Very literate essay, but prone to waffle: Sir, the post would be much improved if you could indicate what these "real threats" are. Then we can compare with the suggested threat of global warming, and thus discover if your post is making any point whatsoever.
I spent my student loans on CDs rather than food and kept the bug ever since, so I have a similarly enormous pile of them: I do forget what I have because (through iTunes), it all becomes one big list.
What ends up happening is that you have to listen on random for a few days to rediscover stuff, every so often.
Failing that, if you've a Mac, try Clutter. If there's a Windows alternative, I don't know it although I'd like to.
Mmm although I would suggest that the cracker is unlikely to invoke a security update. If it's a web server of a vaguely high profile (as opposed to a dusty Pentium on an ADSL line serving Bugzilla in someone's shed, as an over-described example) then you would hope that the administrator in question keeps an eye (or clamp) on traffic heading out of the server anyway. This should be particularly robust on the more conscientiously user-locked environment of a UNIX server (Admin ineptitude excepted).
For purposes of attacks on other Internet hosts, I guess that a static IP-ed server is too easily traced anyway. Much better to use a dronebot hive of unfirewalled moving-IP Win98 PCs.
I'm with Lloyds TSB: the current system is all well and good but I - and I should know better - haven't changed my password nor my memorable phrase for ages. Yes that's my failing but they should've been forcing password changes every so often. But then the average punter is going to be sending 'lost password' emails every month or writing it down on a....blah blah blah
Regenerating passwords are the way forward. I'm all for it. Applause etc.
[Boring old anti-DRM post] I have always thought that if the terms of my playback of *my* music (I don't care quite so much about video because if I buy a DVD I'll only watch it a few times at most before I get bored) are ever controlled by these ever-so-gracious record companies to the extent that I have to buy DRM equipment to do so...then I'll find music elsewhere.
I'm not sufficiently obsessed by my favourite bands to need their DRM-ed music. I'll just get into medieval-kazoo-skiffle-reggae-fusion or something. Buy bootlegs. Go to more gigs. Stuff 'em. [/Boring old anti-DRM post]
Ah excellent. I'll run this, give it some decent screen estate, dig out the Office toolbar, run my creative taskbar thingy that came with the soundcard, run quicken and get my permanent 'I'm worth nothing to noone' reminder box, tick the "always on top" checkbox on my media player, keep my windows taskbar on the screen and then discover a vacant square inch on my desktop. What can I cover it with?? It's a puzzler.
Errrmmmm. No. I was pointing out the idiocy of suggesting that MS would somehow sue Apple for the iPod. And comparing a series of patents to a death is a bit crass isn't it?
The history doesn't necessarily give guidance to the future: Microsoft has been patenting like a mad man (not that mad men patent....argh anyway) and while you could attribute most of that to a defence strategy, there's no question that a last (or maybe not so last) resort in any confrontation with a competitor could entail a patent-litigation offensive.
After all, abuse of monopoly is illegal and they survived that with avengeance, so what's to stop them pursuing some more legal methods of stifling instead?
From what I see of all this, Apple will just keep throwing the patent back until it does finally get passed.
What's the alternative? Microsoft sue Apple for 'inventing' the iPod interface? That would be an interesting PR escapade....
Amen to the other replies. It took me two years of a paper-round to scrape the money together for an Atari ST back in the day. I appreciated it a whole lot more and worshipped the ground it sat on.
Looking back at others in my school who were given STs or Amigas apropos of nothing, they were generally spoilt brats, natch.
Nicely smarmy article though, because the general air is that we all have a spare 600 quid to lash out on a laptop, and the *only* reason we haven't lashed out yet is that we're not sure if the child would appreciate it. Oh Mr Author, you flatter me with your analysis of the average parent's bank balance.
> Apple already doesn't treat customers like scum the way Microsoft does
I disagree. I'm currently trying to convince Apple that my iBook has a fault, which was due to their repair centre putting it in a vice and bending it. Of course they're now branding the iBook's new floppiness as cosmetic...
Well that's great but a passport costs me twenty something quid, an ID card ninety and will apparently need to be updated more often. What's in it for me?
As mentioned by Tim somethingorother above, it's not the ID card so much as the centralised database and the fuzziness regarding what the government can do with that information, coupled with the almost-certainty that more and more information will collected there as time goes on, all in the name of national security.
Also given the notorious and consistent failure of UK government IT projects, I bet my left testicle that someone will crack it and freely distribute everything they find within five years. Goodbye witness protection etc. etc. This time Daily Mail readers will be able to find every paediatrician at their home address and call them ALL paedophiles.
Come on, bad form. There's no requirement for a student to be able to spell their name correctly outside of the exam room, and you get plenty of revision for that moment.
Yeah but itemisation and categorisation of every asset...sorry person....in the state is a governmental dream. Saves on paper work, leaves them free to take mroe meals with their lobbyists who give them valuable ideas as to what to do with all this lovely information. And then when someone less salubrious comes to power in 30 years time, everyone's shafted - I reluctantly invoke this but it's highly relevant to point to the supremely efficient Dutch civil records at the time of their occupation ~65 years ago that eased the way to identification of certain undesirables. "Couldn't happen" then either could it.
If I get a cold, or feel generally dodgy, then my first impulse is to go out and buy a gadget to make me feel better. Geek comfort shopping.
So this is a marvellous idea. Make sure that the voice recognition has no tolerance whatsoever, and then it may force me to to stay in bed and get better.
Of course then there's online gadget shopping to fall back on so maybe my idea is flawed. Pah.
I was always uncomfortable with the direction WinXP was going in with regard to Microsoft-tied code, but this takes the biscuit.
Win2k for me then has to be the Microsoft OS of choice. It's stable, and it's (relatively) fluff free. I used to forgive Microsoft a lot when Win2k first came out.
That said, I'll be phasing out MS stuff when I can now - I just can't be bothered with it all. My computers are mine. The companies that made them can eff off.
Slashdot Mirror
Very literate essay, but prone to waffle: Sir, the post would be much improved if you could indicate what these "real threats" are. Then we can compare with the suggested threat of global warming, and thus discover if your post is making any point whatsoever.
I spent my student loans on CDs rather than food and kept the bug ever since, so I have a similarly enormous pile of them: I do forget what I have because (through iTunes), it all becomes one big list.
What ends up happening is that you have to listen on random for a few days to rediscover stuff, every so often.
Failing that, if you've a Mac, try Clutter. If there's a Windows alternative, I don't know it although I'd like to.
Mmm although I would suggest that the cracker is unlikely to invoke a security update. If it's a web server of a vaguely high profile (as opposed to a dusty Pentium on an ADSL line serving Bugzilla in someone's shed, as an over-described example) then you would hope that the administrator in question keeps an eye (or clamp) on traffic heading out of the server anyway. This should be particularly robust on the more conscientiously user-locked environment of a UNIX server (Admin ineptitude excepted).
For purposes of attacks on other Internet hosts, I guess that a static IP-ed server is too easily traced anyway. Much better to use a dronebot hive of unfirewalled moving-IP Win98 PCs.
Ah. I didn't realise!
Que? Very powerful OS? In what way does it help you attack remote systems in a more destructive way than with a non-UNIX OS like Windows? If 'power':
= number-of-CL-utilities-included then this isn't an issue because the compromising payload would include the missing functionality anyway.
= Network or system performance under load then the benefit is negligible
= position on internal company network then it doesn't matter what OS it is
= ability to kill Spiderman then I concede.
I'm obviously missing something: could you explain?
I'm with Lloyds TSB: the current system is all well and good but I - and I should know better - haven't changed my password nor my memorable phrase for ages. Yes that's my failing but they should've been forcing password changes every so often. But then the average punter is going to be sending 'lost password' emails every month or writing it down on a....blah blah blah
Regenerating passwords are the way forward. I'm all for it. Applause etc.
[Boring old anti-DRM post]
I have always thought that if the terms of my playback of *my* music (I don't care quite so much about video because if I buy a DVD I'll only watch it a few times at most before I get bored) are ever controlled by these ever-so-gracious record companies to the extent that I have to buy DRM equipment to do so...then I'll find music elsewhere.
I'm not sufficiently obsessed by my favourite bands to need their DRM-ed music. I'll just get into medieval-kazoo-skiffle-reggae-fusion or something. Buy bootlegs. Go to more gigs. Stuff 'em.
[/Boring old anti-DRM post]
Ah excellent. I'll run this, give it some decent screen estate, dig out the Office toolbar, run my creative taskbar thingy that came with the soundcard, run quicken and get my permanent 'I'm worth nothing to noone' reminder box, tick the "always on top" checkbox on my media player, keep my windows taskbar on the screen and then discover a vacant square inch on my desktop. What can I cover it with?? It's a puzzler.
Your thoughts are noted. Thank you for your honest opinion.
Errrmmmm. No. I was pointing out the idiocy of suggesting that MS would somehow sue Apple for the iPod. And comparing a series of patents to a death is a bit crass isn't it?
After all, abuse of monopoly is illegal and they survived that with avengeance, so what's to stop them pursuing some more legal methods of stifling instead?
From what I see of all this, Apple will just keep throwing the patent back until it does finally get passed. What's the alternative? Microsoft sue Apple for 'inventing' the iPod interface? That would be an interesting PR escapade....
Amen to the other replies. It took me two years of a paper-round to scrape the money together for an Atari ST back in the day. I appreciated it a whole lot more and worshipped the ground it sat on. Looking back at others in my school who were given STs or Amigas apropos of nothing, they were generally spoilt brats, natch. Nicely smarmy article though, because the general air is that we all have a spare 600 quid to lash out on a laptop, and the *only* reason we haven't lashed out yet is that we're not sure if the child would appreciate it. Oh Mr Author, you flatter me with your analysis of the average parent's bank balance.
Unless you have shares, or other such controlling interest, in a company then really: stop loving it. Find a girlfriend.
> Apple already doesn't treat customers like scum the way Microsoft does I disagree. I'm currently trying to convince Apple that my iBook has a fault, which was due to their repair centre putting it in a vice and bending it. Of course they're now branding the iBook's new floppiness as cosmetic...
So does this mean that if you want to mod windows, you need to battle for domain names with alta vista? Arf!
I've a sneaking suspicion that before too long, nothing short of a GPS chip implant will be ok for travelling to the US :o)
Well that's great but a passport costs me twenty something quid, an ID card ninety and will apparently need to be updated more often. What's in it for me?
Also given the notorious and consistent failure of UK government IT projects, I bet my left testicle that someone will crack it and freely distribute everything they find within five years. Goodbye witness protection etc. etc. This time Daily Mail readers will be able to find every paediatrician at their home address and call them ALL paedophiles.
Come on, bad form. There's no requirement for a student to be able to spell their name correctly outside of the exam room, and you get plenty of revision for that moment.
Yeah but itemisation and categorisation of every asset...sorry person....in the state is a governmental dream. Saves on paper work, leaves them free to take mroe meals with their lobbyists who give them valuable ideas as to what to do with all this lovely information. And then when someone less salubrious comes to power in 30 years time, everyone's shafted - I reluctantly invoke this but it's highly relevant to point to the supremely efficient Dutch civil records at the time of their occupation ~65 years ago that eased the way to identification of certain undesirables. "Couldn't happen" then either could it.
Ah get over yourself. It makes it more interesting to read. If you don't like it, then read something sycophantic and banal like Zdnet.
If I get a cold, or feel generally dodgy, then my first impulse is to go out and buy a gadget to make me feel better. Geek comfort shopping. So this is a marvellous idea. Make sure that the voice recognition has no tolerance whatsoever, and then it may force me to to stay in bed and get better. Of course then there's online gadget shopping to fall back on so maybe my idea is flawed. Pah.
I was always uncomfortable with the direction WinXP was going in with regard to Microsoft-tied code, but this takes the biscuit.
Win2k for me then has to be the Microsoft OS of choice. It's stable, and it's (relatively) fluff free. I used to forgive Microsoft a lot when Win2k first came out.
That said, I'll be phasing out MS stuff when I can now - I just can't be bothered with it all. My computers are mine. The companies that made them can eff off.