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User: FireWhenRady

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Comments · 54

  1. Re:And the average educated person? on ElcomSoft Jury Denied Access to full DMCA Text · · Score: 1
    In Canada in the 1970's the law against abortion was removed from the books because a number of juries (3 different cases) refused to convict Dr. Henry Morgentaler of providing an abortion. After he was found not guilty by several different juries, the government threw in the towel and changed the law.

    Juries can change the law.

  2. Re:The ISP's terms and conditions? on ISP Sued Over Suspended Email Account · · Score: 1
    This clause limits their liability for causes beyond their control or changes to their service applicable to all subscribers. It does not limit their liability for deliberate action on the ISP's part to accept email but not release it to the owner.

    This is similar to a landlord having a clause saying don''t sue me if a hurricane blows out your windows. That clause doesn't allow the landlord to withold heat because they believe you rent is unpaid. Only a court can decide that.

  3. Re:Raises some interesting ideas on Reuters Accused Of Hacking For Typing In URL · · Score: 1
    What Intentia needed to do was put the disclaimer at the top of the document saying "Private, company confidential, not to be released before xx:xx PM October 28, 2002".

    Then publishing it on another medium would be plagiarism and a copyright infringement. If they dod not indicate that it was confidential and embargoed, then they have effectively published it as if it were a press release.

  4. Try looking for phlogisten on Surprising Science Demonstrations? · · Score: 2, Interesting
    I once taught a Sunday school class that involved science. One really neat experiment to gain the idea of scientific hypothesis needing experiments to confirm was detailing the discovery of Oxygen in air by Joseph Priestley.

    We first lit some candles in small aluminum candle holders (cupcake baking foils) and watched the candle get smaller as it burned and saw the light coming out coming and felt the heat. So I formulated the hypothesis that wax must have a substance in it that is given off as heat when it burns. The candle gets smaller, the heat and light come off. Obvious.

    So I suggested that we capture this stuff, lets call it phlogisten, a name I suggested that Priestley had used for the substance.

    We could catch it in a jar by putting the candle in a the aluminum cupcake holders, floating the foil in water in a saucepan and putting a jar over it. As the phlogisten came out of the candle it would go into the air pushing the water down and so we could measure how much was given off.

    Nice scientific experiment. Obvious hypthosesis, easy and cheap experiment, expected result. If you know the actual result, you have a wonderful way to show that one needs experiments as well as theory to further science.

  5. Re:Spam is also used to attack people on Suing Spammers: What works? · · Score: 1
    I would have difficulty prosecuting because I am in Canada and the spammer in the U.S. But since the same spam was also sent out in the name of an web designer in Tennessee and spamcop.net someone else may be able to prosecute.

    See spam forgery joejob . If somebody does catch up with the perpetrator of this and is able to convict him or her, it would be a great victory for Internet civility and law enforcement.

  6. Spam is also used to attack people on Suing Spammers: What works? · · Score: 3, Interesting
    I recently suffered from a spammers "joejob" where a spammer used my email address as a reply address for a spam.

    This meant that I received all the bounces, irate messages etc. to the tune of over 7000 bounces in the last week and a half. From the email headers of the bounced messages, I was able to trace the sender to Miami Florida using Ameritech ADSL, but that provides little proof.

    My real anger is over the people running open relays that aided and abetted this attack. Spam is not just junk email so they are not innocent bystanders. They are similar to someone who helps a bank robber escape from a crime scene. In this case it prevented me from receiving email for several days (my incoming mailbox was full) and created an immense amount of work sorting the bounces out from legitimate traffic (bounces for messages I wanted to know about).

    Has there been any precedent for suing owners of open relays or providers of abusive users?

  7. Re:And its a good thing! on Microsoft PPTP Buffer Overflow; VPNs Vulnerable · · Score: 1
    That is irrelevant if the incoming host is a Windows host that has no concept of privileged or unprivileged ports.

    It does prevent a Linux host from starting up a new daemon on a priviliged port after it has been hacked, but doesn't prevent exploits on privileged ports already listening.

  8. Re:stop eating meat. on Seeking the Right Environmental Cause to Support? · · Score: 1
    I eat raw fruit a lot. Doesn't seem to hurt my digestive track. Raw vegetables like carrots, lettuce, celery etc. seem to be no problem for most people. We cook vegetables to pre-digest them, but it is not neccessary ecept those that are inherently poisonous without cooking like rhubarb (contains oxalic acid).

    Allowing meat to dry out and age is what carrion eaters do. So your dried meats are basically carrion.

    When you eat meat raw right after you kill it, then talk about humans being carnivores. At most we are omnivores.

  9. Re:Small Pet Peeve on Seeking the Right Environmental Cause to Support? · · Score: 1
    Actually you mean kill all the North Americans.

    With less than 10% of the world population, North America consumers >50% of the worlds resources. Without them, the world would consume within its means and produce far less pollution.

  10. Re:A tidbit about Go on NYT Story On Go Programs And AI · · Score: 1

    That assumes that no stones are ever removed from the board. the 3^(19*19)/4 is the lower bound of possible moves (of course many are senseless) but since one can re enter stones on areas where stones have been removed, each point can have have multiple states over the course of the game, increasing the possible number of moves.

  11. Re:$$, too on Pledge of Allegiance Ruled Unconstitutional · · Score: 2, Interesting
    The pledge of allegiance is for the United States of America founded by Christians and predominantly just that.

    Funny enough, that is completely wrong. Many of the writers of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution were "freethinkers" like Jefferson, Franklin, Madison, John Adams, John Hancock etc. who created the United States specifically to avoid the Christian hegemony in Europe. Three of the first 5 presidents were Unitarians, not orthodox Christians.

    The most important influence on early American political though was the anti-clerical Enlightment of Europe and the writings of such atheists as Thomas Paine and Voltaire.

    The Virginia Acts of Toleration that Jefferson fought so hard for, were advocated by a coalition of Unitarians and Baptists, neither of whom wanted the the colonial Episcopalian church to become sanctioned by the government and to forbid their own. In those days, fundementalist Christianity was persecuted badly and it was the atheists who fought hardest to give Baptists and Evangelicals (Non-conformists) the right to exist and to worship as they chose.

  12. Re:What's the incentive to be secretive? on Open Source... Mining? · · Score: 1

    Of course Bre-X got its start in an Ontario mining area called Red lake. Red Lake had its first gold mining boom in the 1930's and has been up and down like a yo-yo ever since.

  13. Re:Why we kiss Saudi tush still... on Iceland to Voluntarily Go Oil Free in 30-40 Years · · Score: 1

    You sound like you're a Canadian with such a positive attitude about the Canadian military. Most Canadian armed forces personnel would love to have the bicycles. Their helicopters are older than any of their aircrew and the last submarines they bought had holes in them.

  14. Re:Power failures? on Ten Technology Disasters · · Score: 1

    I was in high school when the 1965 power blackout occurred. My route home went past a huge power plant that normally has floodlights over its smoke stacks. The evening of the blackout, it was very eery. There was no light anywhere except for that power plant, which was still lit up like a Christmas tree. An island of power in a sea of darkness.

  15. Re:Well. That throws me off the fence. on MS Exec Testifies In Favor of OS Manipulation · · Score: 1

    Basically the problem is that Microsoft has paid a lot of its employees in stock options. The accrued liability of these is more than its profits, so if Microsoft stocks starts to go down in price significantly, they can owe billions almost overnightaccelerating the losses. They have not been declaring these on their balance sheet as liabilities, somewhat like Enron did with offshore holdings.

  16. Re:Yes, it might be enforcable on General Public Realizes KaZaa is Spyware · · Score: 1
    Most contracts don't need a signature since the majority of purchases (corner store, vending machine etc.) are done without a signature. So online purchases or choices shouldn't need a signature.

    But there needs to be some proof of intent, such as a password entered or that the YES/NO choices have to be explicitly scrolled to choose. Just showing a pop-up window with YES?/NO? and the YES highlighted and selected automatically by a default action shouldn't count.

    What if my cat clicks on the mouse? Can they sue me for my cat's actions.

    I should have to consciously select the case that is binding, not just click on the default button.

  17. Re:Trademarks and "Slashdot" and "Windows" on Questions over the Windows Trademark · · Score: 1

    From that Dow site, one would assume the Windows part Microsoft Windows is a descriptive trademark since X-Windows existed before it for a similar kind of thing. The trademark would be on the phrase "Microsoft Windows", not on the word Windows by itself. A "Linux Windows", "GNU Windows" etc. would be unique names as well. So Lindows might be sued if somebody owned the trademark "Linux Windows" as being a direct derivative, but they should win against Microsoft since they never use the Microsoft part of the name.

  18. Re:little guy can win these things... on Questions over the Windows Trademark · · Score: 1

    Fitz is a useful one. It means "bastard of" so John Fitzgerald Kennedy would be John, bastard son of Gerald, of clan Kennedy.

  19. Re:common criterea? protection profiles? on Computer Security Criteria · · Score: 1

    The problem with the Rainbow series was that things that reached the A1 level were so secure that very little useful work could be done on them. A number of years ago I was involved in creating a secure computer room/system for a defense establishment. It has Tempest rated walls (Faraday cage, lead lined), no networking, mandatory access controls on all users and objects etc. At first there were a large number of systems running on it. Then someone decided that "we need to share data and it isn't REALLY that neccessary to have MAC" on one system. Then another... In about a year and a half, there were only a couple of systems using that room. Part of security is availability as well as security. The Rainbow series guaranteed confidentiality but availability lost out. Companies will go into security when there is more money to make being secure than being feature-laden. And that will only happen when somebody gets sued for $1/2 billion for letting private information be lost for lack of controls. Then there will be an Underwriters Lab for software, becuase the demand will be there to show that your system is secure. Another CISSP.

  20. Re:Morons. on The Problem Of Developing · · Score: 1

    Remember C was a latecomer in programming languages, let alone C++. The first object-oriented language was called Simula-67 (for 1967, the year it was first published). It was developed as a simulation language in Norway. It had inheritance (static and single only), methods, properties and many other features of modern OOP languages. So not even object oriented programming is new.

  21. Re:What about the poor? on Every Road a Toll Road · · Score: 1

    You are saying you didn't go to a school that was supported by taxes and have never driven on a road that was supported by taxes and live in a country with no armed forces supported by taxes? Which planet do you live on? Your assumption about your own effort is complete bull. The essential thing about human society is that we affect each other in every thing we do. What is suggested in that article is to remove some of the subsidy by poor people for the rich. People who have less wealth now subsidize people with more wealth in practically every way. In the United States, poorer people in rental housing subsidize rich peoples morgages becuase of the income tax laws. You are really whining that the rich need a bigger subsidy.

  22. Re:This would be worse in Linux on Clever New Windows Worm · · Score: 1

    Actually the standard one, mailx, does when you use the command pi message.
    The message, including attachments, is put on stdin and then given to command string after pipe.
    If the command string does not properly parse the message, it can cause problems.

  23. Re:Imperial System does have an advantage on Biking @ 80 MPH · · Score: 1

    You assoicate those ranges to because you use Fahrenheit, not because they are natural.
    The Celsius scale provides an easier range.
    OF is not that cold. It gets to -10F regularily in January where I live.
    Cold is below -20C, hot is above 30C. 20C is comfortable, 25C is warm, 15C needs a sweater, 10C needs a jacket.
    Just because you have an appreciation for Fahrenheit, it doesn't mean that it is natural.
    Natural is tieing the scale to common physical phenomena such as melting ice.

  24. Re:Imperial System does have an advantage on Biking @ 80 MPH · · Score: 1

    Actually, some parts of the metric system are much more natural than the Imperial system.
    The Celsius temperature scale has natural limit points.
    0C is freezing, 100C is boiling, 20C is room temperature etc.. It is very natural to use.
    What is convenient about fahrenheit?
    0F was the lowest temperature Fahrenheit could achieve with salt melting ice, not exactly meaningful. 100F was his body temperature (measured while he has a fever).

    A kilogram is the mass of a litre of water but where does a pound come in?

    A metre is 1/10E6 of distance from North Pole to equator so the earth has a circumference of 40,000 km. A yard is the distance from Henry VIII's nose to the tip of his fingers. Which is easier to relate to in the 21st century.
    My foot is not 1 ft. in length, but my stride is very close to a metre (not a yard). A 100 metre walk is a hundred paces.

  25. Re:Imperial vs. Metric: SERIOUSLY OFFTOPIC! on Biking @ 80 MPH · · Score: 0, Offtopic

    Funnily enough, the U.S. was the FIRST country in the world to make metric measurements legal.
    The U.S made the metric system legal in 1866 and in 1875, the US was one of the first countries to sign the Convention of the Metre, which established the international usage of the metric system.
    So the U.S has been metric for over a hundred years, just not in common use.

    As a matter of fact, the legal definitions of the pound, inch, mile etc. are based on metric units.
    An inch is DEFINED as 2.54 cm. for example.