> I'm not a "believer". However, even I can see > that if you define Entity E as "omniscient" then > clearly they must be certain about ethical > matters--by definitio
very interesting....Well it goes to show, Atheism is a religion, just like any other. This is simply a statment of Mr. Stallman's Belief.
His argument about relativism, seems to mimic, for me, certain things that pop up in the relm of physics, when you get into relativity and the "Less well known" (or rather less publicly understood things).
He seems to be saying "Yes I believe there is an objective, real, set of moral right and wrong" but at the same time saying "there is no way that we can actually measure what it is". It becomes that same argument as "am I moving, or are you".
Really, I think the reason that "God" is so popular, the concept of a God makes things simple, "this is right, that is wrong, God said so". It makes people feel secure, there is a nice, absolute standard of morality. People don't like uncertainty.
(I am not saying that "God" is nothing more than "good psycology", certainly, as an atheist, that is my personal belief, but...I have no real hard evidence to back that belief up with, it can't be proven one way or the other)
> The effects of alccohol and tobacco are already > bad enough. Why would you want to embed some > other dangerous drug in to the culture?
Well...I will bite....
These drugs are already part of our culture. Cocaine is part of our culture. Cannabis is part of our culture (just as much so as alcohol, as far as I can tell...just more quite). LSD, heroin (I hate to list those two together) are part of our culture.
Shootings, drugs cut with baking soda (both things you bring up) are NOT the result of drugs. They are the result of prohibition. They are the result of the fact that the drug trade is illegal, and thus run by a black market (black markets being completely without regulation...including those regulations that say its bad buisness to shoot people)
Not to be a nitpicker....but you have the sentance
> Then your logic is probably flawed followed by: > QED
If its "probably" then the QED is unjustified, all you have done is pointed at irrational assertions, which are a flag that tends to indicate flawed logic, not something that proves flaweed logic.
Without having actually demonstrated the logic flawed, noting is QED.
Also...that "personal attack" apears to have been intended as a joke, a little poking of fun, not something meant to be taken as a serious attack, would recomend having your humor parseing subroutines checked out.
Kind of offtopic but.... That wouldn't surprize me one bit. its funny... the RIAA has the opinion that ALL mp3s are illegal I think...
I know a band member who is NOT affiliated with any big label, much less an RIAA member...his band puts MP3s of their own music on their own website....they recieved a cease and desist order from the RIAA, telling them they were "Distributing material copyright by one of our members" and to stop...
I told him he should send them a cease and desist order to stop fraudulently claiming that they represent his band...I don't think he did though.
It seems they don't even check...they see MP3, they send a threat. It would certainly be in their interest to drive people away from web based distribution.
> This is funny when someone violates the GPL, > nobody is hurt or "loses" anything, yet the > violator is boycotted, called a thief, e-mail > bombed...... > > Stop with the double standard here,
Excuse me? Did I email bomb anyone? I have never done that in my life. Have I been applying a double standard here? Not me.
You are acusing me of a double standard because of the actions and words of other people.
As far as boycotting, thats another story...I reserve the right to nbot buy the product of ANY company at ANY time, and to advocate the non-use of their products. No double standard needed. If I don't agree with something they do (be it operating sweat shops, or making proprietary software) then I may decide to not purchase their product. This is my right.
As for napster....napster is a service, like the phone company. They simply provide a means for sharing files, no differnet than the WWW or even ICQ...its just a little easier.
What people do, or do not do, with napster is their own buisness. As for bloacking any "clones" that would be nearly impossible....unless you know how to write a piece of code that checks a network packet, sees its content, and is able to determine with 100% accuracy if the originator of the packet has the legal "right" to distribute the software.
> Napster could do the right thing,
You mean enforce economic censorship? Thats not their buisness...they simply provide people with the means for easy file sharing. It is not their job to police everything, any more than it is the job of the phone company to monitor your phone conversations, toi make sure you aren't breaking "the law".
> The common phrase in the business world is > "opportunity cost". If you download the MP3 > instead of buying the album, the artist loses > out. That's always been the argument against > music/software "piracy".
Well "common sense" has 2 major problems:
1) Noon seems to agree on what is common sense and what isn't.
2) Its often wrong, or based on things that are unprovable (like moral arguments, and assume that everyone used the same metrics for their morality)
Also...again as many have said...what about the case when a person downloads an MP3, but would not have bpurchased the CD even if they couldn't get the mp3? Another failing of this "oppertunity cost".
I agree with your other argument tho. The major reason I stopped looking for songs I like in mp3 is the quality. Whenever I buy a CD, I rip it to mp3 at 192 kBps. (well most things...not everything needs it)...normally the quality of the free mp3s blows....at least thats how it was a few years ago.
So I go and buy CDs, then rip them and add them to my private mp3 collection. Works much nicer.
> And how about your own web page: "This page is > the sole property of The Carp". Then you go on > to list terms on which other people can copy it, > such as "proper credit is given to the author". > > You hypocrite.
Good eye...however...what you don't know about those pages is that I wrote them a LONG time ago. That page has not been updated in a LONG time.
In fact...that particular page probably hasn't been substantially updated in 4 years. (other than perhaps when I converted some of the gif's to PNGs....I don't know if I even uploaded that update to the public pages.)
Rest assured, when I come out with my new pages, and take those down, that statment will apear nowhere in the text....As I no longer believe that I have the right to say it.
> Hey, guess what. I just made a copy of your > site. Next I'll see if I can sell advertising on > it,
Hey cool! I am glad you like it. Have fun with it. However I would apreciate it if you would not call it MY pages, since, when you put it up, its no longer my pages, and claiming I said or put up pages that you have put up would be a form of fraud.
Beyond that....enjoy. I am glad that something I wrote may be useful to someone. (actually I know some parts have been useful to people already - so I already feel good about it)
Now please tell me where I complained at ALL about moderation? That was a discussion about playboy magzine and, me, defending the stance that its articles ARE actually good and worth reading.
Perhaps in the subject line you say? well the subject line began with a 3 letter sequence "re:" before the "how did this get a 4" which implies, nay, outright states, that it was a reply to someone else. (see above: "Re:Throwing Stones....")
Now, as the Mahareeshi Hashish Yogi said... "People who live in glass houses, shouldn't throw orgies"....thats words to live by homey.
> 2. You can't afford to buy records. Well, I feel > sorry for you, but it's still not okay to steal > something just because you can't afford it. (If > I'm wrong here you are welcome to explain to me > when it's okay, I have some stuff I can't afford > myself.)
I really don't want to start ANOTHER flamewar on this point but...here goes....
Trying to reason out...why is stealing wrong? In my view of morality, there is 1 and only 1 reason why stealing is morally unacceptable. Simply put, if I steal your car, you lose a car.
The fact that I have the car is irrelavent. it is not wrong because "I have it" it is wrong because You don't. Therefore I can not take it, without depriviving the rightful owner of it.
With music, this is not the case. It is copying. If I see you have a fountain in your yard, and I decide I want a fountain...so I go down to the hardware store, buy some cement, pipes whatever and build myself a copy of your fountain, then I have a very hard time calling that "stealing". You are completely not involved in the transaction , it has nothing to do with you. This is the very nature of a "Copy".
> So, even if Napster is a great way to get the > MP3's you want, you should be aware that you are > doing something wrong everytime you download a > copyrighted song.
Yup...the same way women all over the world are doing something wrong by leaving their house without covering ALL body hair. (according to islamic law). Its morally wrong, the Koran says so. You should be aware of it.
Oh yea, and not everyone agrees with your moral veiwpoint (see above). Much like those billions of women who go out without all of their face and hair covered.
> They made their career choice just as everyone > here did, or will once they graduate college.
So did the people who used to work in the Ice industry. You know...the people whose job it was to go to places where water froze naturally and ship it into cities to be sold.
New Technology (refridgeration) was invented and made affordable to everyone...everyone could make a cheap copy, that was practically in every way the same as the ice they would sell....so the ice industry disapeared.
Now people still make plenty of ice, there are just no (or very few) professional, full time, ice makers/collectors. Most of the people who do it now are amature ice makers, who do it for the personal benefit they gain from making ice.
Re:What about my privacy?
on
Laptop Lojack?
·
· Score: 4
FYI - At least in MY home state (MA) things are just a "tiny bit" different. See...the police in MA REFUSED to use lojack, unless certain changes were made to the system.
What did they want? The police wanted the ability to activate any lojack at any time, for any reason. Guess what? they got it. If you have lojack in MA, the police could turn it on at any time, without you knowing a thing about it.
(I am assuming by this that there are protections in place in other states, like its not the policebut the lojack people who transmit the code and need some password or mothers maiden name or some such to do it)
Re:Maybe genuinely secure laptops make more sense.
on
Laptop Lojack?
·
· Score: 1
> This doesn't sound like a realistic solution to > me - the certificates pass phrase might be > cracked, at least by the guys really interested > in such data. Or simply get the person who knows > the phrase and make him tell it
Well that depends on the crackability of the passphrase. If its a good passphrase, it should be a very hard problem to attack it. Of course, they need a copy of the certificate itself to attack....it could easily be stored in a smart card or som,e similar device.
As for "get him to tell you", thats a problem with ANY system for keeping secure data, all you need to do is compromise a person with legitimate access. (like if I wanted someones medical records...couldn't I just get a job in the hospital records filing room, and steal them?)
> A keyboard which is able to check the users > finger prints makes much more sense to me
Such a system doesn't sound like it would be very reliable. Most of the time it would only be able to get partial finger prints, it would have to get them VERY quickly, as people type, and it would require the hardware to do the scanning in EVERY key...which means 100+ individual finger print scanners, in 1 keyboard.
This STILL does nothing to the idea of a comprtomised person with legitimate access.
Wouldn't it be more fun to just have a system that simply destroys the hardware? For example....
Have a device that can be armed or disarmed with a secret RF transmitted code. If you open the case, without disarming...or a destruct code is sent (via RF) then.,...say... a small canister of thermite, mounted over the hard drive, suddenly ignites.
Should easily destroy the hard drive, and most of the rest of the laptop, pretty quickly..... Hell...a version of this for home computers could be made for probably under $100
The only real problem is deciding how much thermite to use...Afterall...its good to destroy the hard drive....burning a hole through the floor and the next floor down is usually considered to be fairly inconsiderate, at the least. (unless you own your own house)
Offtopic rant: I am sick and tired of all this "Hey moderators" bull. Let whoever has mod points moderate already. It seems in every article these days there are a few posts saying "I can't believe this got a 2" or "Mod this up" etc....leave it alone. I mean I can understand posting a clarification when something was intended as a joke and gets called flamebait (has happend to me even) but...seriously let them decide for themselves.
> I totally agree, even working in a media > organisation I hate the way they've got to put a > spin on these thin
Its not just these things, its everything. Face it, scare tactics work. Repeat after me everyone: "Readership is God.".
Why do you think media flocked to columbine like flies to shit? Great opertunity to scare people shitless, and keep the glued to the tube and reading the paper. Anything they can do to latch into peoples fear, they will do. If your afraid that something might affect you, then you are going to keep reading, keep watching, and keeping their advertisers happy.
A) Suicides....well suicide rates don't go down
when gun access is not available (methods change)
- so they would tend to drive any such statistic
(which you didn't even bother to give) up, in a
misleading manner (ie it suggests their deaths
would have been prevented without guns)
B) Accidental shootings.... these tend to
suggest that lack of gun saftey training would
be a factor. So any statistics would need to
also include what percentage of accidental gun
deaths, of children, involved directly (ie parents
who were not home or in another room don't count)
people who had gun saftey training....
I have noticed that the anti-gun crowed never
seems to bother to collect that data either.
So corpses you say? Interesting...though most
humans eventually become corpses anyway...not very
compelling...the largest percentage of people
who ever existed in the world have never even seen
a gun (they are a recent invention of the past few
centuries)...and most of them are all corpses.
Unless your at home and hear the door suddenly
crash in....then aim for the face or legs
(storm troopers tend to wear body armor...for
best protection, don't grab your gun at all...if
its already in your hand, then remember they might
shoot you as soon as they see a gun...if its
gonna happen anyway...id rather be the first to
shoot...wouldn't you?)
> 1.All guns are always loaded.
English to moron translation:
"Treat all guns as if they are loaded" noone is
advocating actually leaving ALL guns loaded ALL
the time...just that you should always assume a
gun is loaded and treat it with the care you would
a loaded gun, even if you "know" its not loaded.
Quite frankly....I have no qualms whatsoever about
shooting a person in defense of my life, or the
life of my fammily (hell, even in defense of a
stranger on the street for that matter).
Certainly the use of ANY type of force should be
a last resort, I will certainly agree to that. Of
course, you don't have to FIRE a gun to USE a gun.
Simply aiming it at an attacker or burgler often
has the desired effect....pointing your dick at
them tends to not have the desired effect.
(unless geting laughed at and probably killed is
the desired effect)
Self defense is a perfectly acceptable use of a
fire arm in my book. Hell if it were up to me
I would say that not only is self defense
acceptable...the victem should be able to charge
the price of the bullet to the estate of thier
attacker. (along with any charges to get blood out
of any clothing/carpet etc that they may have
bled on)
> In general people must think kids are the
> stupidest people in the universe. I mean saying
> that thinking that one cannot distinguish a
> logical argument from a foolish one is silly.
Well non-logical arguments Do have their place.
Not everything in the world has to be logical.
Of course...many adults can't tell REAL logic from
an emotional argument anyway...how can we expect
children to?
Though I agree...people do tend to underestimate
kids. Its not that they can necissarily tell a
logical argument from one that isn't...bu they
are not going to suddenly forget all of the moral
and social learning that they have aquired and
blindly follow anything that they read either....
many people forget that.
When I was in high school, I studied french. I clearly remember a picture in the book of a Fast Food restraunt (MCDonnalds or some knock off) and beer WAS on the menu.
And for the person who called it "la wine" it should be le vin (or was vin feminin?...been a whiile)
What good is missle guidance software without missles? The worst case scenario is china or someone uses the software for their own missles. Oh boo hoo...that would be horrible.
If it was designed correctly, then there would be no need for the guidence software to be secret, for security. All it serves to do is allow them to get into an unhealthy mindset, and raise the cost for other countries to make the same stuff by some incredibly tiny amount (when compared to the hardware and tech needed to actually make the missles)
The only real secrets they need are short term "move the troops that way"...and that data is obselete within days usually anyway. (knowing when an attack was ordered doesn't help if you figure it out 5 mins after the troops arrive and stick guns in your face)
> I don't see this (the French government claim to > source disclosure) as a good thing. I am highly > distrustful of governments and giving more power > to them -- and this is a power grab by the > government,
Well I am one of those weirdos who thinks government was one of the "Top 10 worst ideas that anyone ever had". I think they don't deserve any trust at all...however...I see this very differntly.
This is simply a sensible internal policy. They are not saying "You have to give us the source". They are simply setting an INTERNAL policy for their own offices that "We wont use it, if it doesn't come with source".
I think that governments SHOULD do things like this, if they want to exist. They should require even more strict things. They should require things like "No government agency is allowed to buy product from a company that makes the product overseas and gives the workers less wages and benefits than they could give local workers" (ie, no sweat shops).
This is simply saying "This is the kind of thing we want to suport". They are not saying you can't make closed software, just that "We wont buy it". I think its one of the few good things I have ever seen a government do.
No software should EVER be considered a security problem if its released. If they are relying on the fact that noone knows how the program works to keep things secure....then they deserve what they get.
All software they write should be released as source to the world. They should be relying on solid math and hardware to be keeping security, not the obscurity of their algorithms.
By forcing them to release the code, you force them to not even consider writting code that relies on its own secrecy.
Besides...with the small exception of immediate military secrets (like orders to tell troops where to move) the government shouldn't be allowed to keep ANY secrets AT ALL. (with the exception of private data like SSNs, Census data, and of course their own encryption keys).
It is VERY conceivable that they could easily get around this. Sure...outright security holes like back doors are easy to spot in code...but...a cleverly engineered hole could be hidden very well and if any organization has the talent, expertise, and interest in doing so, its the NSA.
Take encryption software, all they would need is to cripple it a tiny bit so that it leaks a bit or two of key every time it encrypts something... would not be long before they had the whole key.
> would interpret this as requiring full open > documentation of all the Windows/Office/IE/VB > APIs.
Lets not forget Kerberos. Foir Win2k it would mean that M$ Kerberos (which as we all know only differs from real kerberos by a tiny bit) would have to be documented...so non-MS servers could serve Kerberos Tickets, even to Win2K machines.
Slashdot Mirror
> I'm not a "believer". However, even I can see
> that if you define Entity E as "omniscient" then
> clearly they must be certain about ethical
> matters--by definitio
very interesting....Well it goes to show, Atheism
is a religion, just like any other. This is simply
a statment of Mr. Stallman's Belief.
His argument about relativism, seems to mimic, for
me, certain things that pop up in the relm of
physics, when you get into relativity and the
"Less well known" (or rather less publicly
understood things).
He seems to be saying "Yes I believe there is an
objective, real, set of moral right and wrong"
but at the same time saying "there is no way that
we can actually measure what it is". It becomes
that same argument as "am I moving, or are you".
Really, I think the reason that "God" is so
popular, the concept of a God makes things simple,
"this is right, that is wrong, God said so".
It makes people feel secure, there is a nice,
absolute standard of morality. People don't like
uncertainty.
(I am not saying that "God" is nothing more than
"good psycology", certainly, as an atheist, that
is my personal belief, but...I have no real hard
evidence to back that belief up with, it can't
be proven one way or the other)
> The effects of alccohol and tobacco are already
> bad enough. Why would you want to embed some
> other dangerous drug in to the culture?
Well...I will bite....
These drugs are already part of our culture.
Cocaine is part of our culture. Cannabis is part
of our culture (just as much so as alcohol, as
far as I can tell...just more quite). LSD, heroin
(I hate to list those two together) are part of
our culture.
Shootings, drugs cut with baking soda (both things
you bring up) are NOT the result of drugs. They
are the result of prohibition. They are the result
of the fact that the drug trade is illegal, and
thus run by a black market (black markets being
completely without regulation...including those
regulations that say its bad buisness to shoot
people)
Not to be a nitpicker....but you have the sentance
> Then your logic is probably flawed
followed by:
> QED
If its "probably" then the QED is unjustified, all
you have done is pointed at irrational assertions,
which are a flag that tends to indicate flawed
logic, not something that proves flaweed logic.
Without having actually demonstrated the logic
flawed, noting is QED.
Also...that "personal attack" apears to have been
intended as a joke, a little poking of fun,
not something meant to be taken as a serious
attack, would recomend having your humor parseing
subroutines checked out.
Kind of offtopic but....
That wouldn't surprize me one bit. its funny...
the RIAA has the opinion that ALL mp3s are illegal
I think...
I know a band member who is NOT affiliated with
any big label, much less an RIAA member...his
band puts MP3s of their own music on their own
website....they recieved a cease and desist order
from the RIAA, telling them they were
"Distributing material copyright by one of our
members" and to stop...
I told him he should send them a cease and desist
order to stop fraudulently claiming that they
represent his band...I don't think he did though.
It seems they don't even check...they see MP3,
they send a threat. It would certainly be in their
interest to drive people away from web based
distribution.
> This is funny when someone violates the GPL,
> nobody is hurt or "loses" anything, yet the
> violator is boycotted, called a thief, e-mail
> bombed......
>
> Stop with the double standard here,
Excuse me? Did I email bomb anyone? I have never
done that in my life. Have I been applying a
double standard here? Not me.
You are acusing me of a double standard because
of the actions and words of other people.
As far as boycotting, thats another story...I reserve the
right to nbot buy the product of ANY company at
ANY time, and to advocate the non-use of their
products. No double standard needed. If I don't
agree with something they do (be it operating
sweat shops, or making proprietary software) then
I may decide to not purchase their product. This
is my right.
As for napster....napster is a service, like the
phone company. They simply provide a means for
sharing files, no differnet than the WWW or
even ICQ...its just a little easier.
What people do, or do not do, with napster is
their own buisness. As for bloacking any "clones"
that would be nearly impossible....unless you
know how to write a piece of code that checks a
network packet, sees its content, and is able to
determine with 100% accuracy if the originator
of the packet has the legal "right" to distribute
the software.
> Napster could do the right thing,
You mean enforce economic censorship? Thats not
their buisness...they simply provide people with
the means for easy file sharing. It is not their
job to police everything, any more than it is the
job of the phone company to monitor your phone
conversations, toi make sure you aren't breaking
"the law".
> The common phrase in the business world is
> "opportunity cost". If you download the MP3
> instead of buying the album, the artist loses
> out. That's always been the argument against
> music/software "piracy".
Well "common sense" has 2 major problems:
1) Noon seems to agree on what is common sense
and what isn't.
2) Its often wrong, or based on things that are
unprovable (like moral arguments, and assume that
everyone used the same metrics for their morality)
Also...again as many have said...what about the
case when a person downloads an MP3, but would
not have bpurchased the CD even if they couldn't
get the mp3? Another failing of this "oppertunity
cost".
I agree with your other argument tho. The major
reason I stopped looking for songs I like in mp3
is the quality. Whenever I buy a CD, I rip it
to mp3 at 192 kBps. (well most things...not
everything needs it)...normally the quality of the
free mp3s blows....at least thats how it was a few
years ago.
So I go and buy CDs, then rip them and add them
to my private mp3 collection. Works much nicer.
> And how about your own web page: "This page is
> the sole property of The Carp". Then you go on
> to list terms on which other people can copy it,
> such as "proper credit is given to the author".
>
> You hypocrite.
Good eye...however...what you don't know about
those pages is that I wrote them a LONG time ago.
That page has not been updated in a LONG time.
In fact...that particular page probably hasn't
been substantially updated in 4 years. (other
than perhaps when I converted some of the gif's to
PNGs....I don't know if I even uploaded that
update to the public pages.)
Rest assured, when I come out with my new pages,
and take those down, that statment will apear
nowhere in the text....As I no longer believe that
I have the right to say it.
> Hey, guess what. I just made a copy of your
> site. Next I'll see if I can sell advertising on
> it,
Hey cool! I am glad you like it. Have fun with it.
However I would apreciate it if you would not call
it MY pages, since, when you put it up, its no
longer my pages, and claiming I said or put up
pages that you have put up would be a form of
fraud.
Beyond that....enjoy. I am glad that something I
wrote may be useful to someone. (actually I know
some parts have been useful to people already -
so I already feel good about it)
-Steve
Now please tell me where I complained at ALL
about moderation? That was a discussion about
playboy magzine and, me, defending the stance
that its articles ARE actually good and worth
reading.
Perhaps in the subject line you say? well the
subject line began with a 3 letter sequence
"re:" before the "how did this get a 4" which
implies, nay, outright states, that it was a reply
to someone else.
(see above: "Re:Throwing Stones....")
Now, as the Mahareeshi Hashish Yogi said...
"People who live in glass houses, shouldn't throw
orgies"....thats words to live by homey.
-Steve
> 2. You can't afford to buy records. Well, I feel
> sorry for you, but it's still not okay to steal
> something just because you can't afford it. (If
> I'm wrong here you are welcome to explain to me
> when it's okay, I have some stuff I can't afford
> myself.)
I really don't want to start ANOTHER flamewar on
this point but...here goes....
Trying to reason out...why is stealing wrong?
In my view of morality, there is 1 and only 1
reason why stealing is morally unacceptable.
Simply put, if I steal your car, you lose a car.
The fact that I have the car is irrelavent. it is
not wrong because "I have it" it is wrong because
You don't. Therefore I can not take it, without
depriviving the rightful owner of it.
With music, this is not the case. It is copying.
If I see you have a fountain in your yard, and
I decide I want a fountain...so I go down to the
hardware store, buy some cement, pipes whatever
and build myself a copy of your fountain, then
I have a very hard time calling that "stealing".
You are completely not involved in the transaction
, it has nothing to do with you. This is the very
nature of a "Copy".
> So, even if Napster is a great way to get the
> MP3's you want, you should be aware that you are
> doing something wrong everytime you download a
> copyrighted song.
Yup...the same way women all over the world are
doing something wrong by leaving their house
without covering ALL body hair. (according to
islamic law). Its morally wrong, the Koran says
so. You should be aware of it.
Oh yea, and not everyone agrees with your moral
veiwpoint (see above). Much like those billions
of women who go out without all of their face
and hair covered.
> They made their career choice just as everyone
> here did, or will once they graduate college.
So did the people who used to work in the Ice
industry. You know...the people whose job it was
to go to places where water froze naturally and
ship it into cities to be sold.
New Technology (refridgeration) was invented and
made affordable to everyone...everyone could make
a cheap copy, that was practically in every way
the same as the ice they would sell....so the
ice industry disapeared.
Now people still make plenty of ice, there are
just no (or very few) professional, full time, ice
makers/collectors. Most of the people who do it
now are amature ice makers, who do it for the
personal benefit they gain from making ice.
FYI - At least in MY home state (MA) things are
just a "tiny bit" different. See...the police in
MA REFUSED to use lojack, unless certain changes
were made to the system.
What did they want? The police wanted the ability
to activate any lojack at any time, for any
reason. Guess what? they got it. If you have
lojack in MA, the police could turn it on at any
time, without you knowing a thing about it.
(I am assuming by this that there are protections
in place in other states, like its not the policebut the lojack people who transmit the code
and need some password or mothers maiden name
or some such to do it)
> This doesn't sound like a realistic solution to
> me - the certificates pass phrase might be
> cracked, at least by the guys really interested
> in such data. Or simply get the person who knows
> the phrase and make him tell it
Well that depends on the crackability of the
passphrase. If its a good passphrase, it should
be a very hard problem to attack it. Of course,
they need a copy of the certificate itself to
attack....it could easily be stored in a smart
card or som,e similar device.
As for "get him to tell you", thats a problem with
ANY system for keeping secure data, all you need
to do is compromise a person with legitimate
access. (like if I wanted someones medical
records...couldn't I just get a job in the
hospital records filing room, and steal them?)
> A keyboard which is able to check the users
> finger prints makes much more sense to me
Such a system doesn't sound like it would be very
reliable. Most of the time it would only be able
to get partial finger prints, it would have to get
them VERY quickly, as people type, and it would
require the hardware to do the scanning in EVERY
key...which means 100+ individual finger print
scanners, in 1 keyboard.
This STILL does nothing to the idea of a
comprtomised person with legitimate access.
Wouldn't it be more fun to just have a system that
simply destroys the hardware? For example....
Have a device that can be armed or disarmed with
a secret RF transmitted code. If you open the
case, without disarming...or a destruct code is
sent (via RF) then.,...say... a small canister of
thermite, mounted over the hard drive, suddenly
ignites.
Should easily destroy the hard drive, and most of
the rest of the laptop, pretty quickly.....
Hell...a version of this for home computers could
be made for probably under $100
The only real problem is deciding how much
thermite to use...Afterall...its good to destroy
the hard drive....burning a hole through the floor
and the next floor down is usually considered to
be fairly inconsiderate, at the least. (unless you
own your own house)
> (note to moderators: mod the above up please).
Offtopic rant:
I am sick and tired of all this "Hey moderators"
bull. Let whoever has mod points moderate already.
It seems in every article these days there are
a few posts saying "I can't believe this got a 2"
or "Mod this up" etc....leave it alone. I mean I
can understand posting a clarification when
something was intended as a joke and gets called
flamebait (has happend to me even) but...seriously
let them decide for themselves.
> I totally agree, even working in a media
> organisation I hate the way they've got to put a
> spin on these thin
Its not just these things, its everything. Face
it, scare tactics work. Repeat after me everyone:
"Readership is God.".
Why do you think media flocked to columbine like
flies to shit? Great opertunity to scare people
shitless, and keep the glued to the tube and
reading the paper. Anything they can do to latch
into peoples fear, they will do. If your afraid
that something might affect you, then you are
going to keep reading, keep watching, and keeping
their advertisers happy.
Ok so I would guess we have 2 catagories here...
.... these tend to
A) Suicides....well suicide rates don't go down
when gun access is not available (methods change)
- so they would tend to drive any such statistic
(which you didn't even bother to give) up, in a
misleading manner (ie it suggests their deaths
would have been prevented without guns)
B) Accidental shootings
suggest that lack of gun saftey training would
be a factor. So any statistics would need to
also include what percentage of accidental gun
deaths, of children, involved directly (ie parents
who were not home or in another room don't count)
people who had gun saftey training....
I have noticed that the anti-gun crowed never
seems to bother to collect that data either.
So corpses you say? Interesting...though most
humans eventually become corpses anyway...not very
compelling...the largest percentage of people
who ever existed in the world have never even seen
a gun (they are a recent invention of the past few
centuries)...and most of them are all corpses.
We need more data I think.
> aim center-of-mass.
Unless your at home and hear the door suddenly
crash in....then aim for the face or legs
(storm troopers tend to wear body armor...for
best protection, don't grab your gun at all...if
its already in your hand, then remember they might
shoot you as soon as they see a gun...if its
gonna happen anyway...id rather be the first to
shoot...wouldn't you?)
> 1.All guns are always loaded.
English to moron translation:
"Treat all guns as if they are loaded" noone is
advocating actually leaving ALL guns loaded ALL
the time...just that you should always assume a
gun is loaded and treat it with the care you would
a loaded gun, even if you "know" its not loaded.
The rest is all good sense.
Well, humans ARE animals.
Quite frankly....I have no qualms whatsoever about
shooting a person in defense of my life, or the
life of my fammily (hell, even in defense of a
stranger on the street for that matter).
Certainly the use of ANY type of force should be
a last resort, I will certainly agree to that. Of
course, you don't have to FIRE a gun to USE a gun.
Simply aiming it at an attacker or burgler often
has the desired effect....pointing your dick at
them tends to not have the desired effect.
(unless geting laughed at and probably killed is
the desired effect)
Self defense is a perfectly acceptable use of a
fire arm in my book. Hell if it were up to me
I would say that not only is self defense
acceptable...the victem should be able to charge
the price of the bullet to the estate of thier
attacker. (along with any charges to get blood out
of any clothing/carpet etc that they may have
bled on)
> In general people must think kids are the
> stupidest people in the universe. I mean saying
> that thinking that one cannot distinguish a
> logical argument from a foolish one is silly.
Well non-logical arguments Do have their place.
Not everything in the world has to be logical.
Of course...many adults can't tell REAL logic from
an emotional argument anyway...how can we expect
children to?
Though I agree...people do tend to underestimate
kids. Its not that they can necissarily tell a
logical argument from one that isn't...bu they
are not going to suddenly forget all of the moral
and social learning that they have aquired and
blindly follow anything that they read either....
many people forget that.
Actually...
When I was in high school, I studied french. I
clearly remember a picture in the book of a
Fast Food restraunt (MCDonnalds or some
knock off) and beer WAS on the menu.
And for the person who called it "la wine"
it should be le vin (or was vin feminin?...been a
whiile)
Why?
What good is missle guidance software without
missles? The worst case scenario is china or
someone uses the software for their own missles.
Oh boo hoo...that would be horrible.
If it was designed correctly, then there would
be no need for the guidence software to be
secret, for security. All it serves to do is
allow them to get into an unhealthy mindset, and
raise the cost for other countries to make the
same stuff by some incredibly tiny amount (when
compared to the hardware and tech needed to
actually make the missles)
The only real secrets they need are short term
"move the troops that way"...and that data is
obselete within days usually anyway. (knowing
when an attack was ordered doesn't help if you
figure it out 5 mins after the troops arrive and
stick guns in your face)
> I don't see this (the French government claim to
> source disclosure) as a good thing. I am highly
> distrustful of governments and giving more power
> to them -- and this is a power grab by the
> government,
Well I am one of those weirdos who thinks
government was one of the "Top 10 worst ideas that
anyone ever had". I think they don't deserve any
trust at all...however...I see this very
differntly.
This is simply a sensible internal policy. They
are not saying "You have to give us the source".
They are simply setting an INTERNAL policy for
their own offices that "We wont use it, if it
doesn't come with source".
I think that governments SHOULD do things like
this, if they want to exist. They should require
even more strict things. They should require
things like "No government agency is allowed to
buy product from a company that makes the product
overseas and gives the workers less wages and
benefits than they could give local workers"
(ie, no sweat shops).
This is simply saying "This is the kind of thing
we want to suport". They are not saying you can't
make closed software, just that "We wont buy it".
I think its one of the few good things I have
ever seen a government do.
I would disagree on a minor point...
No software should EVER be considered a security
problem if its released. If they are relying on
the fact that noone knows how the program works
to keep things secure....then they deserve what
they get.
All software they write should be released as
source to the world. They should be relying on
solid math and hardware to be keeping security,
not the obscurity of their algorithms.
By forcing them to release the code, you force
them to not even consider writting code that
relies on its own secrecy.
Besides...with the small exception of immediate
military secrets (like orders to tell troops where
to move) the government shouldn't be allowed to
keep ANY secrets AT ALL. (with the exception of
private data like SSNs, Census data, and of
course their own encryption keys).
heh
French Culture is fairly differnt from american
culture. They are related, they have alot in
common, but they are certainly also very differnt.
Tho....the flame was stupid in other ways...
certainly the french DO have McDonnalds (hell
their McDonnalds sells beer even)
Considering who the NSA is...
It is VERY conceivable that they could easily get
around this. Sure...outright security holes like
back doors are easy to spot in code...but...a
cleverly engineered hole could be hidden very well
and if any organization has the talent, expertise,
and interest in doing so, its the NSA.
Take encryption software, all they would need is
to cripple it a tiny bit so that it leaks a bit
or two of key every time it encrypts something...
would not be long before they had the whole key.
> would interpret this as requiring full open
> documentation of all the Windows/Office/IE/VB
> APIs.
Lets not forget Kerberos. Foir Win2k it would mean
that M$ Kerberos (which as we all know only
differs from real kerberos by a tiny bit) would
have to be documented...so non-MS servers could
serve Kerberos Tickets, even to Win2K machines.