... SOPA/PIPA to protect the movie/music industries from offshore (non-US) piracy.
SOPA/PIPA were US legislation and would have had only been able to be used to prosecute inside the United States. I think what you and your friend are looking to debate in that respect is ACTA and even that's looking limited.
In a recent debate, Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich said he would like to beat the Chinese back to the moon. He has even been so bold as to propose setting up a manned base by 2020, driven by empowering private industry to take the initiative. It's ironic to hear moon travel still being debated 40 years after the last Apollo landing in 1972.
How is that ironic? Establishing a base versus traveling to are two fairly different goals in magnitude with one totally encompassing the other. Aside from that, I don't think it's ironic that 40 years have passed and we need to reevaluate a moon mission. It's seriously still a nontrivial problem today, it's not like riding a bike. In my mind, the fact that they did it forty years ago doesn't take away the danger and knowledge involved with such a feat but instead just proves how badass and ahead of their time those people who worked on the Apollo Program were (yes, yes, Wernher von Braun and Nazi scientists, I'm aware).
And as far as it's being "debated" I challenge you to name one thing that requires government spending that hasn't been debated off and on over the years. Oh, the massive Department of Defense spending, right, for some reason nobody debates that ballooning military industrial complex and that's about it. Wouldn't want to look "weak" going into office now, would we. Speaking of which, I'm all for a shift of some of those funds to space exploration. It took a space race with 'the ruskies' to get us to the moon maybe another 'rah rah USA' race with those other 'commies' will help us establish a presence and research lab?
Nagaicevs generated more than $850,000 in illegal profits from this scheme. His unauthorized trading in the hijacked accounts also caused losses in excess of $2 million which were reimbursed by the broker-dealer firms that carried the victimized customer accounts.
So how did the firms that the associates work for 'walk away with millions' when Nagaicevs got $850,000 and the total losses to the accounts was over $2 million? I'm guessing that since the firms that those associates worked for reimbursed those accounts that those two associates are facing some pretty upset employers. Is that really worth a couple hundred thousand?
It was really clear to me how he was precisely doing this for his own gain but here's a PDF of the 15 page court proceedings that goes into detail (section B is the informative part). Essentially within one single trading day he would establish a long or short position through one of the unregistered trading firms. Then in that day he would gain illegal access and, if he had to, sell securities to beef up the cash in the account and then make trades that would cause his long or short to payoff. Then he'd pull it all out from the original account. He would often complete this cycle in 15 to 20 minutes and, as a result, he'd often be responsible for more than 50% of that stock's trading volume for that day. It's interesting, they go in to the details of a GBX stock and how the price changes are 10 to 50 cents (on ~$10 per stock).
Even the general Slashdot feeling towards Microsoft, it is true that his (and Melinda's) work is great. Let's hope he keeps it up!
Well, I have an issue with this. From the article:
While that will give an immediate boost, more is needed from governments, which have provided the bulk of the $22.6 billion that has been raised by the Geneva-based organization to date for its work in 150 countries.
The commitment of governments was shaken last year when the fund reported "grave misuse of funds" in four recipient nations, prompting some donors such as Germany and Sweden to freeze their donations.
Why do coutnries pay into this foundation that invests primarily in American funds and stocks? Why do they not setup their own charities that invest in their own stocks or -- better yet -- give it directly to the institutions of medical research?
This perplexes me to no end. This foundation is at the mercy of the stock market and rely on money managers to post returns every year so that it can give those returns to the targeted countries and research -- right up until a crisis causes those funds to greatly shrink.
I have complained about this before and been called "full of bullshit" and I guess this is just one thing that my opinion and concern diverges on from the rest of the readers here. This is charity in the form of keeping the capital inside America's border and shaving off returns. The money stays at work in America and no such stock or company or infrastructure is built up in the countries that could truly use it and truly need it.
When you're talking billions of dollars, you're talking enough money to start internal institutions and programs that could create jobs or better education as well as do medical research. Instead this money stays in the coffers of rich Western companies and even after the returns are "given" to the countries, it is given in the form of purchased medicines often made by American companies. And that strategy of deciding where your donations gets spent doesn't always work out like you would expect.
It's great he donates all that money but that method is never going to change anything. The real winners here are the companies that get huge cash infusions from the foundation in the form of investment (like Monsanto) and Big Pharma who gets the revenue from all the AIDS medicine that is bought and shipped. Exactly why are foreign governments investing in the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation instead of finding a better solution?
Bring on the "look a gift horse in the mouth" posts. They may be right but there has to be a better way to use this money to accomplish these goals. It's almost designed to be a perpetual medicine exporting machine.
How am I supposed to take a summary seriously when it refers to bacteria as a "bug"?
While this is seen as probably an oversimplification of describing bacteria, viruses, etc. there are probably a lot of dictionary entries backing this up like the fifth one in Wiktionary: "A contagious illness; a bacterium or virus causing it." You also had media in the late nineties using this virtually everywhere. See this BBC article for an example. The fact that researchers themselves have used phrases like Super Bug to describe resistant bacteria to lay people probably doesn't help. English is viscous. Deal with it.
"We try to steer clear of things that would attract scrutiny," Labian said. "If people are pirating on our service, we don’t want those people to use it."
So what you're openly admitting is that you just don't know the extent of piracy on your service? I probably would have said "no comment" rather than risk the Eye of Sauron... er RIAA/MPAA's gaze. From what I gather, it could 0% it could be 100% of your service based on pirates sharing files with each other but since you don't know it's okay? Unless you have some sort of Youtube-like fingerprinting going on, I'd just keep your mouth shut.
Another reason Labian said he wasn’t worried about the government stepping in is because the company maintains a "good relationship" with various government bodies, including "Homeland Security, ICE, and the FBI."
Right but those are just the enforcers, your real problem is the MPAA and unless you're paying elected officials more than they are you could be next.
I LOVE IT! Not only is a nutjob getting harassed, but they finally decided to harass someone that can do something to shut their asses down.
Both Ron Paul and his son Rand Paul have been very vocal opponents of the TSA (I'm pretty sure Ron Paul is running on a platform to completely dissolve the TSA as well as a number of other agencies and departments of the federal government -- although that depends on where he's speaking and to whom). Even if you don't believe he would go that far, Ron Paul has introduced the American Traveler's Dignity Act which specifically addresses being treated like cattle. I would wager most of this was coolly calculated by his son as beneficial to Ron Paul's campaign efforts -- bringing attention to such policies and putting them on the debate table.
Scratch that, I just read some lengthy forums that say that's a shattered lens cap. Here's another panorama with said lens cap pieces. The Daily Mail offers this strange image as evidence... but that's The Daily Mail so take it with a grain of salt. If that is what all the fuss is about, I'm a little angry I just wasted this much time. Personally I'd assume my camera is experiencing an anomaly due to it being 867 degrees Fahrenheit outside...
No pictures were included, so how can we form our own, uneducated, opinions???
This article from Ria Novosti has one picture with attributions to the scientist and journal. I'm not sure what you're looking at but I am guessing that the object outside of the pod is not a device of theirs -- which leads to a lot of speculation and conjecture. I guess I don't know enough about their sensors/cameras that they were using in 1982 to say whether or not this was some sort of aberration or malfunction of the camera due to extreme temperatures. But that's about the best uneducated opinion I can offer you.
Hell, I only TOLERATE progressives, I certainly don't ACCEPT em and since 99% of gays are also progs........ you guys made my shitlist long before my gaydar went off.
I guess it was really hard for you to justify automatically hating homosexuals right up until the point that you could say "99% of gays are also progs." Then I bet it was really easy for you to say you hate them not because they're gay but because of their political alignment (that you forced upon them).
Well done. Well done. Say, have you ever considered that they're also human beings with different needs than you? That they just want to be recognized the same way you are by your government that supposedly espouses equal rights?
Homosexuality is a mental defect, albeit a minor one in the bigger scheme of things.
Take all your political bullshit and leave. This is about the rights of human beings. Not "being progressive" or "saying 2+2=5" but about respecting your fellow citizens the same fucking way they respect you.
Well, the summary specifically references a developer's forum where I can sympathize (being a developer) with people modding Android ROMs or whatever and uploading such binaries for distribution to others. I guess the people who run the forum don't really get a say in any of this. However, as a software developer, I can imagine a third option for files that are user generated (and for the most part legal).
Now XDA-Developers is going to have tens of thousands of once helpful posts that now lead to a broken link. How could they have avoided this? Well, I'd imagine that someone could have written an internal bot for their forums that would harvest links to the external megaupload. They then could have subscribed to megaupload, downloaded said linked files and created a local cache of their files purely for their own use on a small RAID. Now the last thing the bot would need to do is take the megaupload URL and develop some unique URI... perhaps a hash of the date, checksum and filename? It would then maintain a key-value pair of these megaupload links to your internal URIs and also a directory structure of these URIs as the files. Now, say megaupload is a very unreliable/questionable service or goes down and now your forum is worthless. Well, you can always re-spider your site and replace all the megaupload links with links to your cloud hosting of these new files or work out a deal with another third party similar to megaupload where they would accept the file and URI and return to you the URI paired with their new URL. Then it's a matter of spidering your site and replacing the megaupload links with your new service's URLs.
It's a pain in the ass but let's face it, some forums could perish when their codependence on megaupload is fully realized in a very painful manner. And I don't think that's a fair risk to the users who have created hundreds of thousands of posts.
Officially named ReFS — for Resilient File System — the new file system will be made available via a staged “evolution,” according to a January 16 post on the “Building Windows 8 blog.
So you're saying something that was just announced and will be made available via a staged evolution has already been tested by you? Impressive!
It is basically all the best filesystems compiled into one.
Thanks for summing it up for me there, bud. I didn't realize it was the greatest goddamn filesystem I could imagine, why didn't you just say "Imagine what your dream filesystem will be able to do, this is it." I wonder though, will it have the homicide capacity of ReiserFS?
This reminds me of my initial tests of cold fusion. I must say that cold fusion is incredible dvangement. Cold fusion supports providing us with unlimited power from a glass of water, it prints money, it gives the user eternal life, it allows the user to travel faster than the speed of life and -- when activated -- attractive women jump out of the core reactor demanding money shot after money shot.
SilverLight. They technology behind it stunning. You can also use C# to developed. For video sites there's also a HUGE difference compared to flash - with SilverLight the client and server will adjust to the available bandwidth the user has.. in flash this would just show up the loading icon and stop playing. SilverLight is technically much better than Flash.
Makita. They power drills let me build anything. So why not web sites? You can also use your hands to use them. For tables built with power drills there's also a HUGE difference compared to hammers - with Makita the carpenter and sitter will adjust to how quickly they can drill.. with a hammer this would just show up as unfinished nailheads sticking out on the surface. Makita is technically much better than a hammer.
*picks up his fat paycheck from Makita* Welp, my work here is done.
The same problem that there would be with lots of people if Microsoft started suddenly introducing their own "standards" again. There's still some issues because of all that bs 10 years ago, but now it has almost gone away. There really isn't any need to broke the web again. And how to create something better? Work out a standard of it.
Google will offer a cross compiler that compiles Dart to ECMAScript 3 on the fly, for compatibility with non-Dart browsers.
And, in fact, dartc already cross compiles Dart code to plain Javascript. Once it's integrated into browsers, use it or don't use it.
It's like Microsoft all again.
Right, that's a stretch. You conveniently cherry pick details here. For example, NaCl is released under a BSD license with source code readily available. Are you saying the same was true of ActiveX since it's launch?
Deader Than a Doornail
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Is E85 Dead Now?
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· Score: 5, Interesting
I come from a family of farmers, some of which have taken advantage of the high price of corn. Well, around Christmas they were talking about two things. One is the serious disregard for pollution standards from most (they said more than just those caught and fined) ethanol refineries. And also the negative effect it has had on farmland in their area. The second was that many refineries were shutting down as these subsidies came to a close (my dad pointed out two abandoned as we drove along) and as a result some farmers had bought up land at high prices expecting the recent price of corn to continue. They had figured they would be getting $6 or $7 a bushel and there was a lot of talk that since the refineries were going down and production was already juiced that this was going to lead to a lot of farmers losing money in these purchases. From what I gathered from folks who have been doing this for many decades: this will be a very painful learning experience for everyone involved and this seems to be the sentiment whether the wind blows right or left.
'There are some indications already that California wants to split off and such pressures tend to build over time. It is hard to see this waiting until the end of the century. Maybe an East Coast cluster will want to break off too. Pressures come from the enormous differences in wealth generation capability, and people not wanting to fund others if they can avoid it.'
And who is making such outrageous claims? A geologist? Perhaps a seismologist? Perhaps even just some sort of basic scientist?
From the beginning of the article:
Here is what futurologists Ian Pearson (IP) and Patrick Tucker (PT) think of your ideas.
"Futurologist?" What does it take to call oneself a 'futurologist?'
Well, from Ian Pearson's page I'd guess he's got some communication technology background? Or perhaps an author? From his list of achievements:
Ian Pearson has been a full time futurologist since 1991, with a proven track record of around 85% accuracy at the 10 year horizon.
So you could estimate he has a (0.85)^10 or ~19.7% accuracy at the 100 year horizon? Do you get to pick which issues you have to weigh in on? How accurate do you have to be? Are these just yes or no? Multiple choice?
And Patrick Tucker looks to be little more than an author and interviewer. Sorry for the character assassination or ad hominem attacks but these guys are sci-fi authors, essentially. Reprinting their claims of North America breaking apart in anyway within 100 years is less than prudent.
Just write the damn thing once, somehow, and give it away free to everyone. Seems inevitable, and I'm eager to see it.
Hey man if you're up for writing it, I'd definitely chuck $25 at a thing like this. I donated $25 to Daniel Shiffman's Nature of Code book and plan on reviewing it on Slashdot once he's done. Here's some examples of his latest products for it: PDF of Chapter 10 and Code.
Figure out how much money you would need to have your department make some creative common texts and see how Kickstarter responds...
Comply with PayPal's shipping requests in a timely manner.
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For transactions that total less than USD $250 (or local currency equivalent), proof of delivery is confirmation that can be viewed online and includes: recipient's (seller's) address, showing at least city, postal code, state, or country (or equivalent), delivery date, and the URL to the shipping company's web site if you've selected "Other" in the shipping drop down menu. For transactions that total USD $250 or more, you must get signature confirmation of the delivery.
Well, at least everyone involved has a crazy story to tell: "Gather 'round children and let me tell you about the time I had to destroy a hundred year old violin in a timely manner. FuhrerMarks had instructed me -- back then they were known as 'PayPal' -- to destroy the violin after a dispute about its label..."
I disagree, it creates a conflict of rights and a loophole allowing people to commit harm to others. That is foolish and irresponsible, but it is not the end of the world or the end of slashdot or the end of free speech.
When did I say it was the end of the world, the end of Slashdot or the end of free speech? And, yes, it could affect my Slashdot posting as I might inform you that I have parodied Dr. Suess and movies and songs in my posts. Should a rights holder decide that those are too close to their original material or even just decide that I probably couldn't defend their lawsuit, they could sue me instead of issuing a DMCA and demanding it be taken down.
If it is abused, then the conflict of rights will have to be resolved in the courtroom.
Well, unfortunately, those with the most money often win in the courtroom and which side do you think is going to predominantly be the big dog? The conglomeration of all record labels known as the RIAA? Or the single mother?
No matter how badly the courts stumble over it, it won't end up with some doomsday "zomg we're China" xenophobic nonsense.
Wow, if you think my criticism of an oppressive tool such as the Great Firewall of China is xenophobic then you truly are ignorant. Don't you get it, I want to help the Chinese people enjoy the freedom to say and read whatever the hell they want! I want the Chinese people to enjoy the freedoms I enjoy like being able to say "Fuck the United States Government and that wasteful war in Iraq" while being a citizen and not worry that there is a death van awaiting me on my return to my home tonight. That's not xenophobia, you idiot! It's a desire for freedom! I suffer from oppressive-government-phobia!
This simple act underscored a problem possibly bigger than SOPA: the fact that as with far too many of our elected officials, technology legislation isn't even on his radar.
I don't think you understand SOPA. SOPA isn't a problem with Technology. It's not going to physically break the backbone routers we need for the internet. It's not going to present technological challenges. What it's going to do that is a problem is rape free speech, make user-generated content (like what I'm doing right now) nearly impossible and on par with China's arcane policies as well as a number of other things. It threatens uploading content, it threatens internal networks, it threatens open source software, it threatens DNS, DNSSEC and internet security. And the worst part is that it's going to be completely ineffective at what it aims to do!
You don't need to understand technology to read the pieces on how this is a direct assault on free speech. Screw their understanding of technology, frame this piece of shit legislation as a direct assault on basic civil liberties! Let them chisel into stone memos about their dry cleaning, who cares if they don't use e-mail. Just make sure they understand that this is first and foremost diametrically opposed to free speech when you simply consider the internet as a means of communication and expression!
The best we can do for the short term is to throw everything we can behind legislation to reinstate the OTA (Office of Technology Assessment). From 1974 through 1995, this small group with a tiny budget served as an impartial, nonpartisan advisory to the U.S. Congress on all matters technological.
Another government office or agency? Man, don't we have enough of that bullshit as it is? I think you're deflecting and focusing on something that will sidetrack us from getting this crap shut down. Call your representative and senators and tell them that you feel that your First Amendment Rights are being threatened by H.R. 3261 and forget trying to lecture them about how DNSSEC works.
You want to effectively stop this? Here's a commercial I'd like to see Google air on national TV:
*woman sits behind bars with a look of remorse on her face* Woman: I uploaded a video less than half a minute long of my toddler dancing to music on Youtube. *clip of cute toddler jamming out to some pop music plays* Woman: The video went viral. Then I received a letter in the mail from lawyers saying I owed them the cost of that song for every view. Instead of just taking it down, I'm now in a criminal lawsuit facing bankruptcy and jail time. Please call your representative to stop SOPA and prevent this from happening to thousands of people.
Fight fire with fire, 15 second ad. Let's see it, Google.
Well, there was a Chinese film crew that had seen Primer and been influenced to re-write it into a Chinese version (the biggest difference being that the men in the movie were actually very successful and content and auspicious electronics line workers at a nearby Foxconn plant). But then China's State Administration of Radio, Film and Television finally read the screenplay and were pretty sure there was some form of time travel involved. The film crew has been reassigned to film a documentary at the China/Afghanistan border where a team of ill equipped officers fight drug traffickers with nothing more than the irrepressible spirit of the People's Republic of China. The twist? The film crew are the officers!
I suspect that this is just more of the same sort of security circus show that has the TSA
Well, in awkward defense of this plan (I don't think it will work either) I must point out that this is probably several orders of magnitude cheaper than what those TSA actions cost you as a tax payer. I mean, we have right now on the local level a report-to-the-police then police-investigate system complete with repercussions if that system is abused. And that sometimes works well so why wouldn't a similar plan work for the web on a larger level and be way cheaper than TSA groping and cancer dosing at airports?
TSA making me take off my shoes at the airport
The difference between these two things is that the article makes it sounds like you can opt in to report pages for terrorism. Nobody would be making anyone do anything in this EU scenario. I don't see any threats of failure to report citations or whatever you would do to enforce this.
even as they load a hundred suitcases of largely unscrutinized baggage on the same plane.
That's not true, the screen every bag. I had a lot of olive oils and mustards (two of my favorite condiments) as Christmas presents that I flew back with from MSP to IAD and when I arrived and got my luggage there was a little note in my bag saying the contents had made them hand search it after it was screened.
It could also be another step in getting Europeans used to the idea of law enforcement dictating terms to ISP's and of "flagged" websites being blocked--almost all of which will of course end up being torrent sites, proxies, Wikileaks and other leak sites, etc. that have nothing to do with terrorists.
They pretty much said that in the article (except that would be a separate system left to nation by nation laws):
This could be combined with a ‘notice and take down’ system under which law enforcement agencies would assess flagged web pages and forward take down notices to ISPs if the content is believed to contravene national laws.
I don't think they're like the United States in that respect but I guess only time will tell. I think it'd be smart of the EU to stay out of petty things like copyright infringement as the cost and infrastructure would be far too high and there are bigger problems like terrorism, sex trafficking, etc to target.
Slashdot Mirror
... SOPA/PIPA to protect the movie/music industries from offshore (non-US) piracy.
SOPA/PIPA were US legislation and would have had only been able to be used to prosecute inside the United States. I think what you and your friend are looking to debate in that respect is ACTA and even that's looking limited.
In a recent debate, Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich said he would like to beat the Chinese back to the moon. He has even been so bold as to propose setting up a manned base by 2020, driven by empowering private industry to take the initiative. It's ironic to hear moon travel still being debated 40 years after the last Apollo landing in 1972.
How is that ironic? Establishing a base versus traveling to are two fairly different goals in magnitude with one totally encompassing the other. Aside from that, I don't think it's ironic that 40 years have passed and we need to reevaluate a moon mission. It's seriously still a nontrivial problem today, it's not like riding a bike. In my mind, the fact that they did it forty years ago doesn't take away the danger and knowledge involved with such a feat but instead just proves how badass and ahead of their time those people who worked on the Apollo Program were (yes, yes, Wernher von Braun and Nazi scientists, I'm aware).
And as far as it's being "debated" I challenge you to name one thing that requires government spending that hasn't been debated off and on over the years. Oh, the massive Department of Defense spending, right, for some reason nobody debates that ballooning military industrial complex and that's about it. Wouldn't want to look "weak" going into office now, would we. Speaking of which, I'm all for a shift of some of those funds to space exploration. It took a space race with 'the ruskies' to get us to the moon maybe another 'rah rah USA' race with those other 'commies' will help us establish a presence and research lab?
And the SEC wonders why people keep doing this sort of thing. I bet those two guys (and many other not charged) walked away with millions.
According to the court filing:
Nagaicevs generated more than $850,000 in illegal profits from this scheme. His unauthorized trading in the hijacked accounts also caused losses in excess of $2 million which were reimbursed by the broker-dealer firms that carried the victimized customer accounts.
So how did the firms that the associates work for 'walk away with millions' when Nagaicevs got $850,000 and the total losses to the accounts was over $2 million? I'm guessing that since the firms that those associates worked for reimbursed those accounts that those two associates are facing some pretty upset employers. Is that really worth a couple hundred thousand?
It was really clear to me how he was precisely doing this for his own gain but here's a PDF of the 15 page court proceedings that goes into detail (section B is the informative part). Essentially within one single trading day he would establish a long or short position through one of the unregistered trading firms. Then in that day he would gain illegal access and, if he had to, sell securities to beef up the cash in the account and then make trades that would cause his long or short to payoff. Then he'd pull it all out from the original account. He would often complete this cycle in 15 to 20 minutes and, as a result, he'd often be responsible for more than 50% of that stock's trading volume for that day. It's interesting, they go in to the details of a GBX stock and how the price changes are 10 to 50 cents (on ~$10 per stock).
Even the general Slashdot feeling towards Microsoft, it is true that his (and Melinda's) work is great. Let's hope he keeps it up!
Well, I have an issue with this. From the article:
While that will give an immediate boost, more is needed from governments, which have provided the bulk of the $22.6 billion that has been raised by the Geneva-based organization to date for its work in 150 countries.
The commitment of governments was shaken last year when the fund reported "grave misuse of funds" in four recipient nations, prompting some donors such as Germany and Sweden to freeze their donations.
Why do coutnries pay into this foundation that invests primarily in American funds and stocks? Why do they not setup their own charities that invest in their own stocks or -- better yet -- give it directly to the institutions of medical research?
This perplexes me to no end. This foundation is at the mercy of the stock market and rely on money managers to post returns every year so that it can give those returns to the targeted countries and research -- right up until a crisis causes those funds to greatly shrink.
I have complained about this before and been called "full of bullshit" and I guess this is just one thing that my opinion and concern diverges on from the rest of the readers here. This is charity in the form of keeping the capital inside America's border and shaving off returns. The money stays at work in America and no such stock or company or infrastructure is built up in the countries that could truly use it and truly need it.
When you're talking billions of dollars, you're talking enough money to start internal institutions and programs that could create jobs or better education as well as do medical research. Instead this money stays in the coffers of rich Western companies and even after the returns are "given" to the countries, it is given in the form of purchased medicines often made by American companies. And that strategy of deciding where your donations gets spent doesn't always work out like you would expect.
It's great he donates all that money but that method is never going to change anything. The real winners here are the companies that get huge cash infusions from the foundation in the form of investment (like Monsanto) and Big Pharma who gets the revenue from all the AIDS medicine that is bought and shipped. Exactly why are foreign governments investing in the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation instead of finding a better solution?
Bring on the "look a gift horse in the mouth" posts. They may be right but there has to be a better way to use this money to accomplish these goals. It's almost designed to be a perpetual medicine exporting machine.
How am I supposed to take a summary seriously when it refers to bacteria as a "bug"?
While this is seen as probably an oversimplification of describing bacteria, viruses, etc. there are probably a lot of dictionary entries backing this up like the fifth one in Wiktionary: "A contagious illness; a bacterium or virus causing it." You also had media in the late nineties using this virtually everywhere. See this BBC article for an example. The fact that researchers themselves have used phrases like Super Bug to describe resistant bacteria to lay people probably doesn't help. English is viscous. Deal with it.
"We try to steer clear of things that would attract scrutiny," Labian said. "If people are pirating on our service, we don’t want those people to use it."
So what you're openly admitting is that you just don't know the extent of piracy on your service? I probably would have said "no comment" rather than risk the Eye of Sauron ... er RIAA/MPAA's gaze. From what I gather, it could 0% it could be 100% of your service based on pirates sharing files with each other but since you don't know it's okay? Unless you have some sort of Youtube-like fingerprinting going on, I'd just keep your mouth shut.
Another reason Labian said he wasn’t worried about the government stepping in is because the company maintains a "good relationship" with various government bodies, including "Homeland Security, ICE, and the FBI."
Right but those are just the enforcers, your real problem is the MPAA and unless you're paying elected officials more than they are you could be next.
I LOVE IT! Not only is a nutjob getting harassed, but they finally decided to harass someone that can do something to shut their asses down.
Both Ron Paul and his son Rand Paul have been very vocal opponents of the TSA (I'm pretty sure Ron Paul is running on a platform to completely dissolve the TSA as well as a number of other agencies and departments of the federal government -- although that depends on where he's speaking and to whom). Even if you don't believe he would go that far, Ron Paul has introduced the American Traveler's Dignity Act which specifically addresses being treated like cattle. I would wager most of this was coolly calculated by his son as beneficial to Ron Paul's campaign efforts -- bringing attention to such policies and putting them on the debate table.
Scratch that, I just read some lengthy forums that say that's a shattered lens cap. Here's another panorama with said lens cap pieces. The Daily Mail offers this strange image as evidence ... but that's The Daily Mail so take it with a grain of salt. If that is what all the fuss is about, I'm a little angry I just wasted this much time. Personally I'd assume my camera is experiencing an anomaly due to it being 867 degrees Fahrenheit outside ...
No pictures were included, so how can we form our own, uneducated, opinions???
This article from Ria Novosti has one picture with attributions to the scientist and journal. I'm not sure what you're looking at but I am guessing that the object outside of the pod is not a device of theirs -- which leads to a lot of speculation and conjecture. I guess I don't know enough about their sensors/cameras that they were using in 1982 to say whether or not this was some sort of aberration or malfunction of the camera due to extreme temperatures. But that's about the best uneducated opinion I can offer you.
Hell, I only TOLERATE progressives, I certainly don't ACCEPT em and since 99% of gays are also progs........ you guys made my shitlist long before my gaydar went off.
I guess it was really hard for you to justify automatically hating homosexuals right up until the point that you could say "99% of gays are also progs." Then I bet it was really easy for you to say you hate them not because they're gay but because of their political alignment (that you forced upon them).
Well done. Well done. Say, have you ever considered that they're also human beings with different needs than you? That they just want to be recognized the same way you are by your government that supposedly espouses equal rights?
Homosexuality is a mental defect, albeit a minor one in the bigger scheme of things.
A mental defect you say? Are you aware that the method by which we communicate right now could not have been possible without the progress of one man who had such a mental defect (in more than one way)?
Take all your political bullshit and leave. This is about the rights of human beings. Not "being progressive" or "saying 2+2=5" but about respecting your fellow citizens the same fucking way they respect you.
Well, the summary specifically references a developer's forum where I can sympathize (being a developer) with people modding Android ROMs or whatever and uploading such binaries for distribution to others. I guess the people who run the forum don't really get a say in any of this. However, as a software developer, I can imagine a third option for files that are user generated (and for the most part legal).
... perhaps a hash of the date, checksum and filename? It would then maintain a key-value pair of these megaupload links to your internal URIs and also a directory structure of these URIs as the files. Now, say megaupload is a very unreliable/questionable service or goes down and now your forum is worthless. Well, you can always re-spider your site and replace all the megaupload links with links to your cloud hosting of these new files or work out a deal with another third party similar to megaupload where they would accept the file and URI and return to you the URI paired with their new URL. Then it's a matter of spidering your site and replacing the megaupload links with your new service's URLs.
Now XDA-Developers is going to have tens of thousands of once helpful posts that now lead to a broken link. How could they have avoided this? Well, I'd imagine that someone could have written an internal bot for their forums that would harvest links to the external megaupload. They then could have subscribed to megaupload, downloaded said linked files and created a local cache of their files purely for their own use on a small RAID. Now the last thing the bot would need to do is take the megaupload URL and develop some unique URI
It's a pain in the ass but let's face it, some forums could perish when their codependence on megaupload is fully realized in a very painful manner. And I don't think that's a fair risk to the users who have created hundreds of thousands of posts.
After my initial tests
Wait, what? From the article:
Officially named ReFS — for Resilient File System — the new file system will be made available via a staged “evolution,” according to a January 16 post on the “Building Windows 8 blog.
So you're saying something that was just announced and will be made available via a staged evolution has already been tested by you? Impressive!
It is basically all the best filesystems compiled into one.
Thanks for summing it up for me there, bud. I didn't realize it was the greatest goddamn filesystem I could imagine, why didn't you just say "Imagine what your dream filesystem will be able to do, this is it." I wonder though, will it have the homicide capacity of ReiserFS?
This reminds me of my initial tests of cold fusion. I must say that cold fusion is incredible dvangement. Cold fusion supports providing us with unlimited power from a glass of water, it prints money, it gives the user eternal life, it allows the user to travel faster than the speed of life and -- when activated -- attractive women jump out of the core reactor demanding money shot after money shot.
SilverLight. They technology behind it stunning. You can also use C# to developed. For video sites there's also a HUGE difference compared to flash - with SilverLight the client and server will adjust to the available bandwidth the user has.. in flash this would just show up the loading icon and stop playing. SilverLight is technically much better than Flash.
Makita. They power drills let me build anything. So why not web sites? You can also use your hands to use them. For tables built with power drills there's also a HUGE difference compared to hammers - with Makita the carpenter and sitter will adjust to how quickly they can drill.. with a hammer this would just show up as unfinished nailheads sticking out on the surface. Makita is technically much better than a hammer.
*picks up his fat paycheck from Makita* Welp, my work here is done.
The same problem that there would be with lots of people if Microsoft started suddenly introducing their own "standards" again. There's still some issues because of all that bs 10 years ago, but now it has almost gone away. There really isn't any need to broke the web again. And how to create something better? Work out a standard of it.
What a great idea! I'll hop to it right now!
Situation: there are n+1 competing standards.
They're mimicking the old Microsoft here - make your own "standards" and break the web by making features and sites that only work Google's browser.
From Dart's wikipedia page:
Google will offer a cross compiler that compiles Dart to ECMAScript 3 on the fly, for compatibility with non-Dart browsers.
And, in fact, dartc already cross compiles Dart code to plain Javascript. Once it's integrated into browsers, use it or don't use it.
It's like Microsoft all again.
Right, that's a stretch. You conveniently cherry pick details here. For example, NaCl is released under a BSD license with source code readily available. Are you saying the same was true of ActiveX since it's launch?
I come from a family of farmers, some of which have taken advantage of the high price of corn. Well, around Christmas they were talking about two things. One is the serious disregard for pollution standards from most (they said more than just those caught and fined) ethanol refineries. And also the negative effect it has had on farmland in their area. The second was that many refineries were shutting down as these subsidies came to a close (my dad pointed out two abandoned as we drove along) and as a result some farmers had bought up land at high prices expecting the recent price of corn to continue. They had figured they would be getting $6 or $7 a bushel and there was a lot of talk that since the refineries were going down and production was already juiced that this was going to lead to a lot of farmers losing money in these purchases. From what I gathered from folks who have been doing this for many decades: this will be a very painful learning experience for everyone involved and this seems to be the sentiment whether the wind blows right or left.
'There are some indications already that California wants to split off and such pressures tend to build over time. It is hard to see this waiting until the end of the century. Maybe an East Coast cluster will want to break off too. Pressures come from the enormous differences in wealth generation capability, and people not wanting to fund others if they can avoid it.'
And who is making such outrageous claims? A geologist? Perhaps a seismologist? Perhaps even just some sort of basic scientist?
From the beginning of the article:
Here is what futurologists Ian Pearson (IP) and Patrick Tucker (PT) think of your ideas.
"Futurologist?" What does it take to call oneself a 'futurologist?'
Well, from Ian Pearson's page I'd guess he's got some communication technology background? Or perhaps an author? From his list of achievements:
Ian Pearson has been a full time futurologist since 1991, with a proven track record of around 85% accuracy at the 10 year horizon.
So you could estimate he has a (0.85)^10 or ~19.7% accuracy at the 100 year horizon? Do you get to pick which issues you have to weigh in on? How accurate do you have to be? Are these just yes or no? Multiple choice?
And Patrick Tucker looks to be little more than an author and interviewer. Sorry for the character assassination or ad hominem attacks but these guys are sci-fi authors, essentially. Reprinting their claims of North America breaking apart in anyway within 100 years is less than prudent.
Just write the damn thing once, somehow, and give it away free to everyone. Seems inevitable, and I'm eager to see it.
Hey man if you're up for writing it, I'd definitely chuck $25 at a thing like this. I donated $25 to Daniel Shiffman's Nature of Code book and plan on reviewing it on Slashdot once he's done. Here's some examples of his latest products for it: PDF of Chapter 10 and Code.
...
Figure out how much money you would need to have your department make some creative common texts and see how Kickstarter responds
Comply with PayPal's shipping requests in a timely manner.
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For transactions that total less than USD $250 (or local currency equivalent), proof of delivery is confirmation that can be viewed online and includes: recipient's (seller's) address, showing at least city, postal code, state, or country (or equivalent), delivery date, and the URL to the shipping company's web site if you've selected "Other" in the shipping drop down menu. For transactions that total USD $250 or more, you must get signature confirmation of the delivery.
Emphasis mine. Note, I found this at the original article over at Regretsy along with a picture for those of you who are lazy.
..."
Well, at least everyone involved has a crazy story to tell: "Gather 'round children and let me tell you about the time I had to destroy a hundred year old violin in a timely manner. FuhrerMarks had instructed me -- back then they were known as 'PayPal' -- to destroy the violin after a dispute about its label
I disagree, it creates a conflict of rights and a loophole allowing people to commit harm to others. That is foolish and irresponsible, but it is not the end of the world or the end of slashdot or the end of free speech.
When did I say it was the end of the world, the end of Slashdot or the end of free speech? And, yes, it could affect my Slashdot posting as I might inform you that I have parodied Dr. Suess and movies and songs in my posts. Should a rights holder decide that those are too close to their original material or even just decide that I probably couldn't defend their lawsuit, they could sue me instead of issuing a DMCA and demanding it be taken down.
If it is abused, then the conflict of rights will have to be resolved in the courtroom.
Well, unfortunately, those with the most money often win in the courtroom and which side do you think is going to predominantly be the big dog? The conglomeration of all record labels known as the RIAA? Or the single mother?
No matter how badly the courts stumble over it, it won't end up with some doomsday "zomg we're China" xenophobic nonsense.
Wow, if you think my criticism of an oppressive tool such as the Great Firewall of China is xenophobic then you truly are ignorant. Don't you get it, I want to help the Chinese people enjoy the freedom to say and read whatever the hell they want! I want the Chinese people to enjoy the freedoms I enjoy like being able to say "Fuck the United States Government and that wasteful war in Iraq" while being a citizen and not worry that there is a death van awaiting me on my return to my home tonight. That's not xenophobia, you idiot! It's a desire for freedom! I suffer from oppressive-government-phobia!
This simple act underscored a problem possibly bigger than SOPA: the fact that as with far too many of our elected officials, technology legislation isn't even on his radar.
I don't think you understand SOPA. SOPA isn't a problem with Technology. It's not going to physically break the backbone routers we need for the internet. It's not going to present technological challenges. What it's going to do that is a problem is rape free speech, make user-generated content (like what I'm doing right now) nearly impossible and on par with China's arcane policies as well as a number of other things. It threatens uploading content, it threatens internal networks, it threatens open source software, it threatens DNS, DNSSEC and internet security. And the worst part is that it's going to be completely ineffective at what it aims to do!
You don't need to understand technology to read the pieces on how this is a direct assault on free speech. Screw their understanding of technology, frame this piece of shit legislation as a direct assault on basic civil liberties! Let them chisel into stone memos about their dry cleaning, who cares if they don't use e-mail. Just make sure they understand that this is first and foremost diametrically opposed to free speech when you simply consider the internet as a means of communication and expression!
The best we can do for the short term is to throw everything we can behind legislation to reinstate the OTA (Office of Technology Assessment). From 1974 through 1995, this small group with a tiny budget served as an impartial, nonpartisan advisory to the U.S. Congress on all matters technological.
Another government office or agency? Man, don't we have enough of that bullshit as it is? I think you're deflecting and focusing on something that will sidetrack us from getting this crap shut down. Call your representative and senators and tell them that you feel that your First Amendment Rights are being threatened by H.R. 3261 and forget trying to lecture them about how DNSSEC works.
You want to effectively stop this? Here's a commercial I'd like to see Google air on national TV:
*woman sits behind bars with a look of remorse on her face*
Woman: I uploaded a video less than half a minute long of my toddler dancing to music on Youtube.
*clip of cute toddler jamming out to some pop music plays*
Woman: The video went viral. Then I received a letter in the mail from lawyers saying I owed them the cost of that song for every view. Instead of just taking it down, I'm now in a criminal lawsuit facing bankruptcy and jail time. Please call your representative to stop SOPA and prevent this from happening to thousands of people.
Fight fire with fire, 15 second ad. Let's see it, Google.
Well, there was a Chinese film crew that had seen Primer and been influenced to re-write it into a Chinese version (the biggest difference being that the men in the movie were actually very successful and content and auspicious electronics line workers at a nearby Foxconn plant). But then China's State Administration of Radio, Film and Television finally read the screenplay and were pretty sure there was some form of time travel involved. The film crew has been reassigned to film a documentary at the China/Afghanistan border where a team of ill equipped officers fight drug traffickers with nothing more than the irrepressible spirit of the People's Republic of China. The twist? The film crew are the officers!
I suspect that this is just more of the same sort of security circus show that has the TSA
Well, in awkward defense of this plan (I don't think it will work either) I must point out that this is probably several orders of magnitude cheaper than what those TSA actions cost you as a tax payer. I mean, we have right now on the local level a report-to-the-police then police-investigate system complete with repercussions if that system is abused. And that sometimes works well so why wouldn't a similar plan work for the web on a larger level and be way cheaper than TSA groping and cancer dosing at airports?
TSA making me take off my shoes at the airport
The difference between these two things is that the article makes it sounds like you can opt in to report pages for terrorism. Nobody would be making anyone do anything in this EU scenario. I don't see any threats of failure to report citations or whatever you would do to enforce this.
even as they load a hundred suitcases of largely unscrutinized baggage on the same plane.
That's not true, the screen every bag. I had a lot of olive oils and mustards (two of my favorite condiments) as Christmas presents that I flew back with from MSP to IAD and when I arrived and got my luggage there was a little note in my bag saying the contents had made them hand search it after it was screened.
It could also be another step in getting Europeans used to the idea of law enforcement dictating terms to ISP's and of "flagged" websites being blocked--almost all of which will of course end up being torrent sites, proxies, Wikileaks and other leak sites, etc. that have nothing to do with terrorists.
They pretty much said that in the article (except that would be a separate system left to nation by nation laws):
This could be combined with a ‘notice and take down’ system under which law enforcement agencies would assess flagged web pages and forward take down notices to ISPs if the content is believed to contravene national laws.
I don't think they're like the United States in that respect but I guess only time will tell. I think it'd be smart of the EU to stay out of petty things like copyright infringement as the cost and infrastructure would be far too high and there are bigger problems like terrorism, sex trafficking, etc to target.