Given all the planes and automobiles, vs these 3 different planes.... it would be hard for them to get to the point of being significant. I don't see this becoming a consumer mode of travel anytime soon.
Heh reminds me of reading this message board where some people were discussing good local spots around town to go as a couple to have sex in a different place.
Someone mentioned how great a local place that rents hot tubs was, and how its ok, and the owners don't seem to mind etc. A couple of other people chimed in about it.
It ended in a rather longer post by the owner of the place saying he is no prude, and totally understands but, they are a business, and if they find out you had sex in the hot tub, they have to drain it, clean it, and that means canceling other peoples appointments.
At least that all stays in the tub, which can be drained. I have to imaging that jizz mopping the cabin of a space flight plane would be less than a fun task.
Many security systems, like those used to protect online banking, online commerce in general etc, are based on these problems being very hard to solve. If it turns out that they are not as hard as we think, then we are not as safe as we think we are.... If we don't have honest people looking for the solution and letting everyone else know, then, we will not found out whether we are safe or not until someone dishonest figures it out and uses it against us.
Just putting it in the first terms, that is, the terms of what we lose if it turns out to not be true, puts it in terms of the status quo vs discovering the vulnerability. Obviously, its better that we continue as we are, and nobody finds the vulnerability ever... because that means what we are doing works, and there is no need to change. However, it ignores the long term risk of the discovery happening later by someone else.
Overall, if anyone goes on to prove P=NP, then I want it to be someone like this guy who just wants the recognition, rather than someone who just wants the money.
I believe you mean that you accomplish the same thing, in a different manner.
Wouldn't the opposite be receiving all mail locally, uploading it into Google, and then deleting it locally?
I actually do rather differently. I use IMAP, leave it on Google, and never backup. Its not my primary email account, just used for secondary stuff. If they reset my account right now, I would lose a bit, but, little that i care about.
You know, tests have been done with martial artists.... they demonstrated an interesting one in a show "Fight Science".
Very simple, you give a person a bunch of targets, with little LEDs, tell a subject to hit each target as the lights come on.
Compare the results of a trained, practiced martial artist against someone who isn't, and the results are striking. The martial artist was hitting the target BEFORE the normal persons limbs were even in motion!
Similar things in video games, you process visual information, and translate it into action (in this case, button presses). It should be no surprise that practice can make one person far better at these things than another, or that some people are better at these things than others.
Very much agreed. I can't say PHP is a problem so much as...it encourages the problem.
My experience with PHP went something like this, back when I was a professional newb. Boss: "I need you to write this app, here are the specs, it should be done in PHP, that way we can hand it off to another group and we don't have to maintain it".
It SOUNDED great. The problem is, php is easy. its easy to start, its easy to mock something up real quick. its easy to think you are doing well and producing something good that works. Its no harder, however,m than any other language to make absolute hash of it.
Can you blame the PHP developers for making it easy to learn and get started? Thats like blaming the wheel and pedal interface for letting bad drivers on the road.
I think its a more subtle problem of competence. There were some great studies a bit back where they looked at how people rate themselves vs objective measures of their compence. Generally, the more cometent people (and this has been my experience) tend to rate their abilities lower than the less competent. Why?
Well one thing you hear a lot from very competent people "I don't know X". "I am not sure exactly how Y works...". Whereas the less competent tend to deal in absolutes "Oh I can do that", "I know how that works". The more competent people are more nuanced... they know that there are things that they don't know, and have an idea what many of those things are. They make less assumptions.
It is easy to get to the point where you can write a fairly non-trivial application. However, its also easy to think that this makes you some sort of expert, or espcially skilled, especially with all the work you put in to get to that point. Its another thing entirely to do it very well, and to understand the implications of all of what you are doing, especially when it goes beyond your narrow expertise.
Take databases and sql injection. These days, if I am working on code, I know its not my strong suit, so I compensate by stopping all work, and working just on the database. Designing a schema, writing stored procedures, THEN go to write the higher level code. I didn't do that when I first started out. I used to do what ALOT of people do.... I started with the bare minimum that I knew would "do the job" and only revisited it later if it turned out to be a problem (and then had to re-write large sections...which is usually where the project would die)
Slopping strings together haphazardly is easy to do, very quick....and it works. It works great. Its no surprise to me that it continues to be one of the most common techniques for working with SQL. Its just sad that this quality of code makes it into real products.
My first reaction when I read about the HB Gary hack was "SQL Injection and Rainbow tables? Haven't these people learned to handle SQL properly and salt passwords? I am no expert and all my recent code does BOTH". The truth is though,most people start out writting that sort of code and...it works so well its hard to distinguish. Well written secure code is great but, in practice its often indistinguishable from bad code unless you have the time and resources to audit it.
Yah but you are missing one important fact.... if I am hiring, they would have to deal with me, so having a normal attitude and personal temperament is actually not really a plus. Overall, I think the guy who writes "piss off" or "decline" in there, and insists on coming in to tell me why its a bad idea and why they wont work for me because of it.... well shit, that guy is the perfect fit, I might offer him the job on the spot.
Here is how I would implement a policy like that. I would ask, all applicants for their facebook username and password up front.
Then, everyone who gave it to me, would get a polite letter informing them that they did not get the job because they so easily violated the TOS of facebook, with whom they had a standing agreement before they applied with us. Thus, there is no way that we could trust them with access credentials on our system.
You failed the test, you are the weakest link, goodbye.
Even so, has it even been demonstrated in a lab environment on a disk manufactured in the past decade or so? I was under the impression (from other discussions) that the "area around" that which is written has become so small as to render this pretty much impossible.
I have occasionally wondered what would happen if someone posted a message like that, then when contacted by a "hitman" (which is almost certainly sure to be the police) the person turned around, called the FBI and said "I was joking around online, but somebody contacted me, and I think this guy is serious! He says he has done this before too!"
How much investigation do you think would go on before the local police and FBI realized that they were trying to sting each other?
Not that I would actually recommend anyone doing that but, given how freely some people joke or blow off steam online, I wouldn't be surprised if it has happened without even being intentional.
I would submit that there is a big difference between being designed for safe operation to protect the user from an accident, and preventing the user from making a decision.
My circular saw has a guard that gets pushed back as it glides over the cutting surface, and snaps back when it finishes. This prevents all sorts of errors and injures that could occur accidentally.
That same saw, has a handle on the guard, such that I can grab it with my hand and pull it out of the way, should I decide that, in this situation, I need to remove the safety to do something (like making a downwards cut into a material)
I have no problem with this guard, and you will find it perfectly in tact on my saw.
This is not about safety, I am fine with having to say "yes I really want to do this" or making is slightly difficult or unintuitive to do. Its the complete prohibition (the putting the device before obedience to its owner) that I have a problem with.
I love my Android but, its no surprise that the maker would prioritize protection above obedience. I would change the order: 1. Obey the authorized user (esp since he is normally the OWNER) 2. Protect the authorized user. 3. Protect itself.
Different orders can be considered when they become self aware. Until then, its a tool damnit. My hammer doesn't try to protect me, nor would I want it to. A safety on a gun may "protect me" but, the device definitely obeys before protects, because all the user needs to do is turn off the safety, and all protection is gone.
As the user/owner of a non-self aware device, it should obey me, even if my intention is to use it to destroy itself, or others.
C) Each side sees things the way that they do for their own reasons, and they have a genuine disagreement over how they see the events
Two people, can interpret the same event in wildly different ways. Add in a bit of distrust of motives, and things can really get skewed.
Perfect example. When I was in HS I spent a lot of time waiting for public busses. At one point, I used to go get a burger and drink to eat while I waited for the bus home (usually after wrestling practice when the busses ran slower too, and I was pretty hungry). Anyway, I come up to the stop one day, and the newspaper stand machine that I set my drink on while I waited was tipped over....so being generally a nice guy and wanting a place to set my drink... I decide to help out and pick it up.
Well, this was difficult because the thing wasd chained to a light pole and tightly, so the chain would bind after 2 inches.... anyway....
So a cop saw me and decided to come over and harass me "What are you doing?" (in the standard dickhead cop accusatory tone that I just have no tolerance for being addressed with unless there is damned good reason) "trying to pick this up" I tell him.
So I bend back down and go back to struggling with the chain. To which he, still sitting comfortably in his cruiser, feels the need to quip "its not that heavy"
At which point, you can probably see the difference in perspective right here as I drop the thing back down look at him and say "can't you see the damned chain".... and he.... obviously not knowing how to respond politely to being shown what an abusive retard he was being, just drove off without another word.
Clearly, I know what he thought, he looked at the situation and assumed the worst.... I really don't know enough about the details of this situation to be able to say that it was any different.
Pity? Sounds great to me, I can't stand this repressive government. Better we end it before it gets worst. I am entirely tired of hearing all the sanctimonious BS about what a free country we are, and how great we are. This country has supported brutal dictators, has started war after war after war, spends in ways that would give drunk sailors a bad name, throws people in cages for growing plants... and yet.... with all that... in many ways is better today than its ever been... which is pretty damned sad.... because up to this point, we forced gay people into "treatment", had the "red scare", and all this, AFTER having to go to war over slavery, starting wars to take land, not allowing women to vote, not allowing black people to vote, not allowing white men who didn't own land to vote,
To me, all that overshadows ANY good this government did for us or the world. Time to start over. This is not a few isolated incidents, this is a long standing pattern of malicious behavior, which has never stopped and shows no sign of stopping.
So what? If I ran a trust fund for you, wouldn't I be bound to administer it fairly, and with your best interest in mind? Wouldn't taking it all and investing it in my own pet project be... a huge breech of trust? I don't see how this is any different. They were not asked to buy their own bonds with it. That is an inappropriate and fundamentally corrupt use of the money.
You are right, but that is not really the point, is it?
Frankly, I think people should be absolutely PISSED about this. The point of SS was never to give the Gov another fund to borrow from. It was never supposed to be a backdoor general tax for the general budget. It is evidence of.... acting in bad faith with our assetts. Its one more reason that we should not trust them.
Put it this way...it is supposed to be a trust fund. What would the courts say if I ran a trust fund for you, and decided on my own to invest all of your money in my personal pet project? Wouldn't that be a conflict of interest and a huge breech of trust?
Its true, this is... a major conflict of interest, and acting in bad faith. it is why we should not trust these people, and one of the many reasons to junk this system and start over. However, none of that is the fault of the program or the trust fund itself, its the fault of corrupt administration.
Unless by "entitlements" you are shifting things like the GI Bill out of the military budget, then I don't see how that could be the case. Last I looked the military and social services were approximately equal ON BUDGET. Of course, Wars are OFF BUDGET, so the reality is, that the military gets an even larger slice of the pie.
We should be shutting down the majority of the military, stop both wars, and cut cut cut. They do little to nothing for US. We should just arm the south Koreans, and the Japanese, and tell them all, western Europe included, to defend them damned selves from the cold war bogey man, or the terrorists, or whatever the excuse of the day is.
Once we have cut them to the absolute bone, and they are "watching the borders" in a few dinghies, then we can start talking about cutting social programs, which actually benefit someone here in a way other than spending on building weapons to go commit murder on other people's soil.
The biggest problem bitcoin seems to have is that people get way too caught up in those details. I did too.... but that's just about how its minted. Yes, you get 50 btc if you process a block (an amount which cuts in half roughly every 4 years until it goes below the 8 decimal minimum and becomes 0)
However, nobody is going to make a lot of btc doing that,.... the network is already too big (a phenom II 6 core will process a block around every 125 days last I checked). The MAIN way to get btc is to trade for them. The fact of how it is produced is just technical details of how its done in such a way as to not have ANY central bank.
btc is subdivisable to 8 decimal places, and this scheme means only 21 million will ever be made (21 million units divisable to 8 decimal places... you do the math:) )
This is already the case, I got my btc by... trading them for cash (got them in december...so I am pretty happy right now). That,s how most people get them now, either buy them for cash, or exchange services/goods for them. You can already rent servers, get stuff from amazon (through an agent), escrow them for deals that need an extra level of trust, get voip services, get VPN services....
Like you say the US dollar is backed by an economy, so is bitcoin. Its just a start-up economy. If people use it, it will succeed. Otherwise, it will fail.
I love it when they were asked for proof and posted a totally photoshopped pic of a girl holding a sign. Note to scammers: do not post a modified picture to a forum full of geeks unless you are good enough to not edit over the fingrs holding the sign;)
Things really are getting interesting with bitcoin.
Ahh but they denounced him within his lifetime. This is sort of their MO isn't it? Quick to denounce, glacially slow at admitting that they shouldn't have. Actually amusing epitaph on this... I looked up this issue, and, not too long before the church admitted its mistake in Galileo, Ratzinger (now Pope Benedict) was actually defending the churches original position!
From Wikipedia:
On 15 February 1990, in a speech delivered at the Sapienza University of Rome,[126] Cardinal Ratzinger (later to become Pope Benedict XVI) cited some current views on the Galileo affair as forming what he called "a symptomatic case that permits us to see how deep the self-doubt of the modern age, of science and technology goes today".[127] Some of the views he cited were those of the philosopher Paul Feyerabend, whom he quoted as saying "The Church at the time of Galileo kept much more closely to reason than did Galileo himself, and she took into consideration the ethical and social consequences of Galileo's teaching too. Her verdict against Galileo was rational and just and the revision of this verdict can be justified only on the grounds of what is politically opportune."[127] The Cardinal did not clearly indicate whether he agreed or disagreed with Feyerabend's assertions. He did, however, say "It would be foolish to construct an impulsive apologetic on the basis of such views."[127]
I am not talking about restoring full access to every home. Look at egypt... the few people who were able to setup links became information hubs. Able to get information out on twitter or facebook, or get it to someone outside who can.
Sure, restoration of full, high bandwidth service... probably not happening. However, as long as some service remains, it is something to use, and build on...and the more they use the kill switch, the better those ad hoc systems will get.
I disagree.... I think it will be the biggest threat for authoritarianism.
There are enough people in the US that know how to setup networks. If they turn on the kill switch, how many people in this country are going to be.... within hours (it not minutes) be working on ways to get new links up and to circumvent it in any way possible? The more they use it, the longer it stays on, the more resistance we build to it.
Let them use their antibiotic, they will merely pave the way for resistance. Also, how many jobs require networks and the internet to be functioning? Many! The longer it is on, the more people in the streets!
So I say.... bring it on! Lets see how quickly they can go the way of Tunisia! Sic Semper Tyrannis!
Sure we do.... we know how networks connect. Sure, they can try it... but I suspect that for every hour that the internet is down, hundreds of new connections come online. The damage will be healed, and connectivity will slowly be restored.... it may not be fast, it may not be great, and it make take time, but it will be enough to let the world know what they are doing to us.
Slashdot Mirror
Not before the video shows up on the internet.
Given all the planes and automobiles, vs these 3 different planes.... it would be hard for them to get to the point of being significant. I don't see this becoming a consumer mode of travel anytime soon.
Heh reminds me of reading this message board where some people were discussing good local spots around town to go as a couple to have sex in a different place.
Someone mentioned how great a local place that rents hot tubs was, and how its ok, and the owners don't seem to mind etc. A couple of other people chimed in about it.
It ended in a rather longer post by the owner of the place saying he is no prude, and totally understands but, they are a business, and if they find out you had sex in the hot tub, they have to drain it, clean it, and that means canceling other peoples appointments.
At least that all stays in the tub, which can be drained. I have to imaging that jizz mopping the cabin of a space flight plane would be less than a fun task.
I think a better way to put it is this....
Many security systems, like those used to protect online banking, online commerce in general etc, are based on these problems being very hard to solve. If it turns out that they are not as hard as we think, then we are not as safe as we think we are.... If we don't have honest people looking for the solution and letting everyone else know, then, we will not found out whether we are safe or not until someone dishonest figures it out and uses it against us.
Just putting it in the first terms, that is, the terms of what we lose if it turns out to not be true, puts it in terms of the status quo vs discovering the vulnerability. Obviously, its better that we continue as we are, and nobody finds the vulnerability ever... because that means what we are doing works, and there is no need to change. However, it ignores the long term risk of the discovery happening later by someone else.
Overall, if anyone goes on to prove P=NP, then I want it to be someone like this guy who just wants the recognition, rather than someone who just wants the money.
I believe you mean that you accomplish the same thing, in a different manner.
Wouldn't the opposite be receiving all mail locally, uploading it into Google, and then deleting it locally?
I actually do rather differently. I use IMAP, leave it on Google, and never backup. Its not my primary email account, just used for secondary stuff. If they reset my account right now, I would lose a bit, but, little that i care about.
I never really like "trusting the cloud".
You know, tests have been done with martial artists.... they demonstrated an interesting one in a show "Fight Science".
Very simple, you give a person a bunch of targets, with little LEDs, tell a subject to hit each target as the lights come on.
Compare the results of a trained, practiced martial artist against someone who isn't, and the results are striking. The martial artist was hitting the target BEFORE the normal persons limbs were even in motion!
Similar things in video games, you process visual information, and translate it into action (in this case, button presses). It should be no surprise that practice can make one person far better at these things than another, or that some people are better at these things than others.
Very much agreed. I can't say PHP is a problem so much as...it encourages the problem.
My experience with PHP went something like this, back when I was a professional newb.
Boss: "I need you to write this app, here are the specs, it should be done in PHP, that way we can hand it off to another group and we don't have to maintain it".
It SOUNDED great. The problem is, php is easy. its easy to start, its easy to mock something up real quick. its easy to think you are doing well and producing something good that works. Its no harder, however,m than any other language to make absolute hash of it.
Can you blame the PHP developers for making it easy to learn and get started? Thats like blaming the wheel and pedal interface for letting bad drivers on the road.
I think its a more subtle problem of competence. There were some great studies a bit back where they looked at how people rate themselves vs objective measures of their compence. Generally, the more cometent people (and this has been my experience) tend to rate their abilities lower than the less competent. Why?
Well one thing you hear a lot from very competent people "I don't know X". "I am not sure exactly how Y works...". Whereas the less competent tend to deal in absolutes "Oh I can do that", "I know how that works". The more competent people are more nuanced... they know that there are things that they don't know, and have an idea what many of those things are. They make less assumptions.
It is easy to get to the point where you can write a fairly non-trivial application. However, its also easy to think that this makes you some sort of expert, or espcially skilled, especially with all the work you put in to get to that point. Its another thing entirely to do it very well, and to understand the implications of all of what you are doing, especially when it goes beyond your narrow expertise.
Take databases and sql injection. These days, if I am working on code, I know its not my strong suit, so I compensate by stopping all work, and working just on the database. Designing a schema, writing stored procedures, THEN go to write the higher level code. I didn't do that when I first started out. I used to do what ALOT of people do.... I started with the bare minimum that I knew would "do the job" and only revisited it later if it turned out to be a problem (and then had to re-write large sections...which is usually where the project would die)
Slopping strings together haphazardly is easy to do, very quick....and it works. It works great. Its no surprise to me that it continues to be one of the most common techniques for working with SQL. Its just sad that this quality of code makes it into real products.
My first reaction when I read about the HB Gary hack was "SQL Injection and Rainbow tables? Haven't these people learned to handle SQL properly and salt passwords? I am no expert and all my recent code does BOTH". The truth is though,most people start out writting that sort of code and...it works so well its hard to distinguish. Well written secure code is great but, in practice its often indistinguishable from bad code unless you have the time and resources to audit it.
Yah but you are missing one important fact.... if I am hiring, they would have to deal with me, so having a normal attitude and personal temperament is actually not really a plus. Overall, I think the guy who writes "piss off" or "decline" in there, and insists on coming in to tell me why its a bad idea and why they wont work for me because of it.... well shit, that guy is the perfect fit, I might offer him the job on the spot.
Here is how I would implement a policy like that. I would ask, all applicants for their facebook username and password up front.
Then, everyone who gave it to me, would get a polite letter informing them that they did not get the job because they so easily violated the TOS of facebook, with whom they had a standing agreement before they applied with us. Thus, there is no way that we could trust them with access credentials on our system.
You failed the test, you are the weakest link, goodbye.
Even so, has it even been demonstrated in a lab environment on a disk manufactured in the past decade or so? I was under the impression (from other discussions) that the "area around" that which is written has become so small as to render this pretty much impossible.
I have occasionally wondered what would happen if someone posted a message like that, then when contacted by a "hitman" (which is almost certainly sure to be the police) the person turned around, called the FBI and said "I was joking around online, but somebody contacted me, and I think this guy is serious! He says he has done this before too!"
How much investigation do you think would go on before the local police and FBI realized that they were trying to sting each other?
Not that I would actually recommend anyone doing that but, given how freely some people joke or blow off steam online, I wouldn't be surprised if it has happened without even being intentional.
I would submit that there is a big difference between being designed for safe operation to protect the user from an accident, and preventing the user from making a decision.
My circular saw has a guard that gets pushed back as it glides over the cutting surface, and snaps back when it finishes. This prevents all sorts of errors and injures that could occur accidentally.
That same saw, has a handle on the guard, such that I can grab it with my hand and pull it out of the way, should I decide that, in this situation, I need to remove the safety to do something (like making a downwards cut into a material)
I have no problem with this guard, and you will find it perfectly in tact on my saw.
This is not about safety, I am fine with having to say "yes I really want to do this" or making is slightly difficult or unintuitive to do. Its the complete prohibition (the putting the device before obedience to its owner) that I have a problem with.
I love my Android but, its no surprise that the maker would prioritize protection above obedience. I would change the order:
1. Obey the authorized user (esp since he is normally the OWNER)
2. Protect the authorized user.
3. Protect itself.
Different orders can be considered when they become self aware. Until then, its a tool damnit. My hammer doesn't try to protect me, nor would I want it to. A safety on a gun may "protect me" but, the device definitely obeys before protects, because all the user needs to do is turn off the safety, and all protection is gone.
As the user/owner of a non-self aware device, it should obey me, even if my intention is to use it to destroy itself, or others.
However, there is a C.
C) Each side sees things the way that they do for their own reasons, and they have a genuine disagreement over how they see the events
Two people, can interpret the same event in wildly different ways. Add in a bit of distrust of motives, and things can really get skewed.
Perfect example. When I was in HS I spent a lot of time waiting for public busses. At one point, I used to go get a burger and drink to eat while I waited for the bus home (usually after wrestling practice when the busses ran slower too, and I was pretty hungry). Anyway, I come up to the stop one day, and the newspaper stand machine that I set my drink on while I waited was tipped over....so being generally a nice guy and wanting a place to set my drink... I decide to help out and pick it up.
Well, this was difficult because the thing wasd chained to a light pole and tightly, so the chain would bind after 2 inches.... anyway....
So a cop saw me and decided to come over and harass me "What are you doing?" (in the standard dickhead cop accusatory tone that I just have no tolerance for being addressed with unless there is damned good reason) "trying to pick this up" I tell him.
So I bend back down and go back to struggling with the chain. To which he, still sitting comfortably in his cruiser, feels the need to quip "its not that heavy"
At which point, you can probably see the difference in perspective right here as I drop the thing back down look at him and say "can't you see the damned chain".... and he.... obviously not knowing how to respond politely to being shown what an abusive retard he was being, just drove off without another word.
Clearly, I know what he thought, he looked at the situation and assumed the worst.... I really don't know enough about the details of this situation to be able to say that it was any different.
Pity? Sounds great to me, I can't stand this repressive government. Better we end it before it gets worst. I am entirely tired of hearing all the sanctimonious BS about what a free country we are, and how great we are. This country has supported brutal dictators, has started war after war after war, spends in ways that would give drunk sailors a bad name, throws people in cages for growing plants... and yet.... with all that... in many ways is better today than its ever been... which is pretty damned sad.... because up to this point, we forced gay people into "treatment", had the "red scare", and all this, AFTER having to go to war over slavery, starting wars to take land, not allowing women to vote, not allowing black people to vote, not allowing white men who didn't own land to vote,
To me, all that overshadows ANY good this government did for us or the world. Time to start over. This is not a few isolated incidents, this is a long standing pattern of malicious behavior, which has never stopped and shows no sign of stopping.
So what? If I ran a trust fund for you, wouldn't I be bound to administer it fairly, and with your best interest in mind? Wouldn't taking it all and investing it in my own pet project be... a huge breech of trust? I don't see how this is any different. They were not asked to buy their own bonds with it. That is an inappropriate and fundamentally corrupt use of the money.
You are right, but that is not really the point, is it?
Frankly, I think people should be absolutely PISSED about this. The point of SS was never to give the Gov another fund to borrow from. It was never supposed to be a backdoor general tax for the general budget. It is evidence of.... acting in bad faith with our assetts. Its one more reason that we should not trust them.
Put it this way...it is supposed to be a trust fund. What would the courts say if I ran a trust fund for you, and decided on my own to invest all of your money in my personal pet project? Wouldn't that be a conflict of interest and a huge breech of trust?
Its true, this is... a major conflict of interest, and acting in bad faith. it is why we should not trust these people, and one of the many reasons to junk this system and start over. However, none of that is the fault of the program or the trust fund itself, its the fault of corrupt administration.
Unless by "entitlements" you are shifting things like the GI Bill out of the military budget, then I don't see how that could be the case. Last I looked the military and social services were approximately equal ON BUDGET. Of course, Wars are OFF BUDGET, so the reality is, that the military gets an even larger slice of the pie.
We should be shutting down the majority of the military, stop both wars, and cut cut cut. They do little to nothing for US. We should just arm the south Koreans, and the Japanese, and tell them all, western Europe included, to defend them damned selves from the cold war bogey man, or the terrorists, or whatever the excuse of the day is.
Once we have cut them to the absolute bone, and they are "watching the borders" in a few dinghies, then we can start talking about cutting social programs, which actually benefit someone here in a way other than spending on building weapons to go commit murder on other people's soil.
> Probably similar to Germany in that they're okay with killing non-humans
antisemite! :)
The biggest problem bitcoin seems to have is that people get way too caught up in those details. I did too.... but that's just about how its minted. Yes, you get 50 btc if you process a block (an amount which cuts in half roughly every 4 years until it goes below the 8 decimal minimum and becomes 0)
However, nobody is going to make a lot of btc doing that,.... the network is already too big (a phenom II 6 core will process a block around every 125 days last I checked). The MAIN way to get btc is to trade for them. The fact of how it is produced is just technical details of how its done in such a way as to not have ANY central bank.
btc is subdivisable to 8 decimal places, and this scheme means only 21 million will ever be made (21 million units divisable to 8 decimal places... you do the math :) )
This is already the case, I got my btc by... trading them for cash (got them in december...so I am pretty happy right now). That,s how most people get them now, either buy them for cash, or exchange services/goods for them. You can already rent servers, get stuff from amazon (through an agent), escrow them for deals that need an extra level of trust, get voip services, get VPN services....
Like you say the US dollar is backed by an economy, so is bitcoin. Its just a start-up economy. If people use it, it will succeed. Otherwise, it will fail.
lol true, but it was totally a fake.
I love it when they were asked for proof and posted a totally photoshopped pic of a girl holding a sign. Note to scammers: do not post a modified picture to a forum full of geeks unless you are good enough to not edit over the fingrs holding the sign ;)
Things really are getting interesting with bitcoin.
Ahh but they denounced him within his lifetime. This is sort of their MO isn't it? Quick to denounce, glacially slow at admitting that they shouldn't have. Actually amusing epitaph on this... I looked up this issue, and, not too long before the church admitted its mistake in Galileo, Ratzinger (now Pope Benedict) was actually defending the churches original position!
From Wikipedia:
Define "make that work".
I am not talking about restoring full access to every home. Look at egypt... the few people who were able to setup links became information hubs. Able to get information out on twitter or facebook, or get it to someone outside who can.
Sure, restoration of full, high bandwidth service... probably not happening. However, as long as some service remains, it is something to use, and build on...and the more they use the kill switch, the better those ad hoc systems will get.
I disagree.... I think it will be the biggest threat for authoritarianism.
There are enough people in the US that know how to setup networks. If they turn on the kill switch, how many people in this country are going to be.... within hours (it not minutes) be working on ways to get new links up and to circumvent it in any way possible? The more they use it, the longer it stays on, the more resistance we build to it.
Let them use their antibiotic, they will merely pave the way for resistance. Also, how many jobs require networks and the internet to be functioning? Many! The longer it is on, the more people in the streets!
So I say.... bring it on! Lets see how quickly they can go the way of Tunisia! Sic Semper Tyrannis!
Sure we do.... we know how networks connect. Sure, they can try it... but I suspect that for every hour that the internet is down, hundreds of new connections come online. The damage will be healed, and connectivity will slowly be restored.... it may not be fast, it may not be great, and it make take time, but it will be enough to let the world know what they are doing to us.