Eliminate all menial labor without drastically increasing the quality of education would result in massive unemployment and unrest, I fear. Yes, people would still be having trouble with their DSL, but as a result of the riots. You know, I couldn't disagree with you more. You know why this technology is "suddenly" popping up even though we've really had it for a long time? How about the recent crack down on 'illegal aliens' in the states? This is going to spread everywhere because the cheap labor that was once here will slowly dry up. The people who traveled to farms to work in the summer, they can't do that anymore. You should expect to see these robots of various sizes and kinds show up on farms too to off set our loss of cheap labor.
I don't really look at Mexicans as merely cheap labor, I'm just speaking in very frank terms of what anti-immigration laws and fence building are going to do to us.
If you are still productive from the result of a robot and the person who used to have that job can now go to school, I only see more skilled workers in the workforce. People aren't as stupid as you think they are, they just haven't had a chance to go to school. There may be a generation or two that adapt badly to this new model but I welcome the future where a farming family's children now have the option to go to school because the farm can be just as efficient and producing as it would be without the children.
Corporate farms are going to love this even though they'll hate the initial cost of the machines being greater than the poor Mexican wages.
At the time I wondered, after seeing all those flattened trees, how they failed to find the crater. Wouldn't it just be a case of going to several spots, drawing a parallel line to the flattened trees, then looking on a map for the point where the lines intersect? Presumably all the trees fell "away" from the blast area. No, the explosion was above ground level, see our prior discussion on this.
Also, my post on this has a link to a PDF with a sketch of the breaking apart and trajectories.
Also, remember how long ago this happened. There was an expedition there but they didn't have the technology we did. I'm not sure if the tree patterns would help you 100 years later.
Maybe his daughter was caught using an iPod? Or perhaps his work machine's cache was found to have a Google Search results page in it?
But, in all seriousness, it wouldn't surprise me if Microsoft had a very stringent agreement with it's employees such that you're guilty of violating company policy at all times. Something really vague and impossible to avoid like "you shall not support a competitor in anyway with any of your personal funds or free time." They only let you go if they want to and so few get let go on these grounds that nobody really cares about it. Does anyone know if this is the case?
It really wouldn't surprise me if they treated their employees the same way they treat their customers.
Two words: Puzzle Pirates. Well, believe it or not, Puzzle Pirates uses Java 1.4, not Flash (like the title of the article states). From the installation requirements:
Puzzle Pirates runs in Java 1.4 and is presently supported on Windows 98, ME, 2000, and XP, on Mac OS X 10.3 'Panther' on Linux and other Unix platforms. If this article were not restricted to flash only games, I think the quality of the games would be a bit better.
Now, I'm not a lawyer but I believe they are escalating this too far too fast.
"Comcast's blatant and deceptive BitTorrent blocking is exactly the type of problem advocates warned would occur without Net Neutrality laws." Now why would you go and bring that into this? If this is because your end goal is to have Net Neutrality laws, then you're starting from the wrong point. I think what just happened there is this turned from "Discriminating Against Customers Based on Their Needs & Rights" to a political hot topic that has been raging for the past four or so years. And another reason you may want to distance yourself from that (if you want to win this case) is that currently, there are no Federal Laws. So now you have all the politicians (who so far have decided amongst themselves that these laws are unnecessary) watching you, I wonder how the Federal Communications Commission is going to rule on this?
Now, with that said, there is one option that could be taken now that Net Neutrality has been brought into this.
I see from the PDF that the people filing this complaint are from Washington, DC. It probably should have been filed in New York with the demands specifying only NY victims for the time being. Why might you ask NY? Well, it's the only state to have established net neutrality as a telecommunications standard (See 16 NYCRR Part 605). And this case is exactly the definition of what those standards are put in place to protect!
So while it may have had to be filed with the FCC, the real place where you could pretty much guaranty a (maybe even court case) win against Comcast is in the state of New York. I know they provide service there and I think it would be more prudent to first prove your point there, then file a complaint to the FCC from New York after the local government has awarded the victims there.
In my opinion, a guaranteed sure win in a small battle is bigger than a huge uncertainty in the overall war.
How does the outcome of thousands of already drawn balls assure that same frequency will continue to occur?
These differences aren't that compelling. To me I would say, "Congratulations, you have found some deviation from equal frequency for all balls. But this would happen in any instance of drawing these balls."
I'm concerned that this has been an exercise in deviation in pseudo random systems. The same could be done with a computer simulation and similar results would be found.
I hate to say it but this study points out to me that the lottery is actually pretty much as close to random as it could get. In fact, the summary of the paper states that if there were some event to skew this, then you could achieve a small bonus:
However, in the event there is some peculiar factor skewing the ball selection such that any of these trends continue, a player stands a mildly better chance of winning a partial prize through the selection of weighted numbers. However this peculiar factor can not only be identified but if it exists, it is highly unlikely it is anything even remotely observable.
It should probably be noted (as one of the articles states) that this release is dedicated to a man who passed away a few days ago. From another article on KernelTrap:
"Jun-ichiro 'itojun' Itoh Hagino passed away on October 29, 2007 at the age of 37. "To those in the BSD communities he was simply Itojun, best known in his role as IPv6 KAME project core researcher. Itojun did the vast majority of the work to get IPv6 into the BSD network stacks. He was also instrumental in moving IPv6 forward in all aspects through his participation in IETF protocol design meetings. Itojun was helpful to everyone around him, and dedicated to his work. He believed and worked toward making technology available to everyone. He will be missed, and always remembered." Truly unfortunate for the open source community, the networking community & all of Itojun's family. It's a shame to see someone so promising go at a young age.
Wow! Are we trying to convince people that Linux sucks? On the contrary, the article points out the hilarity that would ensue if someone would install Vista:
If users want to install Windows on it, they can, though Everex cautions that Vista will not run well without a RAM upgrade. Recent games will not run well, if at all, on the gPC: the requirements of even humble titles like World of Warcraft exceed the system specifications. I think that people are soon going to realize something that speaks to their pocket books about Linux: it runs on the slowest of hardware. Sure, webpages and plugins will require more resources but that's the great advantage Linux will always have over Windows--that minimum requirements is nearly unbeatable. So keep tweaking that kernel and you'll start to see a $150 machine go on sale that will do nearly everything. Then a $100 machine. Then an $80 machine. And so on and so forth until you'd have to be a raving lunatic (or fat rich American) to pay the beefy cost of a premium machine just so you have the resources that the latest Windows needs to consume.
How much precisely will you pay to have your UI look like glass and all your games run at the highest resolutions? I think we're approaching the point where only avid gamers & people with too much disposable income will support the ladened OS that is Windows.
What's really strange is I can't find anything on this from Microsoft or Intel. You're providing 150,000 laptops at only $200 each to a developing nation for the purposes of education and you don't have a press release outside of that country? Maybe they're just being humble? Or maybe someone was leveraging their ex-boss's many donations to African medicine & development to convince the Libyan government to take a different route?
You know, it's great that the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is donating all that money to research and aide but if word gets out that they're using that to influence who those countries do business with, I don't think anyone's going to be impressed anymore. There's something fishy going on here, I'll bet you start to see many more countries make the switch to Classmate PCs over OLPCs... and not for the technological reasons that they should be concerned with.
why did he not blow away the HDD and reload before putting the thing on the internet? Well, I believe he was doing that, from the article:
Later, at his $1,800-a-month apartment along Miami Beach, the burglar erased the laptops' hard drives and began selling them via services like eBay, where he had earned a 99.4 percent customer-satisfaction rating and tens of thousands of dollars in profit. And then later:
Thanks in part to the company's use of a clever antitheft device... They don't really go into details about it, but this might be something in the NIC chip or something else ingeniously specific to the hardware. They probably don't want to give out details as this was the only way to catch and stop this kind of outfit.
The author of this e-mail, which is incredibly insightful and articulate asked:
How did an argument containing such an elementary fallacy get through
the filter? To be fair, I don't consider this that elementary a fallacy but when you break it down to if x + y = infinity then both x & y are infinity it does sound like a rather obvious pitfall. And, in response to his comment on catching it, it had not yet been through "the filter" as the original story stated:
Smith's proof will be published in the journal Complex Systems. Meaning it had not yet been peer reviewed. But I agree with the author however abrasive he came off (although this is far higher than an elementary mistake) when he said:
Had I pushed my luck my second question would have been, who has
verified this proof that has taught an automata theory course at a
suitably accredited institution? I can forgive an undergrad prof for missing this, his response was probably just to look at it and encourage the kid to submit it. Afterall, what motive would a professor have to read it?
But what should really be noted is what Wolfram himself is quoted as saying from the initial publishing of this proof:
"I had no idea how long it would take for the prize to be won," said Stephen Wolfram. "It could have taken a year, a decade, or a century. I'm thrilled it was so quick. It's an impressive piece of work." Alright, that last sentence there is pretty damning. I have heard time and time again on Slashdot that Wolfram just took other people's work, that he had people working underneath him & that he didn't actually know what he was talking about in his book. This is some corroborating evidence, in my opinion.
I don't know a lot about finite automata but this whole display has shown that Alex Smith is talented but not the winner of the prize, it's best to accept and seek out all criticisms from your community before publishing & Wolfram is not the genius he makes himself out to be. I don't believe I will ever read "A New Kind of Science" as I have many other books in front of that one on my list.
Sounds like just another step in the learning process for Alex--too bad about the cash but he is only 20 and from the looks of it has a bright and promising future. Quite the embarrassment for Wolfram, however.
The real kicker would be if Wolfram had asked his staff to review the proof and they knew it had an elementary mistake and had told him it was golden. Now that would be poetic justice.
10-15 years from always, I'll wake up to my alarm clock, powered by cold fusion. I'll stumble down stairs and get the keys to the hover car from the kitchen and grab my hand held supercomputer. On the way to work, I'll play Duke Nukem Forever as my car flies me along the correct path.
Some joker likely thought it would be funny to use the public address for the VP's office when submitting a tip. When the mass mailing was sent it out, it got sent to that address as well. Or maybe it's simpler than that, maybe the Vice President wants to be a whistle blower. Personally, I think he's got a lot of whistle blowing to do. Mostly on himself, but there are a few others.
Think: a blubbering Chunk from The Goonies talking about shooting a man in the face.
... and because all orders are bulk orders in the millions, maybe they could cut the price dramatically. See, your problem is that you're thinking like a human being with a heart and soul who cares for his fellow man. Well, we have this thing called 'the internet' and it allows all software to be distributed 'in bulk' to everyone using the internet. I like your explanation and agree that that is how they should look at it. But it's obviously not because they could have treated everyone in the world as 'bulk' when they released their latest piece of MS Office software. Imagine downloading it to the tune of $5. It makes sense because then everyone would use it, everyone would pay the trivial cost and they would make a lot of money.
But that's not the case because they know they can make more money. They balance their greed and desire for money with their market dominance. If they go too far one way, they lose ground on the other. Their marketing is so good they don't even worry about whether or not the software is great. Having coded web apps for IE, I can tell you in a heart beat I wish it never existed.
Maybe they could even open source the low end version and turn the world into their kernel developer. You must be new here. Great idea, I agree with you but again, money. You and I both know that would improve Windows too much!
Microsoft is putting more money into development of a product that's going to net them less cash than the original product they already dumped millions into. Something funny is going on here and I bet it has to do with them fearing losing world wide dominance on an operating system. Just in numbers! Start adding millions of machines running Linux bought by governments and suddenly your CEO reports can't brag insane digits of market share over Linux. It's probably more fear driven than anything--but the final thing they need to figure out is how they can get money out of this deal.
Microsoft is spending a 'non-trivial' amount of money to get Windows XP working on the OLPC project's XO laptop. But why? I'm going to propose two reasons, both are quite laughable.
The first is the driving force behind all of Microsoft's actions (and, in fact, almost everyone's): money.
They are developing this so that people can pay an extra $20 to get XP on the OLPC. I assume they will have to drop the regular license price of $90 to something not one half the cost of the laptop. Well, for common sense reasons and also the fact that it destroys the idea of a cheap laptop for kids.
The second idea is that they've finally caved. They finally recognized that releasing an XP shell for free (but not open source) will guaranty their survival because it will allow the poor, the desperate & the cheap to still run windows and possibly alleviate piracy. The idealists like us will still use open source but for practicality purposes many will go along with this. Vista will still cost you an arm and a leg but it will be shinier and flashier and souped up compared to this shell of XP. This will also ensure that the children will grow up accustomed to the broken model of Windows and any development they do will be Win32.
So, I see this as in all likelihood a cross between the two above. They will release Windows XP trimmed down but it will only run if it recognizes the hardware as XO (to prevent you and I from using it to run an MMO only on Windows without the operating system or SVCHost process taking up 30% of my resources). So it's free on OLPCs but still costs fat cat Americans & Europeans moneys. They retain some profit and are seeding themselves into the minds of youths that will be responsible for saving their countries from third world status.
It's the same strategy they used with their "Academic Alliance" software giving to universities & the not so strange donations that Gates oversees when a village in a third world nation receives computers and technical support worth thousands of USD.
Microsoft's interests are their survival and money.
Nicholas Negroponte should be thrilled that Microsoft is already recognizing his success and I wish to send him my gratitude and admiration as so far he has been the only person in this picture with purely good motives. Also all the unnamed developers that have made this possible whether they be employed to do it or not.
Don't get me wrong, it's great that the world's largest software maker is fighting to give more options to people in need. I'm just afraid that they're going to try to maneuver putting their software on instead of the Linux kernel and we'll have to deal with Windows/Internet Explorer's horrible insecurities on a global level.
The retraction came about when, on a whim, Dr. Jacobson ran a search for his name on Google. At age 84 and after 20 years of retirement, "I wanted to see, what have I done in all these many years?" he said. "It was vanity. What can I tell you?" That's vanity? No, the only thing he's missing is a bottle of Jack Daniels & that's how I spend my Friday nights!
But in all serious, this is going to be a pretty futile effort. It's greatly appreciated but it's probably going to backfire. This could be spun as 'lawyers' forcing a scientist's views out of sight, a scientist that's just trying to tell the truth. The same lawyers that have orchestrated the dinosaur bones found across the world.
And the character assassination from the Creationists will most likely consist of 'waffler' and 'flip-flopper', two terms I have no idea why they even exist.
This is the sign of a man of the highest quality in my eyes. I only wish that everyone--especially the politicians--look to him for guidance in how to 1) take ownership of something when you're wrong and 2) fix it.
Well, here's his original post :
Virtualization seems to have a lot of security benefits.
You've been smoking something really mind altering, and I think you
should share it.
x86 virtualization is about basically placing another nearly full
kernel, full of new bugs, on top of a nasty x86 architecture which
barely has correct page protection. Then running your operating
system on the other side of this brand new pile of shit.
You are absolutely deluded, if not stupid, if you think that a
worldwide collection of software engineers who can't write operating
systems or applications without security holes, can then turn around
and suddenly write virtualization layers without security holes.
You've seen something on the shelf, and it has all sorts of pretty
colours, and you've bought it.
That's all x86 virtualization is. It's highly probable that Theo is right. After reading the above post, it's highly probable he is a very abrasive and one sided individual. But this is a tech forum so I won't get into judging character.
However, his technical argument is... somewhat unsound in my humble opinion. He seems to follow the train of thought that 1) people are, by nature, erroneous coders 2) virtualization means more code therefore 3) virtualization has more errors.
I'm going to point out some other things I know about coding. Although more lines of code usually means more bugs, this is not always the case. Correlation does not equal causation. It is correlated but only because the more lines of code, the more probability that more people contributed to the project which means it is highly probable one of them was a bad coder. Also, if you plan things out and follow a rigorous model, it is within your power to make very fully functional, very nice software.
My second point is a different way of looking at the problem. Let's take the naive approach of assuming a primary job of the operating system is to protect the user (and applications) from completely fouling things up in the hardware & memory realm. So it does an 'ok' job at this but, as Theo noted, some bugs still exist. Let's say it's something really bad like they don't stop programs from altering a very sensitive range of memory that is very vital to the correct execution of the operating system itself. Now, hypothetically, the virtualized layer on top of this would give coders a chance to catch this and correct it and protect the user from bringing down the operating system. In this way of looking at things you have two nets. Alone one lets many things pass through so you double it up and now you're catching more fish.
But my analogy is probably very flawed and I must confess I have coded neither of these pieces of software so I cannot confirm or deny this. I am quite shocked that Mr. de Raadt would react so abusively to a post where someone was merely saying that they 'appeared' to be receiving some amount of additional security from virtualization.
As for the very last comment Mr. de Raadt makes, I am confused. My employer uses virtualization on a mass scale to more effectively utilize hardware. I believe it has more uses than just bright shiny colors and wrapping--in fact I am interested in its potentials for hosting web OSs and other neat applications to users. It might not be the future like some people think it is but I think Mr. de Raadt was suffering a moment of frustration or dealing with irritable people when he authored this.
I do wish he were open to more ideas. The second you start to just outright dismiss all your options because they don't satisfy you on the surface you will find you are left with none and often miss the best.
I think you interpreted what you wanted to... I'm a human being, I have faults, this is precisely what I did.
For once a company is taking steps (though forced to do so) to limit the extent to which they oversell bandwidth. That's odd, when I read the article, I didn't see the part where Verizon stepped up and admitted they were wrong and asked for forgiveness. In fact, it kind of sounded like they were actually part of the solution. Once I read the details, it was those evil filesharers that did this. Those P2P users who are just automatically guilty if they reach a certain point.
I don't think Verizon is taking any responsibility here at all. It reeks of political maneuvering and just plain leaves a bad taste in my mouth. I'm ashamed to be a customer of theirs.
If you don't admit your mistakes and your faults, there is no chance in hell you can correct them.
When you try to sign up there is a huge scrollable box beneath your order. In the mess of those terms and conditions is now:
DATA PLANS AND FEATURES
Data Plans and Features (such as NationalAccess, BroadbandAccess, GlobalAccess, and certain VZEmail services that do not include a specific monthly MB allowance or are not billed on a pay-as-you-go basis) may ONLY be used with wireless devices for the following purposes: (i) Internet browsing; (ii) email; and (iii) intranet access (including access to corporate intranets, email, and individual productivity applications like customer relationship management, sales force, and field service automation). These Data Plans and Features MAY NOT be used for any other purpose. Examples of prohibited uses include, without limitation, the following: (i) continuous uploading, downloading, or streaming of audio or video programming or games; (ii) server devices or host computer applications, including, but not limited to, Web camera posts or broadcasts, automatic data feeds, automated machine to-machine connections or peer-to-peer (P2P) file-sharing; or (iii) as a substitute or backup for private lines or dedicated data connections. This means, by way of example only, that checking email, surfing the Internet, downloading legally acquired songs, and/or visiting corporate intranets is permitted, but downloading movies using P2P file-sharing services and/or redirecting television programming content for viewing on laptops is prohibited. A person engaged in prohibited uses continuously for one hour could typically use 100 to 200 MB, or, if engaged in prohibited uses for 10 hours a day, 7 days a week, could use more than 5 GB in a month.
For individual use only and not for resale. We reserve the right to protect our network from harm, which may impact legitimate data flows. We reserve the right to limit throughput speeds or amount of data transferred, and to deny or terminate service, without notice, to anyone we believe is using one of these Data Plans or Features in any manner prohibited above or whose usage adversely impacts our network or service levels. Anyone using more than 5 GB per line in a given month is presumed to be using the service in a manner prohibited above, and we reserve the right to limit throughput speed or immediately terminate the service of any such person without notice. We also reserve the right to terminate service upon expiration of Customer Agreement term.
Verizon Wireless Plans, Rate and Coverage Areas, rates, agreement provisions, business practices, procedures and policies are subject to change as specified in the Customer Agreement. Emphasis mine.
So they really haven't learned their lesson. I personally think that CmdrTaco should sign up and start hosting Slashdot through it. Either that or point the loyal readers to a page he's hosting through it.
I would recommend prospective customers of Verizon to think twice and assess if they want to sign contracts with a company so inclined to assume a user of the service is guilty of copyright violations just because of the amount of data they are transferring. Couldn't someone watching YouTube all day or streaming video from another TV network site rack up this sort of data transferring?
I submitted this story a while ago for California. Something I found interesting from that article is at the bottom:
California is required to announce its intention to sue the federal government six months before it does so. I assume this is true of all the states so you should note that this isn't something that's going to happen today unless they announced it six months ago.
"The brain is still in beta mode, it's got all sorts of patches and workarounds. It's not perfectly created, it's clearly evolved up." Wow, just... wow. I'm not even a biologist but I know that's a terrible analogy. You can't compare the brain to software. We can control software and decide when it 'goes live,' there are no prototypes in nature or evolution. Every attempt is an iteration of the process and the process is never ending. Furthermore, the existence of an absolute of 'perfectly created' is debatable on any level in regards to any process or system.
Exaggerate uncommon risks -- for example, air travel is safer than cars but because car accidents are common they are seen as less risky Maybe because everyone involved in an air plane crash usually dies. Automobile deaths are much less. There's this idea of risk = probability * impact. In the case of automobiles, probability is high but the impact is low. It's the other way around in aircraft failures.
Personified risk -- Osama Bin Laden is scarier than a faceless threat How in the hell does this relate to IT security? I think IT administrators are more afraid of the people they don't know hacking their systems then the people they actually employ doing the same. In the end, I'm sure more attacks come internally or from an ex-worker than someone unknown. Maybe the face you know should be more scary than the face you don't at the office?
Risks that could be controlled -- The DC sniper caused a few deaths but the response was way out of proportion. Please elaborate, I know of the John Lee Malvo incident but I have no idea how this relates to IT security. Are you telling me that shutting down a system to protect a database from a possible threat or virus is overkill? I would respond with that varying on a case by case basis but at my job, offline databases are worth maintaining the integrity of the data inside them.
I know I'm really coming off as a jerk when I say this but I don't think this article helped me in anyway. All I saw was someone over simplifying a complex problem--thereby making them seem smarter to the people they were explaining it to.
Don't read this article, it has nothing to offer you. If you don't know this subject, I believe this article will only add to your confusion and lack of understanding.
*An overweight bond sits at a computer desk littered with Payday bar wrappers and graphic novles. He struggles to breath as he brushes at the cheetohs crumbs stuck in his stubble. A blinking light flashes on his monitor and he reaches up with his stubby fat fingers to press the 'Accept Transmission Now' key. The video feed of an equally bloated and zit faced man, though somewhat less pastey white, comes up.*
Cats: Good evening, Mr. Bond, I was just hitting up some 3 am Taco Bell for fourth meal... I would like to discuss your latest attempts to probe my botnets on the interweb. Bond: *wheezes at the site of his archnemisis* Cats! I should have known it was you! You won't get away with this diabolical scheme! Cats: Oh won't I, Mr. Bond? I have all of the world's computers trapped to do my bidding. What would you say if I told you I could bring any website to its knees with a DDOS attack? I noticed you have an apache http server running, Mr. Bond. Perhaps sharing pictures with your loved ones!? Well, I hope a billion attempts to access those images won't... SATURATE YOUR BANDWIDTH! Bond: My GOD! You've gone mad with power, Cats. You're a madman! You'll never get away with this. How do you even keep your franken net in check? What happens when it turns on you? Cats: Oh, I think I will, Mr. Bond, Caribbean law is quite kind when it comes to orchestrating botnets. Prepare to say goodnight. Good luck making your raiding schedule, I hope you won't miss those 50 DKP! *Bond's screen slows to a crawl as he rushes to turn off Apache* Bond: Nooooooooooo!
Saw the same thing with abortion inversely linked to crime[PDF Warning]:
We offer evidence that legalized abortion has contributed significantly to
recent crime reductions. Crime began to fall roughly 18 years after abortion
legalization. The 5 states that allowed abortion in 1970 experienced declines
earlier than the rest of the nation, which legalized in 1973 with Roe v. Wade.
States with high abortion rates in the 1970s and 1980s experienced greater crime
reductions in the 1990s. In high abortion states, only arrests of those born after
abortion legalization fall relative to low abortion states. Legalized abortion
appears to account for as much as 50 percent of the recent drop in crime. I saw those researchers talking about that on the Daily show once (or someone who wrote a book about it). No doubt, people will be more open to the lead paint idea than the abortion idea. Not because the data is any better or different but more so because religious beliefs are tied to abortion.
I'd like to know if forcing your beliefs on other people is worth twice as much crime? Is making cheaper, more effective paint worth twice as much crime? Personally I'd say no to both of those but I'm sure half the country disagrees with me on the first point.
Pricing for these apps is pretty steep at $1,299 per machine license. Well, maybe not so steep if you consider how valuable it could be for you. It doesn't say if that has the GPU utilization with it yet or not.
Also, I wonder if they've investigated using SLI & CrossFire with these. That seems like something obvious to me but not included in the article. I'm unaware of their implementation but it sounds like it could be parallelized--and accross 2 or even 4 cards, that could get hilariously powerful.
Slashdot Mirror
I don't really look at Mexicans as merely cheap labor, I'm just speaking in very frank terms of what anti-immigration laws and fence building are going to do to us.
If you are still productive from the result of a robot and the person who used to have that job can now go to school, I only see more skilled workers in the workforce. People aren't as stupid as you think they are, they just haven't had a chance to go to school. There may be a generation or two that adapt badly to this new model but I welcome the future where a farming family's children now have the option to go to school because the farm can be just as efficient and producing as it would be without the children.
Corporate farms are going to love this even though they'll hate the initial cost of the machines being greater than the poor Mexican wages.
Also, my post on this has a link to a PDF with a sketch of the breaking apart and trajectories.
Also, remember how long ago this happened. There was an expedition there but they didn't have the technology we did. I'm not sure if the tree patterns would help you 100 years later.
Maybe his daughter was caught using an iPod? Or perhaps his work machine's cache was found to have a Google Search results page in it?
But, in all seriousness, it wouldn't surprise me if Microsoft had a very stringent agreement with it's employees such that you're guilty of violating company policy at all times. Something really vague and impossible to avoid like "you shall not support a competitor in anyway with any of your personal funds or free time." They only let you go if they want to and so few get let go on these grounds that nobody really cares about it. Does anyone know if this is the case?
It really wouldn't surprise me if they treated their employees the same way they treat their customers.
You probably remember discussing this almost a year ago. Enjoy more on this at that coverage of the same story.
Now, with that said, there is one option that could be taken now that Net Neutrality has been brought into this.
I see from the PDF that the people filing this complaint are from Washington, DC. It probably should have been filed in New York with the demands specifying only NY victims for the time being. Why might you ask NY? Well, it's the only state to have established net neutrality as a telecommunications standard (See 16 NYCRR Part 605). And this case is exactly the definition of what those standards are put in place to protect!
So while it may have had to be filed with the FCC, the real place where you could pretty much guaranty a (maybe even court case) win against Comcast is in the state of New York. I know they provide service there and I think it would be more prudent to first prove your point there, then file a complaint to the FCC from New York after the local government has awarded the victims there.
In my opinion, a guaranteed sure win in a small battle is bigger than a huge uncertainty in the overall war.
These differences aren't that compelling. To me I would say, "Congratulations, you have found some deviation from equal frequency for all balls. But this would happen in any instance of drawing these balls."
I'm concerned that this has been an exercise in deviation in pseudo random systems. The same could be done with a computer simulation and similar results would be found.
I hate to say it but this study points out to me that the lottery is actually pretty much as close to random as it could get. In fact, the summary of the paper states that if there were some event to skew this, then you could achieve a small bonus: However, in the event there is some peculiar factor skewing the ball selection such that any of these trends continue, a player stands a mildly better chance of winning a partial prize through the selection of weighted numbers. However this peculiar factor can not only be identified but if it exists, it is highly unlikely it is anything even remotely observable.
How much precisely will you pay to have your UI look like glass and all your games run at the highest resolutions? I think we're approaching the point where only avid gamers & people with too much disposable income will support the ladened OS that is Windows.
Fishy things have been going on in Classmate PC Vs OLPC. Recently I read that Microsoft & Intel have already begun shipment to Libya of their classmate PCs. Libya had agreed to buy 1.2 million OLPCs but, of course, they aren't available yet.
... and not for the technological reasons that they should be concerned with.
What's really strange is I can't find anything on this from Microsoft or Intel. You're providing 150,000 laptops at only $200 each to a developing nation for the purposes of education and you don't have a press release outside of that country? Maybe they're just being humble? Or maybe someone was leveraging their ex-boss's many donations to African medicine & development to convince the Libyan government to take a different route?
You know, it's great that the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation is donating all that money to research and aide but if word gets out that they're using that to influence who those countries do business with, I don't think anyone's going to be impressed anymore. There's something fishy going on here, I'll bet you start to see many more countries make the switch to Classmate PCs over OLPCs
But what should really be noted is what Wolfram himself is quoted as saying from the initial publishing of this proof: "I had no idea how long it would take for the prize to be won," said Stephen Wolfram. "It could have taken a year, a decade, or a century. I'm thrilled it was so quick. It's an impressive piece of work." Alright, that last sentence there is pretty damning. I have heard time and time again on Slashdot that Wolfram just took other people's work, that he had people working underneath him & that he didn't actually know what he was talking about in his book. This is some corroborating evidence, in my opinion.
I don't know a lot about finite automata but this whole display has shown that Alex Smith is talented but not the winner of the prize, it's best to accept and seek out all criticisms from your community before publishing & Wolfram is not the genius he makes himself out to be. I don't believe I will ever read "A New Kind of Science" as I have many other books in front of that one on my list.
Sounds like just another step in the learning process for Alex--too bad about the cash but he is only 20 and from the looks of it has a bright and promising future. Quite the embarrassment for Wolfram, however.
The real kicker would be if Wolfram had asked his staff to review the proof and they knew it had an elementary mistake and had told him it was golden. Now that would be poetic justice.
10-15 years from always, I'll wake up to my alarm clock, powered by cold fusion. I'll stumble down stairs and get the keys to the hover car from the kitchen and grab my hand held supercomputer. On the way to work, I'll play Duke Nukem Forever as my car flies me along the correct path.
Think: a blubbering Chunk from The Goonies talking about shooting a man in the face.
... and because all orders are bulk orders in the millions, maybe they could cut the price dramatically. See, your problem is that you're thinking like a human being with a heart and soul who cares for his fellow man. Well, we have this thing called 'the internet' and it allows all software to be distributed 'in bulk' to everyone using the internet. I like your explanation and agree that that is how they should look at it. But it's obviously not because they could have treated everyone in the world as 'bulk' when they released their latest piece of MS Office software. Imagine downloading it to the tune of $5. It makes sense because then everyone would use it, everyone would pay the trivial cost and they would make a lot of money.But that's not the case because they know they can make more money. They balance their greed and desire for money with their market dominance. If they go too far one way, they lose ground on the other. Their marketing is so good they don't even worry about whether or not the software is great. Having coded web apps for IE, I can tell you in a heart beat I wish it never existed. Maybe they could even open source the low end version and turn the world into their kernel developer. You must be new here. Great idea, I agree with you but again, money. You and I both know that would improve Windows too much!
Microsoft is putting more money into development of a product that's going to net them less cash than the original product they already dumped millions into. Something funny is going on here and I bet it has to do with them fearing losing world wide dominance on an operating system. Just in numbers! Start adding millions of machines running Linux bought by governments and suddenly your CEO reports can't brag insane digits of market share over Linux. It's probably more fear driven than anything--but the final thing they need to figure out is how they can get money out of this deal.
The first is the driving force behind all of Microsoft's actions (and, in fact, almost everyone's): money.
They are developing this so that people can pay an extra $20 to get XP on the OLPC. I assume they will have to drop the regular license price of $90 to something not one half the cost of the laptop. Well, for common sense reasons and also the fact that it destroys the idea of a cheap laptop for kids.
The second idea is that they've finally caved. They finally recognized that releasing an XP shell for free (but not open source) will guaranty their survival because it will allow the poor, the desperate & the cheap to still run windows and possibly alleviate piracy. The idealists like us will still use open source but for practicality purposes many will go along with this. Vista will still cost you an arm and a leg but it will be shinier and flashier and souped up compared to this shell of XP. This will also ensure that the children will grow up accustomed to the broken model of Windows and any development they do will be Win32.
So, I see this as in all likelihood a cross between the two above. They will release Windows XP trimmed down but it will only run if it recognizes the hardware as XO (to prevent you and I from using it to run an MMO only on Windows without the operating system or SVCHost process taking up 30% of my resources). So it's free on OLPCs but still costs fat cat Americans & Europeans moneys. They retain some profit and are seeding themselves into the minds of youths that will be responsible for saving their countries from third world status.
It's the same strategy they used with their "Academic Alliance" software giving to universities & the not so strange donations that Gates oversees when a village in a third world nation receives computers and technical support worth thousands of USD.
Microsoft's interests are their survival and money.
Nicholas Negroponte should be thrilled that Microsoft is already recognizing his success and I wish to send him my gratitude and admiration as so far he has been the only person in this picture with purely good motives. Also all the unnamed developers that have made this possible whether they be employed to do it or not.
Don't get me wrong, it's great that the world's largest software maker is fighting to give more options to people in need. I'm just afraid that they're going to try to maneuver putting their software on instead of the Linux kernel and we'll have to deal with Windows/Internet Explorer's horrible insecurities on a global level.
But in all serious, this is going to be a pretty futile effort. It's greatly appreciated but it's probably going to backfire. This could be spun as 'lawyers' forcing a scientist's views out of sight, a scientist that's just trying to tell the truth. The same lawyers that have orchestrated the dinosaur bones found across the world.
And the character assassination from the Creationists will most likely consist of 'waffler' and 'flip-flopper', two terms I have no idea why they even exist.
This is the sign of a man of the highest quality in my eyes. I only wish that everyone--especially the politicians--look to him for guidance in how to 1) take ownership of something when you're wrong and 2) fix it.
You've been smoking something really mind altering, and I think you should share it.
x86 virtualization is about basically placing another nearly full kernel, full of new bugs, on top of a nasty x86 architecture which barely has correct page protection. Then running your operating system on the other side of this brand new pile of shit.
You are absolutely deluded, if not stupid, if you think that a worldwide collection of software engineers who can't write operating systems or applications without security holes, can then turn around and suddenly write virtualization layers without security holes.
You've seen something on the shelf, and it has all sorts of pretty colours, and you've bought it.
That's all x86 virtualization is. It's highly probable that Theo is right. After reading the above post, it's highly probable he is a very abrasive and one sided individual. But this is a tech forum so I won't get into judging character.
However, his technical argument is
I'm going to point out some other things I know about coding. Although more lines of code usually means more bugs, this is not always the case. Correlation does not equal causation. It is correlated but only because the more lines of code, the more probability that more people contributed to the project which means it is highly probable one of them was a bad coder. Also, if you plan things out and follow a rigorous model, it is within your power to make very fully functional, very nice software.
My second point is a different way of looking at the problem. Let's take the naive approach of assuming a primary job of the operating system is to protect the user (and applications) from completely fouling things up in the hardware & memory realm. So it does an 'ok' job at this but, as Theo noted, some bugs still exist. Let's say it's something really bad like they don't stop programs from altering a very sensitive range of memory that is very vital to the correct execution of the operating system itself. Now, hypothetically, the virtualized layer on top of this would give coders a chance to catch this and correct it and protect the user from bringing down the operating system. In this way of looking at things you have two nets. Alone one lets many things pass through so you double it up and now you're catching more fish.
But my analogy is probably very flawed and I must confess I have coded neither of these pieces of software so I cannot confirm or deny this. I am quite shocked that Mr. de Raadt would react so abusively to a post where someone was merely saying that they 'appeared' to be receiving some amount of additional security from virtualization.
As for the very last comment Mr. de Raadt makes, I am confused. My employer uses virtualization on a mass scale to more effectively utilize hardware. I believe it has more uses than just bright shiny colors and wrapping--in fact I am interested in its potentials for hosting web OSs and other neat applications to users. It might not be the future like some people think it is but I think Mr. de Raadt was suffering a moment of frustration or dealing with irritable people when he authored this.
I do wish he were open to more ideas. The second you start to just outright dismiss all your options because they don't satisfy you on the surface you will find you are left with none and often miss the best.
I don't think Verizon is taking any responsibility here at all. It reeks of political maneuvering and just plain leaves a bad taste in my mouth. I'm ashamed to be a customer of theirs.
If you don't admit your mistakes and your faults, there is no chance in hell you can correct them.
Data Plans and Features (such as NationalAccess, BroadbandAccess, GlobalAccess, and certain VZEmail services that do not include a specific monthly MB allowance or are not billed on a pay-as-you-go basis) may ONLY be used with wireless devices for the following purposes: (i) Internet browsing; (ii) email; and (iii) intranet access (including access to corporate intranets, email, and individual productivity applications like customer relationship management, sales force, and field service automation). These Data Plans and Features MAY NOT be used for any other purpose. Examples of prohibited uses include, without limitation, the following: (i) continuous uploading, downloading, or streaming of audio or video programming or games; (ii) server devices or host computer applications, including, but not limited to, Web camera posts or broadcasts, automatic data feeds, automated machine to-machine connections or peer-to-peer (P2P) file-sharing; or (iii) as a substitute or backup for private lines or dedicated data connections. This means, by way of example only, that checking email, surfing the Internet, downloading legally acquired songs, and/or visiting corporate intranets is permitted, but downloading movies using P2P file-sharing services and/or redirecting television programming content for viewing on laptops is prohibited. A person engaged in prohibited uses continuously for one hour could typically use 100 to 200 MB, or, if engaged in prohibited uses for 10 hours a day, 7 days a week, could use more than 5 GB in a month.
For individual use only and not for resale. We reserve the right to protect our network from harm, which may impact legitimate data flows. We reserve the right to limit throughput speeds or amount of data transferred, and to deny or terminate service, without notice, to anyone we believe is using one of these Data Plans or Features in any manner prohibited above or whose usage adversely impacts our network or service levels. Anyone using more than 5 GB per line in a given month is presumed to be using the service in a manner prohibited above, and we reserve the right to limit throughput speed or immediately terminate the service of any such person without notice. We also reserve the right to terminate service upon expiration of Customer Agreement term.
Verizon Wireless Plans, Rate and Coverage Areas, rates, agreement provisions, business practices, procedures and policies are subject to change as specified in the Customer Agreement. Emphasis mine.
They now have a site defining acceptable use.
So they really haven't learned their lesson. I personally think that CmdrTaco should sign up and start hosting Slashdot through it. Either that or point the loyal readers to a page he's hosting through it.
I would recommend prospective customers of Verizon to think twice and assess if they want to sign contracts with a company so inclined to assume a user of the service is guilty of copyright violations just because of the amount of data they are transferring. Couldn't someone watching YouTube all day or streaming video from another TV network site rack up this sort of data transferring?
Exaggerate uncommon risks -- for example, air travel is safer than cars but because car accidents are common they are seen as less risky Maybe because everyone involved in an air plane crash usually dies. Automobile deaths are much less. There's this idea of risk = probability * impact. In the case of automobiles, probability is high but the impact is low. It's the other way around in aircraft failures. Personified risk -- Osama Bin Laden is scarier than a faceless threat How in the hell does this relate to IT security? I think IT administrators are more afraid of the people they don't know hacking their systems then the people they actually employ doing the same. In the end, I'm sure more attacks come internally or from an ex-worker than someone unknown. Maybe the face you know should be more scary than the face you don't at the office? Risks that could be controlled -- The DC sniper caused a few deaths but the response was way out of proportion. Please elaborate, I know of the John Lee Malvo incident but I have no idea how this relates to IT security. Are you telling me that shutting down a system to protect a database from a possible threat or virus is overkill? I would respond with that varying on a case by case basis but at my job, offline databases are worth maintaining the integrity of the data inside them.
I know I'm really coming off as a jerk when I say this but I don't think this article helped me in anyway. All I saw was someone over simplifying a complex problem--thereby making them seem smarter to the people they were explaining it to.
Don't read this article, it has nothing to offer you. If you don't know this subject, I believe this article will only add to your confusion and lack of understanding.
*An overweight bond sits at a computer desk littered with Payday bar wrappers and graphic novles. He struggles to breath as he brushes at the cheetohs crumbs stuck in his stubble. A blinking light flashes on his monitor and he reaches up with his stubby fat fingers to press the 'Accept Transmission Now' key. The video feed of an equally bloated and zit faced man, though somewhat less pastey white, comes up.*
... I would like to discuss your latest attempts to probe my botnets on the interweb. ... SATURATE YOUR BANDWIDTH!
Cats: Good evening, Mr. Bond, I was just hitting up some 3 am Taco Bell for fourth meal
Bond: *wheezes at the site of his archnemisis* Cats! I should have known it was you! You won't get away with this diabolical scheme!
Cats: Oh won't I, Mr. Bond? I have all of the world's computers trapped to do my bidding. What would you say if I told you I could bring any website to its knees with a DDOS attack? I noticed you have an apache http server running, Mr. Bond. Perhaps sharing pictures with your loved ones!? Well, I hope a billion attempts to access those images won't
Bond: My GOD! You've gone mad with power, Cats. You're a madman! You'll never get away with this. How do you even keep your franken net in check? What happens when it turns on you?
Cats: Oh, I think I will, Mr. Bond, Caribbean law is quite kind when it comes to orchestrating botnets. Prepare to say goodnight. Good luck making your raiding schedule, I hope you won't miss those 50 DKP!
*Bond's screen slows to a crawl as he rushes to turn off Apache*
Bond: Nooooooooooo!
I'd like to know if forcing your beliefs on other people is worth twice as much crime? Is making cheaper, more effective paint worth twice as much crime? Personally I'd say no to both of those but I'm sure half the country disagrees with me on the first point.
Pricing for these apps is pretty steep at $1,299 per machine license. Well, maybe not so steep if you consider how valuable it could be for you. It doesn't say if that has the GPU utilization with it yet or not.
Also, I wonder if they've investigated using SLI & CrossFire with these. That seems like something obvious to me but not included in the article. I'm unaware of their implementation but it sounds like it could be parallelized--and accross 2 or even 4 cards, that could get hilariously powerful.