I'll second that recommendation. If you want an intelligent discussion of your options and their pros/cons as far as authentication methods, read Chapter 9 of Secrets and Lies. You should read the whole book anyway because it's so good;-) but that section is particularly relevant to this topic.
As a side note, if you want to see for yourself just how bad seemingly good passwords are, go download one of the many password cracking/checking programs out there and run the passwords you use through it. See just how fast it can be done. When we did our "break-in" lab for my Information Warfare class last semester, even most of the passwords that had been uncrackable in past semesters were broken. Gets that point across real fast. Basically, if your company is serious about increasing authentication security, they need to look at better ways than just requiring "strong" passwords.
I would be understanding of this policy change IF they were restricting how much data you could upload rather than download. That kind of policy is pretty common (tho annoying) to keep people from running a commercial server on a residential-price-range connection. But to restrict downloads? To 3GB? Per MONTH? Ridiculous. Per day, maybe, but not per month. It's an underhanded way of going about it, too, changing the AUP. Much as I hate @home, I hope all Telstra's customers bail to Optus.
In my last lease, it specifically mentioned that they could, at any time, install surveillance equipment in "common areas" (meaning hallways, laundry room, etc). They didn't, but I can think of reasons why they might start doing so. Since you have no "expectation of privacy" in common areas, their installing video cameras in the hallway is perfectly legal. If, let's say, when a resident opens their door, the interior of the apartment would be visible, that _might_ be a different story. Someone standing outside your door waiting to be let in, however, is in a public place; while I object to this personally as a privacy issue, it is almost certainly legal.
Talk to the landlord, or get a petition of residents that are opposed to putting in the cameras. If they aren't already there, the landlord might actually welcome an excuse not to spend the money for them.
Now, I live in a university town, so this may not apply to you, but here goes. The international students support office here pairs up native English speakers with international students who need to work on their conversational English. What usually ends up happening is the pair (or 3 or 4 from the same country, whatever) get together each week and teach each other their native language. So the American gets a great cultural experience and exposure to a language from a native speaker, and the foreign student gets to practice their English skills in a low-pressure setting. I've heard it works reasonably well, though it might be better to start learning a language on your own a little bit first, and then get practice this way.
Like I said, this might not work for you depending on where you live, but if there's an international students group near you it might be worth trying.
Hmm. Wasn't Invita, just one letter off from Invicta, the name of the fake security company the FBI used to snag those Russian hackers not that long ago? Curious...
Autonomous code bits ranging through a network is considered by some to be the Next Big Thing in security. Try a google search on "intelligent agents security." ---
Why isn't Microsoft bundling all the functionality of Microsoft Word into every copy of Windows?
Because they have little or no competition for aftemarket word processors, that's why. No impetus to get that foot in the door when people buy a computer and be the first one on the machine.
I love WordPerfect myself, but I'm under no delusion that it's a major competitor with Word, at least right now in the windows market.
Have you considered switching mouse hands? I am right handed, but I mouse with my left hand for repetitive-stress reasons. I switched to left-mousing without a lot of trouble. It was really easy since you can switch the buttons in software, took maybe a week to get proficient. I also know two people who are left handed, who mouse with their right hand. Reason: they can mouse and write at the same time, or stop to take a note or point something out without taking their hand off of the mouse. Pretty slick, I think. I'm not quite coordinated enough to do that yet, but I'm working on it.
There is probably major prior art from Tripwire and other file-integrity checkers. Basically the exact same idea, with the purpose of detecting when important files have been altered through a breakin.
Some time in the last year or so, I forget which issue, Consumer Reports did an article on room A/C units like you're describing, with ratings and everything. Their site's not free so I can't get a link, try your library. They should have some sort of periodicals index that you can search for "room air conditioners".
If the addresses are posted at any time to the web site (ie. in the/. email field), it's not surprising that they're getting spammed. There are programs such as SamSpade which can be used to crawl websites (like google does for their search engine), searching and grabbing specific things. One major use of this is grabbing email addresses for spam. That's why so many people obfuscate their email address on Slashdot; the address-grabber grabs the fake address instead of a real one.
So yes, it's definitely probable that someone did get the address from your web page, but without using your database and without your knowledge or permission.
I've gotten more spam than I can count from supposed headhunters who "saw your resume posted on the internet". Who clearly are mass mailing, as the mails went to some list address, and I'm usually not even qualified for (let alone interested in) the jobs they're advertising. Sigh.
In your case, an alternative, a possible compromise between you and the prof, might be to send mail to the academic advisors in departments whose students might be interested. They would be most likely to know who would actually be interested and could forward the message to the appropriate students, without annoying excessive numbers of people. Might be worth a go.
Good for you for standing up for your principles tho.
Actually I did. I don't know which networks Viacom owns, and the host is the guy who used to host that MTV quiz show (what was that called?), so the connection made sense to me. It was a serious question.
Most, if not all, summer internship positions will have been filled by now. Especially with the slim pickings there were this year. You will probably have to settle for what you can find locally. Next year start looking in December or January, February at the very latest.
That said: other than through your campus career-services office, the best way to find a summer CS job is to call/write/email companies you are interested in directly. Make actual, nice-looking, printed copies of your resume. Write a cover letter specific for each company. Take the time to track down who at a company is the right person to send it to. Monster.com et al are for full time and contract work really. Why would a company look there for students, when they can look where the students are (campuses)?
Incidentally, I'm surprised Ask Slashdot posted this with the resume-page link. The post is a fairly blatant "hire me". It could have gotten the same helpful answers without being advertising.
I wonder what their response would have been if instead of abortion doctors, this had been a list of judges. Or a "hit list" of peers that some student put together. Interesting.
I suppose you would find a similar argument against people wanting running water instead of walking out to a well every day (lead poisoning from pipes!) or rural mail service (junk mail! let 'em drive to town to get their mail) or television access (my god! they might become informed on current events!). Every development brings problems; that doesn't mean people don't deserve equal access to such things. If you want to escape them, go live in a rural area for a while, see how much you miss the conveniences you're used to.
True too of the online version of You Don't Know Jack. That's been around for years. They show a couple commercials in between each round, and then at the end of the game they have links to where you can go learn more about the products advertised. Works pretty well, actually. The ads are reasonably short and sometimes clever, and don't break up the flow of the game too much.
I highly second that recommendation; I've had two friends who used Target for their registries. They have a goodly amount of geeky stuff, plus "useful" things that you'd find on any couple's registry. And, less tech-savvy (or computerless) guests can get the list and buy gifts in a Target store. Oh, and if you go register in a store, you get to go around with one of the scanner guns to make your picks. That's just fun.;-)
Why is that not open enough?
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Hacking Biology
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I know I'm gonna get flamed here for not espousing the popular/. OpenSource view but....
Why isn't this a good enough definition of open source? True, not every Tom, Dick, and Sally can have the source. But everyone who uses the program has access to and can modify the source, and it stays open in that fashion. The only restriction is on who can use the software in the first place. And frankly, I wouldn't want just anyone to be using this program. In this situation, this is as open as the source can reasonably get.
Slashdot Mirror
As a side note, if you want to see for yourself just how bad seemingly good passwords are, go download one of the many password cracking/checking programs out there and run the passwords you use through it. See just how fast it can be done. When we did our "break-in" lab for my Information Warfare class last semester, even most of the passwords that had been uncrackable in past semesters were broken. Gets that point across real fast. Basically, if your company is serious about increasing authentication security, they need to look at better ways than just requiring "strong" passwords.
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Talk to the landlord, or get a petition of residents that are opposed to putting in the cameras. If they aren't already there, the landlord might actually welcome an excuse not to spend the money for them.
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Like I said, this might not work for you depending on where you live, but if there's an international students group near you it might be worth trying.
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Autonomous code bits ranging through a network is considered by some to be the Next Big Thing in security. Try a google search on "intelligent agents security."
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Because they have little or no competition for aftemarket word processors, that's why. No impetus to get that foot in the door when people buy a computer and be the first one on the machine.
I love WordPerfect myself, but I'm under no delusion that it's a major competitor with Word, at least right now in the windows market.
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- alt.comp.sys.palmtops.pilot
- comp.sys.palmtops
- comp.sys.palmtops.pilot
Or even alt.cellular.nokia.---
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So yes, it's definitely probable that someone did get the address from your web page, but without using your database and without your knowledge or permission.
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In your case, an alternative, a possible compromise between you and the prof, might be to send mail to the academic advisors in departments whose students might be interested. They would be most likely to know who would actually be interested and could forward the message to the appropriate students, without annoying excessive numbers of people. Might be worth a go.
Good for you for standing up for your principles tho.
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And yes, it's definitely a male bunch...
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That said: other than through your campus career-services office, the best way to find a summer CS job is to call/write/email companies you are interested in directly. Make actual, nice-looking, printed copies of your resume. Write a cover letter specific for each company. Take the time to track down who at a company is the right person to send it to. Monster.com et al are for full time and contract work really. Why would a company look there for students, when they can look where the students are (campuses)?
Incidentally, I'm surprised Ask Slashdot posted this with the resume-page link. The post is a fairly blatant "hire me". It could have gotten the same helpful answers without being advertising.
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Heh...point taken. :-)
ABC History. Also a bunch of general History of Computing links.
Why isn't this a good enough definition of open source? True, not every Tom, Dick, and Sally can have the source. But everyone who uses the program has access to and can modify the source, and it stays open in that fashion. The only restriction is on who can use the software in the first place. And frankly, I wouldn't want just anyone to be using this program. In this situation, this is as open as the source can reasonably get.