How very devious to put a statement covering all "Controlled Substances" into a bill that is supposedly only covering methamphetamines.
Another nail into the coffin of the Bill of Rights. Distributing information should be covered by the first amendment, regardless of how the information is judge. This bill if enacted into law would make it illegal not only for posting and/or linking to drug related sites, but also teaching the manufacture in universities. (Note that there is no disclaimer excusing it's teaching in the interest of education)
I can just see, 20 years from now, some junkie ODs and gets brought to the emergency room, and the doctors are like "Uhhh...I have no idea how to treat this man, we didn't cover street drugs in med school, being illegal and all.
This reminds me of a concept in the Cyberpunk RPG called the "Cookie-cutter" where a firearm, attack droid, or other nasty implement of death is fitted with a radio receiver, and anyone wearing (or implanted with) a transmitter with the correct signal briefly stops the firing mechanism while the gun is pointed at them. So, in theory, with such a device, one could open fire on room full of people, and no friendlies would be hit.
They'll probably implement something similar on these aircraft. Then again, maybe not...this IS the US Military we're talking about.
But seriously, I don't even see a problem developing something like this with current technology...the logistics of doing it with a plane 5000 meters above you are more difficult, but hell, we've accomplished more difficult things.
That's kind of hard to quantify for all of europe, considering drugs are legal to possess/use in some european countries. Everyone seems to want to put borders on the net (we Americans are of course the most notorious of this) and that, I think, is far too difficult considering the nature of the beast.
For example, pretend for a moment that a bill DID pass disallowing drug related sites...all they could enforce is not allowing them to be hosted in the US, and POSSIBLY not allowing Americans to peruse these sites. First of all, it would be an enforcement nightmare resulting in a LOT of gov't spying on Joe Average. Secondly, there are so many ways around it, that it's a joke...use an anonymous redirector, telnet to a shell account out of the country and use Lynx, etx.
For this reason, I can only see a law like that every getting passed is because they want to use it like they use meat-space drug laws...as a way to bypass the illegal search and seizure laws.
>where the supposed 'clothes' on the characters are rigid and taught (a la Lara Croft) it is one out of many little things which disrupt the fantasy experience.
I don't know about you, but the words rigid and taut in regards to Ms Croft are hardly disruptive to my fantasy experience.
While I can't speak for most large banks, a lot of smaller financial institutions such as credit unions tend to outsource their online banking and even their security....in fact, a government regulation was just passed by the NCUA (Nat'l Credit Union Association) that REQUIRES them to use high encryption, firewalls, and intrusion detection or they lose government backing. They are being audited for compliancy. (and these auditors are no joke, we got the same audit the CU's did)
The company I work for is an ISP/Mail/Web hosting for credit unions exlusively, and provide them with the services they don't have the expertise to maintain...anything from encrypted online banking and bill pay, to firewalled internet access and email services.
While I can't divulge exact information for very obvious reasons, they're quite secure, barring a hack at the CU itself. (Someone walks up to a station at an office where some dumb teller didn't lock his/her terminal) The host with all customer info actually sits at the CU, behind our network and two firewalls. A hit to their website hits one server, and if they log in to online banking, it proxies to an SSL server that can ONLY be hit from the web server, which in turn communicates with the datahost at the CU. To actually get customer data, 3 extremely hardened servers and 2 firewalls would need to be compromised. It's not even worth the effort. We don't even see the customer information, as the encryption/decryption take place at the user and CU ends. We've had security audits and penetration tests up the ass (no pun) and have yet to be compromised. Not to mention everything is logged and monitored both onsite and off.
I imagine most banks have a similar setup, though the larger ones utilize their own networks. But to sum up, I guarantee you that your cash is safe...federal regulations require it. If a bank thought their setup was a risk to their network integrity, they wouldn't offer the service...it's just not worth it to them to lose the federal insurance.
>Of course you'll never hear of a destroyer being abandoned because of a Linux problem.
Who said Linux in ANY of those posts? !M$ != Linux.
> No military on this planet would trust ships which cost hundreds of millions (if not billions) to an unproven operating system like Linux.
And NT has proven itself so well. *choke*
>You're running complicated, big applications on NT all day long to get your work done, and you're using Linux to play. Of course Linux isn't going to crash, you're not stressing the machine at all.
I use a Linux box to act as a firewall, quake3 server, web/ftp server, ad filtering web proxy, and X irc client. My uptime is around 45 days now cuz that's when I built it. Oh yeah, and I can recompile the kernel without crashing a single process, let alone the box itself.
My laptop on the other hand, (which work mandates must be running NT) runs like a piece of shit if I have more than a browser and email program open. And it's more pimped out in the hardware department than that "unproven" linux box I have running at home. NT is bloated, poorly designed, and a pain in the ass to manage. (try getting in to kill a process on an NT machine that's had it's GUI locked. Good luck.)
But I can see you're not one to be reasoned with anyway, as you must resort to bashing someone's typos. It is...too late for you, my poor lackey.
Microsoft isn't exactly known for their attention to detail where computing security is involved. Especially on the net. The Hotmail fiascos in the past, the security holes in IIS/NT.
And don't feed me this Windows Millenium crap. 65k+ bugs, try and tell me at least a couple hundred (if not more) aren't security flaws.
>I mean Linux takes up most of a CD-ROM - I doubt it can be downsized to fit into your toaster as you seem to think.
That's because it includes RPMs for the source as well as a plethora of applications for both console and X. The kernel itself takes up about 600k (give or take a bit). For a relatively simple embedded system, the bit of code running on top of the kernel isn't going to take up much space, itself. So.....yes, it can be downsized just fine.
I'm sorry this has turned out to be a rant all, please forgive me. Theres nothing I get more passionate about then technology and the Average Joe who's going out to buy that top o the line CPU to run his wordpad. If it wasnt for Joe Average spending tons of cash buying the top of line CPUs, do you think these companies would have the money to develop better chips as quickly? Or the desire to? Just because you only drive 3 miles a day to work, and to church on sundays don't mean you shouldn't drive a BMW/Cadillac/(insert expensive car here) and look good doing it. I hate when elitist geeks spout superiority over your typical user. Get over yourself.
It is my understanding that changes were made to the CGI when Passport was integrated, and that is what allowed the security hole. If I'm incorrect (which I'm pretty sure I'm not) then it's certainly not intentional FUD, but rather my own misunderstanding.
Isn't this Passport service the main cause of that little Hotmail fiasco a couple weeks ago? I'd be a bit skeptical about storing my financial data online anywhere, much less with a service that has proven already once to be insecure. (fixed or not, it's hard to trust something that has been cracked that easily in the past)
Not to mention, I get a bit paranoid when M$ is involved in anything regarding personal finances.
I have some friends (well, quake clan members) who went to RPI, and they're all NT droids to the last. In fact, one of em started an ISP and was running it on NT...he was surprised when it went belly-up. "What, no shell account??"
I can't speak for the majority of NC products out there but Windows Terminal Server is basically a hack rewrite of NT to have more of a multi-user (i.e. unix-like) kernel. We use them where I work for customer service reps....and in that category they excel...the amount of downtime of the reps is significantly reduced because the software residing on the server with a HEAVILY locked down user profile, and there are no moving parts in the terminal on their desk. We use WYSE terminals, which are about the size of a typical 40 watt PC speaker...all it has is a keyboard/mouse connection, a video board, and a NIC. No RAM, no CPU, etc. They cost about $300. Very easy to support, even for the retards we have who call themselves desktop techs.
The bandwidth used by each connection is pretty low...latency is barely noticeable over a 28.8 modem connection. (The connection does not have to be via "dumb" terminal...there are clients for Win9X, NT, and Linux..basically a spiffy windows telnet)
All in all, there is nothing new about this technology...it gives Windows the functionality that X has had for years, but all rolled into one happy little M$-prepared, stupid-end-user-friendly package.
Got a link or something to support that statement? They can't just "do away" with drivers' licenses, as that's currently a state run function, and the kind of effort it would require to make it a federal responsibility is beyond just next year.
We're making all the hype. Transmeta is simply saying "We will not tell you what we do until our product is finished." And, in typical slashdot paranoid mentality, people seem to need to infer much more from that simple statement.
I doubt Linus would work for a company that is planning to pull a fast one on investors...if he was looking to make a quick buck, he could have done so with Linux.
>Ironically, the biggest impediment to going back >to Unix is that a few of the faculty don't know >Unix and don't want to learn.
In a UNIVERSITY environment, there should no excuse for anyone not wanting to learn, be it professors, TAs, or students. That's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard...an instructor with an attitude like that has no business teaching at an institution of higher learning.
It will be proportionally less here...I think $200-$250 is the anticipated price. $370 is what you'll pay if you go buy it in Japan. (+/- several thousand $$ for the trip)
A good portion of contractors ARE momos who can't hold a steady job. He didn't say ALL of them.
And not hiring someone and treating them like a human being, and judging them by output rather than arrival time or how they dress is a SURE FIRE way of attracting someone with some talent. Truly intelligent individuals don't like to be controlled.
If the government could prove their ability to utilize such technology without abuse, then I'd be all for it. However, as is inevitable in positions of power, individuals become corrupted. There needs to be some sort of check and balance system on such an undertaking. You know the old saying.... "Who will watch the watchers?"
I, for one, fear what the NSA/CIA/SS/#include favorite TLA can do, especially when they're looking for some dork to patsy on a bust to meet their quotas, further political agendas or whatever cockamanie reason these "agents" have for their intrusions.
In a perfect world, these sort of systems would only be used by reliable, trustworthy individuals who had only the nation and public's well being in mind. Of course, in a perfect world, these measures would not be necessary in the first place.
There's always going to be a system, and it's never perfect. Vagrants/terrorists/kiddie pornsters/etc are going to find a way to beat any system that's put into place, leaving those of us who don't bother anybody put under unjustified observation.
I think Calvin & Hobbes said it best in this dialog: (paraphrasing)
C: Hobbes, do you believe in the Devil? H: You mean a vile creature dedicated to the temptation and corruption of mankind? C: Yeah. H: I don't think mankind needs the help.
Basically, I don't really buy into the typical Christian mythology about the lake of fire, eternal damnation, pie in the sky, and marks of the beast. Man is a balance of good and evil, and unfortunately, those less enlightened have been the ones in power for some time. But avoiding a long theological debate, I think this diverts from the intent of the original article, which is basically that the government will have a picture of you on file. (which they already do, they'll just all be linked with each other state now)
I highly doubt that this country would drop a nuke on one of it's own cities. There are some fucked up politicians, but what soldier is going to follow THAT order? No way.
The problem with arguing religion (as well as politics most of the time) is that someone has to be wrong. Not everyone can be right...the belief systems contradict that.
Both parties can even be wrong. Both cannot be right, but will believe to the death that they are. Such is the nature of faith.
It's a tender subject, and I've found that while many agnostics and atheists and even Buddhists/Taoists can adopt a "Live and let live" policy for their beliefs, most western (and some eastern) have a hard time with this, because, by nature of their theology, non-belief is heresy and punished by eternal burning, damnation, and wedgies in the gym-class of the afterlife.
In short, it's an attempt in futility. Once someone has made up their mind on their belief system, it's a rare event that they change. It's like admitting to being sucked into a really bad scam.
Playing a game you've written yourself is a lot like reading a book you've written yourself.
Sure, you can appreciate the quality and talent (or lack thereof) that went into it, but you already know what will and will not happen, taking the adventure and excitement out of the game.
Not to mention, some of the best commercial games took waaay more than one person to create, what with all the artwork, coding, quality assurance, filming (if the game has video capture), etc that goes into it.
So, we must rely upon the gaming industry to supply us with quality entertainment. Money talks though....geeks are getting tired of putting money into half-assed attempts at unoriginal game ideas. Why do you think software pirating is so prevelant? Sure, a lot of it is because it's underage kids with no money and a lot of time, but mostly, and I know this is the reason *I* cruise the warez sites and friends' ftp sites before buying a game: I HATE WASTING 50 BUCKS ON A POORLY CODED PIECE OF CRAP. If I like a game, I buy it. I won't buy a game and pray that I like it. I work too goddam hard to throw my money away on them. I do a good enough job of that at the bar.
Slashdot Mirror
How very devious to put a statement covering all "Controlled Substances" into a bill that is supposedly only covering methamphetamines.
Another nail into the coffin of the Bill of Rights. Distributing information should be covered by the first amendment, regardless of how the information is judge. This bill if enacted into law would make it illegal not only for posting and/or linking to drug related sites, but also teaching the manufacture in universities. (Note that there is no disclaimer excusing it's teaching in the interest of education)
I can just see, 20 years from now, some junkie ODs and gets brought to the emergency room, and the doctors are like "Uhhh...I have no idea how to treat this man, we didn't cover street drugs in med school, being illegal and all.
Insightful and compelling post.
For the sake of us all, please follow this link.
This reminds me of a concept in the Cyberpunk RPG called the "Cookie-cutter" where a firearm, attack droid, or other nasty implement of death is fitted with a radio receiver, and anyone wearing (or implanted with) a transmitter with the correct signal briefly stops the firing mechanism while the gun is pointed at them. So, in theory, with such a device, one could open fire on room full of people, and no friendlies would be hit.
They'll probably implement something similar on these aircraft. Then again, maybe not...this IS the US Military we're talking about.
But seriously, I don't even see a problem developing something like this with current technology...the logistics of doing it with a plane 5000 meters above you are more difficult, but hell, we've accomplished more difficult things.
Your hard earned tax dollars at work folks.
That's kind of hard to quantify for all of europe, considering drugs are legal to possess/use in some european countries. Everyone seems to want to put borders on the net (we Americans are of course the most notorious of this) and that, I think, is far too difficult considering the nature of the beast.
For example, pretend for a moment that a bill DID pass disallowing drug related sites...all they could enforce is not allowing them to be hosted in the US, and POSSIBLY not allowing Americans to peruse these sites. First of all, it would be an enforcement nightmare resulting in a LOT of gov't spying on Joe Average. Secondly, there are so many ways around it, that it's a joke...use an anonymous redirector, telnet to a shell account out of the country and use Lynx, etx.
For this reason, I can only see a law like that every getting passed is because they want to use it like they use meat-space drug laws...as a way to bypass the illegal search and seizure laws.
>where the supposed 'clothes' on the characters are rigid and taught (a la Lara Croft) it is one out of many little things which disrupt the fantasy experience.
I don't know about you, but the words rigid and taut in regards to Ms Croft are hardly disruptive to my fantasy experience.
While I can't speak for most large banks, a lot of smaller financial institutions such as credit unions tend to outsource their online banking and even their security....in fact, a government regulation was just passed by the NCUA (Nat'l Credit Union Association) that REQUIRES them to use high encryption, firewalls, and intrusion detection or they lose government backing. They are being audited for compliancy. (and these auditors are no joke, we got the same audit the CU's did)
The company I work for is an ISP/Mail/Web hosting for credit unions exlusively, and provide them with the services they don't have the expertise to maintain...anything from encrypted online banking and bill pay, to firewalled internet access and email services.
While I can't divulge exact information for very obvious reasons, they're quite secure, barring a hack at the CU itself. (Someone walks up to a station at an office where some dumb teller didn't lock his/her terminal) The host with all customer info actually sits at the CU, behind our network and two firewalls. A hit to their website hits one server, and if they log in to online banking, it proxies to an SSL server that can ONLY be hit from the web server, which in turn communicates with the datahost at the CU. To actually get customer data, 3 extremely hardened servers and 2 firewalls would need to be compromised. It's not even worth the effort. We don't even see the customer information, as the encryption/decryption take place at the user and CU ends. We've had security audits and penetration tests up the ass (no pun) and have yet to be compromised. Not to mention everything is logged and monitored both onsite and off.
I imagine most banks have a similar setup, though the larger ones utilize their own networks. But to sum up, I guarantee you that your cash is safe...federal regulations require it. If a bank thought their setup was a risk to their network integrity, they wouldn't offer the service...it's just not worth it to them to lose the federal insurance.
>Of course you'll never hear of a destroyer being abandoned because of a Linux problem.
Who said Linux in ANY of those posts? !M$ != Linux.
> No military on this planet would trust ships which cost hundreds of millions (if not billions) to an unproven operating system like Linux.
And NT has proven itself so well. *choke*
>You're running complicated, big applications on NT all day long to get your work done, and you're using Linux to play. Of course Linux isn't going to crash, you're not stressing the machine at all.
I use a Linux box to act as a firewall, quake3 server, web/ftp server, ad filtering web proxy, and X irc client. My uptime is around 45 days now cuz that's when I built it. Oh yeah, and I can recompile the kernel without crashing a single process, let alone the box itself.
My laptop on the other hand, (which work mandates must be running NT) runs like a piece of shit if I have more than a browser and email program open. And it's more pimped out in the hardware department than that "unproven" linux box I have running at home. NT is bloated, poorly designed, and a pain in the ass to manage. (try getting in to kill a process on an NT machine that's had it's GUI locked. Good luck.)
But I can see you're not one to be reasoned with anyway, as you must resort to bashing someone's typos. It is...too late for you, my poor lackey.
Microsoft isn't exactly known for their attention to detail where computing security is involved.
Especially on the net. The Hotmail fiascos in the past, the security holes in IIS/NT.
And don't feed me this Windows Millenium crap. 65k+ bugs, try and tell me at least a couple hundred (if not more) aren't security flaws.
>I mean Linux takes up most of a CD-ROM - I doubt it can be downsized to fit into your toaster as you seem to think.
That's because it includes RPMs for the source as well as a plethora of applications for both console and X. The kernel itself takes up about 600k (give or take a bit). For a relatively simple embedded system, the bit of code running on top of the kernel isn't going to take up much space, itself. So.....yes, it can be downsized just fine.
I'm sorry this has turned out to be a rant all, please forgive me. Theres nothing I get more passionate about then technology and the Average Joe who's going out to buy that top o the line CPU to run his wordpad. If it wasnt for Joe Average spending tons of cash buying the top of line CPUs, do you think these companies would have the money to develop better chips as quickly? Or the desire to? Just because you only drive 3 miles a day to work, and to church on sundays don't mean you shouldn't drive a BMW/Cadillac/(insert expensive car here) and look good doing it. I hate when elitist geeks spout superiority over your typical user. Get over yourself.
It is my understanding that changes were made to the CGI when Passport was integrated, and that is what allowed the security hole. If I'm incorrect (which I'm pretty sure I'm not) then it's certainly not intentional FUD, but rather my own misunderstanding.
Isn't this Passport service the main cause of that little Hotmail fiasco a couple weeks ago? I'd be a bit skeptical about storing my financial data online anywhere, much less with a service that has proven already once to be insecure. (fixed or not, it's hard to trust something that has been cracked that easily in the past)
Not to mention, I get a bit paranoid when M$ is involved in anything regarding personal finances.
I have some friends (well, quake clan members) who went to RPI, and they're all NT droids to the last. In fact, one of em started an ISP and was running it on NT...he was surprised when it went belly-up. "What, no shell account??"
I can't speak for the majority of NC products out there but Windows Terminal Server is basically a hack rewrite of NT to have more of a multi-user (i.e. unix-like) kernel. We use them where I work for customer service reps....and in that category they excel...the amount of downtime of the reps is significantly reduced because the software residing on the server with a HEAVILY locked down user profile, and there are no moving parts in the terminal on their desk. We use WYSE terminals, which are about the size of a typical 40 watt PC speaker...all it has is a keyboard/mouse connection, a video board, and a NIC. No RAM, no CPU, etc. They cost about $300. Very easy to support, even for the retards we have who call themselves desktop techs.
The bandwidth used by each connection is pretty low...latency is barely noticeable over a 28.8 modem connection. (The connection does not have to be via "dumb" terminal...there are clients for Win9X, NT, and Linux..basically a spiffy windows telnet)
All in all, there is nothing new about this technology...it gives Windows the functionality that X has had for years, but all rolled into one happy little M$-prepared, stupid-end-user-friendly package.
Strip YOUR MOM to email me
Got a link or something to support that statement? They can't just "do away" with drivers' licenses, as that's currently a state run function, and the kind of effort it would require to make it a federal responsibility is beyond just next year.
We're making all the hype. Transmeta is simply saying "We will not tell you what we do until our product is finished." And, in typical slashdot paranoid mentality, people seem to need to infer much more from that simple statement.
I doubt Linus would work for a company that is planning to pull a fast one on investors...if he was looking to make a quick buck, he could have done so with Linux.
>Ironically, the biggest impediment to going back >to Unix is that a few of the faculty don't know >Unix and don't want to learn.
In a UNIVERSITY environment, there should no excuse for anyone not wanting to learn, be it professors, TAs, or students. That's the most ridiculous thing I've ever heard...an instructor with an attitude like that has no business teaching at an institution of higher learning.
It will be proportionally less here...I think $200-$250 is the anticipated price. $370 is what you'll pay if you go buy it in Japan. (+/- several thousand $$ for the trip)
They all used Macs. They are so 31337. What's good enough for our nation's crackers is good enough for Unca Sam.
Why the hell is this a troll?
A good portion of contractors ARE momos who can't hold a steady job. He didn't say ALL of them.
And not hiring someone and treating them like a human being, and judging them by output rather than arrival time or how they dress is a SURE FIRE way of attracting someone with some talent. Truly intelligent individuals don't like to be controlled.
Here's a nickel, but a clue.
If the government could prove their ability to utilize such technology without abuse, then I'd be all for it. However, as is inevitable in positions of power, individuals become corrupted. There needs to be some sort of check and balance system on such an undertaking. You know the old saying.... "Who will watch the watchers?"
I, for one, fear what the NSA/CIA/SS/#include favorite TLA can do, especially when they're looking for some dork to patsy on a bust to meet their quotas, further political agendas or whatever cockamanie reason these "agents" have for their intrusions.
In a perfect world, these sort of systems would only be used by reliable, trustworthy individuals who had only the nation and public's well being in mind. Of course, in a perfect world, these measures would not be necessary in the first place.
There's always going to be a system, and it's never perfect. Vagrants/terrorists/kiddie pornsters/etc are going to find a way to beat any system that's put into place, leaving those of us who don't bother anybody put under unjustified observation.
Here's your soap box back.
I think Calvin & Hobbes said it best in this dialog: (paraphrasing)
C: Hobbes, do you believe in the Devil?
H: You mean a vile creature dedicated to the temptation and corruption of mankind?
C: Yeah.
H: I don't think mankind needs the help.
Basically, I don't really buy into the typical Christian mythology about the lake of fire, eternal damnation, pie in the sky, and marks of the beast. Man is a balance of good and evil, and unfortunately, those less enlightened have been the ones in power for some time. But avoiding a long theological debate, I think this diverts from the intent of the original article, which is basically that the government will have a picture of you on file. (which they already do, they'll just all be linked with each other state now)
I highly doubt that this country would drop a nuke on one of it's own cities. There are some fucked up politicians, but what soldier is going to follow THAT order? No way.
The problem with arguing religion (as well as politics most of the time) is that someone has to be wrong. Not everyone can be right...the belief systems contradict that.
Both parties can even be wrong. Both cannot be right, but will believe to the death that they are. Such is the nature of faith.
It's a tender subject, and I've found that while many agnostics and atheists and even Buddhists/Taoists can adopt a "Live and let live" policy for their beliefs, most western (and some eastern) have a hard time with this, because, by nature of their theology, non-belief is heresy and punished by eternal burning, damnation, and wedgies in the gym-class of the afterlife.
In short, it's an attempt in futility. Once someone has made up their mind on their belief system, it's a rare event that they change. It's like admitting to being sucked into a really bad scam.
Playing a game you've written yourself is a lot like reading a book you've written yourself.
Sure, you can appreciate the quality and talent (or lack thereof) that went into it, but you already know what will and will not happen, taking the adventure and excitement out of the game.
Not to mention, some of the best commercial games took waaay more than one person to create, what with all the artwork, coding, quality assurance, filming (if the game has video capture), etc that goes into it.
So, we must rely upon the gaming industry to supply us with quality entertainment. Money talks though....geeks are getting tired of putting money into half-assed attempts at unoriginal game ideas. Why do you think software pirating is so prevelant? Sure, a lot of it is because it's underage kids with no money and a lot of time, but mostly, and I know this is the reason *I* cruise the warez sites and friends' ftp sites before buying a game: I HATE WASTING 50 BUCKS ON A POORLY CODED PIECE OF CRAP. If I like a game, I buy it. I won't buy a game and pray that I like it. I work too goddam hard to throw my money away on them. I do a good enough job of that at the bar.