'' In a choice between escalation and appeasement I'd go with escalation every time. There is no reason to allow the disrespectful behavior of this old guy with a grudge to be rewarded in any way. ''
That is a very brave and very stupid attitude.
It can be funny for outsiders, as shown in the film "War of the Roses".
'' Well IANL but I am a FY LS. I don't think this is really a matter for the police, from my probably naive student view this seems to be a textbook case of tort law (i.e. civil suits). Your neighbor may place anything on his property, but if it interfere with the enjoyment of your property then you could get the device removed/compensated. It might even work as a small claims court (where you won't need a lawyer). Of course you could also sue the manufacturer as well. ''
If, one day, you become a lawyer, and someone comes to you with a complaint like this, I hope you will listen carefully to what they say, and when they are finished, you ask: "And now tell me what is _really_ going on". Do you think that as a lawyer you should start a court case without knowing any of the facts, just because of wild accusations by some punk kid?
I bet if you asked the neighbor what is going on, and if you asked a few other adult people living there, you would get a completely different picture.
'' Exactly. The neighbor is creating a nuisance, so you sue for a court order to make him knock it off. This is what tort law is all about. ''
This might of course backfire if the court asks him _why_ he put up the device. These things don't happen without a reason. Like: How often has his property been damaged in the last year? How often has he been insulted by neighbour kids? How many calls to the police without any result? Without knowing that, it is preposterous to make any judgement.
'' The problem with this theory is that said neighbour has already invested approx £700 in a device with which to fight this war. A device which, if the war is terminated early will be useless. ''
Seems there is a guy who has been annoyed by the neighborhood kids so much that he was forced to spend £700 to get a bit of piece. One of the offending neighbourhood kids describes him as "paranoid". Since that kid is in no way qualified to make that assessment, and since that kid is talking about "neighbourhood war" already, he is also unlikely to be objective. Since this apparently happens in England, I can assure you that the number of absolutely unbearable kids in England exceeds the number of paranoid elderly people by a huge factor.
And interestingly, how come you are talking about "war" as well? There is no war. Measures were taken by one side to keep the sides apart, which is apparently what the original poster doesn't like. This is a purely defensive move, so we can have some idea who the aggressor is.
Try to behave like a man. Knock on his door, and ask him _politely_ why he thinks he needs to keep you and your friends away from your home. And I mean, politely. And alone, not with a gang of youths in the background. And listen to what he says. If he doesn't want to talk to you, try again. This may be the hardest thing you have ever done in your life, showing some respect for the people around you, thinking about the consequences of your actions and behaving like a responsible adult. Maybe think about things that you do that you think are funny when you are drunk, and think what other people would feel about them.
Now if you are completely without fault, and the reason for your problem _is_ indeed just paranoia, then the easiest and best solution is to just stay away. It doesn't cost you much, he feels better, and you feel better because you have done The Right Thing.
Some idiots here suggest you should escalate the problem. The problem with that is you don't know where it will end. If you escalate enough, it can end with destroyed lives, his or yours. Think about that.
"Apple today announced that they will be withdrawing their financial reports back to September 29, 2002 and delaying the filing of future reports " Correct.
"after finding more backdated options problems. " Incorrect.
"Companies backdate their stock options by looking back over a period of time and choosing a historical low as the option strike price. While not illegal, this must be fully disclosed to investors and properly accounted." Incorrect. Backdating options is illegal, that's what people will go to jail for. That is also what Apple hasn't done .
Expect more uncertainty in the coming weeks as regulators must now uncover how much of Apple's record profits were incorrect " Regulators are not involved in this at all. This is an Apple internal inquiry.
"as well as whether or not Steve Jobs will be able to continue leading the company." Taken out of thin air.
In other words, the submitter took one line from the quoted article, then added 90 percent bullshit to it.
Sometimes I think people who submit articles to Slashdot are pure idiots.
The original article makes no mention of "backdating options" whatsoever. "Backdating options" is an illegal and criminal method of giving employees more money by chosing the date of an option grant long after the option is granted, usually to a time when the stock was low. Even just with the usual random fluctuation of the share price, this can make options much cheaper and therefore more valuable for the employee. However, nothing like that was mentioned in the article at all. What was mentioned was "possible irregularities in the accounting" of the value of stock options, which was found by Apple itself in an internal inquiry that it started itself, and it was Apple who called the SEC about it, not the other way round. And since the rules for the accounting of stock options have changed a lot in the recent years and are quite complicated, it is quite possible for a company to account them incorrectly by mistake. The bit that the submitter added about Steve Jobs has been pulled out of thin air altogether, just to make it sound more interesting.
This is like Mr. Smith calling the Inland Revenue, telling them that he might have made a mistake in his tax returns, and a submitter on Slashdot calling him a thief and criminal.
Two important facts: Nobody has actually seen an active exploit; there is only a video available. Quite obviously anyone can hack into a Macintosh if it is prepared in the right way, for example by turning file sharing on and allowing everyone in the world access. More important, the video should a Macintosh notebook with an external wireless card. Now how many Macs have an external wireless card? For several years, all the notebooks have been shipping with built-in wireless connection, including the one in the video.
I would suspect that the problem is that a wireless connection can be created without knowledge of the user, and a user who has a Macintosh that was made vulnerable but should be safe because it has no network connection would unexpectedly be unsafe.
'' Here is the problem. My system is fried and all my music is on the hard drive. I can't listen to my own music on the Ipod and if I replace the systems mainboard which is fried it will require another installation of Windows. Itunes will never create teh same user again even if its the same name. Therefore my collection is drmed and encrypted and unaccessible. ''
I can't quite see your problem. Copy the files over to the new computer (or reuse the harddisk), start iTunes, and authorise that computer with your apple id. You can authorise up to five computers at a time. The only problem is when a computer is destroyed and you cannot deauthorise it (you need the computer itself in working condition in order to deauthorise it); in that case you send an email to Apple and they deauthorise _all_ your computers, and then you can authorise five more computers again.
'' For those who aren't aware, Ken Thompson admitted to actually writing and installing a back door in the unix login program and the associated C compiler, as described in his 1983 Turing Award lecture. ''
I checked it; fortunately the book with the Award Lectures from 1966 to 1985 is on my bookshelf, and the lecture in question, titled "Reflections on Trusting Trust" contains the code
'' In fact, as an amusing aside, I don't know if there are any SUVs left that don't have ABS since they're so prone to being driven on dry pavement. That works against them in a HUGE way on slick surfaces and probably negates any benefits to be had from tire size and tread when trying to stop in a winter weather. ''
A while ago they showed on British TV a test of a BMW four wheel drive car. They started at a top of a small hill, covered in grass (the hill, not the driver), on a wet day. Then tried driving downhill very slowly. Unfortunately, the brakes on the four wheel drive car didn't manage to slow it down... Hilarious to watch; would have been quite frightening if you were inside the car.
'' Right now the Intel integrated graphics lack pixel or vertex shaders, or both (I don't remember which). ''
They don't have vertex shaders. Having neither vertex shaders nor pixel shaders would be kind of sad, then you would just need a framebuffer device:-(
Now seriously, pixel shaders are much more important. A 2 GHz Core Duo can do quite a bit of vertex shading; the real work is done in the pixelshaders. All the CoreGraphics functionality in MacOS X is pixelshaders. All the fancy effects that Vista wants to do is pixelshaders. Lighting etc. used to be done in vertexshaders, but nowadays is done in the pixelshaders because you get higher quality and more realism.
'' Macs are marketed as a fashion statement. How do you feel when you are wearing unfashionable clothes? Your Mac friends start saying, "hey, I got the model up from that one, when are you going to be cool like me?" ''
My desktop Macintosh is a Quicksilver, built in 2001. Runs MacOS 10.4 Tiger absolutely fine. Now I dare you to find _any_ computer that looks better.
Apple builds computers that look good. But that has nothing to do with fashion, they just look good. Some things just look good today, and they will keep looking good, and Apple builds its stuff that way. Sometimes they manage to improve things (the iPod Nano _does_ look better than the iPod Mini), but again, that is not because of fashion, it just looks better. If you turned up in a 1956 Porsche, people would still say that you have a very nice looking car.
'' Can someone tell me what the deficiencies are in GPLv2 that have created this need for an upgrade? I'm just curious what the motivation is. Is it only DRM? All I've heard about GPLv3 regards DRM and encryption keys. Is there anything else noteworthy that it changes from v2? ''
If you take software licensed under the GPL, and distribute it, you must give your customers access to the source code, and you must allow them to modify the software and distribute it further. With GPL2, a distributor could create a situation where you have the source code and modified it, but the modified source code cannot possibly work. For example, if you bought a computer running Linux, and the bootloader takes a checksum and only runs the system if the OS software has the right checksum, then your right to modify the software has become purely theoretical: You can make modified versions as much as you like, but they won't work.
That is _one_ change with GPL3: Again, the customer must have the right to modify the software, but you also have to give him the capability to make it run. So the distributor is not allowed anymore to give you purely theoretical rights, that you cannot use in practice.
Or lets say Microsoft takes an open source music player and modifies it to play music with DRM. They distribute the software under the GPL with source code. However, as soon as you make the slightest change to the source code, the compiled code stops playing DRM'd music. In theory, you have the right to modify the software, in practice that right is useless because the modified software doesn't work the way it should. That would be legal with GPL 2, but not with GPL 3.
'' For some reason I highly doubt the customs people would know how to use my laptop, as first, they would need to get past BIOS password. Second, they would need user password. Then they would be at a nice console. Have a nice day:) ''
If customs wants to search the laptop, and they can't, the easiest thing they can do is send you back home.
If you read the PDF where the court described the case, you would know that all he needed to do is to empty the browser history, and he would never have been in trouble. Forensics would have found the stuff, but forensics would never have been involved.
'Uhm, Dell started shipping Opterons in May, precisely because high-end users were demanding them, and buying their servers from HP.'
That's what I call bad timing. Three months with AMD, that means Intel is pissed off, and now they have the second fastest chips only. And while Apple has record margins because of "extremely favorable component prices", Dell issues a profit warning. Just wondering if these are related.
'' 2. it is one of the ways terrorists can communicate safely without any chance of being tracked ''
If it were found that terrorists communicated using my wireless network, then the police could just call the manufacturer of my router, who would tell them that the terrorists must be within fifty or maybe hundred meters from my home. They should have no problem finding the terrorists.
'' Lawyer "Mr. Doe, you left the SSID or 'name' of the network at the default value and didn't add any encryption or security?" ''
Some manufacturers of wireless equipment are just clueless and make it unnecessarily hard for people to do the right thing.
On my wireless router, there is a setup page with an html interface where all kinds of things can be changed. The problem is, it never tells you what these things are that you could change, and why you should change them, and what you could change them. One of the things to change was called "SSID" and the preset value was the name of the manufacturer.
Now how am I supposed to know what "SSID" means? If you apply logical thinking, since it is set to the name of the manufacturer, it is probably meant to be the name of the manufacturer. So the logical assumption would be that it is used to identify the make of the router, like a processor having an ID of "IntelInside" or "AMDSomething" so you know who made it, and the only reason to change it would be to pretend to be a router made by some other manufacturer.
If these idiots had set the preset field to "NameOfThisNetwork" or "TypeInNameOfTheNetworkHere" then it would have been much more obvious what SSID is for. One line change in the source code for the router software, and I guess 30 percent fewer people leaving the default name because they don't have a clue what SSID is supposed to mean.
Now that is just one minor point. But consider that there are about hundred settings, and ninetyfive of them will stop the router from working properly if I change them, so how is an end user who is not a computer expert supposed to get this right?
how many copies are made without going online. My music collection is backed up on DVDs, on the average about 600 songs per DVD, and all a lot better quality than you find on any P2P network or iTMS, and all DRM-free. Just good that I don't let anyone get their hands on those DVDs, it would be RIAAs nightmare and completely untracable.
'' Apple's approach is different; you can't run OSX on vanilla hardware, so you don't even get the chance. Once OSX is up and running, though, you're basically left alone because the presumption is that you're using OSX on an Apple machine and that doesn't need to be "investigated" further. ''
You can of course pirate MacOS X, you just have to wait until the next release is out. You can:
1. Buy a new computer that comes with a newer MacOS X version and install it on an older Mac (that reminds me, has anyone checked if the MacOS X shipping with Intel Macs can be installed on a PowerPC Mac as well ? ). Result: Apple has made money on your new Mac.
2. When a new release comes out, buy it and install it on two or more Macs at home. Result: Apple has made some money on the new release, and more money on the Macs.
3. When a new release comes out, buy a home license and install it on more Macs than allowed. Result: See above
4. Get a copy from a friend and install it. Result: At least Apple has made money on the Macintosh.
Now we try to really hurt Apple. You break into someone's house, steal their Mac, and install a pirated copy of MacOS X. Result: Insurance pays for a new Mac, Apple makes money.
'' While I can remember 1/2 a dozen passwords, I cannot expect my coworkers to do the same. Most often there is a sea of sticky notes pasted right on the monitor with the bi-annual password!!! ''
A reasonable compromise is a password made of two parts: A really complicated sequence of characters that you write on a sticky note, and something that is easy to remember. Outside hackers cannot get in because of the complicated part, someone sneaking in won't be able to find your dogs name in a short time.
Slashdot Mirror
'' But hey, dual 5150s for $2500? I think I might just buy that baby and an extra flat panel instead. ''
According to the Intel July price list with prices for 1000 processors, the two processors alone will cost you $1380.
'' In a choice between escalation and appeasement I'd go with escalation every time. There is no reason to allow the disrespectful behavior of this old guy with a grudge to be rewarded in any way. ''
That is a very brave and very stupid attitude.
It can be funny for outsiders, as shown in the film "War of the Roses".
'' Well IANL but I am a FY LS. I don't think this is really a matter for the police, from my probably naive student view this seems to be a textbook case of tort law (i.e. civil suits). Your neighbor may place anything on his property, but if it interfere with the enjoyment of your property then you could get the device removed/compensated. It might even work as a small claims court (where you won't need a lawyer). Of course you could also sue the manufacturer as well. ''
If, one day, you become a lawyer, and someone comes to you with a complaint like this, I hope you will listen carefully to what they say, and when they are finished, you ask: "And now tell me what is _really_ going on". Do you think that as a lawyer you should start a court case without knowing any of the facts, just because of wild accusations by some punk kid?
I bet if you asked the neighbor what is going on, and if you asked a few other adult people living there, you would get a completely different picture.
'' Exactly. The neighbor is creating a nuisance, so you sue for a court order to make him knock it off. This is what tort law is all about. ''
This might of course backfire if the court asks him _why_ he put up the device. These things don't happen without a reason. Like: How often has his property been damaged in the last year? How often has he been insulted by neighbour kids? How many calls to the police without any result? Without knowing that, it is preposterous to make any judgement.
'' The problem with this theory is that said neighbour has already invested approx £700 in a device with which to fight this war. A device which, if the war is terminated early will be useless. ''
Seems there is a guy who has been annoyed by the neighborhood kids so much that he was forced to spend £700 to get a bit of piece. One of the offending neighbourhood kids describes him as "paranoid". Since that kid is in no way qualified to make that assessment, and since that kid is talking about "neighbourhood war" already, he is also unlikely to be objective. Since this apparently happens in England, I can assure you that the number of absolutely unbearable kids in England exceeds the number of paranoid elderly people by a huge factor.
And interestingly, how come you are talking about "war" as well? There is no war. Measures were taken by one side to keep the sides apart, which is apparently what the original poster doesn't like. This is a purely defensive move, so we can have some idea who the aggressor is.
Try to behave like a man. Knock on his door, and ask him _politely_ why he thinks he needs to keep you and your friends away from your home. And I mean, politely. And alone, not with a gang of youths in the background. And listen to what he says. If he doesn't want to talk to you, try again. This may be the hardest thing you have ever done in your life, showing some respect for the people around you, thinking about the consequences of your actions and behaving like a responsible adult. Maybe think about things that you do that you think are funny when you are drunk, and think what other people would feel about them.
Now if you are completely without fault, and the reason for your problem _is_ indeed just paranoia, then the easiest and best solution is to just stay away. It doesn't cost you much, he feels better, and you feel better because you have done The Right Thing.
Some idiots here suggest you should escalate the problem. The problem with that is you don't know where it will end. If you escalate enough, it can end with destroyed lives, his or yours. Think about that.
"Apple today announced that they will be withdrawing their financial reports back to September 29, 2002 and delaying the filing of future reports "
Correct.
"after finding more backdated options problems. "
Incorrect.
"Companies backdate their stock options by looking back over a period of time and choosing a historical low as the option strike price. While not illegal, this must be fully disclosed to investors and properly accounted."
Incorrect. Backdating options is illegal, that's what people will go to jail for. That is also what Apple hasn't done .
Expect more uncertainty in the coming weeks as regulators must now uncover how much of Apple's record profits were incorrect "
Regulators are not involved in this at all. This is an Apple internal inquiry.
"as well as whether or not Steve Jobs will be able to continue leading the company."
Taken out of thin air.
In other words, the submitter took one line from the quoted article, then added 90 percent bullshit to it.
Sometimes I think people who submit articles to Slashdot are pure idiots.
The original article makes no mention of "backdating options" whatsoever. "Backdating options" is an illegal and criminal method of giving employees more money by chosing the date of an option grant long after the option is granted, usually to a time when the stock was low. Even just with the usual random fluctuation of the share price, this can make options much cheaper and therefore more valuable for the employee. However, nothing like that was mentioned in the article at all. What was mentioned was "possible irregularities in the accounting" of the value of stock options, which was found by Apple itself in an internal inquiry that it started itself, and it was Apple who called the SEC about it, not the other way round. And since the rules for the accounting of stock options have changed a lot in the recent years and are quite complicated, it is quite possible for a company to account them incorrectly by mistake. The bit that the submitter added about Steve Jobs has been pulled out of thin air altogether, just to make it sound more interesting.
This is like Mr. Smith calling the Inland Revenue, telling them that he might have made a mistake in his tax returns, and a submitter on Slashdot calling him a thief and criminal.
Two important facts: Nobody has actually seen an active exploit; there is only a video available. Quite obviously anyone can hack into a Macintosh if it is prepared in the right way, for example by turning file sharing on and allowing everyone in the world access. More important, the video should a Macintosh notebook with an external wireless card. Now how many Macs have an external wireless card? For several years, all the notebooks have been shipping with built-in wireless connection, including the one in the video.
I would suspect that the problem is that a wireless connection can be created without knowledge of the user, and a user who has a Macintosh that was made vulnerable but should be safe because it has no network connection would unexpectedly be unsafe.
'' Here is the problem. My system is fried and all my music is on the hard drive. I can't listen to my own music on the Ipod and if I replace the systems mainboard which is fried it will require another installation of Windows. Itunes will never create teh same user again even if its the same name. Therefore my collection is drmed and encrypted and unaccessible. ''
I can't quite see your problem. Copy the files over to the new computer (or reuse the harddisk), start iTunes, and authorise that computer with your apple id. You can authorise up to five computers at a time. The only problem is when a computer is destroyed and you cannot deauthorise it (you need the computer itself in working condition in order to deauthorise it); in that case you send an email to Apple and they deauthorise _all_ your computers, and then you can authorise five more computers again.
There must be more than one Apple company.
'' For those who aren't aware, Ken Thompson admitted to actually writing and installing a back door in the unix login program and the associated C compiler, as described in his 1983 Turing Award lecture. ''
I checked it; fortunately the book with the Award Lectures from 1966 to 1985 is on my bookshelf, and the lecture in question, titled "Reflections on Trusting Trust" contains the code
compile(s)
char* s;
{
if (match (s, "pattern1")) {
compile ("bug1");
return;
}
if (match (s, "pattern2")) {
compile ("bug2");
return;
}
}
I think this doesn't quite qualify as "actually writing and installing a backdoor".
'' In fact, as an amusing aside, I don't know if there are any SUVs left that don't have ABS since they're so prone to being driven on dry pavement. That works against them in a HUGE way on slick surfaces and probably negates any benefits to be had from tire size and tread when trying to stop in a winter weather. ''
A while ago they showed on British TV a test of a BMW four wheel drive car. They started at a top of a small hill, covered in grass (the hill, not the driver), on a wet day. Then tried driving downhill very slowly. Unfortunately, the brakes on the four wheel drive car didn't manage to slow it down... Hilarious to watch; would have been quite frightening if you were inside the car.
'' Right now the Intel integrated graphics lack pixel or vertex shaders, or both (I don't remember which). ''
:-(
They don't have vertex shaders. Having neither vertex shaders nor pixel shaders would be kind of sad, then you would just need a framebuffer device
Now seriously, pixel shaders are much more important. A 2 GHz Core Duo can do quite a bit of vertex shading; the real work is done in the pixelshaders. All the CoreGraphics functionality in MacOS X is pixelshaders. All the fancy effects that Vista wants to do is pixelshaders. Lighting etc. used to be done in vertexshaders, but nowadays is done in the pixelshaders because you get higher quality and more realism.
'' Macs are marketed as a fashion statement. How do you feel when you are wearing unfashionable clothes? Your Mac friends start saying, "hey, I got the model up from that one, when are you going to be cool like me?" ''
My desktop Macintosh is a Quicksilver, built in 2001. Runs MacOS 10.4 Tiger absolutely fine. Now I dare you to find _any_ computer that looks better.
Apple builds computers that look good. But that has nothing to do with fashion, they just look good. Some things just look good today, and they will keep looking good, and Apple builds its stuff that way. Sometimes they manage to improve things (the iPod Nano _does_ look better than the iPod Mini), but again, that is not because of fashion, it just looks better. If you turned up in a 1956 Porsche, people would still say that you have a very nice looking car.
'' Even I, a long time PC user wanted to get a MacBook, but... I don't have 1100 to drop on one. Damn me not having much money! ''
A MacBook will last you probably about five years. That is about $18 per month.
Most porn sites cost more than that.
'' Can someone tell me what the deficiencies are in GPLv2 that have created this need for an upgrade? I'm just curious what the motivation is. Is it only DRM? All I've heard about GPLv3 regards DRM and encryption keys. Is there anything else noteworthy that it changes from v2? ''
If you take software licensed under the GPL, and distribute it, you must give your customers access to the source code, and you must allow them to modify the software and distribute it further. With GPL2, a distributor could create a situation where you have the source code and modified it, but the modified source code cannot possibly work. For example, if you bought a computer running Linux, and the bootloader takes a checksum and only runs the system if the OS software has the right checksum, then your right to modify the software has become purely theoretical: You can make modified versions as much as you like, but they won't work.
That is _one_ change with GPL3: Again, the customer must have the right to modify the software, but you also have to give him the capability to make it run. So the distributor is not allowed anymore to give you purely theoretical rights, that you cannot use in practice.
Or lets say Microsoft takes an open source music player and modifies it to play music with DRM. They distribute the software under the GPL with source code. However, as soon as you make the slightest change to the source code, the compiled code stops playing DRM'd music. In theory, you have the right to modify the software, in practice that right is useless because the modified software doesn't work the way it should. That would be legal with GPL 2, but not with GPL 3.
'' For some reason I highly doubt the customs people would know how to use my laptop, as first, they would need to get past BIOS password. Second, they would need user password. Then they would be at a nice console. Have a nice day :) ''
If customs wants to search the laptop, and they can't, the easiest thing they can do is send you back home.
If you read the PDF where the court described the case, you would know that all he needed to do is to empty the browser history, and he would never have been in trouble. Forensics would have found the stuff, but forensics would never have been involved.
'Uhm, Dell started shipping Opterons in May, precisely because high-end users were demanding them, and buying their servers from HP.'
That's what I call bad timing. Three months with AMD, that means Intel is pissed off, and now they have the second fastest chips only. And while Apple has record margins because of "extremely favorable component prices", Dell issues a profit warning. Just wondering if these are related.
'' 2. it is one of the ways terrorists can communicate safely without any chance of being tracked ''
If it were found that terrorists communicated using my wireless network, then the police could just call the manufacturer of my router, who would tell them that the terrorists must be within fifty or maybe hundred meters from my home. They should have no problem finding the terrorists.
'' Lawyer "Mr. Doe, you left the SSID or 'name' of the network at the default value and didn't add any encryption or security?" ''
Some manufacturers of wireless equipment are just clueless and make it unnecessarily hard for people to do the right thing.
On my wireless router, there is a setup page with an html interface where all kinds of things can be changed. The problem is, it never tells you what these things are that you could change, and why you should change them, and what you could change them. One of the things to change was called "SSID" and the preset value was the name of the manufacturer.
Now how am I supposed to know what "SSID" means? If you apply logical thinking, since it is set to the name of the manufacturer, it is probably meant to be the name of the manufacturer. So the logical assumption would be that it is used to identify the make of the router, like a processor having an ID of "IntelInside" or "AMDSomething" so you know who made it, and the only reason to change it would be to pretend to be a router made by some other manufacturer.
If these idiots had set the preset field to "NameOfThisNetwork" or "TypeInNameOfTheNetworkHere" then it would have been much more obvious what SSID is for. One line change in the source code for the router software, and I guess 30 percent fewer people leaving the default name because they don't have a clue what SSID is supposed to mean.
Now that is just one minor point. But consider that there are about hundred settings, and ninetyfive of them will stop the router from working properly if I change them, so how is an end user who is not a computer expert supposed to get this right?
how many copies are made without going online. My music collection is backed up on DVDs, on the average about 600 songs per DVD, and all a lot better quality than you find on any P2P network or iTMS, and all DRM-free. Just good that I don't let anyone get their hands on those DVDs, it would be RIAAs nightmare and completely untracable.
'' Apple's approach is different; you can't run OSX on vanilla hardware, so you don't even get the chance. Once OSX is up and running, though, you're basically left alone because the presumption is that you're using OSX on an Apple machine and that doesn't need to be "investigated" further. ''
You can of course pirate MacOS X, you just have to wait until the next release is out. You can:
1. Buy a new computer that comes with a newer MacOS X version and install it on an older Mac (that reminds me, has anyone checked if the MacOS X shipping with Intel Macs can be installed on a PowerPC Mac as well ? ). Result: Apple has made money on your new Mac.
2. When a new release comes out, buy it and install it on two or more Macs at home. Result: Apple has made some money on the new release, and more money on the Macs.
3. When a new release comes out, buy a home license and install it on more Macs than allowed. Result: See above
4. Get a copy from a friend and install it. Result: At least Apple has made money on the Macintosh.
Now we try to really hurt Apple. You break into someone's house, steal their Mac, and install a pirated copy of MacOS X. Result: Insurance pays for a new Mac, Apple makes money.
'' While I can remember 1/2 a dozen passwords, I cannot expect my coworkers to do the same.
Most often there is a sea of sticky notes pasted right on the monitor with the bi-annual password!!! ''
A reasonable compromise is a password made of two parts: A really complicated sequence of characters that you write on a sticky note, and something that is easy to remember. Outside hackers cannot get in because of the complicated part, someone sneaking in won't be able to find your dogs name in a short time.