I'm all for these restrictions, because they don't apply to Open Source software - masquerading as other software is already quite standard. Only closed-source vendors and closed-minded customers have anything to be scared of, and I've no problem with them being scared silly by Homeland Security.
"I support Draconian restrictions because they'll be easy to circumvent."
No, it isn't. It has caused far more misery and suffering throughout history than racism, sexism, or possibly even religious fanaticism. Nationalism is the most consistently predictable flashpoint for brutal and destructive conflicts between nations, and one of the greatest obstacles to fixing a nation's problems ("We're the greatest country on the planet! Nothing is wrong with us!").
Sorry, but anyone who could say, with a straight face, that Nationalism is "fine" needs an intense remedial history lesson.
Hitler was a fierce racist, not just nationalist.
So what? The Romans were not particularly racist, but they still formed a brutal, militaristic empire founded on aggression, slavery, and strict class segregation.
Yes, the Nazis' racism was awful, and it certainly contributed signifiantly to the evil that they did. But even without it, they would have been just as dangerous -- possibly even more so.
To me, free speech is a basic form of property rights. Government can't tell me what I can do with my body and how I use it, when I am on my property or on public land.
I don't think there's really a connection there. The government doesn't restrict your speech any more when you're on somebody else's private property than when you are on your own or on public land. The owner of that property can tell you to leave if he doesn't like what you're saying, and the law will be on his side, but that has nothing to do with speech -- he can ask you to leave for any reason he wishes (apart from the clear exceptions laid out for businesses in anti-discrimination laws).
Oh course not. But let is be realists for a moment.
That would be a very welcome change from our government's current behavior.
If we are to prevent madmen from going KABOOM in unwelcome places we have to have spooks doing the sometimes unpleasant things spooks do, right?
That depends on how unpleasant those things are.
Now if we can agree that so long as the risk of people going FOOM in a shopping mall exceeds the risk of Bush taking to the podium and announcing a new thousand year reich,
A strawman. Simply preventing "a new thousand year reich" is not the goal we should be striving for when it comes to keeping an eye on our government. If that's the best we can accomplish, then we're already screwed.
we as informed citozens should insist that intelligence agencies investigate.
Yes. Investigate things that are relevant, and that have a chance of providing useful information without trampling on those rights that we consider to be important.
There's another aspect to this story that doesn't seem to be getting much discussion. Setting aside, for the moment, the question of whether it is morally acceptable for an allegeldy freedom-loving government to investigate its citizens in this manner, the book in question consisted of quotes from a Communist leader. How many of the 9/11 hijackers were Communists? When was the last time an Iraqi insurgent quoted Lenin or Mao in front of a camera? In fact, not only are these people not Communists, they are diametrically and violently opposed to Communism. Hell, many of the senior Al Qaeda leaders cut their teeth fighting Communists.
So IOW, this investigation had ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to do with counter-terrorism. Which tells me that, at best, these investigations are being run in a haphazard and disorganized manner, and at worst, they are being used to watch people with politically undesireable views and send them a message. Combine that with the fact that many neo-cons use the label "Communist" or "Marxist" to stain anyone with views that even remotely appear leftist -- or, for that matter, just plain critical of the current administration -- and perhaps you can begin to understand why so many people consider this to be a frightening precedent.
We can already zoom in and out of structures. We can't rotate well - but that's not something that I think stops useful things from happening.
Yeah, but think of the immense potential for losing your place.
"Let's see; did I put Photoshop in the third Virtual Desktop on the top of the cube with Firefox, or in the fifth Virtual Desktop on the back of the cube with Acrobat?"
"There would still, of course, be ways that you could access your bank or e-commerce accounts from other computers when you were traveling, but the connection wouldn't be as secure as using your own computer."
IOW, banks will make it ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY for you to have the proper TPM ID chip in order to log into your account. Unless, of course, you don't have it -- in which case you can verify your identity another way. I feel safer already.
The truth, of course, is that TPM will do nothing to prevent phishing and identity theft, because it's a technological solution to a social problem. A much better way to prevent such things is to require financial institutions to practice better security (it would be even better if customers could practice better security, but that's a much more difficult target). Instead, what we're going to see is less adherence to reasonable security practices due to the false security aura of the Almighty Trusted Computing Platform.
Oh, and outside entities (government, corporations, etc.) will have the opportunity to limit what we can do with our own computers. But I'm sure that's just an unintended side effect.
In all fairness I have been a DirecTV subscriber since they took over Primestar. I have used their online bill pay, manually each month, for at least the past 2 years. I have never had a problem with a "double-charge" or any other form of unauthorized charge to my credit card.
As with the other poster, I'm glad to hear that.
Don't get me wrong; I am not claiming, and I do not believe, that they deliberately overcharged me. I'm certain that that was an honest mistake, and I understand that that can happen. What was infuriating to me was that they seemed completely and totally unconcerned about fixing their mistake. If they had corrected it within a day or two (which is all it should have taken) I would have been very understanding. They chose to jerk me around, and as a result, they will be losing my business when my contract expires.
When I read stories like this, I know there's something being left out.
Then perhaps you should re-acquaint yourself with the definition of "know".
Nothing is being left out. What happened is exactly what I described. I am glad you have not had such an experience, but that doesn't mean that I am being dishonest about mine.
Actually, I am considering cancelling my installation scheduled for this Friday.
Do it. Immediately. And if you don't, take my advice: NEVER use their online payment service. DirecTV is, IMO, a criminal organization. Last year, they issued an unauthorized double-charge on my account (I had paid that month's bill electronically on their web site) to the tune of $300. My wife and I spent two weeks on the phone with them trying to get the money back. They kept assuring us that it was going to happen, but the date kept slipping back. Worse, they wouldn't even let us speak directly with their finance department -- only clueless customer "service" reps. I finally had to go to my Credit Union and issue a Stop Payment to get my money back. Bad service is one thing; stealing money is in another category altogether. I wish the aforementioned settlement had a few more zeroes on the end; I would like nothing more than to see these scumbags sued into oblivion.
If we're gonna play that game...
on
Java Is So 90s
·
· Score: 1
The fight has now "brewed" (couldn't resist) into the mainstream press at BusinessWeek.
Slashdot Mirror
A.K.A. "The Recursive Slashdot Effect"
I'm all for these restrictions, because they don't apply to Open Source software - masquerading as other software is already quite standard. Only closed-source vendors and closed-minded customers have anything to be scared of, and I've no problem with them being scared silly by Homeland Security.
"I support Draconian restrictions because they'll be easy to circumvent."
Is that the Libertarian's Gamble?
names are based on the assumption that nobody can touch-type.
ls, rm, df, du, etc . . . did any of the engineers at Bell Labs type 10-fingered?
Much of this is due to the enormous contributions of their most prolific developer -- James "Stumpy" Smith.
Does anyone else find it ironic that this story appears right after "Challenges to Microsoft for 2006"?
Please, nobody tell Michael Crichton.
"Nationalism" is fine.
No, it isn't. It has caused far more misery and suffering throughout history than racism, sexism, or possibly even religious fanaticism. Nationalism is the most consistently predictable flashpoint for brutal and destructive conflicts between nations, and one of the greatest obstacles to fixing a nation's problems ("We're the greatest country on the planet! Nothing is wrong with us!").
Sorry, but anyone who could say, with a straight face, that Nationalism is "fine" needs an intense remedial history lesson.
Hitler was a fierce racist, not just nationalist.
So what? The Romans were not particularly racist, but they still formed a brutal, militaristic empire founded on aggression, slavery, and strict class segregation.
Yes, the Nazis' racism was awful, and it certainly contributed signifiantly to the evil that they did. But even without it, they would have been just as dangerous -- possibly even more so.
George W. Bush, Hitler and Jesus walk into a bar...
Dust on earth is primarily ash, flakes of skin, dust mites, and dust mite fecal matter,
Well, that's the last time I empty my vacuum cleaner's basket without gloves.
To me, free speech is a basic form of property rights. Government can't tell me what I can do with my body and how I use it, when I am on my property or on public land.
I don't think there's really a connection there. The government doesn't restrict your speech any more when you're on somebody else's private property than when you are on your own or on public land. The owner of that property can tell you to leave if he doesn't like what you're saying, and the law will be on his side, but that has nothing to do with speech -- he can ask you to leave for any reason he wishes (apart from the clear exceptions laid out for businesses in anti-discrimination laws).
It seems to me that a 'count' of peer to peer users without including BitTorrent (at least an estimation) ... is rather pointless.
Not necessarily. It can provide a reasonable lower bound, which could potentially be valuable information.
I would rather see it go to the military myself,
If it had to be only one, I'd agree. They're more likely to need it.
I trust them (in the long run) to protect our civil rights more than the police do.....
Oof. If those are our only choices, we've already lost.
"Win a Billion Dollars in 21 Days"
Oh course not. But let is be realists for a moment.
That would be a very welcome change from our government's current behavior.
If we are to prevent madmen from going KABOOM in unwelcome places we have to have spooks doing the sometimes unpleasant things spooks do, right?
That depends on how unpleasant those things are.
Now if we can agree that so long as the risk of people going FOOM in a shopping mall exceeds the risk of Bush taking to the podium and announcing a new thousand year reich,
A strawman. Simply preventing "a new thousand year reich" is not the goal we should be striving for when it comes to keeping an eye on our government. If that's the best we can accomplish, then we're already screwed.
we as informed citozens should insist that intelligence agencies investigate.
Yes. Investigate things that are relevant, and that have a chance of providing useful information without trampling on those rights that we consider to be important.
There's another aspect to this story that doesn't seem to be getting much discussion. Setting aside, for the moment, the question of whether it is morally acceptable for an allegeldy freedom-loving government to investigate its citizens in this manner, the book in question consisted of quotes from a Communist leader. How many of the 9/11 hijackers were Communists? When was the last time an Iraqi insurgent quoted Lenin or Mao in front of a camera? In fact, not only are these people not Communists, they are diametrically and violently opposed to Communism. Hell, many of the senior Al Qaeda leaders cut their teeth fighting Communists.
So IOW, this investigation had ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to do with counter-terrorism. Which tells me that, at best, these investigations are being run in a haphazard and disorganized manner, and at worst, they are being used to watch people with politically undesireable views and send them a message. Combine that with the fact that many neo-cons use the label "Communist" or "Marxist" to stain anyone with views that even remotely appear leftist -- or, for that matter, just plain critical of the current administration -- and perhaps you can begin to understand why so many people consider this to be a frightening precedent.
I hate the Eagles as much as the next guy,
Then it's true. The world really is going to hell.
So it's still being used for training the U.S. military?
No, it's now used to make policy decisions.
We can already zoom in and out of structures. We can't rotate well - but that's not something that I think stops useful things from happening.
Yeah, but think of the immense potential for losing your place.
"Let's see; did I put Photoshop in the third Virtual Desktop on the top of the cube with Firefox, or in the fifth Virtual Desktop on the back of the cube with Acrobat?"
"There would still, of course, be ways that you could access your bank or e-commerce accounts from other computers when you were traveling, but the connection wouldn't be as secure as using your own computer."
IOW, banks will make it ABSOLUTELY NECESSARY for you to have the proper TPM ID chip in order to log into your account. Unless, of course, you don't have it -- in which case you can verify your identity another way. I feel safer already.
The truth, of course, is that TPM will do nothing to prevent phishing and identity theft, because it's a technological solution to a social problem. A much better way to prevent such things is to require financial institutions to practice better security (it would be even better if customers could practice better security, but that's a much more difficult target). Instead, what we're going to see is less adherence to reasonable security practices due to the false security aura of the Almighty Trusted Computing Platform.
Oh, and outside entities (government, corporations, etc.) will have the opportunity to limit what we can do with our own computers. But I'm sure that's just an unintended side effect.
If they have already traced the source and still couldn't fend it off, I don't know what they would do next, calling President Hu?
They already tried. He's with Ambassador Watt at the Y.
Now we just need half way decent VR and a "touch suit" (I should TM that name)
The suit is nothing. The real money will be made on the cleaning services.
In all fairness I have been a DirecTV subscriber since they took over Primestar. I have used their online bill pay, manually each month, for at least the past 2 years. I have never had a problem with a "double-charge" or any other form of unauthorized charge to my credit card.
As with the other poster, I'm glad to hear that.
Don't get me wrong; I am not claiming, and I do not believe, that they deliberately overcharged me. I'm certain that that was an honest mistake, and I understand that that can happen. What was infuriating to me was that they seemed completely and totally unconcerned about fixing their mistake. If they had corrected it within a day or two (which is all it should have taken) I would have been very understanding. They chose to jerk me around, and as a result, they will be losing my business when my contract expires.
When I read stories like this, I know there's something being left out.
Then perhaps you should re-acquaint yourself with the definition of "know".
Nothing is being left out. What happened is exactly what I described. I am glad you have not had such an experience, but that doesn't mean that I am being dishonest about mine.
Actually, I am considering cancelling my installation scheduled for this Friday.
Do it. Immediately. And if you don't, take my advice: NEVER use their online payment service. DirecTV is, IMO, a criminal organization. Last year, they issued an unauthorized double-charge on my account (I had paid that month's bill electronically on their web site) to the tune of $300. My wife and I spent two weeks on the phone with them trying to get the money back. They kept assuring us that it was going to happen, but the date kept slipping back. Worse, they wouldn't even let us speak directly with their finance department -- only clueless customer "service" reps. I finally had to go to my Credit Union and issue a Stop Payment to get my money back. Bad service is one thing; stealing money is in another category altogether. I wish the aforementioned settlement had a few more zeroes on the end; I would like nothing more than to see these scumbags sued into oblivion.
The fight has now "brewed" (couldn't resist) into the mainstream press at BusinessWeek.
Shouldn't that be "percolated"?
There is something about that word that just bothers me... maybe it is all the porn sites out there who advertise their "micro" monthly cost.
Yeah, I hate those sites.
I mean, based on what I've heard.