I heard about the balloons this morning and thought hey, Google wants as many people as possible to see their ads. It's good for Google AND good for me, I applaud this.
You don't think that there are hundreds of thousands of eyeballs scrutinizing the source code right now, especially after Snowden's revelations? It's pretty damned hard to put a back door in an open source OS or app and not have it found fairly quickly, impossible to not have it found sooner or later.
recall the cynic's, i.e founding father's, observation that government seeks massive regulation and legislation precisely to have things to lord over people with.
Interesting if true, do you have a citation for that? I've never seen it and would be interested in reading it. I'm a readaholic and love learning.
It seems to me that when Microsoft's involved, "responsible disclosure" guidelines should be adjusted to immediate public release, as long as MS is feeding exploits to hackers before fixing them.
It seems to me that ALL vulnerabilities should be disclosed immediately. Vuln in FireFox? No problem, use IE or Opera. Vuln in PDF? Uninstall it until it's fixed or use a different reader or writer. It's not like there's only one OS, spreadsheet, browser, image editor, etc.
It seems to me that when a white hat finds a vuln there's probably a 50% chance a black hat found it first, but he's not going to disclose it at all, he'll keep it under his hat and use the hell out of it until a white hat discloses it.
Fuck the company that wrote the software, tell ME, the user, so I can stop using the vulnerable software until it's fixed.
I've maintained that what IQ tests measure how good you are at taking IQ tests, but what other measure could you go by? At any rate, regardless of how you measure intelligence, probably (although not necessarily) half the population will be below average, with most being at or close to the median.
At any rate, there are an awful lot of stupid people out there.
The recent Pew poll indicating a majority of Americans are okay with warrantless data aggregation is merely a sign of the times to come.
Not a majority of Americans, a majority of Americans who have landlines. Who still has a landline these days? The only ones I know are in their eighties. A telephone poll is hardly a representative sample of the American people.
Too many Americans are too fucking stupid to give enough of a shit for these revelations to cause real change.
You have to remember, half the population have two digit IQs. And I haven't spoken to a single person IRL who isn't disgusted by what the NSA is doing. The only apologists I've seen are politicians, a few columnists, and anonymous people on the internet.
That said, there isn't a whole hell of a lot we can do but speak out loudly, especially to our elected "representatives".
He gave up a $200k job, a beautiful, talented girlfriend and all his possessions with nothing in return. The secrets he's revealing should never have been secret in the first place and brought government crimes against the constitution to light. The "putting lives in danger" is a baldfaced lie only a moron would believe.
As to freedom, what freedoms do we have that other civilized nations don't?
4. When you do post, post as an Anonymous Coward, even if No Such Agency can find out who you are.
I'm not a coward, I'm shouting out loudly in my own name (yes, I'm McGrew). If I was a cowardly little pussy like you I wouldn't have joined the USAF and volunteered for South East Asia during Vietnam, where we were supposedly fighting the same bullshit our own government is now doing.
I now wish I hadn't, it was a fucking waste of time and effort considering how things have gone since 911. Oh, well, at least it made going to school easier, what with the GI Bill and Illinois paying my tuition. But that's not why I joined.
I own my LPs, cassettes, CDs, DVDs, and VHS tapes. What I don't own is the data on them, but the MAFIAA can't take them away like they can an Amazon or iTunes download. When you "buy" a download you're just renting.
My data stays on my own private network (unless I've been rooted). I can synch my own data, I don't need the Cloud Boys to do it for me and have the NSA hoover up everything I have (not that they couldn't if they wanted to but it would actually take effort, unlike when you use cloud services).
The Republican House Speaker called Edward Snowden a traitor. It's a bipartisan police state we now have (this isn't the first time I've said that). I wouldn't doubt if I were on the no-fly list but I haven't been on a plane since you could smoke inflight.
I say Boehner's the traitor, Snowden's a patriot who gave everything but his life (and still may) for his fellow Americans.
If you're against Snowden you're against freedom. That's one brave kid.
Unfortuantly, a large number of "low information" people who are still bitching about Bush, when he's been gone for 5 flippin' years and the new boss is FAR worse than the old boss.
Worse? Hardly. More like the same damned thing. A better comparison of Bush to a Democrat would be Blagojevich, Illinois' previous Governor (now in prison for selling Obama's Senate seat). Both were corrupt incompetents who appointed incompetent cronies to top positions... hmmm, Eric Holder? Nope, Obama isn't much different at all.
However, Obama hasn't started any needless wars (yet), hasn't tried to lower taxes on the rich, and hasn't destroyed the still struggling economy like Bush did. Obama's far from a great President, but he's better than Carter or Reagan. I never thought I'd see a worse President than Carter but Bush proved me wrong. Went into office with a booming economy and a balanced budget and peace, left office with the worst economy the US has seen since the Depression, the highest deficit we'd had in our history, and fighting two wars.
If you think Obama's a worse President than Bush you're a fool who was brainwashed by your fellow Republicans.
BTW, I voted Green Party, aka "none of the above." I'd have voted Libertarian but I like the clean air we didn't have before the EPA and I don't like eating toxic fish from filthy waterways. Being against environmental regulations is a show stopper for me; I was 20 when the environmental regs were passed and unlike you kids I know what it was like. Take it from a geezer, 1960 wasn't pretty.
By the way, I've been smoking pot since Obama was ten years old and I applaud the fact that he isn't sending the Feds to Washington and Colorado like Romney would have done. Plus, Romney is an evil job-destroying sociopath and there's no way possible he would have been better than Obama, bad as I think Obama is.
Stop voting for Republicrats. They're both bad, just in different ways.
I've always heard that, but I've never truly believed it. I think the corruptible are drawn to power. Being power hungry must be a form of mental illness; I mean, who in their right mind would want to be President?
I suspect that the USSR was never so different from the way we were then as the propagandists would have us believe. Rigged elections? Media that didn't inform the public what was going on? Warfare and bullying as a way of achieving the top dog's "national" goals?
Not back then, no, but certainly now. Vietnam and Korea were really part of the cold war, Eisenhower won by a landslide, Kennedy won the states you'd expect him to, as did Nixon in the 1960 election, and if the media had been a propaganda machine you'd never have heard of the Kent State Massacre, the police overreactions to the Chicago Seven, and Pentagon Papers would have never seen the light and Daniel Ellsberg would have never worked again, probably jailed, and possibly assassinated.
It started slowly with Reagan's "War on Drugs" and slowly got worse until 911 when the slippery slope became a steep cliff.
Isn't that like a book proclaiming how bad literacy is?
It's not like Woz posted the clip. And I commend him for it, I couldn't have said it better myself. IMO the cloud is only good for things you want posted publicly.
Personally, I won't do online banking simply because the internet is an insecure form of communication, although I'll shop online with a credit card if necessary since the most it will cost is fifty bucks (and perhaps increased surveillance by the NSA if I buy the wrong book, like maybe 1984.)
It's like going to China and concluding based on a survey taken from people you meet there that no one speaks Portuguese.
Well, statistically, nobody does speak Portuguese.
I have that issue with Mr. Bean and most modern sitcoms where intended comedy is a product of greed, ignorance, lying and other negative aspects of personalities of the characters involved.
I haven't seen Mr. Bean, but that's how I feel about Seinfeld. It's like I'm supposed to find meanness and suffering funny. Obviously I'm in a tiny minority there, it was a highly rated show that lasted a decade and everyone I know thinks it's funny. I find it depressing. But if there was a reference to Seinfeld in a slashdot summary, I wouldn't jump in trying to get first post saying what a terrible show it was, even if I were a New Yorker and thought it made New Yorkers look like assholes. That's just trolling.
A well written book will can transport me (and let me admit here that I own a literary agency, and am the son of one of the golden age SF writers, a hugo, and other, award winner... I know at least a little bit about well written books.)
Yes, when I'm reading a well written story I'm transported to a different place as well. I feel sorry for those who don't read.
I'm also compelled to remind you that the real world disagrees with your perception.
Perception can never match reality, it's far too complex and we're far too simple.
I should send you a copy of Nobots when it's done (what's online is a crappy error-filled first rough draft).
It wasn't that driving while on the phone was worse than drunk driving, but that it was as dangerous. The difference is when you're drunk, you're drunk from when you start the trip until after you get there. With a phone you're only dangerous for the part of the trip you're on the phone. Plus, someone drunk is less likely to be wearing a seat belt than if they were sober.
Slashdot Mirror
I heard about the balloons this morning and thought hey, Google wants as many people as possible to see their ads. It's good for Google AND good for me, I applaud this.
You don't think that there are hundreds of thousands of eyeballs scrutinizing the source code right now, especially after Snowden's revelations? It's pretty damned hard to put a back door in an open source OS or app and not have it found fairly quickly, impossible to not have it found sooner or later.
recall the cynic's, i.e founding father's, observation that government seeks massive regulation and legislation precisely to have things to lord over people with.
Interesting if true, do you have a citation for that? I've never seen it and would be interested in reading it. I'm a readaholic and love learning.
It seems to me that when Microsoft's involved, "responsible disclosure" guidelines should be adjusted to immediate public release, as long as MS is feeding exploits to hackers before fixing them.
It seems to me that ALL vulnerabilities should be disclosed immediately. Vuln in FireFox? No problem, use IE or Opera. Vuln in PDF? Uninstall it until it's fixed or use a different reader or writer. It's not like there's only one OS, spreadsheet, browser, image editor, etc.
It seems to me that when a white hat finds a vuln there's probably a 50% chance a black hat found it first, but he's not going to disclose it at all, he'll keep it under his hat and use the hell out of it until a white hat discloses it.
Fuck the company that wrote the software, tell ME, the user, so I can stop using the vulnerable software until it's fixed.
Your cell number isn't in the phone book, which is where survey outfits get the phone numbers.
I've maintained that what IQ tests measure how good you are at taking IQ tests, but what other measure could you go by? At any rate, regardless of how you measure intelligence, probably (although not necessarily) half the population will be below average, with most being at or close to the median.
At any rate, there are an awful lot of stupid people out there.
People are going to compose documents, spreadsheets, etc. on a tablet??
Maybe I need more coffee, can someone explain why anyone would want this?
http://www.techdirt.com/blog/innovation/articles/20130430/22152622896/chuck-schumer-to-introduce-patent-reform-bill-to-make-it-cheaper-to-fight-back-against-patent-trolls.shtml
The recent Pew poll indicating a majority of Americans are okay with warrantless data aggregation is merely a sign of the times to come.
Not a majority of Americans, a majority of Americans who have landlines. Who still has a landline these days? The only ones I know are in their eighties. A telephone poll is hardly a representative sample of the American people.
Professors too have the right to be scaremongered into an unrealistic fear of terrorism.
Occam says they're better at math than that. However, they can be bought or threatened easily enough.
Too many Americans are too fucking stupid to give enough of a shit for these revelations to cause real change.
You have to remember, half the population have two digit IQs. And I haven't spoken to a single person IRL who isn't disgusted by what the NSA is doing. The only apologists I've seen are politicians, a few columnists, and anonymous people on the internet.
That said, there isn't a whole hell of a lot we can do but speak out loudly, especially to our elected "representatives".
He gave up a $200k job, a beautiful, talented girlfriend and all his possessions with nothing in return. The secrets he's revealing should never have been secret in the first place and brought government crimes against the constitution to light. The "putting lives in danger" is a baldfaced lie only a moron would believe.
As to freedom, what freedoms do we have that other civilized nations don't?
4. When you do post, post as an Anonymous Coward, even if No Such Agency can find out who you are.
I'm not a coward, I'm shouting out loudly in my own name (yes, I'm McGrew). If I was a cowardly little pussy like you I wouldn't have joined the USAF and volunteered for South East Asia during Vietnam, where we were supposedly fighting the same bullshit our own government is now doing.
I now wish I hadn't, it was a fucking waste of time and effort considering how things have gone since 911. Oh, well, at least it made going to school easier, what with the GI Bill and Illinois paying my tuition. But that's not why I joined.
I sneer at you, wimp.
I own my LPs, cassettes, CDs, DVDs, and VHS tapes. What I don't own is the data on them, but the MAFIAA can't take them away like they can an Amazon or iTunes download. When you "buy" a download you're just renting.
My data stays on my own private network (unless I've been rooted). I can synch my own data, I don't need the Cloud Boys to do it for me and have the NSA hoover up everything I have (not that they couldn't if they wanted to but it would actually take effort, unlike when you use cloud services).
The Republican House Speaker called Edward Snowden a traitor. It's a bipartisan police state we now have (this isn't the first time I've said that). I wouldn't doubt if I were on the no-fly list but I haven't been on a plane since you could smoke inflight.
I say Boehner's the traitor, Snowden's a patriot who gave everything but his life (and still may) for his fellow Americans.
If you're against Snowden you're against freedom. That's one brave kid.
Unfortuantly, a large number of "low information" people who are still bitching about Bush, when he's been gone for 5 flippin' years and the new boss is FAR worse than the old boss.
Worse? Hardly. More like the same damned thing. A better comparison of Bush to a Democrat would be Blagojevich, Illinois' previous Governor (now in prison for selling Obama's Senate seat). Both were corrupt incompetents who appointed incompetent cronies to top positions... hmmm, Eric Holder? Nope, Obama isn't much different at all.
However, Obama hasn't started any needless wars (yet), hasn't tried to lower taxes on the rich, and hasn't destroyed the still struggling economy like Bush did. Obama's far from a great President, but he's better than Carter or Reagan. I never thought I'd see a worse President than Carter but Bush proved me wrong. Went into office with a booming economy and a balanced budget and peace, left office with the worst economy the US has seen since the Depression, the highest deficit we'd had in our history, and fighting two wars.
If you think Obama's a worse President than Bush you're a fool who was brainwashed by your fellow Republicans.
BTW, I voted Green Party, aka "none of the above." I'd have voted Libertarian but I like the clean air we didn't have before the EPA and I don't like eating toxic fish from filthy waterways. Being against environmental regulations is a show stopper for me; I was 20 when the environmental regs were passed and unlike you kids I know what it was like. Take it from a geezer, 1960 wasn't pretty.
By the way, I've been smoking pot since Obama was ten years old and I applaud the fact that he isn't sending the Feds to Washington and Colorado like Romney would have done. Plus, Romney is an evil job-destroying sociopath and there's no way possible he would have been better than Obama, bad as I think Obama is.
Stop voting for Republicrats. They're both bad, just in different ways.
It's not necessary. If I want to see if a check has cleared or look at my balance, I'll call them. I do check my credit card account online, though.
I've always heard that, but I've never truly believed it. I think the corruptible are drawn to power. Being power hungry must be a form of mental illness; I mean, who in their right mind would want to be President?
I suspect that the USSR was never so different from the way we were then as the propagandists would have us believe. Rigged elections? Media that didn't inform the public what was going on? Warfare and bullying as a way of achieving the top dog's "national" goals?
Not back then, no, but certainly now. Vietnam and Korea were really part of the cold war, Eisenhower won by a landslide, Kennedy won the states you'd expect him to, as did Nixon in the 1960 election, and if the media had been a propaganda machine you'd never have heard of the Kent State Massacre, the police overreactions to the Chicago Seven, and Pentagon Papers would have never seen the light and Daniel Ellsberg would have never worked again, probably jailed, and possibly assassinated.
It started slowly with Reagan's "War on Drugs" and slowly got worse until 911 when the slippery slope became a steep cliff.
Isn't that like a book proclaiming how bad literacy is?
It's not like Woz posted the clip. And I commend him for it, I couldn't have said it better myself. IMO the cloud is only good for things you want posted publicly.
Personally, I won't do online banking simply because the internet is an insecure form of communication, although I'll shop online with a credit card if necessary since the most it will cost is fifty bucks (and perhaps increased surveillance by the NSA if I buy the wrong book, like maybe 1984.)
Speaking of which, the NSA is cooking up more CYA lies for us. Is anybody stupid enough to believe anything the NSA says?
It's like going to China and concluding based on a survey taken from people you meet there that no one speaks Portuguese.
Well, statistically, nobody does speak Portuguese.
I have that issue with Mr. Bean and most modern sitcoms where intended comedy is a product of greed, ignorance, lying and other negative aspects of personalities of the characters involved.
I haven't seen Mr. Bean, but that's how I feel about Seinfeld. It's like I'm supposed to find meanness and suffering funny. Obviously I'm in a tiny minority there, it was a highly rated show that lasted a decade and everyone I know thinks it's funny. I find it depressing. But if there was a reference to Seinfeld in a slashdot summary, I wouldn't jump in trying to get first post saying what a terrible show it was, even if I were a New Yorker and thought it made New Yorkers look like assholes. That's just trolling.
Happy Birthday to her then. :)
Thank you!
A well written book will can transport me (and let me admit here that I own a literary agency, and am the son of one of the golden age SF writers, a hugo, and other, award winner... I know at least a little bit about well written books.)
Yes, when I'm reading a well written story I'm transported to a different place as well. I feel sorry for those who don't read.
I'm also compelled to remind you that the real world disagrees with your perception.
Perception can never match reality, it's far too complex and we're far too simple.
I should send you a copy of Nobots when it's done (what's online is a crappy error-filled first rough draft).
It wasn't that driving while on the phone was worse than drunk driving, but that it was as dangerous. The difference is when you're drunk, you're drunk from when you start the trip until after you get there. With a phone you're only dangerous for the part of the trip you're on the phone. Plus, someone drunk is less likely to be wearing a seat belt than if they were sober.
That's true, but that's how it is.