"Tip of the iceberg" isn't a good metaphor, though. I tend to think it's exactly the *wrong* metaphor to use.
"No, no," says the government. "It's just this bit here; we needed this power to stop the terrorists and keep you safe!" And sure, the conspiracy theorists freak out and call it fascism, but when you look under the water, YES some scattered abuse exists, and NO the new power claimed by the executive branch has not succeeded in actually catching any *real* terrorists... but by and large, most citizens aren't affected (just a handful of activist types, you know, ha ha).
There's no iceberg under the water.
So it goes largely unchecked, and gradually people stop listening to the conspiracy theorists. Hey, we're not really under threat here... You wouldn't worry if you had nothing to hide... Damn, isn't stopping gay marriage more important?
And so the threat grows, and it's subtle and slow (and politicians rail against it now and again, if people seem worried). And it's nothing like an iceberg, where you can just look under the water and see it sitting there.
I personally am fairly excited about some of the "cloud" hosting services like mor.ph (completely managed RoR and J2EE hosting, sits on Amazon EC2), the Google AppEngine and the like. There are also more than a handful of hosts now that aren't as locked down, but at least let you scale quite flexibly -- toss a new VM image up there and launch a new instance, and it's all more or less automatic. It's good to be pushing towards a model of app design that's scalable by default, and it's all still pretty rough for now, but I feel these kinds of services are pushing people to think the right way. Why waste all the energy and money for dedicated servers you may never need when you could launch with a little VPN that you kick up into a full cluster when (if) the crowd hits? I love that idea. I want to have 4-5 little projects kicking along that are super-cheap to run, but they won't just vanish if they get some attention.
I know that all fits *somewhere* into cloud computing. Is that IaaS vs. SaaS?
Whatever, but it's clear Stallman is talking about the software-as-a-service stuff. Which I half-agree on -- I'm a paranoid kinda person, so I run my own mail server instead of letting Google mine my email... but damn, sometimes I would love to be able to give up all the responsibility that entails. There's a tradeoff, *especially* when your provider tells you specifically they they're going through your personal data with a fine-toothed comb so they can better "target" you. It's not like you might find they've been sniffing through your private data and you can sue them... they told you up front.
That's completely unreconcilable with basic privacy and just... what? Psychological security? As parent mentioned, and I worked on a project a few years back with an insurance company implementing HIPAA guidelines (related situation, maybe), and they're probably going to be tied to their AS/400s for a long time to come... and they're sure as hell not moving their data "into the cloud".
One dazzling new possibility that I don't think Stallman has foreseen... as Infrastructure-as-a-Service develops (that first thing I was talking about, unless I'm misusing the buzzword...), we get the possibility of PRIVATE software-as-a-service.
Like, you can use the free Google Apps if you want, *or* if you have the cash and the need (and the standardized, auto-scaling infrastructure -- see above), you can deploy Google Apps privately.
That's pretty pie-in-the-sky, but we all gotta dream.
Jesus is suing both companies, stating his clear association with the cross as grounds for an ex parte decision on royalties owed. That would only really make sense if Jesus were famous for crucifying people, and marketing his new execution method to world leaders, perhaps.
Why the hell is that the Jesus "symbol", anyway? It makes no sense. That's just the particular method used to *kill* him. Sure, there's various symbolic meaning behind the death, but the *method* of killing has nothing to do with any of that. The Romans could have had him keel-hauled.
Maybe Gandhi's symbol should be a handgun? I think he'd be pleased.
I've been taking the same approach (unique email for each company) for years.
Usually it's pretty safe, but there are two who sold my email (or got hacked, etc.):
allofmp3.com
traveloasis.com
Maybe allofmp3 isn't so surprising....
But these are the only two -- other spam I get is all to email addresses that are publically available, or built on dictionary attacks. I've *never* seen another company name in there at random, by the way. The randomized attacks are usually built using possible user names (which wouldn't normally be a company name).
Though I guess some conservationists might mistakenly attack him for "logging", or old video game fans might confusedly cheer him for being a "frogger", or his political opponents might see the article and agree that he is indeed a hogger of pork-barrel cash, bogging things down or slogging on day after day, dogging them relentlessly.
REDMOND, WA (Reuters): Bill Gates dropped the bombshell in a recent interview after the exit of two key executives, one to spend more time with a racecar hobby, and the other to start his own company. "That's it," he said, with a shake in his voice. "We're closing up shop. Without these two guys, I just don't think I can do it anymore... Balmie and I just can't keep throwing chairs as if..." His voice trailed off, and he ended his statement prematurely, but a Microsoft spokesperson stepped up to fill in the rest of the details.
"There are a lot of misconceptions out there about the real function of top executives at any major corporation, but as it turns out, when this particular pair left, no more code was written, no more EULAs were drafted, no more patents were filed. Everything stopped! We've also noticed huge cracks appearing in virtually every building on the main Microsoft campus. It's a disaster, but the decision has been made to turn over all Microsoft resources, including intellectual property, customer contracts, and funds, directly over to Linux Torvalds. It's an unfortunately situation, but we see no alternative."
Stay tuned for more details on this startling, but inevitable turn of events.
Umm; I *did* clearly flag my message as both offtopic (that's the "OT") AND a sig comment in the subject of my post.
This seemed like the simplest way to make a response WITHOUT forcing lots of people who would be totally uninterested from reading it (more so than any of the methods of response you mentioned).
Read my other posts if you want; I'm no troll. Trolling means *trying* to waste people's time (by writing intentionally "misguided" opinions, etc), and flamebaiting means *trying* to get other posters to flame you.
Nice sig. I'm thinking of putting up a site with up-close photos of women who died during a legally-forced childbirth -- with blood everywhere, and the infant as well (preferably dead as well, or alive but with no living guardian is okay as well). Also photos of unwanted and/or abused & neglected children born to drug addicts, rape victims, 13-year-olds, etc.. They sure are shocking, and there's no better argument against forcing a woman to carry an unwanted fetus to term.
Oh no, I'm sorry -- visceral photos aren't an argument at all. I forgot for a second there.
Seriously, abortion is a big topic. But you have to discuss it -- I don't convince people to be vegetarians by leaving glossies of slaughterings on their kitchen table.
Meh -- fair enough, I assumed you were the AC above that as well. I'll still ding you a few points for contributing nothing to the conversation, though. Whether Wikipedia is the ideal reference is irrelevant when you can confirm his point on numerous other sites.
Just like whether urine is going to be *perfectly* sterile or not is pretty irrelevant when it's definitely more sterile than saliva and at least as sterile as semen.
Personally, I'm still waiting where you show that urine is in any way LESS safe than the other fluids that are involved in plain vanilla sex. Which IS perfectly legal for those over 18.
Even if you suppose the urinator has an infection of some kind and that sterile urine picks up some bacteria on the way out... isn't that the same exit that semen is taking? And how does either of those compare to saliva?
The entire point of the (what was it now, great-great-grandparent?) original post was that two consenting adults involved in "water sports" aren't doing anything in any way more dangerous than you'd see in "standard" porn. So -- why in the world should anyone care if another adult wants to see videos of this? So.. it doesn't hurt the participants in any way (cf America's Funniest Home Videos, for example), they are consenting adults, and even if viewers decide to do the same thing, it won't hurt them in any way (again, cf America's Funniest HV, or Jackass, or WWF wrestling, or pro football, or boxing, or almost any action movie... need I go on?). Why the hell are they outlawing it? Hey, it doesn't float my boat, but I really have no concern whatsoever with anyone who does get off on it. Why shouldn't I?
Oh, because urination is OUTRAGEOUS! It must be stopped! Sure, it's not hurting anyone... but somehow it's CORRUPTING THEM!
It's so ridiculous, I could just spit. Wait, is that still legal?
Sniffing me, then offering to plug the holes for a price is almost the equivalent of blackmail. This may earn you one of 2 things: ...and in a bar, this kind of behavior will almost *certainly* get you slapped, hard.
The bubonic plague is treatable with antibiotics as long as you treat it fairly soon.
And this is NOT like it's something that we've wiped out completely and would annihilate mankind if it reappeared -- actually there are still between 1000 and 3000 cases every year, including some in North America.
So yeah -- if you live near where the mice escaped and you come down with a nasty flu (and those, uh, buboes), you should make sure you get it checked out immediately... but it's no disaster.
After trying for 4 hours, you FINALLY manage to get past the toughest part of your favorite game. You toss your controller on the rug as you leap up in the air... only to see (with horror) the TV screen wink out.
This can be solved by a delay-button -- i.e., you have to hold it down for a few seconds before it works.
But your spaz scenario is spot-on, and even worse with the power button on the controller, he can even pretend he did it *accidentally*.
Whoah. Yeah, no good.
There are more evil scenarios -- how about the 3-year old little sibling who likes to play with the spare controller while you play -- if that power button works you aren't going to be too happy, and that's a lot of shouting and crying coming right up.
Other than the power button, though, I have to say I'm really intrigued by it. I'm *definitely* keen on the more intuitive movement/angle interface. Doesn't everyone try to do this anyway? Come on, admit you lean into the turns.
Nintendo can still manage to kill the thing if it's buggy, breaks easily (or gets out of whack easily), or if the new games using it are weak... but I have a feeling this is really going to take off.
Seriously, the "rich" user experience that we see in most Flash websites really isn't something we need more of. Notice how rich the GMail user experience is, without a drop of Flash? Wonder why Google chose to go the route they did?
The vast majority of Flash sites I see only detract from the user experience. The supposedly "rich" user experiences just mean that there's a cool animation as each new content area opens... with a tiny font that I can't resize, with a poorly-contrasting color scheme that I can't override, with annoying non-standard scrollbars, and with form fields that can't I use my browser's auto-complete features on. How is that a richer user experience? Adding eye-candy at the expense of breaking basic usability -- never mind the fact that you're hiding your pages from the search engines -- is not a worth trade-off.
Oh, but wait -- I forgot there's music playing in the background, and bloops and echoing clicks when I mouse over the mystery-meat controls.
Seriously, there's a place for Flash online -- it's a nice way to add inline audio/video or animations, and there are online Flash-based games that are awesome... but I'm yet to see a single Flash-only website where the user experience was actually better because of Flash.
The funny thing about this is that it wouldn't have *mattered* 20 years ago. We live in a different world now, and it's going to take a while for people to understand it.
Think about the stereotypical absent-minded professor. Someone gives him a file of students' academic info, and like everything else, he misplaces it.
Okay -- 20 years ago, worst case scenario: the file is left out in plain view on his desk in an unlocked office, and a student nicks it. The student shows his friends, word gets out, and the student gets in trouble. Some students are upset about the privacy violation.
Now fast-forward to today, and the same innocuous, absent-minded professor can misplace a file and cause a DISASTER. Surprise, the whole world can see it! Nobody needed to break into his office, nobody needed to even enter the school, and they can get the file, just because he mixed up the X: drive (teacher fileserv) with the W: drive (public webserver), or something like that.
I'm no Luddite -- heck, I'm a web developer, and I'm the first to say that the benefits of the internet are incredible -- but it's a dangerous and powerful tool that doesn't get the respect it deserves... most users out there are kinda like teenagers learning to drive tractor trailors. Or it's like everyone's using these new ballpoint pens that also shoot out a lethal dart if you twist the handle.
Slashdot Mirror
"Tip of the iceberg" isn't a good metaphor, though. I tend to think it's exactly the *wrong* metaphor to use.
"No, no," says the government. "It's just this bit here; we needed this power to stop the terrorists and keep you safe!"
And sure, the conspiracy theorists freak out and call it fascism, but when you look under the water, YES some scattered abuse exists, and NO the new power claimed by the executive branch has not succeeded in actually catching any *real* terrorists... but by and large, most citizens aren't affected (just a handful of activist types, you know, ha ha).
There's no iceberg under the water.
So it goes largely unchecked, and gradually people stop listening to the conspiracy theorists. Hey, we're not really under threat here... You wouldn't worry if you had nothing to hide... Damn, isn't stopping gay marriage more important?
And so the threat grows, and it's subtle and slow (and politicians rail against it now and again, if people seem worried). And it's nothing like an iceberg, where you can just look under the water and see it sitting there.
I think I see how this works.... Come on mods, hurry and mod me funny! Cut me in on the action before it's too lat
(just kidding, I'm still here. But still waiting for the funny...)
I personally am fairly excited about some of the "cloud" hosting services like mor.ph (completely managed RoR and J2EE hosting, sits on Amazon EC2), the Google AppEngine and the like. There are also more than a handful of hosts now that aren't as locked down, but at least let you scale quite flexibly -- toss a new VM image up there and launch a new instance, and it's all more or less automatic. It's good to be pushing towards a model of app design that's scalable by default, and it's all still pretty rough for now, but I feel these kinds of services are pushing people to think the right way. Why waste all the energy and money for dedicated servers you may never need when you could launch with a little VPN that you kick up into a full cluster when (if) the crowd hits? I love that idea. I want to have 4-5 little projects kicking along that are super-cheap to run, but they won't just vanish if they get some attention.
I know that all fits *somewhere* into cloud computing. Is that IaaS vs. SaaS?
Whatever, but it's clear Stallman is talking about the software-as-a-service stuff. Which I half-agree on -- I'm a paranoid kinda person, so I run my own mail server instead of letting Google mine my email... but damn, sometimes I would love to be able to give up all the responsibility that entails. There's a tradeoff, *especially* when your provider tells you specifically they they're going through your personal data with a fine-toothed comb so they can better "target" you. It's not like you might find they've been sniffing through your private data and you can sue them... they told you up front.
That's completely unreconcilable with basic privacy and just... what? Psychological security? As parent mentioned, and I worked on a project a few years back with an insurance company implementing HIPAA guidelines (related situation, maybe), and they're probably going to be tied to their AS/400s for a long time to come... and they're sure as hell not moving their data "into the cloud".
One dazzling new possibility that I don't think Stallman has foreseen... as Infrastructure-as-a-Service develops (that first thing I was talking about, unless I'm misusing the buzzword...), we get the possibility of PRIVATE software-as-a-service.
Like, you can use the free Google Apps if you want, *or* if you have the cash and the need (and the standardized, auto-scaling infrastructure -- see above), you can deploy Google Apps privately.
That's pretty pie-in-the-sky, but we all gotta dream.
Why the hell is that the Jesus "symbol", anyway? It makes no sense. That's just the particular method used to *kill* him. Sure, there's various symbolic meaning behind the death, but the *method* of killing has nothing to do with any of that. The Romans could have had him keel-hauled.
Maybe Gandhi's symbol should be a handgun? I think he'd be pleased.
I've been taking the same approach (unique email for each company) for years.
Usually it's pretty safe, but there are two who sold my email (or got hacked, etc.):
allofmp3.com
traveloasis.com
Maybe allofmp3 isn't so surprising....
But these are the only two -- other spam I get is all to email addresses that are publically available, or built on dictionary attacks. I've *never* seen another company name in there at random, by the way. The randomized attacks are usually built using possible user names (which wouldn't normally be a company name).
You're thinking of "snogging".
Though I guess some conservationists might mistakenly attack him for "logging", or old video game fans might confusedly cheer him for being a "frogger", or his political opponents might see the article and agree that he is indeed a hogger of pork-barrel cash, bogging things down or slogging on day after day, dogging them relentlessly.
But let's not get carried away here!
"Microsoft loses two key...": UPDATED:
REDMOND, WA (Reuters):
Bill Gates dropped the bombshell in a recent interview after the exit of two key executives, one to spend more time with a racecar hobby, and the other to start his own company. "That's it," he said, with a shake in his voice. "We're closing up shop. Without these two guys, I just don't think I can do it anymore... Balmie and I just can't keep throwing chairs as if..." His voice trailed off, and he ended his statement prematurely, but a Microsoft spokesperson stepped up to fill in the rest of the details.
"There are a lot of misconceptions out there about the real function of top executives at any major corporation, but as it turns out, when this particular pair left, no more code was written, no more EULAs were drafted, no more patents were filed. Everything stopped! We've also noticed huge cracks appearing in virtually every building on the main Microsoft campus. It's a disaster, but the decision has been made to turn over all Microsoft resources, including intellectual property, customer contracts, and funds, directly over to Linux Torvalds. It's an unfortunately situation, but we see no alternative."
Stay tuned for more details on this startling, but inevitable turn of events.
Umm; I *did* clearly flag my message as both offtopic (that's the "OT") AND a sig comment in the subject of my post.
This seemed like the simplest way to make a response WITHOUT forcing lots of people who would be totally uninterested from reading it (more so than any of the methods of response you mentioned).
Read my other posts if you want; I'm no troll. Trolling means *trying* to waste people's time (by writing intentionally "misguided" opinions, etc), and flamebaiting means *trying* to get other posters to flame you.
Um -- just wondering. No reason, really, but I forgot to check. ;)
And I've been building up my reputation, and "leveling up".
Nice sig. I'm thinking of putting up a site with up-close photos of women who died during a legally-forced childbirth -- with blood everywhere, and the infant as well (preferably dead as well, or alive but with no living guardian is okay as well). Also photos of unwanted and/or abused & neglected children born to drug addicts, rape victims, 13-year-olds, etc.. They sure are shocking, and there's no better argument against forcing a woman to carry an unwanted fetus to term.
Oh no, I'm sorry -- visceral photos aren't an argument at all. I forgot for a second there.
Seriously, abortion is a big topic. But you have to discuss it -- I don't convince people to be vegetarians by leaving glossies of slaughterings on their kitchen table.
Meh -- fair enough, I assumed you were the AC above that as well. I'll still ding you a few points for contributing nothing to the conversation, though. Whether Wikipedia is the ideal reference is irrelevant when you can confirm his point on numerous other sites.
Just like whether urine is going to be *perfectly* sterile or not is pretty irrelevant when it's definitely more sterile than saliva and at least as sterile as semen.
Personally, I'm still waiting where you show that urine is in any way LESS safe than the other fluids that are involved in plain vanilla sex. Which IS perfectly legal for those over 18.
Even if you suppose the urinator has an infection of some kind and that sterile urine picks up some bacteria on the way out... isn't that the same exit that semen is taking? And how does either of those compare to saliva?
The entire point of the (what was it now, great-great-grandparent?) original post was that two consenting adults involved in "water sports" aren't doing anything in any way more dangerous than you'd see in "standard" porn. So -- why in the world should anyone care if another adult wants to see videos of this? So.. it doesn't hurt the participants in any way (cf America's Funniest Home Videos, for example), they are consenting adults, and even if viewers decide to do the same thing, it won't hurt them in any way (again, cf America's Funniest HV, or Jackass, or WWF wrestling, or pro football, or boxing, or almost any action movie... need I go on?). Why the hell are they outlawing it? Hey, it doesn't float my boat, but I really have no concern whatsoever with anyone who does get off on it. Why shouldn't I?
Oh, because urination is OUTRAGEOUS! It must be stopped! Sure, it's not hurting anyone... but somehow it's CORRUPTING THEM!
It's so ridiculous, I could just spit. Wait, is that still legal?
Sniffing me, then offering to plug the holes for a price is almost the equivalent of blackmail. This may earn you one of 2 things: ...and in a bar, this kind of behavior will almost *certainly* get you slapped, hard.
The bubonic plague is treatable with antibiotics as long as you treat it fairly soon.
And this is NOT like it's something that we've wiped out completely and would annihilate mankind if it reappeared -- actually there are still between 1000 and 3000 cases every year, including some in North America.
So yeah -- if you live near where the mice escaped and you come down with a nasty flu (and those, uh, buboes), you should make sure you get it checked out immediately... but it's no disaster.
After trying for 4 hours, you FINALLY manage to get past the toughest part of your favorite game. You toss your controller on the rug as you leap up in the air... only to see (with horror) the TV screen wink out.
This can be solved by a delay-button -- i.e., you have to hold it down for a few seconds before it works.
But your spaz scenario is spot-on, and even worse with the power button on the controller, he can even pretend he did it *accidentally*.
Whoah. Yeah, no good.
There are more evil scenarios -- how about the 3-year old little sibling who likes to play with the spare controller while you play -- if that power button works you aren't going to be too happy, and that's a lot of shouting and crying coming right up.
Other than the power button, though, I have to say I'm really intrigued by it. I'm *definitely* keen on the more intuitive movement/angle interface. Doesn't everyone try to do this anyway? Come on, admit you lean into the turns.
Nintendo can still manage to kill the thing if it's buggy, breaks easily (or gets out of whack easily), or if the new games using it are weak... but I have a feeling this is really going to take off.
Seriously, the "rich" user experience that we see in most Flash websites really isn't something we need more of. Notice how rich the GMail user experience is, without a drop of Flash? Wonder why Google chose to go the route they did? The vast majority of Flash sites I see only detract from the user experience. The supposedly "rich" user experiences just mean that there's a cool animation as each new content area opens... with a tiny font that I can't resize, with a poorly-contrasting color scheme that I can't override, with annoying non-standard scrollbars, and with form fields that can't I use my browser's auto-complete features on. How is that a richer user experience? Adding eye-candy at the expense of breaking basic usability -- never mind the fact that you're hiding your pages from the search engines -- is not a worth trade-off. Oh, but wait -- I forgot there's music playing in the background, and bloops and echoing clicks when I mouse over the mystery-meat controls. Seriously, there's a place for Flash online -- it's a nice way to add inline audio/video or animations, and there are online Flash-based games that are awesome... but I'm yet to see a single Flash-only website where the user experience was actually better because of Flash.
The funny thing about this is that it wouldn't have *mattered* 20 years ago. We live in a different world now, and it's going to take a while for people to understand it.
Think about the stereotypical absent-minded professor. Someone gives him a file of students' academic info, and like everything else, he misplaces it.
Okay -- 20 years ago, worst case scenario: the file is left out in plain view on his desk in an unlocked office, and a student nicks it. The student shows his friends, word gets out, and the student gets in trouble. Some students are upset about the privacy violation.
Now fast-forward to today, and the same innocuous, absent-minded professor can misplace a file and cause a DISASTER. Surprise, the whole world can see it! Nobody needed to break into his office, nobody needed to even enter the school, and they can get the file, just because he mixed up the X: drive (teacher fileserv) with the W: drive (public webserver), or something like that.
I'm no Luddite -- heck, I'm a web developer, and I'm the first to say that the benefits of the internet are incredible -- but it's a dangerous and powerful tool that doesn't get the respect it deserves... most users out there are kinda like teenagers learning to drive tractor trailors. Or it's like everyone's using these new ballpoint pens that also shoot out a lethal dart if you twist the handle.