I had played with this idea a bit a few months back and came up with an idea I think could work - but only ever got around to coding the most basic example of it. For those on/. who are interested, find it here. Each reload will produce the image of a new challenge.
In a closer to final version I had envisioned instructions in multiple fonts and colors involving shapes, letters, etc., and much more flexibility.
In the example I've shown above, pure random clicking will produce a correct response to the challenge 1 time in 30 approximately. So - make them solve three in a row and there you are - 1 chance in 27,000.
...especially if the hard drive manufacturers are successful in their spurious patent infringement lawsuits against Flash RAM manufacturers. This could derail the process for years. I know that they are also using the International Trade Commission "double whammy" to attempt to clobber imports of Flash RAM independent of their (presumably Marshall TX) lawsuits.
Try installing something you can't buy. Not too easy.
...but I do recall reading something quite recently about another project where data/video was being archived "to be used to fight terrorism". The powers that be swore up and down that it would not be abused. And months later it was being used by an automated system to issue parking tickets in an effort to boost revenue.
If this goes through, it will not take very long at all before the data is being used, whether by an authorized user or otherwise, for any or all of the following:
Monitoring peoples' use of Internet at work for personal stuff
Snitching to human resources departments which potential hires use online pornography, or were not at their doctor's office when called in sick
Catching undeclared personal income earned through online activities
Analyzing friend network patterns on social networks to detect "potential" drug dealers, leftists, other people the government doesn't like
And what happens if ISPs are ordered to block all encrypted packets for which the DHS doesn't hold the keys in escrow? And phone companies are ordered to block all unauthorized modem carriers? Difficult to get around restrictive "cyber laws" when the government can exercise control over the infrastructure.
Bear in mind that in many mainframe COBOL applications that date back to the 1960s, you do not have accurate source code. Often, the compiled code was directly patched (in hex no less) due to deadlines or emergencies, and the long time it took to compile even a moderately sized program.
Most of the developers out there today learned using an object oriented programming model and a language such as Java (or for older people, C++ and others). This throws up an impediment to learning COBOL.
You see, COBOL is all coded procedurally. There is no such thing as an object. Additionally, there is no IDE to even compare to what's available for modern OOP.
Now, if this code is very old like it sounds from TFA, then not only is the code procedural, it is UNSTRUCTURED procedural. This means GOTO statements, loops without control structures, in general what used to be called "spaghetti code".
I am a bit of an anomaly, being a 44 year old who can develop in COBOL (5 years exposure to legacy systems early in my career). No IT person who leaned using Java or another OOP stands a CHANCE learning such an alien coding paradigm. Such a person would choke the first time they had to trap an error on a disk read or display information on a 3270 dumb terminal's screen.
/. - Don't be in such a hurry to mod this "Funny". If the so called "Trusted Computing Initiative" goes through as planned, then indeed your Linux distro may well turn out to be illegal, especially if you have added or removed stuff and recompiled. In these cases, it will not be "approved" software as the hash will have changed.
All DRM is almost as completely screwed up as the laws that purport to deal with it. My personal favorite silly DRM law is the one which sets out massive penalties for circumventing a DRM mechanism - making anyone who holds the shift key while loading a CD into Windoze box a felon.
They can pick up on a shadowban by checking posts while not logged in (if they get suspicious). Then guaranteed they start a new registered user account.
In the past I've dealt with trolls by doing a mod on the forum code. Once tagged as "troll", all threads just seem to end with their comment. Nothing more is shown in the thread following their rant except for their further rants when they look. Everyone else sees the normal thread. Just one strategy that helped out a few times.
And I have faced down exactly this issue: lousy bandwidth and latency on satellite Internet. There are a few alternatives that come in way less than the $30K you mentioned, but the availability very much depends on your location.
If you would like, you can email me at panaqqa [at sign] gmail [separator dot] com with more specifics and I'll let you know if my solution would work for you. FYI the best satellite I know of gives RELIABLE 2Mbps down/450kbps up.
They have to solve three in a row. That way it works out that random clicks within the image would have approximately one chance in 27,000 of getting through. I figure that even one chance in 100 is still good enough odds to make it worthwhile having a bot run up against it. But not 27,000:1.
I had thought of using something similar to what I have posted at the link below. The user must solve three of these in a row. Of course the number of fonts/numbers/backgrounds would be much large. Also I planned to introduce letters, letter pairs and shapes. But the key concept is that the instructions to solve are also embedded in the image. Much tougher I would think.
Actually, I had a Commoodore PET 2001 back in 1979. That machine got me started down my current path (IT, software development). My PET had 8K of RAM, cassette device, and the old style "chicklet" keyboard. Piece of trivia: PET stood for "Personal Electronic Transactor".
At the ripe old age of 15, I developed a number of games for the PET and actually sold them through a company called "Instant Software" that was affiliated with Kilobaud Magazine (later "Microcomputing"). The $200-$300 US royalty cheques that I received from them each month went a long way towards paying for my university education in 1980-1983.
Hate to say it, but the unstructured MICROSOFT basic on the PET caused me to develop a number of bad habits (unstructured spaghetti code) which were difficult to get rid of a couple of years later. But I can brag that I was using Microsoft development tools 30 years ago.
Hate to be a spoilsport, but we had an operational C64 LAN back in 1983. I worked for RTC, an early computer firm (long since gone), and one of the products we developed was the "Multi Link", a LAN adapter that networked C64s in a star topology. It was originally designed for use in educational settings, but needless to say, as a bunch of early hackers we quickly got some games running multi-player.
We also used to access the Internet using a c64, but that's a story for another time.
FYI 40 foot towers won't do it due to extensive wooded areas. I've signal tested and 65 feet or above is needed - plus trees may grow higher.
As for moving into town, well, as you figured out, it is a fairly exclusive area of the province. So a $400/month office is a pipe dream. What small amount of commercial space there is in town happens to be controlled by two guys, and the minimum would be about $1,200 per month - plus the cost of business permits from the township and county. Call it $14,400 per year plus about $10,000 for the permits. And don't even think of running it out of an apartment - apartments aren't allowed by zoning.
Seeing as I've made out pretty well on the Internet, basically working from $0 in 1993 to being a "rich guy" today purely from development work, I don't have an issue with spending some bucks on hardware. It's investments in time and hardware that got me the horse farm.
Perhaps you are right. Taking that into account might result in "a leg over" (if one is lucky), and failing to take it into account could cause one to "get off on the wrong foot". But considering this is Slashdot, the former calculation could hardly be called a standard deviation.
...where I live, which is a horse farm in rural central Ontario, Canada. I do have my broadband though in the form of satellite access. For this, I bought equipment that cost over $1,000 and I pay over $100/month for 1Mbps down/256kbps up. The thing is I need it for my Internet consulting business and it is my only option currently. If kind of sucks also, due to the 550msec speed-of-light latency.
How many of those dial up users are facing the same dilemma? I know for a fact, for example, that in central Vermont there is no cable/xDSL available. I have heard that there are spots within 20 miles of the Golden Gate Bridge where there is no true broadband available. Never mind $50/month, how many dial-up users would be willing to pay $1,000 plus $100 per month (3 year contract) for broadband? I know, I know, TFA said 14% indicated no availability. This figure seems a bit low.
On a fortunate note, now that 802.11g bridges have advanced I may well have my true broadband soon. But to do it, I'm going to have to put up 2 eighty foot antennas, one here and one in town 5 miles away. It's going to cost me about $10,000. How's that for broadband being a costly luxury?
Of course, a pathologist whose specialty is orthopedic pathology might have dozens of legs in specimen jars. Having 50 legs in this case would be possible, if having legs was not qualified as "having legs that are part of the person's body".
In the case of conjoined triplets, one could say, I suppose, that each of the three actually has 6 legs. But since prior to something going wrong in utero the legs (or clusters of cells that would later differentiate into legs) actually belonged to one of the people specifically, this is arguable. In fact it is why I used the example of a parasitic twin rather than a conjoined twin. In the case of the parasitic twin (a subset of conjoined), the second human did not actually develop, except for a few body parts external to the body of the host twin.
Looking at the set of the number of legs each human has, the median number of legs is 2.
Looking at the set of all numbers of legs it is possible for a human to have, the median is 2 also. You must also consider, in addition to amputees, those deformed with extra legs, in which case 3 and 4 are also possible (4 in the case of a "parasitic twin"). So the median is still 2.
Slashdot Mirror
I had played with this idea a bit a few months back and came up with an idea I think could work - but only ever got around to coding the most basic example of it. For those on /. who are interested, find it here. Each reload will produce the image of a new challenge.
In a closer to final version I had envisioned instructions in multiple fonts and colors involving shapes, letters, etc., and much more flexibility.
In the example I've shown above, pure random clicking will produce a correct response to the challenge 1 time in 30 approximately. So - make them solve three in a row and there you are - 1 chance in 27,000.
...especially if the hard drive manufacturers are successful in their spurious patent infringement lawsuits against Flash RAM manufacturers. This could derail the process for years. I know that they are also using the International Trade Commission "double whammy" to attempt to clobber imports of Flash RAM independent of their (presumably Marshall TX) lawsuits.
Try installing something you can't buy. Not too easy.
It looks like Google's search results will only display properly in this "compatibility mode". Funny, that.
That is "Not In My BackYard" has become "Build Absolutely Nothing Anywhere Near Anybody".
"The horizon coughed up the sun, almost as if mighty Atlas had taken the world down from his shoulders and given it the Heimlich Maneuver."
If this goes through, it will not take very long at all before the data is being used, whether by an authorized user or otherwise, for any or all of the following:
Slippery slope and all that. This one should die.
And what happens if ISPs are ordered to block all encrypted packets for which the DHS doesn't hold the keys in escrow? And phone companies are ordered to block all unauthorized modem carriers? Difficult to get around restrictive "cyber laws" when the government can exercise control over the infrastructure.
Bear in mind that in many mainframe COBOL applications that date back to the 1960s, you do not have accurate source code. Often, the compiled code was directly patched (in hex no less) due to deadlines or emergencies, and the long time it took to compile even a moderately sized program.
Most of the developers out there today learned using an object oriented programming model and a language such as Java (or for older people, C++ and others). This throws up an impediment to learning COBOL.
You see, COBOL is all coded procedurally. There is no such thing as an object. Additionally, there is no IDE to even compare to what's available for modern OOP.
Now, if this code is very old like it sounds from TFA, then not only is the code procedural, it is UNSTRUCTURED procedural. This means GOTO statements, loops without control structures, in general what used to be called "spaghetti code".
I am a bit of an anomaly, being a 44 year old who can develop in COBOL (5 years exposure to legacy systems early in my career). No IT person who leaned using Java or another OOP stands a CHANCE learning such an alien coding paradigm. Such a person would choke the first time they had to trap an error on a disk read or display information on a 3270 dumb terminal's screen.
Uh, what do you mean WHEN Microsoft goes bad?
/. - Don't be in such a hurry to mod this "Funny". If the so called "Trusted Computing Initiative" goes through as planned, then indeed your Linux distro may well turn out to be illegal, especially if you have added or removed stuff and recompiled. In these cases, it will not be "approved" software as the hash will have changed.
All DRM is almost as completely screwed up as the laws that purport to deal with it. My personal favorite silly DRM law is the one which sets out massive penalties for circumventing a DRM mechanism - making anyone who holds the shift key while loading a CD into Windoze box a felon.
They can pick up on a shadowban by checking posts while not logged in (if they get suspicious). Then guaranteed they start a new registered user account.
In the past I've dealt with trolls by doing a mod on the forum code. Once tagged as "troll", all threads just seem to end with their comment. Nothing more is shown in the thread following their rant except for their further rants when they look. Everyone else sees the normal thread. Just one strategy that helped out a few times.
That's easy... object oriented
And I have faced down exactly this issue: lousy bandwidth and latency on satellite Internet. There are a few alternatives that come in way less than the $30K you mentioned, but the availability very much depends on your location.
If you would like, you can email me at panaqqa [at sign] gmail [separator dot] com with more specifics and I'll let you know if my solution would work for you. FYI the best satellite I know of gives RELIABLE 2Mbps down/450kbps up.
They have to solve three in a row. That way it works out that random clicks within the image would have approximately one chance in 27,000 of getting through. I figure that even one chance in 100 is still good enough odds to make it worthwhile having a bot run up against it. But not 27,000:1.
I had thought of using something similar to what I have posted at the link below. The user must solve three of these in a row. Of course the number of fonts/numbers/backgrounds would be much large. Also I planned to introduce letters, letter pairs and shapes. But the key concept is that the instructions to solve are also embedded in the image. Much tougher I would think.
/. think?
And what does
Next gen CAPTCHA link here.
Note - this is just a random sample image, not an actual implementation.
Actually, I had a Commoodore PET 2001 back in 1979. That machine got me started down my current path (IT, software development). My PET had 8K of RAM, cassette device, and the old style "chicklet" keyboard. Piece of trivia: PET stood for "Personal Electronic Transactor".
At the ripe old age of 15, I developed a number of games for the PET and actually sold them through a company called "Instant Software" that was affiliated with Kilobaud Magazine (later "Microcomputing"). The $200-$300 US royalty cheques that I received from them each month went a long way towards paying for my university education in 1980-1983.
Hate to say it, but the unstructured MICROSOFT basic on the PET caused me to develop a number of bad habits (unstructured spaghetti code) which were difficult to get rid of a couple of years later. But I can brag that I was using Microsoft development tools 30 years ago.
Hate to be a spoilsport, but we had an operational C64 LAN back in 1983. I worked for RTC, an early computer firm (long since gone), and one of the products we developed was the "Multi Link", a LAN adapter that networked C64s in a star topology. It was originally designed for use in educational settings, but needless to say, as a bunch of early hackers we quickly got some games running multi-player.
We also used to access the Internet using a c64, but that's a story for another time.
FYI 40 foot towers won't do it due to extensive wooded areas. I've signal tested and 65 feet or above is needed - plus trees may grow higher.
As for moving into town, well, as you figured out, it is a fairly exclusive area of the province. So a $400/month office is a pipe dream. What small amount of commercial space there is in town happens to be controlled by two guys, and the minimum would be about $1,200 per month - plus the cost of business permits from the township and county. Call it $14,400 per year plus about $10,000 for the permits. And don't even think of running it out of an apartment - apartments aren't allowed by zoning.
Seeing as I've made out pretty well on the Internet, basically working from $0 in 1993 to being a "rich guy" today purely from development work, I don't have an issue with spending some bucks on hardware. It's investments in time and hardware that got me the horse farm.
Hmm, so much for no-one else reading this thread.
Perhaps this debate has legs.
Perhaps you are right. Taking that into account might result in "a leg over" (if one is lucky), and failing to take it into account could cause one to "get off on the wrong foot". But considering this is Slashdot, the former calculation could hardly be called a standard deviation.
...where I live, which is a horse farm in rural central Ontario, Canada. I do have my broadband though in the form of satellite access. For this, I bought equipment that cost over $1,000 and I pay over $100/month for 1Mbps down/256kbps up. The thing is I need it for my Internet consulting business and it is my only option currently. If kind of sucks also, due to the 550msec speed-of-light latency.
How many of those dial up users are facing the same dilemma? I know for a fact, for example, that in central Vermont there is no cable/xDSL available. I have heard that there are spots within 20 miles of the Golden Gate Bridge where there is no true broadband available. Never mind $50/month, how many dial-up users would be willing to pay $1,000 plus $100 per month (3 year contract) for broadband? I know, I know, TFA said 14% indicated no availability. This figure seems a bit low.
On a fortunate note, now that 802.11g bridges have advanced I may well have my true broadband soon. But to do it, I'm going to have to put up 2 eighty foot antennas, one here and one in town 5 miles away. It's going to cost me about $10,000. How's that for broadband being a costly luxury?
I wonder if this AVG behaviour of doing prefetch on linked sites is driving up advertising clicks at all?
Could AVG be unintentionally committing massive click fraud?
Of course, a pathologist whose specialty is orthopedic pathology might have dozens of legs in specimen jars. Having 50 legs in this case would be possible, if having legs was not qualified as "having legs that are part of the person's body".
In the case of conjoined triplets, one could say, I suppose, that each of the three actually has 6 legs. But since prior to something going wrong in utero the legs (or clusters of cells that would later differentiate into legs) actually belonged to one of the people specifically, this is arguable. In fact it is why I used the example of a parasitic twin rather than a conjoined twin. In the case of the parasitic twin (a subset of conjoined), the second human did not actually develop, except for a few body parts external to the body of the host twin.
Looking at the set of the number of legs each human has, the median number of legs is 2.
Looking at the set of all numbers of legs it is possible for a human to have, the median is 2 also. You must also consider, in addition to amputees, those deformed with extra legs, in which case 3 and 4 are also possible (4 in the case of a "parasitic twin"). So the median is still 2.