I think you should be flattered, but that must kind of suck. I hope you're not suggesting that by posting it here I was trying to pass it off as my own.
For the record (though I think it's fairly obvious that I wasn't trying to plagiarize anybody as I cited it the way I found it) after I originally read it a forum cited as I mentioned I googled it and found it in many places exactly as I posted it here or unattributed.
I think it's a very succinct and well reasoned argument.
If I were to show your essay to somebody in the future, how would you like to be cited? By Ravenshrike?
The Gun is Civilization, by Maj. L. Caudill, USMC (Ret)
Human beings only have two ways to deal with one another: reason and force. If you want me to do something for you, you have a choice of either convincing me via argument, or make me do your bidding under threat of force. Every human interaction falls into one of those two categories, without exception. Reason or force, that's it.
In a truly moral and civilized society, people exclusively interact through persuasion. Force has no place as a valid method of social interaction, and the only thing that removes force from the menu is the personal firearm, as paradoxical as it may sound to some.
When I carry a gun, you cannot deal with me by force. You have to use reason and try to persuade me, because I have a way to negate your threat or employment of force.
The gun is the only personal weapon that puts a 100-pound woman on equal footing with a 220-pound mugger, a 75-year old retiree on equal footing with a 19-year old gang banger, and a single guy on equal footing with a carload of drunk guys with baseball bats. The gun removes the disparity in physical strength, size, or numbers between a potential attacker and a defender.
There are plenty of people who consider the gun as the source of bad force equations. These are the people who think that we'd be more civilized if all guns were removed from society, because a firearm makes it easier for a [armed] mugger to do his job. That, of course, is only true if the mugger's potential victims are mostly disarmed either by choice or by legislative fiat--it has no validity when most of a mugger's potential marks are armed.
People who argue for the banning of arms ask for automatic rule by the young, the strong, and the many, and that's the exact opposite of a civilized society. A mugger, even an armed one, can only make a successful living in a society where the state has granted him a force monopoly.
Then there's the argument that the gun makes confrontations lethal that otherwise would only result in injury. This argument is fallacious in several ways. Without guns involved, confrontations are won by the physically superior party inflicting overwhelming injury on the loser.
People who think that fists, bats, sticks, or stones don't constitute lethal force watch too much TV, where people take beatings and come out of it with a bloody lip at worst. The fact that the gun makes lethal force easier works solely in favor of the weaker defender, not the stronger attacker. If both are armed, the field is level.
The gun is the only weapon that's as lethal in the hands of an octogenarian as it is in the hands of a weight lifter. It simply wouldn't work as well as a force equalizer if it wasn't both lethal and easily employable.
When I carry a gun, I don't do so because I am looking for a fight, but because I'm looking to be left alone. The gun at my side means that I cannot be forced, only persuaded. I don't carry it because I'm afraid, but because it enables me to be unafraid. It doesn't limit the actions of those who would interact with me through reason, only the actions of those who would do so by force. It removes force from the equation...and that's why carrying a gun is a civilized act.
So the greatest civilization is one where all citizens are equally armed and can only be persuaded, never forced.
I can't believe that whoever handles this stuff for BT isn't aware of the "Streisand Effect." Maybe their PR staff had nothing to do with it.
It's the stupidest thing you can do these days, tring to censor your customer base in public like that.
It's one of the things that really makes me feel good about the internet, and one of the few phenomenons in these times where people can organize (without even organizing) and change the behavior of a corporate behemoth.
It must drive authoritarian corporations and governments crazy. I love it.
Nice catch. I agree with you, it IS coincedental, to say the least....
Unfortunately many people in America still think things are the way they are on TV, they way we all like to think America is.
In truth, when you do something public that purports to shine light into the incredible amount of malfeasance, scandal, and many times outright criminal or unconstitutional activity of the federal government don't think that they wont look for a way to "fuck up your game."
This is just one facet of what the justice system has become in America - it is abused by those who control it and abusive towards their enemies and the masses in general.
I'm not a big Mark Cuban fan, but I don't dislike him either - I haven't had a chance to really examine bailoutsleuth in detail, but I have to say that at least he has done soemthing rather than just complain about it - this whole financial situation we're in is total bullshit and is no accident, nor is the way that much of this bailout money is being used (EG for bonuses and other such crap). Every day we get deeper into fascism (and BTW, I am not one of those people crying "fascism, fascism" at every perceived injustice; I am talking about the definition of that word - and that is what America is becoming.
People are supposed to be presumed innocent - but have you looked at the way federal prosecutors behave? If you're facing federal charges you can be pretty fucked, it's a plea bargain game because the penalties are so severe that it's basically gambling with your life and livlihood - and the prosecutors and judges seem to reap political dividends from this system because it raises their conviction and sentencing stats among other things; and once something like this has been in the press you're pretty fucked in the court of public opinion too.
So yes, I think he stepped on some toes trying to show people what's really going on "behind the curtain" and stop it; publically.... so the powers that be decided to do a little digging or pulled out a file that was ready for the occasion, and viola, bend over Mark Cuban.
I have this router and it's worked really well - has been very stable and has a whole lot of really nice features - I do a lot of remote stuff both ways too and from work - not to mentioned bittorrent and binaries, webcams. Never have a problem, never have to reboot it.
Additionally the router has a feature that can email you when a new update comes out, the download page had a link for 1.21 with securespot and 1.21 without - I checked out what it was and decided against it. As others have mentioned. Below is the link I used:
I agree with how most people feel, that they need to be a little more upfront - a lot of the people here aren't going to want that feature - however, there are some people who may - among other things I think it has parental controls, it's like websense for the home user.
When you're updating the firmware on any device and not paying attention to the changes and what they actually do you're going to end up getting fucked, - especially when it comes to consumer home devices like these.
That analogy isn't the same; I never said anything like that...An account with personal details of employees is not someone's home.
I guess you couldn't argue with perfectly sensible analogy I gave, so you had to make a completely over the top one involving burglars breaking into a home.
I WANT people doing what this kid did. It's the only way we'll approach true security. There is a fine line, but this didn't cross it (my opinion of course, and you're entitled to yours)....
But Davev1.0, I don't know why you're so bitter as to call me a hypocrite, (especially based on your own argument, not anything I said or did... which makes no sense and makes it look like you took my post personally for some weird reason)... Are you the sysadmin of that school or something?...Or maybe just someone who has messed up in a similar fashion? You may want to get anger issue looked at prior to upgrading to "Davev2.0."
I'd say nothing can be assumed when it comes to penalizing people for acts which no officer has witnessed and plantiffs cannot prove definitely occured (other than the copy which they themselves downloaded, which should be some form of entrapment), especially when you are talking about the sort of severe penalties they are.
The problem here is that the way technology is trending (towards openness, decentralization) is heading opposite of the direction governments and laws are heading (towards more laws, repressive laws, loss of freedom and rights for the average citizen).
I see a confrontation coming, and this copyright issue provides one window to it - between this and the constant "cyberterrorism" scare being foisted upon the public they will lead the people towards more government control online, definitive ID online, etc - and that's fucked IMO.
This is bullshit - I am really tired of hearing these scenarios where ignorant fascist assholes are doing serious damage to the reputation and future of kids who are doing the right thing.
The message being sent is that rather than being honest, helpful and productive member of networked society we're teaching kids that it's better to be deceptive and not expose dangerous security flaws....and FELONIES? What the fuck?!
I feel that there is a message that both the powers that be (and irresponsible sys admins who have been professionally shamed by these revelations) want to send - the sysadmins don't want to be embarrassed by kids - the feds or police either don't understand and are hearing sys admins tell them that "these meddling kids broke into our system, it's certainly not MY fault for not securing it" or people who should know better thinking that it's better to send the message that killing the messenger is the appropriate way to handle security, EG what people don't know won't hurt them and what we don't see we wont have to deal with.
I believe that this should be explained to those who aren't very computer/network literate with the following analogy: Let's say you live in one of those multifloor apartment buildings where there is an area in the lobby with many mailboxes which all lock. Each resident gets a key for their own box. This kid either accidentally (or just to see if his and other mailboxes are secure) plugs the key into the wrong box or a box that isn't his and finds that his key (and by logic every other resident's key) opens every mailbox in the building. The mailbox he tests the key on contains an envelope with a ton of cash sticking out of it. He goes to the landlord and says "hey, these keys provide no security because any key can open all mailboxes, and by the way, this mailbox had a ton of cash in it - here's the cash, I didn't want it to get stolen" and he is then arrested and charged with breaking and entering, grand larceny, and other such offenses.
I hope that if any high profile tech people get a chance to comment on this in the press or end up assisting the defense (if it was to go to trial) that they can send a message that criminalizing someone who is doing the right thing is just wrong...
No, see, in the UK your numerous spy agencies and government apparatchiks get to keep this information to themselves for their own little nefarious purposes. Since the government there genuinely does not seem to care about the privacy or civil rights of it's citizens (not that the US is any better) I think the only reason for such an act is to prevent lessor idiots from ruining it for the martinets - who, I am quite sure, do exactly the same sort of curious browsing (or worse) of your personal details as some lowly desk clerk would.
At least here we get to find out what kind of fucked up info is in our government databases because there's always some television addicted civil servant or "hacker" with an inferiority complex who fucks up and gets caught looking up data on somone just cause they've been on TV or in the news.
I hate this instant infobullshitnews celebrity culture aspect of modern life. It blows my mind to think that the public used to be fascinated by people like Einstein and Lindburgh and scientists, now it's trust fund debutante whores and reality TV stars...and it seems to get worse and more vaccuous every year. I can only imagine where this TV culture will be in 20 years...maybe "who wants to date a mass murderer!"
They ignore anything that may set them back because those within these western governments pushing this garbage really don't give a fuck about child porn, protecting the people, or anything. It is all politics; window dressing for censorship and control, a conduit to get an agenda they've wanted for a very long time rammmed through whatever sort of consitutional or other protetctions (including mass opinion) the people supposedly have against these sorts of abuses.
Another interestingly disgusting point when to comes to child porn (and other sexual behaviors that are not criminal but just as denounced by these guys) is that there have been many occasions where politicians, community leaders, priests, leaders of socially conservative movements, etc who are vocal and fervent denoucers and crusaders against such things are caught with this material or, worse, even involved in producing and distributing it.. the nebraska Franklin scandal that the Reagan/Bush whitehouse was caught up in comes to mind....
As a political issue child porn is like terrorism - it's an awful thing, but is also one of those political trump cards - and these slick bastards know it and use it as such.
"I don't get it. Nearly everyone with professional knowledge of computer science and/or hardware, including technology enthusiasts who'd otherwise embrace any new technology, advise against voting machines, because they know that the necessary level of trust and security is impossible to reach. Why don't the politicians for once listen to those who genuinely know better?"
I think that the answer to that is pretty self-evident:
It is because their primary concerns are not accuracy and "what the people want," I mean, it's not like the government and these people running for president don't have access to smart people and good technology (not necessarily electronic). It's not like they don't know what makes elections fair and verifiable and what systems are prone to manipulation.
Their primary concerns are control, keeping the status quo and pleasing their corporate/govt benefactors,(who are not "the people.")
So the real question then becomes: why is this tolerated?
(I shudder to think what methods some of these psychos working in intel may have devised to try to counter this sort of argument - especially with how severely the "laws" in these western countries now seem to be getting in respect to not allowing any sort of due process).
The thing is that people DO forget passwords, especially ones they don't use everyday and, I would think, even more so with something embarassing, very private, or potentially incriminating that someone is going to want to make secure.
How would this be dealt with? I am sure they'd say it was all a ruse, but what if it wasn't?
Would they try to lock someone up until they "remember?" No due process there really, but I guess that is a disappearing concept, which is sad reallly.
Can you repeat that last sentence...uh, several times???.....It just feels so good to think about these kleptocratic oligarch-pig-fellators being shot.
It seems like that is the way to have a good career in IT security - either get arrested for "cyber crime" or carry out famous (or infamous) exploits in your younger years and then reform or be released and get paid to do exactly the same thing on behalf of corporations.
It makes sense. You can't learn this stuff by reading books, you need real world situations to hone your skills.
It is interesting that illegal acts committed in your teens can lead to a good "legitimate" job in the same area. If it worked that way for all teenage unlawful behavior I'd probably be head of Sandoz Pharmaceuticals instead of an IT director.
For day to day surfing on Windows machines I enjoy Chrome, it is a lot faster than IE and doesn't seem to crash like IE7 in Vista does.
I also prefer it for slashdot moderation as IE7 does not seem to work anymore. (I did submit this bug after seeing this issue on several different computers on different networks).
Chrome is fast. I did have to fix one thing; I noticed with my laptop the scrollbar on the touchpad would only scroll down, not up.
If you have this issue there is a simple patch which fixes this perfectly and instantly:
I was a treo user for 4 years prior to getting my iphone about a month ago.
Not being able to swap out the battery for a fresh one was something that bothered me, especially once I started using the iphone and seeing that there are tons of great apps and practically endless uses for the damn thing.
I researched it and ended up buying a device that is slightly smaller (thinner) than a deck of cards made by APC (the UPB10) - it's an external battery charger - you charge it up and keep it with you. When your iphone (or PSP, other cellphone, or other electronic device) needs to be recharged you just plug it into the usb port on this thing and press the button. You can do passthrough charging, so that you are charging both the APC and the iphone at the same time too; http://www.apc.com/resource/include/techspec_index.cfm?base_sku=UPB10%20
It can completely charge my iphone 3g from dead to fully charged twice before I need to recharge it. It's smart and will turn off once it charges the phone completely. It also serves as a power source so you can use your phone while it is charging.
I got mine at Amazon for $60 and am very happy with the purchase.
From an environmental standpoint I am assuming all of these batteries can be recycled. From a privacy standpoint it would be nice to be able to remove the battery.
I have seen way too much credible evidence that this disease was likely engineered to give creedence to this particular report - I've done quite a bit of reading about it on both sides of the issue and for now that is what I believe. I have put some links below the appropriations bill that cover some of the information, The records are there, and this appropriations bill is is just one of many, many things that seem to show this - including a flowchart that seems to show the development of AIDS as an engineered disease from 1971.
HEARINGS BEFORE A SUBCOMMITTEE OF THE COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES NINETY-FIRST CONGRESS FIRST SESSION SUBCOMMITTEE ON DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE APPROPRIATIONS
H.B. 15090
PART 5 RESEARCH, DEVELOPMENT, TEST, AND EVALUATION
Department of the Army Statement of Director, Advanced Research Project Agency Statement of Director, Defense Research and Engineering
Printed for the use of the Committee on Appropriations U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE WASHINGTON : 1969 UNITED STATES SENATE LIBRARY
[pg.] 129 TUESDAY, JULY 1, 1969
SYNTHETIC BIOLOGICAL AGENTS
There are two things about the biological agent field I would like to mention. One is the possibility of technological surprise. Molecular biology is a field that is advancing very rapidly and eminent biologists believe that within a period of 5 to 10 years it would be possible to produce a synthetic biological agent, an agent that does not naturally exist and for which no natural immunity could have been acquired. MR. SIKES. Are we doing any work in that field? DR. MACARTHUR. We are not. MR. SIKES. Why not? Lack of money or lack of interest? DR. MACARTHUR. Certainly not lack of interest. MR. SIKES. Would you provide for our records information on what would be required, what the advantages of such a program would be, the time and the cost involved? DR. MACARTHUR. We will be very happy to. (The information follows:)
The dramatic progress being made in the field of molecular biology led us to investigate the relevance of this field of science to biological warfare. A small group of experts considered this matter and provided the following observations: 1. All biological agents up the the present time are representatives of naturally occurring disease, and are thus known by scientists throughout the world. They are easily available to qualified scientists for research, either for offensive or defensive purposes. 2. Within the next 5 to 10 years, it would probably be possible to make a new infective microorganism which could differ in certain important aspects from any known disease-causing organisms. Most important of these is that it might be refractory to the immunological and therapeutic processes upon which we depend to maintain our relative freedom from infectious disease. 3. A research program to explore the feasibility of this could be completed in approximately 5 years at a total cost of $10 million. 4. It would be very difficult to establish such a program. Molecular biology is a relatively new science. There are not many highly competent scientists in the field. Almost all are in university laboratories, and they are generally adequately supported from sources other than DOD. However, it was considered possible to initiate an adequate program through the National Academy of Sciences - National Research Council (NAS-NRC). The matter was discussed with the NAS-NRC, and tentative plans were plans were made to initiate the program. However decreasing funds in CB, growing criticism of the CB program, and our reluctance to involve the NAS-NRC in such a controversial endeavor have led us to postpone it for the past 2 years.
I think the whole entire "Net Neutrality" argument is a scam. IMO it's about two things primarily:
First, I think it's about making a whole lot of money for, and giving corporate welfare/protectionism to large communications companies that have had plenty of the subsidies from the govt and taxpayers in the past - technology is making things they used to charge an arm and a leg for free, or practically free - look at VOIP for one - and every year the web and our networked society seems to progress more.
Second though, and more importantly, I think it is about control and censorship. The government and these large media conglomerates don't like that people can get any sort of unfiltered information they'd like from around the world in real time. They don't like the fact that people can get news up to the minute from anywhere on any subject that they are interested in that is likely less biased, more accurate, and less full of "agenda setting talking point spin" than they can from TV News* (which has really become absurd, it's Paris/Britney mixed with a health dose of paranoia-behavior-control). They don't like it that instead of having some fascist douche like Bill O'Reilly telling people "what the news means to them," people can either look it up on their own or find their own place full of smart people with diverse views to have conversations with (Slashdot being a perfect example).. They don't like how the net can be used as a tool for orgaqnization and mass communication by practically anybody.
When one of your main goals is control, and knowledge and information are pwoer - the internet is your enemy.
*Now everything I have stated as populist advantages to a free internet can also have their downsides, for example - not all news online is accurate, honest, agenda free - but compared to what you see on TV it is, especially if you are even halfway savvy consumer of media you can find it easily. Also, anything that can be used to spread information can also be used to disinform - but I don't think anything comes close to the amount of disinformation/one-sided information and societal control as network television does.
So these are the real drivers of anti-net neutrality: Money and control. All of this stuff about not having enough capacity, and how strained the internet is - those issues can be solved so many ways properly without creating a digital ghetto for non-corporate/big money websites.
I understand your point and am well aware of the situation in Russia as well as the Russia mob's reach other places.
My post wasn't about being able to unable to criticize the government.
My point is that rackeetering murderers are racketeering murderers. The fact that the "good guys," neck deep in lies, blood, theft, treason etc are more beaurocratic about it only makes them worse IMO.
Slashdot Mirror
I think you should be flattered, but that must kind of suck. I hope you're not suggesting that by posting it here I was trying to pass it off as my own.
For the record (though I think it's fairly obvious that I wasn't trying to plagiarize anybody as I cited it the way I found it) after I originally read it a forum cited as I mentioned I googled it and found it in many places exactly as I posted it here or unattributed.
I think it's a very succinct and well reasoned argument.
If I were to show your essay to somebody in the future, how would you like to be cited? By Ravenshrike?
The Gun is Civilization, by Maj. L. Caudill, USMC (Ret)
Human beings only have two ways to deal with one another: reason and force. If you want me to do something for you, you have a choice of either convincing me via argument, or make me do your bidding under threat of force. Every human interaction falls into one of those two categories, without exception. Reason or force, that's it.
In a truly moral and civilized society, people exclusively interact through persuasion. Force has no place as a valid method of social interaction, and the only thing that removes force from the menu is the personal firearm, as paradoxical as it may sound to some.
When I carry a gun, you cannot deal with me by force. You have to use reason and try to persuade me, because I have a way to negate your threat or employment of force.
The gun is the only personal weapon that puts a 100-pound woman on equal footing with a 220-pound mugger, a 75-year old retiree on equal footing with a 19-year old gang banger, and a single guy on equal footing with a carload of drunk guys with baseball bats. The gun removes the disparity in physical strength, size, or numbers between a potential attacker and a defender.
There are plenty of people who consider the gun as the source of bad force equations. These are the people who think that we'd be more civilized if all guns were removed from society, because a firearm makes it easier for a [armed] mugger to do his job. That, of course, is only true if the mugger's potential victims are mostly disarmed either by choice or by legislative fiat--it has no validity when most of a mugger's potential marks are armed.
People who argue for the banning of arms ask for automatic rule by the young, the strong, and the many, and that's the exact opposite of a civilized society. A mugger, even an armed one, can only make a successful living in a society where the state has granted him a force monopoly.
Then there's the argument that the gun makes confrontations lethal that otherwise would only result in injury. This argument is fallacious in several ways. Without guns involved, confrontations are won by the physically superior party inflicting overwhelming injury on the loser.
People who think that fists, bats, sticks, or stones don't constitute lethal force watch too much TV, where people take beatings and come out of it with a bloody lip at worst. The fact that the gun makes lethal force easier works solely in favor of the weaker defender, not the stronger attacker. If both are armed, the field is level.
The gun is the only weapon that's as lethal in the hands of an octogenarian as it is in the hands of a weight lifter. It simply wouldn't work as well as a force equalizer if it wasn't both lethal and easily employable.
When I carry a gun, I don't do so because I am looking for a fight, but because I'm looking to be left alone. The gun at my side means that I cannot be forced, only persuaded. I don't carry it because I'm afraid, but because it enables me to be unafraid. It doesn't limit the actions of those who would interact with me through reason, only the actions of those who would do so by force. It removes force from the equation...and that's why carrying a gun is a civilized act.
So the greatest civilization is one where all citizens are equally armed and can only be persuaded, never forced.
I can't believe that whoever handles this stuff for BT isn't aware of the "Streisand Effect." Maybe their PR staff had nothing to do with it.
It's the stupidest thing you can do these days, tring to censor your customer base in public like that.
It's one of the things that really makes me feel good about the internet, and one of the few phenomenons in these times where people can organize (without even organizing) and change the behavior of a corporate behemoth.
It must drive authoritarian corporations and governments crazy. I love it.
Nice catch. I agree with you, it IS coincedental, to say the least....
Unfortunately many people in America still think things are the way they are on TV, they way we all like to think America is.
In truth, when you do something public that purports to shine light into the incredible amount of malfeasance, scandal, and many times outright criminal or unconstitutional activity of the federal government don't think that they wont look for a way to "fuck up your game."
This is just one facet of what the justice system has become in America - it is abused by those who control it and abusive towards their enemies and the masses in general.
I'm not a big Mark Cuban fan, but I don't dislike him either - I haven't had a chance to really examine bailoutsleuth in detail, but I have to say that at least he has done soemthing rather than just complain about it - this whole financial situation we're in is total bullshit and is no accident, nor is the way that much of this bailout money is being used (EG for bonuses and other such crap). Every day we get deeper into fascism (and BTW, I am not one of those people crying "fascism, fascism" at every perceived injustice; I am talking about the definition of that word - and that is what America is becoming.
People are supposed to be presumed innocent - but have you looked at the way federal prosecutors behave? If you're facing federal charges you can be pretty fucked, it's a plea bargain game because the penalties are so severe that it's basically gambling with your life and livlihood - and the prosecutors and judges seem to reap political dividends from this system because it raises their conviction and sentencing stats among other things; and once something like this has been in the press you're pretty fucked in the court of public opinion too.
So yes, I think he stepped on some toes trying to show people what's really going on "behind the curtain" and stop it; publically.... so the powers that be decided to do a little digging or pulled out a file that was ready for the occasion, and viola, bend over Mark Cuban.
I have this router and it's worked really well - has been very stable and has a whole lot of really nice features - I do a lot of remote stuff both ways too and from work - not to mentioned bittorrent and binaries, webcams. Never have a problem, never have to reboot it.
Additionally the router has a feature that can email you when a new update comes out, the download page had a link for 1.21 with securespot and 1.21 without - I checked out what it was and decided against it. As others have mentioned. Below is the link I used:
ftp://ftp.dlink.com/Gateway/dir655/Firmware/dir655_firmware_121_no_securespot.zip
I agree with how most people feel, that they need to be a little more upfront - a lot of the people here aren't going to want that feature - however, there are some people who may - among other things I think it has parental controls, it's like websense for the home user.
When you're updating the firmware on any device and not paying attention to the changes and what they actually do you're going to end up getting fucked, - especially when it comes to consumer home devices like these.
Just how often do particles go "through the side of the beam pipe"? That sounds ... bad.
Well, it sounds to me like someone just doesn't know how to use a carb.
Perhaps they should switch to a vaporizor...
That analogy isn't the same; I never said anything like that...An account with personal details of employees is not someone's home.
I guess you couldn't argue with perfectly sensible analogy I gave, so you had to make a completely over the top one involving burglars breaking into a home.
I WANT people doing what this kid did. It's the only way we'll approach true security. There is a fine line, but this didn't cross it (my opinion of course, and you're entitled to yours)....
But Davev1.0, I don't know why you're so bitter as to call me a hypocrite, (especially based on your own argument, not anything I said or did... which makes no sense and makes it look like you took my post personally for some weird reason)... Are you the sysadmin of that school or something? ...Or maybe just someone who has messed up in a similar fashion? You may want to get anger issue looked at prior to upgrading to "Davev2.0."
I'd say nothing can be assumed when it comes to penalizing people for acts which no officer has witnessed and plantiffs cannot prove definitely occured (other than the copy which they themselves downloaded, which should be some form of entrapment), especially when you are talking about the sort of severe penalties they are.
The problem here is that the way technology is trending (towards openness, decentralization) is heading opposite of the direction governments and laws are heading (towards more laws, repressive laws, loss of freedom and rights for the average citizen).
I see a confrontation coming, and this copyright issue provides one window to it - between this and the constant "cyberterrorism" scare being foisted upon the public they will lead the people towards more government control online, definitive ID online, etc - and that's fucked IMO.
This is bullshit - I am really tired of hearing these scenarios where ignorant fascist assholes are doing serious damage to the reputation and future of kids who are doing the right thing.
The message being sent is that rather than being honest, helpful and productive member of networked society we're teaching kids that it's better to be deceptive and not expose dangerous security flaws. ...and FELONIES? What the fuck?!
I feel that there is a message that both the powers that be (and irresponsible sys admins who have been professionally shamed by these revelations) want to send - the sysadmins don't want to be embarrassed by kids - the feds or police either don't understand and are hearing sys admins tell them that "these meddling kids broke into our system, it's certainly not MY fault for not securing it" or people who should know better thinking that it's better to send the message that killing the messenger is the appropriate way to handle security, EG what people don't know won't hurt them and what we don't see we wont have to deal with.
I believe that this should be explained to those who aren't very computer/network literate with the following analogy: Let's say you live in one of those multifloor apartment buildings where there is an area in the lobby with many mailboxes which all lock. Each resident gets a key for their own box. This kid either accidentally (or just to see if his and other mailboxes are secure) plugs the key into the wrong box or a box that isn't his and finds that his key (and by logic every other resident's key) opens every mailbox in the building. The mailbox he tests the key on contains an envelope with a ton of cash sticking out of it. He goes to the landlord and says "hey, these keys provide no security because any key can open all mailboxes, and by the way, this mailbox had a ton of cash in it - here's the cash, I didn't want it to get stolen" and he is then arrested and charged with breaking and entering, grand larceny, and other such offenses.
I hope that if any high profile tech people get a chance to comment on this in the press or end up assisting the defense (if it was to go to trial) that they can send a message that criminalizing someone who is doing the right thing is just wrong...
No, see, in the UK your numerous spy agencies and government apparatchiks get to keep this information to themselves for their own little nefarious purposes. Since the government there genuinely does not seem to care about the privacy or civil rights of it's citizens (not that the US is any better) I think the only reason for such an act is to prevent lessor idiots from ruining it for the martinets - who, I am quite sure, do exactly the same sort of curious browsing (or worse) of your personal details as some lowly desk clerk would.
At least here we get to find out what kind of fucked up info is in our government databases because there's always some television addicted civil servant or "hacker" with an inferiority complex who fucks up and gets caught looking up data on somone just cause they've been on TV or in the news.
I hate this instant infobullshitnews celebrity culture aspect of modern life. It blows my mind to think that the public used to be fascinated by people like Einstein and Lindburgh and scientists, now it's trust fund debutante whores and reality TV stars...and it seems to get worse and more vaccuous every year. I can only imagine where this TV culture will be in 20 years...maybe "who wants to date a mass murderer!"
Seems to me (these days) that the US Army is a potential terrorist tool....
Bill?
Is that you Bill O'Rielly?
They ignore anything that may set them back because those within these western governments pushing this garbage really don't give a fuck about child porn, protecting the people, or anything. It is all politics; window dressing for censorship and control, a conduit to get an agenda they've wanted for a very long time rammmed through whatever sort of consitutional or other protetctions (including mass opinion) the people supposedly have against these sorts of abuses.
Another interestingly disgusting point when to comes to child porn (and other sexual behaviors that are not criminal but just as denounced by these guys) is that there have been many occasions where politicians, community leaders, priests, leaders of socially conservative movements, etc who are vocal and fervent denoucers and crusaders against such things are caught with this material or, worse, even involved in producing and distributing it.. the nebraska Franklin scandal that the Reagan/Bush whitehouse was caught up in comes to mind....
As a political issue child porn is like terrorism - it's an awful thing, but is also one of those political trump cards - and these slick bastards know it and use it as such.
"I don't get it. Nearly everyone with professional knowledge of computer science and/or hardware, including technology enthusiasts who'd otherwise embrace any new technology, advise against voting machines, because they know that the necessary level of trust and security is impossible to reach. Why don't the politicians for once listen to those who genuinely know better?"
I think that the answer to that is pretty self-evident:
It is because their primary concerns are not accuracy and "what the people want," I mean, it's not like the government and these people running for president don't have access to smart people and good technology (not necessarily electronic). It's not like they don't know what makes elections fair and verifiable and what systems are prone to manipulation.
Their primary concerns are control, keeping the status quo and pleasing their corporate/govt benefactors,(who are not "the people.")
So the real question then becomes: why is this tolerated?
Well, if you're going to do that then you'd best make sure "it can blend" immediately afterward.
I forgot.
Prove I didn't.
(I shudder to think what methods some of these psychos working in intel may have devised to try to counter this sort of argument - especially with how severely the "laws" in these western countries now seem to be getting in respect to not allowing any sort of due process).
The thing is that people DO forget passwords, especially ones they don't use everyday and, I would think, even more so with something embarassing, very private, or potentially incriminating that someone is going to want to make secure.
How would this be dealt with? I am sure they'd say it was all a ruse, but what if it wasn't?
Would they try to lock someone up until they "remember?" No due process there really, but I guess that is a disappearing concept, which is sad reallly.
"Statistics can be used by anyone to prove anything...40% of people know that" - Homer J. Simpson.
So I guess they never considered that someone who is riding in the car and not driving may need to use the phone?
I am assuming from something I read in TFA I guess you can override it - but if you can override it then what is the point of it?
Seems like one of those things that some people would think is really great in theory, but in practice wouldn't be used (like UAC).
Can you repeat that last sentence...uh, several times???.....It just feels so good to think about these kleptocratic oligarch-pig-fellators being shot.
It seems like that is the way to have a good career in IT security - either get arrested for "cyber crime" or carry out famous (or infamous) exploits in your younger years and then reform or be released and get paid to do exactly the same thing on behalf of corporations.
It makes sense. You can't learn this stuff by reading books, you need real world situations to hone your skills.
It is interesting that illegal acts committed in your teens can lead to a good "legitimate" job in the same area. If it worked that way for all teenage unlawful behavior I'd probably be head of Sandoz Pharmaceuticals instead of an IT director.
For day to day surfing on Windows machines I enjoy Chrome, it is a lot faster than IE and doesn't seem to crash like IE7 in Vista does.
I also prefer it for slashdot moderation as IE7 does not seem to work anymore. (I did submit this bug after seeing this issue on several different computers on different networks).
Chrome is fast. I did have to fix one thing; I noticed with my laptop the scrollbar on the touchpad would only scroll down, not up.
If you have this issue there is a simple patch which fixes this perfectly and instantly:
http://www.surfchrome.com/index.php/home/news-list-mode/81-patch-fix-for-synaptics-touchpad-scroll
And there are the other missing add ons that people have mentioned, but I suspect those will come along.
I was a treo user for 4 years prior to getting my iphone about a month ago.
Not being able to swap out the battery for a fresh one was something that bothered me, especially once I started using the iphone and seeing that there are tons of great apps and practically endless uses for the damn thing.
I researched it and ended up buying a device that is slightly smaller (thinner) than a deck of cards made by APC (the UPB10) - it's an external battery charger - you charge it up and keep it with you. When your iphone (or PSP, other cellphone, or other electronic device) needs to be recharged you just plug it into the usb port on this thing and press the button. You can do passthrough charging, so that you are charging both the APC and the iphone at the same time too; http://www.apc.com/resource/include/techspec_index.cfm?base_sku=UPB10%20
It can completely charge my iphone 3g from dead to fully charged twice before I need to recharge it. It's smart and will turn off once it charges the phone completely. It also serves as a power source so you can use your phone while it is charging.
I got mine at Amazon for $60 and am very happy with the purchase.
From an environmental standpoint I am assuming all of these batteries can be recycled. From a privacy standpoint it would be nice to be able to remove the battery.
I have seen way too much credible evidence that this disease was likely engineered to give creedence to this particular report - I've done quite a bit of reading about it on both sides of the issue and for now that is what I believe. I have put some links below the appropriations bill that cover some of the information, The records are there, and this appropriations bill is is just one of many, many things that seem to show this - including a flowchart that seems to show the development of AIDS as an engineered disease from 1971.
http://www.scribd.com/doc/3280929/Special-Virus-Program-AIDS-Flow-Chart-TOP-SECRET (Flowchart of the "Special Virus Cancer Program")
DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE APPROPRIATIONS FOR 1970
HEARINGS BEFORE A SUBCOMMITTEE OF THE COMMITTEE ON APPROPRIATIONS HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
NINETY-FIRST CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
SUBCOMMITTEE ON DEPARTMENT OF DEFENSE APPROPRIATIONS
H.B. 15090
PART 5
RESEARCH, DEVELOPMENT, TEST, AND EVALUATION
Department of the Army
Statement of Director, Advanced Research Project Agency
Statement of Director, Defense Research and Engineering
Printed for the use of the Committee on Appropriations
U.S. GOVERNMENT PRINTING OFFICE
WASHINGTON : 1969
UNITED STATES SENATE LIBRARY
[pg.] 129 TUESDAY, JULY 1, 1969
SYNTHETIC BIOLOGICAL AGENTS
There are two things about the biological agent field I would like to mention. One is the possibility of technological surprise. Molecular biology is a field that is advancing very rapidly and eminent biologists believe that within a period of 5 to 10 years it would be possible to produce a synthetic biological agent, an agent that does not naturally exist and for which no natural immunity could have been acquired.
MR. SIKES. Are we doing any work in that field?
DR. MACARTHUR. We are not.
MR. SIKES. Why not? Lack of money or lack of interest?
DR. MACARTHUR. Certainly not lack of interest.
MR. SIKES. Would you provide for our records information on what would be required, what the advantages of such a program would be, the time and the cost involved?
DR. MACARTHUR. We will be very happy to.
(The information follows:)
The dramatic progress being made in the field of molecular biology led us to investigate the relevance of this field of science to biological warfare. A small group of experts considered this matter and provided the following observations:
1. All biological agents up the the present time are representatives of naturally occurring disease, and are thus known by scientists throughout the world. They are easily available to qualified scientists for research, either for offensive or defensive purposes.
2. Within the next 5 to 10 years, it would probably be possible to make a new infective microorganism which could differ in certain important aspects from any known disease-causing organisms. Most important of these is that it might be refractory to the immunological and therapeutic processes upon which we depend to maintain our relative freedom from infectious disease.
3. A research program to explore the feasibility of this could be completed in approximately 5 years at a total cost of $10 million.
4. It would be very difficult to establish such a program. Molecular biology is a relatively new science. There are not many highly competent scientists in the field. Almost all are in university laboratories, and they are generally adequately supported from sources other than DOD. However, it was considered possible to initiate an adequate program through the National Academy of Sciences - National Research Council (NAS-NRC).
The matter was discussed with the NAS-NRC, and tentative plans were plans were made to initiate the program. However decreasing funds in CB, growing criticism of the CB program, and our reluctance to involve the NAS-NRC in such a controversial endeavor have led us to postpone it for the past 2 years.
I think the whole entire "Net Neutrality" argument is a scam. IMO it's about two things primarily:
First, I think it's about making a whole lot of money for, and giving corporate welfare/protectionism to large communications companies that have had plenty of the subsidies from the govt and taxpayers in the past - technology is making things they used to charge an arm and a leg for free, or practically free - look at VOIP for one - and every year the web and our networked society seems to progress more.
Second though, and more importantly, I think it is about control and censorship. The government and these large media conglomerates don't like that people can get any sort of unfiltered information they'd like from around the world in real time. They don't like the fact that people can get news up to the minute from anywhere on any subject that they are interested in that is likely less biased, more accurate, and less full of "agenda setting talking point spin" than they can from TV News* (which has really become absurd, it's Paris/Britney mixed with a health dose of paranoia-behavior-control). They don't like it that instead of having some fascist douche like Bill O'Reilly telling people "what the news means to them," people can either look it up on their own or find their own place full of smart people with diverse views to have conversations with (Slashdot being a perfect example).. They don't like how the net can be used as a tool for orgaqnization and mass communication by practically anybody.
When one of your main goals is control, and knowledge and information are pwoer - the internet is your enemy.
*Now everything I have stated as populist advantages to a free internet can also have their downsides, for example - not all news online is accurate, honest, agenda free - but compared to what you see on TV it is, especially if you are even halfway savvy consumer of media you can find it easily. Also, anything that can be used to spread information can also be used to disinform - but I don't think anything comes close to the amount of disinformation/one-sided information and societal control as network television does.
So these are the real drivers of anti-net neutrality: Money and control. All of this stuff about not having enough capacity, and how strained the internet is - those issues can be solved so many ways properly without creating a digital ghetto for non-corporate/big money websites.
I understand your point and am well aware of the situation in Russia as well as the Russia mob's reach other places.
My post wasn't about being able to unable to criticize the government.
My point is that rackeetering murderers are racketeering murderers. The fact that the "good guys," neck deep in lies, blood, theft, treason etc are more beaurocratic about it only makes them worse IMO.