As a few others have said before me, I too think this email is a fake. Although there are only a few places in this email that are likely wrong (dl'ing vids on a commodore) many others are highly suspect. My personal favorites are:
he'd kept his own decaying poster of Madonna I'm sure all Afghani's love like a virgin
He says other coders and gamers hid their PC's as well. The underground geek network in a third world country devastated by war!
Junis predicts "Temptation Island" will be the number one show in Afghanistan within a month. I suspected Rupert Murdoch was helping rebuild!
hiding spots to dig up their Walkmen, VCRs, TVs, CD players I buried my commodore, too.
It really comes down to this. This email is suspect because it is written in a very american perspective and anybody who has traveled extensively outside of the US knows that most of the world doesn't work or think this way. I feel this person would be just simply unable to gain the ideology expressed here.
But on the other hand, I could be wrong....
-Sean
The Texas A+M story seemed to focus on cold fusion, while the link article seemed to focus on large scale reactors. When the general public thinks of cold fusion they generally think of pons and fleishmann (sp?) tubes that caused so much controversy a decade and a half ago. The D20/paladium set up is quite different from a huge plasma fusion reactor. (Although, of course, the underlying physical principles are the same)
As a scientist let me say I understand the concerns of society. I wish that some software developers would realize that as our society becomes more digitized, the power of programming becomes greater.
Consider this. In the '40's a few great men/women created an awesome force with grave consequences, the nuclear bomb. A computer security scientist would never consider himself on this level of creation of power, nor should he. But what if a programmer develops a worm that destroys information perfectly, there by bring down an economy, possibly killing people? To go even farther, what if someone creates the technology that enables a terrorist attack, or enables that worm to exist?
As we go farther into the digital age, programming is going to have more and more power and influence. Imagine if physicists were to take the arrogant attitude of today's security developers and say, "If I can build it, I should and also tell everyone else how to do it!"
I just think that in some cases, we should really consider the consequences of our actions....
While I agree this was definately the right thing to do, it is a bummer that the events of last week are having longer term disruptions. The best thing, IMO, for the economy and stability is to go back to life as close to normal as possible, except with beefed up security.
Layoffs are obviously tough, I feel bad for those who are losing their jobs in the tech industry. The author of MESA will probably have no problem finding another job. In the long term, though, I worry about the effects on open source development when worker/developers are laid off. I think we need to figure out ways to make open source more sustainable for those who develop projects so layoffs won't cut off important projects. Obviously MESA isn't going anywhere but other projects might be difficult to continue without the support of a company.
For safety reasons cell phones are going to have GPS receivers in them soon to tell 911 operators where you are when calling on your cell phone. This would be totally useful here, because there are going to be a lot more cell phones in that pile of rubble than living people. While I agree with the privacy concerns (including my own) this would have been totally helpful here. (Especially since most cellphones don't have more than 3-5 days of battery life. They should all be running down by now).
It is unfortunately really. If you read the second page of the review, the first thing the authors test is functionality to communicate with M$ office file formats. If that is to be the first level by which KOffice is judged, it will never succeed (in their minds). Unfortunately, M$ has made a business of beating competition by (among other things) keeping file formats different. We need to judge the functionality of KOffice first, its compatibility with M$ second. While the latter goal is important, if we hold that highest M$ truely is the monopoly we accuse them of.
Is there any word on support by any big players? The success of a new language such as this will depend entirely on how well it is adopted by the big guys. Without that support this language will likely fail (like many others). Kudo's for/. tooting its horn, this may get adoption of the language faster.
-Sean
World Trade Center Business List
on
More On Tragedy
·
· Score: 1
Here is a list of world trade center resident businesses. An interesting read:
What an excellent idea! I wish that more companies/entities would utilize this excellent security measure. Imagine how much better M$ would be if they just took after Florda, and had a crack me IIS server. You know everyone would want to crack it, and some of the insecurities would get opened before they cause damage. Florda's new policy rules.
We thought about converting some home materials to build racks. You might try bakers sheet racks as well, They are on wheels, a variety of heights and have built in shelving (baking sheets), and are easy to modify.
Temperature is a problem, obviously. If you live in Alaska it is a good thing. If you live in California, bend over and wait for your PG+E bill.
If you post to usenet, and think your messages aren't being submitted to the public domain, you are crazy. You can probably copyright your post, so others cannot claim it was their own or reword it in anyway, but good luck enforcing it. You certainly cannot prevent anyone from using your post pretty much at will.
Anyway, if you have the arrogance to think your post is important enough to be valuable and you can't find your own news server to post to (including the other free servers like newsone.net) you probably shouldn't be posting to usenet anyway....
Wow we can now cook birds in flight. I wonder what the effects of microwave radiation are on life? Does it disperse on particles in the atmosphere? Will it heat particles/clouds in the atmosphere? Does mild exposure mutagenic? Hmm, I'm totally skeptical of this technology. Perhaps we could use it in space to move around energy, but I don't know about space to earth..
I have a inspiron 7500 and this beast can get *very* hot. I have a habit sometimes of leaving it on after work and commuting while using it as an MP3 Player in my car stereo. When I get it home, sometimes it is so hot I cant touch any of the metal ports on the back and it is hard to type! Needless to say, I don't do that much anymore...
This is just what we need to do. Lets start giving out little pieces of hot uranium to people. If we give 'em MTBE, it ends up in our drinking water. Give 'em Lead Paint, it ends up in our lungs. Give 'em DDT, it ends up in our tumors. Give 'em non-weapons grade uranium and it ends up where?
Years ago, Apple and microsoft got in a bitter dispute over look and feel copying interfaces. Although different, it seems to me that there isn't much difference between making one interface look like another and making an existing one look different.
Anyway, this is a silly control issue. I am always surprised at how much/.'ers like apple and shun m$ when apple always seems to like so much control over their systems.
It is funny how old classic game makers getting together sounds a little like old rock-n-roll bands doing reunion tours. I have I hopes for a breath of fresh air, but like most old reunions, you still just want to hear the old songs. 'cause the new stuff is flat and uninspired.
We at eParka.com have been thinking about how to manage our in house GIS code. Dunno if we will opensrc our software or our proprietary databases (we have the entire country online in our own format). It is interesting field to watch, but there is a lot of junk out there.
Agreed. But my point was not that some commoners writings were important, but that a specific individual's writings generally are not. Commoner's writings are used to understand life for people of that stature, much like old paintings are used. If we had every writing from every commoner, much of it wouldn't even be read. (although some cs informaticians might try to find NLP relationships within it)..
I'm at a loss to understand why this question is perceived as being difficult to answer. Notice the posting talked of the *ruling* class. Today we look back at history and see people who kept records of their letters. They are usually wealthy and upper class.
The analogy would be to read emails from, say, the white house in 200 years. Do you think the white house is saving their emails? You bet. Do we have lots of examples of (from the general public) letters from 200 years ago? Certainly not as many as there will be emails in the future. Usenet archives, digital backups stored in basements, most emails are being stored two or more times at two or more places. I don't quite understand why someone would think that just because it isn't on paper, it isn't going to keep. We are going to have far more emails stored in the future than we will know what to do with.
As society we think of ourselves as individuals to be pretty important, but lets face it, for the vast majority of us, no one is going to care in 150 years. With that in mind, the digital age is storing far more records than ever before and the future holds a new paradigm of historical record. I almost lament that I wasn't born 150 years after the advent of the digital age where high resolution movies will look as good 1000 years from now as they do today.
Slashdot Mirror
It really comes down to this. This email is suspect because it is written in a very american perspective and anybody who has traveled extensively outside of the US knows that most of the world doesn't work or think this way. I feel this person would be just simply unable to gain the ideology expressed here. But on the other hand, I could be wrong.... -Sean
"This probably would have been a better submission if it had included a download link of some sort."
That is pretty harsh coming from someone whose career has been developed by volunteers who send you submissions on a daily basis.
-Sean
The Texas A+M story seemed to focus on cold fusion, while the link article seemed to focus on large scale reactors. When the general public thinks of cold fusion they generally think of pons and fleishmann (sp?) tubes that caused so much controversy a decade and a half ago. The D20/paladium set up is quite different from a huge plasma fusion reactor. (Although, of course, the underlying physical principles are the same)
As a scientist let me say I understand the concerns of society. I wish that some software developers would realize that as our society becomes more digitized, the power of programming becomes greater.
Consider this. In the '40's a few great men/women created an awesome force with grave consequences, the nuclear bomb. A computer security scientist would never consider himself on this level of creation of power, nor should he. But what if a programmer develops a worm that destroys information perfectly, there by bring down an economy, possibly killing people? To go even farther, what if someone creates the technology that enables a terrorist attack, or enables that worm to exist?
As we go farther into the digital age, programming is going to have more and more power and influence. Imagine if physicists were to take the arrogant attitude of today's security developers and say, "If I can build it, I should and also tell everyone else how to do it!"
I just think that in some cases, we should really consider the consequences of our actions....
-Sean
It is very likely that it is resistant to all potato fungal diseases. At least if it is, it won't be for very long.
-Sean
While I agree this was definately the right thing to do, it is a bummer that the events of last week are having longer term disruptions. The best thing, IMO, for the economy and stability is to go back to life as close to normal as possible, except with beefed up security.
-Sean
Layoffs are obviously tough, I feel bad for those who are losing their jobs in the tech industry. The author of MESA will probably have no problem finding another job. In the long term, though, I worry about the effects on open source development when worker/developers are laid off. I think we need to figure out ways to make open source more sustainable for those who develop projects so layoffs won't cut off important projects. Obviously MESA isn't going anywhere but other projects might be difficult to continue without the support of a company.
-Sean
I read a number of news reports earlier in the week. I think /. is just a bit slow on this one.
:)
-Sean
For safety reasons cell phones are going to have GPS receivers in them soon to tell 911 operators where you are when calling on your cell phone. This would be totally useful here, because there are going to be a lot more cell phones in that pile of rubble than living people. While I agree with the privacy concerns (including my own) this would have been totally helpful here. (Especially since most cellphones don't have more than 3-5 days of battery life. They should all be running down by now).
-Sean
It is unfortunately really. If you read the second page of the review, the first thing the authors test is functionality to communicate with M$ office file formats. If that is to be the first level by which KOffice is judged, it will never succeed (in their minds). Unfortunately, M$ has made a business of beating competition by (among other things) keeping file formats different. We need to judge the functionality of KOffice first, its compatibility with M$ second. While the latter goal is important, if we hold that highest M$ truely is the monopoly we accuse them of.
-Sean
Is there any word on support by any big players? The success of a new language such as this will depend entirely on how well it is adopted by the big guys. Without that support this language will likely fail (like many others). Kudo's for /. tooting its horn, this may get adoption of the language faster.
-Sean
Here is a list of world trade center resident businesses. An interesting read:
http://www.onisland.com/wtc/bizdir/index.html
-Sean
What an excellent idea! I wish that more companies/entities would utilize this excellent security measure. Imagine how much better M$ would be if they just took after Florda, and had a crack me IIS server. You know everyone would want to crack it, and some of the insecurities would get opened before they cause damage. Florda's new policy rules.
You can find the packets trying to get you in your web log by looking for a request that looks like:
/default.ida? + A number of letter "N"'s + a series of escape sequence like characters
This buffer overflow was first reported a couple of days ago.
-Moondog
We thought about converting some home materials to build racks. You might try bakers sheet racks as well, They are on wheels, a variety of heights and have built in shelving (baking sheets), and are easy to modify.
Temperature is a problem, obviously. If you live in Alaska it is a good thing. If you live in California, bend over and wait for your PG+E bill.
-Moondog
If you post to usenet, and think your messages aren't being submitted to the public domain, you are crazy. You can probably copyright your post, so others cannot claim it was their own or reword it in anyway, but good luck enforcing it. You certainly cannot prevent anyone from using your post pretty much at will.
Anyway, if you have the arrogance to think your post is important enough to be valuable and you can't find your own news server to post to (including the other free servers like newsone.net) you probably shouldn't be posting to usenet anyway....
-Moondogy
Wow we can now cook birds in flight. I wonder what the effects of microwave radiation are on life? Does it disperse on particles in the atmosphere? Will it heat particles/clouds in the atmosphere? Does mild exposure mutagenic? Hmm, I'm totally skeptical of this technology. Perhaps we could use it in space to move around energy, but I don't know about space to earth..
-Moondog
I have a inspiron 7500 and this beast can get *very* hot. I have a habit sometimes of leaving it on after work and commuting while using it as an MP3 Player in my car stereo. When I get it home, sometimes it is so hot I cant touch any of the metal ports on the back and it is hard to type! Needless to say, I don't do that much anymore...
-Moondog
Vertical takeoff at rest and Vertical landing
at 120 mph (terminal velocity). Yup, I used
to build those too.
-Moondog
This is just what we need to do. Lets start giving out little pieces of hot uranium to people. If we give 'em MTBE, it ends up in our drinking water. Give 'em Lead Paint, it ends up in our lungs. Give 'em DDT, it ends up in our tumors. Give 'em non-weapons grade uranium and it ends up where?
-Moondog
Years ago, Apple and microsoft got in a bitter dispute over look and feel copying interfaces. Although different, it seems to me that there isn't much difference between making one interface look like another and making an existing one look different.
/.'ers like apple and shun m$ when apple always seems to like so much control over their systems.
Anyway, this is a silly control issue. I am always surprised at how much
-Moondog
It is funny how old classic game makers getting together sounds a little like old rock-n-roll bands doing reunion tours. I have I hopes for a breath of fresh air, but like most old reunions, you still just want to hear the old songs. 'cause the new stuff is flat and uninspired.
-Moondog
We at eParka.com have been thinking about how to manage our in house GIS code. Dunno if we will opensrc our software or our proprietary databases (we have the entire country online in our own format). It is interesting field to watch, but there is a lot of junk out there.
-Moondog
Agreed. But my point was not that some commoners writings were important, but that a specific individual's writings generally are not. Commoner's writings are used to understand life for people of that stature, much like old paintings are used. If we had every writing from every commoner, much of it wouldn't even be read. (although some cs informaticians might try to find NLP relationships within it)..
-Moondog
I'm at a loss to understand why this question is perceived as being difficult to answer. Notice the posting talked of the *ruling* class. Today we look back at history and see people who kept records of their letters. They are usually wealthy and upper class.
The analogy would be to read emails from, say, the white house in 200 years. Do you think the white house is saving their emails? You bet. Do we have lots of examples of (from the general public) letters from 200 years ago? Certainly not as many as there will be emails in the future. Usenet archives, digital backups stored in basements, most emails are being stored two or more times at two or more places. I don't quite understand why someone would think that just because it isn't on paper, it isn't going to keep. We are going to have far more emails stored in the future than we will know what to do with.
As society we think of ourselves as individuals to be pretty important, but lets face it, for the vast majority of us, no one is going to care in 150 years. With that in mind, the digital age is storing far more records than ever before and the future holds a new paradigm of historical record. I almost lament that I wasn't born 150 years after the advent of the digital age where high resolution movies will look as good 1000 years from now as they do today.
-Moondog