Is the FCC totally blind? Before starting to enact strict and controversial regulations, they should step back and take a look at the problem.
A broadcast flag is really stupid. It prevents Joe Consumer from recording his favorite show if he is out of town. It does little to - as the article put it -
"permit entertainment companies to designate, or flag, programs to prevent viewers from copying shows or distributing them over the Internet."
If they had actually done 10 minutes of research, as i did, they would discover that the most common source of "bootlegged" tv shows on the internet is not from affialiate/local TV broadcasts. It is from Wild Feeds. Wild feed is a term used to describe the satellite broadcast streams that are used to distribute network television shows to local affialates. These feeds are all digital quality (even HDTV sometimes) and completely commercial free. The local affiliate stations have giant satellite dishes that recieve these streams, splice in the commercials, and broadcast them to your home. If ever you downloaded a TV show via one of the popular Bit Torrent sites, and found that it was perfect HDTV quality w/perfectly cut out commercials, you probably downloaded a show ripped from a wild fire stream.
Wild fire streams can be encrypted -- some are -- and thus impossible to intercept. The FCC should regulate these if it wants to make a difference. It would mean regualting only a handful of companies. Since the signals travel over airwaves, it is arguably in the FCC jurisdiction. Definitely less questionable than regulating the TV set that I have in MY HOME.
Obviously this will not stop end-users from ripping lower quality signals from local airwaves, but neither will the broadcast flag. Unless the FCC can find a way to stop me from obtaining software capable of recording streams from my PC/TV Tuner, shows will still be copied and distributed.
In conclusion, this flag is a bunch of bull shit. It will only suceed in stopping my grandmother from recording her favorite movie when she is on vacation.
As a mac user -- and long time windows user -- I must agree that the mac update model is far better. My ONLY gripe about apple's updater is that the "Reboot or Shutdown" button dialog that appears when you download a large update dows not have a "reboot later" option. It just sits there waiting for me to click it y accident when I am in the middle of important work.
That being said, the MS updater is worse. It pops up every few minutes to bug the user. That makes it far far easier to accidently reboot because you were hitting enter when it pops up.
I only boot into Windows when I want to play a windows game. That OS is almost out of my home life!
I'm pretty sure that Keynote is closed source, thus it cant be the *same* code or this guy would get his ass sued.
The cube is not the only transition in DM and, IMO, it isnt even the best one. I'm probably mistaken in using the term Expose, which is just a marketing term. I should have said the Apple OSX graphics core. From reading the DM site (and some others), i'm faily sure DM just calls functions native to OSX (i.e. calls to the Quartz graphics core librar[y|ies]).
Anyway, truth be told, I couldnt give a shit if he copied code or used native functions. All I had a problem with was this:
'Workspace switching effects so lavish they make Keynote jealous'
Keynote is not a workspace switcher, it is a slide switcher. (although the two may be the same depending on how apple wrote Keynote's slide rendering... the point is moot)
"'Workspace switching effects so lavish they make Keynote jealous' "
Keynote? As in the Apple presentation application? What does this have to do with workspace switching? The only thing that keynote switches are slides.
You must be referring to Expose, a feature of Apple's window manager, not a workspace switcher. However, a great little (free) app called DesktopManager does use expose's effects to create workspaces.
Its true that the service providers need competetion. With that being said, I would rather the government no run my network. This is mainly because -- in my experience -- the government is incompetent.
My father has been a medium-high level gov't official for decades now and I can tell you that most government employees are lazy, unmotivated and incompetent. Private industry demands better from their employees. The result is better and more reliable service.
I cant get a passport or drivers license/state id using it. My online stock firm uses parts of it to create a temporary password if I forget my login info. My university uses it as my student ID. However, nobody has ever asked me for it as verification.
I think we are missing the point. There is NO way to truly verify the identity of an american citizen. To get my passport last week, all I needed was a 20-year old peice of paper with a barely visible raised seal (birth certificate) and 80 US Dollars. With that I provide the same SSN that is on the birth certificate and viola... instant international identity papers.
I would rather the government did not have my DNA on file, but that seems like the next-best solution.
I find it interesting that M$ is publically using FOSS developed by the same subculture of people they are in "competition" with (i.e. OSS developers).
Isnt the TCO of using a FOSS PNG library higher than a M$-developed solution??;-)
Yet another bullshit study about lost productivity.
Has anybody stopped to consider what would happen if we were made to work day-after-day without any distractions?
Productivity would drop-off halfway through the day! I know that I personally need a few minutes to stop programming and do something else every other hour.
Besides, i'll bet Slashdot is responsible for about 100 million dollars in "lost productivity." Hell, Im typing this post at work!!!
New post: "/. Costs U.S. Companies 500 Million Annually":-)
"...could be added to by local police agencys as victims..."
You mean the U.S. Secret Service (in the case of bank fraud). Local police lack both the resources and jurisdiction to investigate online fraud (unless both the victim and server are in their district).
Since the Secret Service is a branch of the Treasury Department, they are tasked with financial/bank fraud investigations.
On another note, I still find it interesting that a branch of the Treasury department is tasked with protecting our President and foreign dignitaries. Seems like a job for the DoD or Homeland Security. I love this country.
Lesson learned: Dont take risks/piss off your bosses in the first month. This guy did a stupid thing. It was his first month at a new job and he went too far. Jen had not yet gained enough respect from his collegues to do this. I think things would have been different if he was a seasoned Googler. Management probably saw him as a loose cannon, and a possible threat to the companies future.
First off, please seperate unix and Firefox. They are not the same. Firefox RUNS on unix. Both are open source and free (usually). This is where the similarities end.
The fact that you imply that unix is as vulnerable to malware as windows is ridiculous. Sure, you could write some malicious programs for unix, but they would not be very effective.
An example: A default winxp install will boot up for the first time with daemons listening on numerous ports. These are the things that virus writers love because they can count on everybody running the same services.
On the otherhand, an out-of-the-box Ubuntu Linux install will be listening on zero ports and will not advertise its presence.
Now in the case of Firefox vs IE: there are innumerable reasons why it would be much much harder to infect a computer via firefox than through IE (aside from it being more popular). First off, in my experience, about 60% of all adware/malware on a computer was put there manually. That is, most of it is caused by a user (accidently) hitting enter or clicking "yes" when IE's "Unsigned Plugin" warning pops up. In firefox, the user must wait 2 full seconds before they can agree to install (0 seconds before they can decline). In Apple's Safari, you cannot download non-apple plugin's.
Now I'm not saying that FF or Unix is impervious to malware; they just require the malware developers to be very VERY creative and fixes would come quicker.
Not to mention that doing anything malicious on UNIX requires root priveledges or a very complex root-escalation hack.
Are you talking about me? I posted because I am a wise-ass....You quoted me, but I hope you were referring to the super-post. I think I know plenty about "UNIX editors." I exclusively use Vi(m) while programming at work. Besides, he wasnt using an editor to post. Vim cant render/. afaik
And does the Sharepoint vulnerability affect your friend on linux?
Besides, I was not aware that MS released software for Linux. If your friend is using a Windows emulator (i.e. wine - linux, or Virtual PC - mac), I would say that still counts as a Windows ONLY fix.
So you have succeeded in tagging yourself as an tech nerd that, like so many others, cannot see the big picture. This is also the reason why many IT persons find it difficult to move up the corporate ladder.
Who gives a shit about the number 22B? I sure as hell dont. Divide it by 4, or remove it completely. "Spam Costs US Companies Alot of Money." or even "Spam Costs Companies Money."
The number is not important. What is important is that organizations are spending RESOURCES on defending against spam. Whether those resources are employee time (reading spam, sorting spam, cleaning virii off the machine), or money (purchasing mail servers/filtering software), loss is still loss.
Dont get me wrong, I dont put that much faith in that dollar number. The point is just that every tiny bit of resource that a company puts into fighting spam results in lost productivity. Do you want your staff sifting through spam? or do you want them to work on something that will generate profit? Additionally, every employee *should* generate more than they cost. Therefore, if you waste 30 minutes a week on spam, your company has wasted 2.5 hours of salary and lost several times that in productivity (say another 5 hours in salary terms). THAT is where the huge number comes from.
Sorry for the rant. I get POed when people downplay important issues.
Upstream cap ro downstream? I'm assuming upstream since that is what is much more expensive for the ISP. I dont even think 40GB is possible with my Comcast Cable connection (in the USA) with a 256Kb/s upload cap!!!
That is equal to 30KB MAX upload.
Lets see...
40,000,000,000 bytes
30,000 bytes/second
cancel some zeroes...
4,000,000/3 = 1,333,333 seconds
1,333,333 sec / 2,595,000 seconds per month = 0.51
Thus to reach 40GB upload, I would have to fill my current upstream pipe for 16 full days. I would gladly accept a cap for a bigger pipe! (note: the only service in Boston, USA which gives significantly better upstream costs almost three times as much as my connection)
All good points. But I am more interested in the fact that you are typing "google.com" so often. Why is that? Please tell me you are not using Internet Craplorer.
Firefox, Opera, Safari, Chamino (Chimera) and Konquerer all have search boxes that search google by default. Heck Firefox's default homepage is not much more than a google search box. And Opera (remember opera?) has had integrated google searching for many years.
Sorry to go on about such a minor point, but I find it disturbing that anybody who uses google often (I am at about two dozen unique "googles" a day) still types it in each time.
I have had a PB 15" for over a year now. I agree that a docking station would be nice to have... but it will not be happening anytime soon.
Docking stations legitamize clutter (keep reading). Apple is about pure simplicity and eliminating the rats nest of wires found around most PC's. Anyone remember the TV spot Apple released when the G5 was unveiled about getting rid of wires?
So Apple will never help you create a wire nest, even if it is easier for many. Instead you have the Apple solution to wires: dont use them. In other words, the Apple solution includes a Bluetooth keyboard, mouse (optional BT cell phone) and an Airport extreme internet/intranet gateway. You can even use an Airport Express so that you dont have to plus in an Audio cable.
Of course External HD's (including the iPod) will be wired for a few more years due to bandwith limitations. Same goes for the external display. Therefore, you should ideally have to plug in 1-3 devices, which isnt really a hassle. If you have 50 USB devices, just use a hub! Also note, Apple will also do everything it can to protect the sleek finish of the PowerBook, including adding additional holes beyond what is needed.
Although CPAN and SourceForge host almost only GPL'd (or MIT'd etc) code. Thus you should not have a problem using it as long as you license the derivative works under an equal or lesser restricting license.
Also your point about other solutions being very close to what is needed, but not close enough, was interesting. Such a collection would be far more beneficial if the testing files came with a list of OSS that used them. That way you can see how other developers used the testing code.
All in all, this repository would require alot more funding than is viable. You would need tons of space and decent bandwidth just to serve "garbage." An interesting idea, however impractical.
The idea of a testing repository is quite interesting, but, in practice, a useless one.
Such a repository would end up as no more than a garbage collection. Additionally, it is generally not too hard to create test data for most projects. Also, the chance that someone else has created test data for the exact problem you are working on is quite slim. And then there is always the most important point of them all:
If someone has already created test data for your specific problem, they have probably already solved your problem! Enter respositories like CPAN and SourceForge.
All commercial products. I was under the impression that the target of this discussion was a free encoder and the availiblity of a cross-platform player (i.e. VLC for everyone, WMP for windows/Mac, Native support in OSX 10.4 and Xine/Mplayer support for Linux). That brings me to the next point:
x264 [videolan.org]
This one is the most likely first free cross-platform candidate. However, I didnt mention it as an existing solution because it is not near completion. Quoth the VLC website: "BIG FAT WARNING: x264 is still in early development stage"
For VLC, H.264 support is already in development. The VLC site has it marked as "Experimental" which usually means it will work better and better every day. VLC provides binaries for OSX, Win32 and most linux distros. Im sure the people at MPlayer and Xine will not be far behind VideoLAN. And we know OSX will have native support in a few months. Thus, when H.264 encoders become availible, it should provide an immediate cross-platform solution.
Naturally, the deciding factor will be WMP support, which should be availible as well.
Slashdot Mirror
Is the FCC totally blind? Before starting to enact strict and controversial regulations, they should step back and take a look at the problem.
A broadcast flag is really stupid. It prevents Joe Consumer from recording his favorite show if he is out of town. It does little to - as the article put it - "permit entertainment companies to designate, or flag, programs to prevent viewers from copying shows or distributing them over the Internet."
If they had actually done 10 minutes of research, as i did, they would discover that the most common source of "bootlegged" tv shows on the internet is not from affialiate/local TV broadcasts. It is from Wild Feeds. Wild feed is a term used to describe the satellite broadcast streams that are used to distribute network television shows to local affialates. These feeds are all digital quality (even HDTV sometimes) and completely commercial free. The local affiliate stations have giant satellite dishes that recieve these streams, splice in the commercials, and broadcast them to your home. If ever you downloaded a TV show via one of the popular Bit Torrent sites, and found that it was perfect HDTV quality w/perfectly cut out commercials, you probably downloaded a show ripped from a wild fire stream.
Wild fire streams can be encrypted -- some are -- and thus impossible to intercept. The FCC should regulate these if it wants to make a difference. It would mean regualting only a handful of companies. Since the signals travel over airwaves, it is arguably in the FCC jurisdiction. Definitely less questionable than regulating the TV set that I have in MY HOME.
Obviously this will not stop end-users from ripping lower quality signals from local airwaves, but neither will the broadcast flag. Unless the FCC can find a way to stop me from obtaining software capable of recording streams from my PC/TV Tuner, shows will still be copied and distributed.
In conclusion, this flag is a bunch of bull shit. It will only suceed in stopping my grandmother from recording her favorite movie when she is on vacation.
What, until tomorrow? yes
As a mac user -- and long time windows user -- I must agree that the mac update model is far better. My ONLY gripe about apple's updater is that the "Reboot or Shutdown" button dialog that appears when you download a large update dows not have a "reboot later" option. It just sits there waiting for me to click it y accident when I am in the middle of important work.
That being said, the MS updater is worse. It pops up every few minutes to bug the user. That makes it far far easier to accidently reboot because you were hitting enter when it pops up.
I only boot into Windows when I want to play a windows game. That OS is almost out of my home life!
The cube is not the only transition in DM and, IMO, it isnt even the best one. I'm probably mistaken in using the term Expose, which is just a marketing term. I should have said the Apple OSX graphics core. From reading the DM site (and some others), i'm faily sure DM just calls functions native to OSX (i.e. calls to the Quartz graphics core librar[y|ies]).
Anyway, truth be told, I couldnt give a shit if he copied code or used native functions. All I had a problem with was this:
'Workspace switching effects so lavish they make Keynote jealous'
Keynote is not a workspace switcher, it is a slide switcher. (although the two may be the same depending on how apple wrote Keynote's slide rendering... the point is moot)
"'Workspace switching effects so lavish they make Keynote jealous' "
Keynote? As in the Apple presentation application? What does this have to do with workspace switching? The only thing that keynote switches are slides.
You must be referring to Expose, a feature of Apple's window manager, not a workspace switcher. However, a great little (free) app called DesktopManager does use expose's effects to create workspaces.
Its true that the service providers need competetion. With that being said, I would rather the government no run my network. This is mainly because -- in my experience -- the government is incompetent.
My father has been a medium-high level gov't official for decades now and I can tell you that most government employees are lazy, unmotivated and incompetent. Private industry demands better from their employees. The result is better and more reliable service.
Who really uses the SSN as verification anymore?
I cant get a passport or drivers license/state id using it. My online stock firm uses parts of it to create a temporary password if I forget my login info. My university uses it as my student ID. However, nobody has ever asked me for it as verification.
I think we are missing the point. There is NO way to truly verify the identity of an american citizen. To get my passport last week, all I needed was a 20-year old peice of paper with a barely visible raised seal (birth certificate) and 80 US Dollars. With that I provide the same SSN that is on the birth certificate and viola... instant international identity papers.
I would rather the government did not have my DNA on file, but that seems like the next-best solution.
Does this "technology convergence" thing remind anyone of the insane barage of all-in-one personal devices introduced during the dot-com era?
Generally such devices fail miserably when the economy is not booming... but its still nice to see.
I find it interesting that M$ is publically using FOSS developed by the same subculture of people they are in "competition" with (i.e. OSS developers).
Isnt the TCO of using a FOSS PNG library higher than a M$-developed solution?? ;-)
Has anybody stopped to consider what would happen if we were made to work day-after-day without any distractions?
Productivity would drop-off halfway through the day! I know that I personally need a few minutes to stop programming and do something else every other hour.
:-)
Besides, i'll bet Slashdot is responsible for about 100 million dollars in "lost productivity." Hell, Im typing this post at work!!!
New post: "/. Costs U.S. Companies 500 Million Annually"
"...could be added to by local police agencys as victims..."
You mean the U.S. Secret Service (in the case of bank fraud). Local police lack both the resources and jurisdiction to investigate online fraud (unless both the victim and server are in their district).
Since the Secret Service is a branch of the Treasury Department, they are tasked with financial/bank fraud investigations.
On another note, I still find it interesting that a branch of the Treasury department is tasked with protecting our President and foreign dignitaries. Seems like a job for the DoD or Homeland Security. I love this country.
Amen.
Lesson learned: Dont take risks/piss off your bosses in the first month. This guy did a stupid thing. It was his first month at a new job and he went too far. Jen had not yet gained enough respect from his collegues to do this. I think things would have been different if he was a seasoned Googler. Management probably saw him as a loose cannon, and a possible threat to the companies future.
First off, please seperate unix and Firefox. They are not the same. Firefox RUNS on unix. Both are open source and free (usually). This is where the similarities end.
The fact that you imply that unix is as vulnerable to malware as windows is ridiculous. Sure, you could write some malicious programs for unix, but they would not be very effective.
An example: A default winxp install will boot up for the first time with daemons listening on numerous ports. These are the things that virus writers love because they can count on everybody running the same services.
On the otherhand, an out-of-the-box Ubuntu Linux install will be listening on zero ports and will not advertise its presence.
Now in the case of Firefox vs IE: there are innumerable reasons why it would be much much harder to infect a computer via firefox than through IE (aside from it being more popular). First off, in my experience, about 60% of all adware/malware on a computer was put there manually. That is, most of it is caused by a user (accidently) hitting enter or clicking "yes" when IE's "Unsigned Plugin" warning pops up. In firefox, the user must wait 2 full seconds before they can agree to install (0 seconds before they can decline). In Apple's Safari, you cannot download non-apple plugin's.
Now I'm not saying that FF or Unix is impervious to malware; they just require the malware developers to be very VERY creative and fixes would come quicker.
Not to mention that doing anything malicious on UNIX requires root priveledges or a very complex root-escalation hack.
Are you talking about me? I posted because I am a wise-ass. ...You quoted me, but I hope you were referring to the super-post. I think I know plenty about "UNIX editors." I exclusively use Vi(m) while programming at work. Besides, he wasnt using an editor to post. Vim cant render /. afaik
From the original text, I dont think he was using it in the /. nerd way.
Thanks for the link though.
Hmm... try to get rid of those pesky ^H's when you hit backspace/del. Assuming you were hitting backspace.
And does the Sharepoint vulnerability affect your friend on linux?
Besides, I was not aware that MS released software for Linux. If your friend is using a Windows emulator (i.e. wine - linux, or Virtual PC - mac), I would say that still counts as a Windows ONLY fix.
So you have succeeded in tagging yourself as an tech nerd that, like so many others, cannot see the big picture. This is also the reason why many IT persons find it difficult to move up the corporate ladder.
Who gives a shit about the number 22B? I sure as hell dont. Divide it by 4, or remove it completely. "Spam Costs US Companies Alot of Money." or even "Spam Costs Companies Money."
The number is not important. What is important is that organizations are spending RESOURCES on defending against spam. Whether those resources are employee time (reading spam, sorting spam, cleaning virii off the machine), or money (purchasing mail servers/filtering software), loss is still loss.
Dont get me wrong, I dont put that much faith in that dollar number. The point is just that every tiny bit of resource that a company puts into fighting spam results in lost productivity. Do you want your staff sifting through spam? or do you want them to work on something that will generate profit? Additionally, every employee *should* generate more than they cost. Therefore, if you waste 30 minutes a week on spam, your company has wasted 2.5 hours of salary and lost several times that in productivity (say another 5 hours in salary terms). THAT is where the huge number comes from.
Sorry for the rant. I get POed when people downplay important issues.
Upstream cap ro downstream? I'm assuming upstream since that is what is much more expensive for the ISP. I dont even think 40GB is possible with my Comcast Cable connection (in the USA) with a 256Kb/s upload cap!!!
That is equal to 30KB MAX upload.
Lets see... 40,000,000,000 bytes
30,000 bytes/second
cancel some zeroes...
4,000,000/3 = 1,333,333 seconds
1,333,333 sec / 2,595,000 seconds per month = 0.51
Thus to reach 40GB upload, I would have to fill my current upstream pipe for 16 full days. I would gladly accept a cap for a bigger pipe! (note: the only service in Boston, USA which gives significantly better upstream costs almost three times as much as my connection)
All good points. But I am more interested in the fact that you are typing "google.com" so often. Why is that? Please tell me you are not using Internet Craplorer.
Firefox, Opera, Safari, Chamino (Chimera) and Konquerer all have search boxes that search google by default. Heck Firefox's default homepage is not much more than a google search box. And Opera (remember opera?) has had integrated google searching for many years.
Sorry to go on about such a minor point, but I find it disturbing that anybody who uses google often (I am at about two dozen unique "googles" a day) still types it in each time.
I have had a PB 15" for over a year now. I agree that a docking station would be nice to have... but it will not be happening anytime soon.
Docking stations legitamize clutter (keep reading). Apple is about pure simplicity and eliminating the rats nest of wires found around most PC's. Anyone remember the TV spot Apple released when the G5 was unveiled about getting rid of wires?
So Apple will never help you create a wire nest, even if it is easier for many. Instead you have the Apple solution to wires: dont use them. In other words, the Apple solution includes a Bluetooth keyboard, mouse (optional BT cell phone) and an Airport extreme internet/intranet gateway. You can even use an Airport Express so that you dont have to plus in an Audio cable.
Of course External HD's (including the iPod) will be wired for a few more years due to bandwith limitations. Same goes for the external display. Therefore, you should ideally have to plug in 1-3 devices, which isnt really a hassle. If you have 50 USB devices, just use a hub! Also note, Apple will also do everything it can to protect the sleek finish of the PowerBook, including adding additional holes beyond what is needed.
Good point.
Although CPAN and SourceForge host almost only GPL'd (or MIT'd etc) code. Thus you should not have a problem using it as long as you license the derivative works under an equal or lesser restricting license.
Also your point about other solutions being very close to what is needed, but not close enough, was interesting. Such a collection would be far more beneficial if the testing files came with a list of OSS that used them. That way you can see how other developers used the testing code.
All in all, this repository would require alot more funding than is viable. You would need tons of space and decent bandwidth just to serve "garbage." An interesting idea, however impractical.
The idea of a testing repository is quite interesting, but, in practice, a useless one.
Such a repository would end up as no more than a garbage collection. Additionally, it is generally not too hard to create test data for most projects. Also, the chance that someone else has created test data for the exact problem you are working on is quite slim. And then there is always the most important point of them all:
If someone has already created test data for your specific problem, they have probably already solved your problem! Enter respositories like CPAN and SourceForge.
NeroDigital [nero.com]
VideoSoft [videosoftinc.com]
VideoSoft [videosoftinc.com]
Sorenson [sorenson.com]
Reference encoder [iphome.hhi.de]
All commercial products. I was under the impression that the target of this discussion was a free encoder and the availiblity of a cross-platform player (i.e. VLC for everyone, WMP for windows/Mac, Native support in OSX 10.4 and Xine/Mplayer support for Linux). That brings me to the next point:
x264 [videolan.org]
This one is the most likely first free cross-platform candidate. However, I didnt mention it as an existing solution because it is not near completion. Quoth the VLC website: "BIG FAT WARNING: x264 is still in early development stage"
For VLC, H.264 support is already in development. The VLC site has it marked as "Experimental" which usually means it will work better and better every day. VLC provides binaries for OSX, Win32 and most linux distros. Im sure the people at MPlayer and Xine will not be far behind VideoLAN. And we know OSX will have native support in a few months. Thus, when H.264 encoders become availible, it should provide an immediate cross-platform solution.
Naturally, the deciding factor will be WMP support, which should be availible as well.