I imagine the first power lines would go to Europe, which is not an insignificant distance. If the power transmission doesn't work over that distance then it has little chance of meeting the global energy needs from the Sahara. However, there are a lot more deserts in Asia, Australia and the Americas that could provide power to population centers on those continents.
Part of the project's proposal is to transfer technology to the local population. This seems like a critical step in the plan (assuming the technology works and the engineering issues can be worked out). If there are more educated people in the local populace and more jobs, this should help to distribute the wealth and stabilize the Saharan countries.
Airport scanners are a joke. Unless they can detect anything in and out of a person's body they can and will be bypassed when needed. So here's the plan, rather than creating a softcore security theater, we copy the security methods of countries that do it effectively. Namely, Israel.
Of course we could just keep doing crazier and crazier scans as people progressively game the system, only to fail because their devices are faulty, not because they really had any trouble getting on the plane.
The Israeli security methods have been incredibly successful, but the methods employed are much easiest to institute on a small scale. The sheer number of flights and travelers in the US make a lot of the Israeli techniques impractical.
There are a number of reasons to send missions sooner. First, going through the design process sooner will lead to more discoveries that might speed up research in space travel technologies or lead to other discoveries that might be useful here on Earth. Also, we are not guaranteed of producing a better space craft simply by waiting. The best way to improve our technological capabilities in terms of space travel is through actually traveling in space. The other advantage of sending a mission sooner is that if some cataclysmic disaster affected earth, at least the pioneers would be saved. So, we are increasing the chances of human survival simply by launching a mission, even if it is overtaken by faster ships later.
More info on the DARPA developed radar being tested here.
The A160T program has had a few crashes over the last few years, even before it got to Belize. That said, it is a challenging project, so some accidents are inevitable.
A great vacation spot for diving, but flight testing?
They were testing the DARPA developed Forester foliage-penetrating radar over Belize's dense jungle canopies. They needed a stable platform, so it had to be a rotorcraft. Not sure why they chose a a fairly new unmanned aircraft as the test bed.
Aviation Week has been covering the A160T and the testing down there pretty extensively.
According to Wikipedia: "In August 2010 the A160 Hummingbird is undergoing jungle test flights in Belize". So it wasn't just having a joy ride in open skies, it was in a tricky terrain to navigate, for *any* kind of autonomous vehicle.
Aviation Week reported on its blog that that the A160T crashed on approach, close to the landing site.
From the MDA press release linked above:
"Less than one hour later, a second solid fuel short-range missile was launched from a ground location on San Nicolas Island, Calif. and the ALTB successfully engaged the boosting target with its High Energy Laser, met all its test criteria, and terminated lasing prior to destroying the second target. The ALTB destroyed a solid fuel missile, identical to the second target, in flight on February 3, 2010."
Only the liquid-fueled target was destroyed in this test. The solid-fueled target was "engaged" but not actually destroyed, whoever a similar solid-fueled target was destroyed in a previous test
I certainly agree with you, for the moment, the amount of malware for macs is negligible, but the *threat* is there. I think as a security planner, you must consider the future threat, not the current state. Since there is no telling what direction malware writers may take, the possibility of malware for macs must be taken into consideration.
My assertion that "Given enough time, this most likely *will* happen" stands by the law of probability that given enough time/opportunity even unlikely events become probable. Even if the likelihood of malware for macs is low, with every day the chances of it happening increases.
I am also claiming that the inspiration for malware writers to target Macs may not be as small as you would think. Apple currently has a non-negligible number of installed users, so even if the percentage of total users is low, Apple provides a significant number of targets to malware writers which to this point have been overlooked.
As far as the security concerns with local admin rights, I consider allowing users to have local admin rights in an enterprise setting to be an implementation flaw. Microsoft implementations do not need to have users as local admins (and neither do Mac implementations). The local admin rights under Microsoft do not only grant the permission to install software, but also modify the OS files, security settings, manage users/passwords, etc. Giving users the ability to make these types of significant changes to their own machine, regardless of platform (or use of sudo or direct access), can only lead to weakened stability and security.
To sum up, chances are Mac users will be a target, this eventuality must be planned for, and lessening user privileges (taking away local admin rights) is one way in which security can be improved and this threat partially mitigated.
I think you might have missed *my* point. Security has nothing to do with market share. Whether or not MSFT or Apple has more customers is not the question, the question is what is the best security policy for enterprise networks and individual users to follow. Even if less malware is written for Macs right now, there is no guarantee that someone maybe even in the near future will target them. Given enough time, this most likely *will* happen, at which point, proper security precautions will dictate the extent of this problem for each user/network.
Everyone rags on Microsoft for lax security in their software, but the prevalence of security intrusions into their software is also due to the fact that they are the biggest target with the most pay-off for degenerates that like to write malware, viruses, spam, etc. MSFT software has plenty of holes with much to be desired, but if they didn't have a commanding market share, it wouldn't be much of an issue.
The fact of the matter is that even if the chances of someone writing malware for a Mac is less, the security stance that Apple (and Microsoft for the moment) has taken is entirely wrong. You have to be secure for the ground up and for Apple to allow its own employees run with admin rights undermines security. Microsoft should be applauded if they do end up taking that step, and Apple should be castigated for not doing so.
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I imagine the first power lines would go to Europe, which is not an insignificant distance. If the power transmission doesn't work over that distance then it has little chance of meeting the global energy needs from the Sahara. However, there are a lot more deserts in Asia, Australia and the Americas that could provide power to population centers on those continents.
Part of the project's proposal is to transfer technology to the local population. This seems like a critical step in the plan (assuming the technology works and the engineering issues can be worked out). If there are more educated people in the local populace and more jobs, this should help to distribute the wealth and stabilize the Saharan countries.
Airport scanners are a joke. Unless they can detect anything in and out of a person's body they can and will be bypassed when needed. So here's the plan, rather than creating a softcore security theater, we copy the security methods of countries that do it effectively. Namely, Israel.
Of course we could just keep doing crazier and crazier scans as people progressively game the system, only to fail because their devices are faulty, not because they really had any trouble getting on the plane.
The Israeli security methods have been incredibly successful, but the methods employed are much easiest to institute on a small scale. The sheer number of flights and travelers in the US make a lot of the Israeli techniques impractical.
There are a number of reasons to send missions sooner. First, going through the design process sooner will lead to more discoveries that might speed up research in space travel technologies or lead to other discoveries that might be useful here on Earth. Also, we are not guaranteed of producing a better space craft simply by waiting. The best way to improve our technological capabilities in terms of space travel is through actually traveling in space. The other advantage of sending a mission sooner is that if some cataclysmic disaster affected earth, at least the pioneers would be saved. So, we are increasing the chances of human survival simply by launching a mission, even if it is overtaken by faster ships later.
More info on the DARPA developed radar being tested here. The A160T program has had a few crashes over the last few years, even before it got to Belize. That said, it is a challenging project, so some accidents are inevitable.
A great vacation spot for diving, but flight testing?
They were testing the DARPA developed Forester foliage-penetrating radar over Belize's dense jungle canopies. They needed a stable platform, so it had to be a rotorcraft. Not sure why they chose a a fairly new unmanned aircraft as the test bed. Aviation Week has been covering the A160T and the testing down there pretty extensively.
According to Wikipedia: "In August 2010 the A160 Hummingbird is undergoing jungle test flights in Belize". So it wasn't just having a joy ride in open skies, it was in a tricky terrain to navigate, for *any* kind of autonomous vehicle.
Aviation Week reported on its blog that that the A160T crashed on approach, close to the landing site.
From the MDA press release linked above: "Less than one hour later, a second solid fuel short-range missile was launched from a ground location on San Nicolas Island, Calif. and the ALTB successfully engaged the boosting target with its High Energy Laser, met all its test criteria, and terminated lasing prior to destroying the second target. The ALTB destroyed a solid fuel missile, identical to the second target, in flight on February 3, 2010." Only the liquid-fueled target was destroyed in this test. The solid-fueled target was "engaged" but not actually destroyed, whoever a similar solid-fueled target was destroyed in a previous test
My assertion that "Given enough time, this most likely *will* happen" stands by the law of probability that given enough time/opportunity even unlikely events become probable. Even if the likelihood of malware for macs is low, with every day the chances of it happening increases.
I am also claiming that the inspiration for malware writers to target Macs may not be as small as you would think. Apple currently has a non-negligible number of installed users, so even if the percentage of total users is low, Apple provides a significant number of targets to malware writers which to this point have been overlooked.
As far as the security concerns with local admin rights, I consider allowing users to have local admin rights in an enterprise setting to be an implementation flaw. Microsoft implementations do not need to have users as local admins (and neither do Mac implementations). The local admin rights under Microsoft do not only grant the permission to install software, but also modify the OS files, security settings, manage users/passwords, etc. Giving users the ability to make these types of significant changes to their own machine, regardless of platform (or use of sudo or direct access), can only lead to weakened stability and security.
To sum up, chances are Mac users will be a target, this eventuality must be planned for, and lessening user privileges (taking away local admin rights) is one way in which security can be improved and this threat partially mitigated.
I think you might have missed *my* point. Security has nothing to do with market share. Whether or not MSFT or Apple has more customers is not the question, the question is what is the best security policy for enterprise networks and individual users to follow. Even if less malware is written for Macs right now, there is no guarantee that someone maybe even in the near future will target them. Given enough time, this most likely *will* happen, at which point, proper security precautions will dictate the extent of this problem for each user/network.
Everyone rags on Microsoft for lax security in their software, but the prevalence of security intrusions into their software is also due to the fact that they are the biggest target with the most pay-off for degenerates that like to write malware, viruses, spam, etc. MSFT software has plenty of holes with much to be desired, but if they didn't have a commanding market share, it wouldn't be much of an issue. The fact of the matter is that even if the chances of someone writing malware for a Mac is less, the security stance that Apple (and Microsoft for the moment) has taken is entirely wrong. You have to be secure for the ground up and for Apple to allow its own employees run with admin rights undermines security. Microsoft should be applauded if they do end up taking that step, and Apple should be castigated for not doing so.