no fear of the Chinese government. Besides, I work for a Chinese company. I fear my own country illegally accessing files to which they have absolutely no rights whatsoever.
Honestly. If someone works for the US government, pulls some CEO's laptop at the boarder for "inspection" and gets free access to all the company financials, would they do the right thing? How many semi-intelligent people wouldn't be tempted to start buying stock options or call their best friend with a really good "tip"? Even if they SEC investigated, they would never find the link.
Over the last several years, I've always been treated very respectfully inside China and going to and from. It is in the US, my own country, where I'm treated as if I'm already guilty.
Back to the topic at hand. TrueCrypt is a wonderful product. Everyone should be using it.
Remind him that this button-down, Oxford-cloth psycho might just snap, and then stalk from office to office with an Armalite AR-10 carbine gas-powered semi-automatic weapon, pumping round after round into colleagues and co-workers. This might be someone you've known for years. Someone very, very close to you.
What scares me is more than one western educated Chinese has told me things like this:
"Don't believe what ever Dalailama said in the western world!! He
kills, tortures the ppl in Tibet in the way that no human can bear.
For his birthday, he requires ppl to give him human Eyeballs, skin,
hands as a gift! He treats all the ppl there as slave!
The only reason why he wants Tibet to be independed is bcs he wants
that power back! And he is supported by the western extreme...He was
abandoned from China bcs the goverment and the ppl there can't bear
his cruelty!
"Free" Tibet back the murder??
Don't be fooled by him!!!!
He kills without thinking!!!!!"
They fully believe it is true and have websites with pictures to prove it. I live in China. I want to see Chinese think for themselves. But when this type of mis-information is take as truth, I'm at a complete loss. Well educated Chinese will argue these points as if they where defending their family's honor.