There's a podcast interviewing former NSA officer Brian Snow that was recorded before the Snowden leaks, and provides some valuable perspective on what the NSA does. I am probably going to get modded and/or flamed to oblivion for saying this, but listening to that podcast made me believe that not everything the NSA does is bad.
This super-duper secret surveillance plan clearly wasn't relying on anything other than good manners to secure the information, and likely it was ripe for being abused by just about anybody there.
That's not a bug. It's a feature. It allows the agency to ignore its already-flimsy privacy protections, at any time, for any reason.
So the CIA pays AT&T to "voluntarily" hand over somebody else's data?
What on earth makes you think data about the customers' activity belongs to the customers? You must not have been paying attention to the telecom or computer industries for the past 15 years.
Maybe it's because Slashdotters have been pointing out that the line at the screening checkpoint is, itself, a target, and they have unfortunately been proven correct.
I seem to recall there are a number of gun-rights advocates in the Slashdot community, who may be concerned about a legislative (over?)reaction to this atrocious act.
Then there are people like me who check Slashdot a lot more often than they check mainstream news sites, and learned about the shooting just now.
I don't mean to be too hard on you, because your question is legitimate. My best answer is, "news for nerds" is in the eye of the beholder and sometimes the editors will post a story that doesn't interest you, but does interest someone else.
The U-2 spy plane is still flying and it can carry a 5,000-pound payload of surveillance equipment. So there is plenty of air surveillance; you just didn't know about it.
Young folks know that business meetings are usually not actually important.
Young folks know that business meetings are not (usually) important to them. They often fail to make the leap that although they may not benefit personally from every meeting, it is more important for the senior staff to be well-informed than for the junior staff to be working at their desks all day.
Besides, according to the Constitution money cannot equal speech, because free speech is an equal proposition, and having more money than other people is not supposed to mean you have more free speech than they do. I don't even understand how such a thing could make sense to anyone.
I dislike the Citizens United verdict as much as you do, but I find this argument muddled and unconvincing. I would suggest that people who care about the issue familiarize themselves with the dissenting opinion in Citizens United. You don't have to read the whole thing (it's 90 pages); the Wikipedia article will do.
Your position seems closest to the following point, one among many in the dissent:
Fourth, Stevens attacked the majority's central argument: that the prohibition of spending guards free speech and allows the general public to receive all available information. Relying on Austin, Stevens argued that corporations "unfairly influence" the electoral process with vast sums of money that few individuals can match, which distorts the public debate. Because a typical voter can only absorb so much information during a relevant election period, Stevens described "unfair corporate influence" as the potential to outspend others, to push others out of prime broadcasting spots and to dominate the "marketplace of ideas."
If you're talking about games or entertainment (iTunes, etc.) then a duo like Siskel and Ebert would be very helpful. When it comes to operating systems and productivity applications, I would prefer an approach more like Consumer Reports.
I think that second step has already been done: in elementary school, high school, college, and the workplace, for starters. Not all that different treatment is for the worse.
Antagonistic reviewers could often quite easily argue that additional experiments are needed which could push back publication, allowing the antagonist to scoop you, while looking like a simple well-argued and substantial review.
The whole idea of "scooping" someone in science is sickening. If there is competitiveness, it should be competitiveness for greater thoroughness and rigor, not quicker results and headline-grabbing. But the type of predatory behavior you describe is not prevented by the anonymous system, and would be visible in a system where reviewers are accountable for their reviews after the fact.
The problem that comes along with that approach is that if you give someones paper a negative review, and your name is attached, they will then see it, and when they get your latest paper to review, they may give you a negative review as retribution.
I think there are two ways to write a negative review: without scientific rigor and logical arguments, or with them. In the first case, the reviewer would just be making an ass of him/herself and casting doubt on both his/her scientific and personal integrity. It's better to let those individuals stand up and identify themselves, rather than prosper under anonymity. The second kind of review, well-argued and substantiated, is exactly what science needs! So if someone is annoyed and becomes motivated to pore over a manuscript with a (figurative) miscroscope, then that is an ideal review, isn't it?
Fear of intense, antagonistic scrutiny is probably widespread, but I am inclined to interpret that fear as a tacit admission that our own methods and conclusions don't hold up.
That is the journals' problem. One could imagine devoting a quarter of each issue to one-page papers confirming previously-published results. In fact, that could be a great way for graduate students to break into prestigious journals. In my not-so-humble opinion, the fact that most or all journals don't make efforts to publish corroborating studies is biting criticism of the journals and their role in undermining the proper scientific method.
I think an ineffective review is worse than no review, because an ineffective review imparts a false sense of confidence in the paper's methods and findings. So a sharp decline in the number of reviewers could be a good thing, if it weeds out the liars who say that have rigorously criticized the manuscript when they haven't.
There's more than one problem at work here. You've identified one, but I think the lack of quality review is also serious. The reviewers' names and their recommendations (accept/reject) should be published along with the paper when it is accepted, to give them an incentive to reject garbage instead of rubber-stamping it.
Well, it's good to see a major scientific institution waking up to a phenomenon Richard Feynman warned about in the 1970s. Yet it seems to me the proposed solution is a little ad hoc. If scientists want to restore integrity to their field(s) -- and I applaud their efforts to do so -- why aren't they using an experimental approach to do so? I think they should try several things and collect data to find out what actually works.
Seconded. With regard to the quality of preservation of the skeletons: when I was there, the volunteers working in the glass-walled laboratory were extracting tiny rodent bones from blocks of natural asphalt.
Here the headline led me to believe a member of the Greatest Generation was stepping up *again* to defend American freedom. You know, maybe filing a lawsuit or something. But no, TFA is just about the author's father being a passive-aggressive jerk in the airport security line. As if that helps anyone. If all you are accomplishing is to make yourself feel smarter than a TSA screener, you are not accomplishing much at all.
Furthermore, why would millionaires trust their money to a company that is getting pilloried in the press for fundamental failures of management, not to mention development practices?
Cutting corners on developing the software that handles your money: penny wise and pound foolish.
Sounds like they want to avoid training anybody and have poor HR people, do little advertising at universities, and cry like babies when they "can't find anybody."
With regard to avoiding training anybody, all American companies are like that. Training costs are an externality they unload onto their employees. It is not, however, difficult to recruit qualified people even under those circumstances. All you have to do is offer them 20% more than your competitor does, and candidates will line up outside your door.
Companies just whine instead are not serious about recruiting and/or want government support in the form of H1-Bs.
Slashdot Mirror
There's a podcast interviewing former NSA officer Brian Snow that was recorded before the Snowden leaks, and provides some valuable perspective on what the NSA does. I am probably going to get modded and/or flamed to oblivion for saying this, but listening to that podcast made me believe that not everything the NSA does is bad.
That's not a bug. It's a feature. It allows the agency to ignore its already-flimsy privacy protections, at any time, for any reason.
What on earth makes you think data about the customers' activity belongs to the customers? You must not have been paying attention to the telecom or computer industries for the past 15 years.
Not according to the US Census Bureau (see page 24). Somebody lied to you.
It ain't over till it's over.
Maybe it's because some nerds travel by airplane.
Maybe it's because Slashdotters have been pointing out that the line at the screening checkpoint is, itself, a target, and they have unfortunately been proven correct.
I seem to recall there are a number of gun-rights advocates in the Slashdot community, who may be concerned about a legislative (over?)reaction to this atrocious act.
Then there are people like me who check Slashdot a lot more often than they check mainstream news sites, and learned about the shooting just now.
I don't mean to be too hard on you, because your question is legitimate. My best answer is, "news for nerds" is in the eye of the beholder and sometimes the editors will post a story that doesn't interest you, but does interest someone else.
The U-2 spy plane is still flying and it can carry a 5,000-pound payload of surveillance equipment. So there is plenty of air surveillance; you just didn't know about it.
Young folks know that business meetings are not (usually) important to them. They often fail to make the leap that although they may not benefit personally from every meeting, it is more important for the senior staff to be well-informed than for the junior staff to be working at their desks all day.
I dislike the Citizens United verdict as much as you do, but I find this argument muddled and unconvincing. I would suggest that people who care about the issue familiarize themselves with the dissenting opinion in Citizens United. You don't have to read the whole thing (it's 90 pages); the Wikipedia article will do.
Your position seems closest to the following point, one among many in the dissent:
If you're talking about games or entertainment (iTunes, etc.) then a duo like Siskel and Ebert would be very helpful. When it comes to operating systems and productivity applications, I would prefer an approach more like Consumer Reports.
You missed the part where you need to get the key signed, or no one can verify it's actually yours. That's the sticking point.
I think that second step has already been done: in elementary school, high school, college, and the workplace, for starters. Not all that different treatment is for the worse.
Agreed, developing countries should go straight to nuclear power. Oh, wait a minute, that's not acceptable to the US either...
The whole idea of "scooping" someone in science is sickening. If there is competitiveness, it should be competitiveness for greater thoroughness and rigor, not quicker results and headline-grabbing. But the type of predatory behavior you describe is not prevented by the anonymous system, and would be visible in a system where reviewers are accountable for their reviews after the fact.
I think there are two ways to write a negative review: without scientific rigor and logical arguments, or with them. In the first case, the reviewer would just be making an ass of him/herself and casting doubt on both his/her scientific and personal integrity. It's better to let those individuals stand up and identify themselves, rather than prosper under anonymity. The second kind of review, well-argued and substantiated, is exactly what science needs! So if someone is annoyed and becomes motivated to pore over a manuscript with a (figurative) miscroscope, then that is an ideal review, isn't it?
Fear of intense, antagonistic scrutiny is probably widespread, but I am inclined to interpret that fear as a tacit admission that our own methods and conclusions don't hold up.
It's a floor wax AND a dessert topping! :-) But yes, as with any systemic problem, there are many aspects that cannot easily be separated from one another. The parable of the blind men and the elephant is probably applicable.
That is the journals' problem. One could imagine devoting a quarter of each issue to one-page papers confirming previously-published results. In fact, that could be a great way for graduate students to break into prestigious journals. In my not-so-humble opinion, the fact that most or all journals don't make efforts to publish corroborating studies is biting criticism of the journals and their role in undermining the proper scientific method.
I think an ineffective review is worse than no review, because an ineffective review imparts a false sense of confidence in the paper's methods and findings. So a sharp decline in the number of reviewers could be a good thing, if it weeds out the liars who say that have rigorously criticized the manuscript when they haven't.
There's more than one problem at work here. You've identified one, but I think the lack of quality review is also serious. The reviewers' names and their recommendations (accept/reject) should be published along with the paper when it is accepted, to give them an incentive to reject garbage instead of rubber-stamping it.
Well, it's good to see a major scientific institution waking up to a phenomenon Richard Feynman warned about in the 1970s. Yet it seems to me the proposed solution is a little ad hoc. If scientists want to restore integrity to their field(s) -- and I applaud their efforts to do so -- why aren't they using an experimental approach to do so? I think they should try several things and collect data to find out what actually works.
Seconded. With regard to the quality of preservation of the skeletons: when I was there, the volunteers working in the glass-walled laboratory were extracting tiny rodent bones from blocks of natural asphalt.
Here the headline led me to believe a member of the Greatest Generation was stepping up *again* to defend American freedom. You know, maybe filing a lawsuit or something. But no, TFA is just about the author's father being a passive-aggressive jerk in the airport security line. As if that helps anyone. If all you are accomplishing is to make yourself feel smarter than a TSA screener, you are not accomplishing much at all.
Please recalibrate your sarcasm detector. :-)
Furthermore, why would millionaires trust their money to a company that is getting pilloried in the press for fundamental failures of management, not to mention development practices?
Cutting corners on developing the software that handles your money: penny wise and pound foolish.
With regard to avoiding training anybody, all American companies are like that. Training costs are an externality they unload onto their employees. It is not, however, difficult to recruit qualified people even under those circumstances. All you have to do is offer them 20% more than your competitor does, and candidates will line up outside your door.
Companies just whine instead are not serious about recruiting and/or want government support in the form of H1-Bs.