This... If you go back through my posts I've been warning folks that they will need to regulate themselves or be subjected to draconian laws and absurd restrictions written by people who aren't them and don't have their interests in mind. I'm not even a hobbyist, I don't even own a drone or want to. However, as I've said time and time again - you will be hurt if you don't police yourselves.
Why am I interested? This doesn't affect me. So, why? Because I hate the very idea of people's rights being limited without just cause. Frankly, lots of things that don't belong regulated will be. Use situations that have no business being regulated will be. This will be overly broad, ill defined, and subject to the vagaries already inherent in the system so prosecutorial discretion will likely be rampant. I don't wish that on anyone.
It's the environment we're in. If you're not proactive then you'll get hammered on by those who either hate you or want to control you. Some sort of outreach program would be good but it may be too late for that now. If you could have set up a site and then gotten manufacturers to link to it in their packaging or something that might have been a good start. I suspect it's too late for any of that now.
Heh... We had engineers and programmers making six figures but I'm sure you'll lie and say you're not only worth that but earn more than that.
You're dismissed. Your preconceived notions do not match reality and reality will not conform to your ideals but you'll still whine. I repeat, fuck off back to your basement. Let us know when you've actually done something. Until then, stay out of the way and stop harassing those who do, who can, or are trying to.
If by "calling her out on her bullshit" you mean misrepresenting her ideas to mean whatever you want them to mean and then "debunking" that?
Then they say:
If you are not seeing the videos and posts that address the points she was making, you should know something that some people suffer from confirmation bias and really only look in their own echo chambers for information.
Then you say:
Well, you haven't managed to come up with anything. If it exists, please, point it out.
And:
We can all accept that she made mistakes using those examples.
Might I suggest that you're too close to the problem and unable to opine objectively? You ask for evidence, you get evidence, you agree with evidence, you dismiss the evidence, you then continue to believe what you've already decided even though you agree with the evidence provided.
As an outside looking in, I'm not a gamer, it does appear that this whole "gamergate" thing is indeed about a developer fucking a reporter in order to get better reviews and that being unethical. Some of those gamers take their games pretty damned seriously and want ethical reporting and full disclosure before they pay good sums of money for their entertainment. They were then shit on and told that they were just sexist for wanting to have ethics in reporting.
Now, sure, at that point they kind of jumped the shark... I don't disagree. Since then we've had unplayable games released that were praised yet simply appear to be being praised because of the gender or sexuality of the developer. And again, the gamers went off the rails. Seeing a pattern start to develop here? I am... I bet it is different than what you see. I see the problem going back to ethics in journalism and the industry as a whole.
Anyhow, this does indeed tie in to the overall subject of the thread and it relates to your sub thread but I don't think you can actually help. You're unable to be objective - your mind is clearly made up. I've seen your other posts in this thread. Your bias is evident and no amount of evidence, as you show above, is going to allow you to be honest with yourself.
That's okay, humans aren't rational generally. You're irrationally basing your opinions due to feelings and that's okay. We're not rational machines, we're rationalizing machines.
Welcome to Slashdot. Now fuck off home. (No, not really, I just figure you might as well get a 'proper' welcome.)
Anyhow, I think you're correct. Some have an aptitude and an interest. Encourage those that do and stop trying to shoehorn people into roles they neither want or are capable of. I have no idea what your gender is but I hope that you're given (or take) the chance to learn. You sound young so now's the time. It will not be easy but it will be rewarding.
Nice try. but like three anonymous cowards whined about it and the rest wished him good luck or were entirely off topic. If you are going to go for revisionist history you should probably wait until the article is a little further from the front page. (I suppose it could have changed since I last read it but that's how it was when I read it. Everyone, for the most part, including myself was wishing him good luck and hoping that they'd push and pull.)
Build something and PROVE YOUR POINT or fuck off back to your basement with your nasal whinging. It is merit based. You have no merit. If you want some then earn some. Get the fuck up off your ass and do something constructive. If you're right and your way is better you will attract the best and brightest. That's how it works. You don't get to whine and change the existing projects. Build your own. Enough people have explained this to you - there it is in nice simple language anyone can understand.
My buddies still stop by my place to drink and whatnot. I have a pool table and all that stuff. I'm not home but they still stop by and use my place. Everybody knows where the key is.
Anyhow, we all put our change into a jug that goes to a water cooler. At my Memorial Day party there's a competition. The person who carries the jug the most times around the house wins the change in it. No straps or other devices are allowed and anyone is open to compete but it's pretty damned heavy. We should weigh it sometime.
I'm not sure that qualifies as collecting. It averages around $400 though.
If you count stock, I sold my business for a XXX digit sum. It was grown from the ground up. It was created at the cusp, highly immature and risky as hell. Yet it succeeded. It thrived. It grew and, as the sphere matured, it grew in ways I'd have never expected. The compute power increases made us thrive and manipulate data in new and interesting ways - also, we could store data that was impossibly large just a few years before.
Now, to share a few things...
We were merit based. I'm not hiring you just because you have a vagina. We had multiple women employees and they were very good at what they did. We were, at times, assholes to one another - bad work means you do it again. We had an unbelievably low turn-over rate - truly mind blowing. We didn't give a shit who you slept with but you don't need to bring that shit into the office. We probably, eventually, knew your family and wept when you did or celebrated with you. We did things thought impossible, or improbable, on a regular basis. We only wanted the best and not some absurd hire because of hurt feelings or supposed inequality. We had multiple races - including myself.
Screw those who argue that things shouldn't be based on merit. It's infantile and absurd at the very front. Where you pee from or who you love hasn't a damned thing to do with it. If you can't do the work get the fuck out of the way and stop trying to hinder those who can. You don't deserve shit, you earn it. You don't even earn it on your own - you earn it with the help of those around you. Your drama and juvenile fantasies have no place in the real world. You can rightly fuck off back to your basement if you don't comprehend this - it's not difficult.
However, don't worry. We did open-invite interviews where you'd be reviewed by your peers before hiring. You'd have not made it past the interview process. Keep your drama queen shit off my code and out of my face.
Simple enough? The conversation has been had, it's over. Whining isn't going to change this. It's just going to piss people off even more. What you can do is what matters. If you can't do then shut the hell up and learn from those who can. Keep your drama to your friends. I'm not your friend.
[sum total redacted, none of your business and I don't need my ego stroked - suffice to say a lot]
I'm going to giggle when the judge comes down from the bench and punches you in the nuts. I take it that you're not actually a lawyer? I'll give you a hint - judges don't really like 'small print' stuff. They will come down off the bench and kick you in the nuts, perhaps even literally. There's no back door to law. If you're breaking the law it is illegal (not necessarily immoral, don't conflate law with morality) by definition. Life (and the courts) don't take kindly to the ideas set in books and movies.
I agree. Add to that, it is from the NSA... The NSA... Yet it is used all over the place. Why? Because millions and millions of eyeballs have been all over that code specifically looking for security flaws. Hell, even I've had a look, for what it's worth. I don't believe it has been given a formal audit but I know it has been reviewed by individuals and peer reviewed by many. I don't use it, I have no need for it, but I would use it in a heartbeat. If, by some chance, I need granular access controls then SELinux is on the top of my list.
You'd write your own ticket if you could prove a flaw in the code. I'm positive that countless people have tried to find it leaking back and they've done so with the ability to fully monitor their traffic - not just using Wireshark on the same box. They've done so while looking at individual CPU threads and state readers for memory. They've mashed, hacked, poked, prodded, reviewed, logged, and prayed to Grace Hopper in hopes of finding a back door. What do we have? Silence where we're expecting (hoping, even) for noise.
Add to the fact that the NSA uses this, it'd be pretty silly for them to have it even remotely insecure. Not that there couldn't be but there very likely isn't and all evidence suggests that there isn't. The code is right there online - a search away. The time has passed to blindly distrust it. We've reached the point where the burden of proof is on those who claim there are issues.
I publicly laughed at people and called them stupid for trusting it when it first came out. I stand by that. My point then was the same as it is now. Let those who know have a peek before blindly trusting it. Well, they have. While I expected to learn of something, nothing came of it. Also, it'd be a pretty silly spot to try to hide a back door. Anyhow, we've gone past the point where the code has been reviewed and deemed safe. At this point, the onus is on them to prove the back door. They're fast approaching tin-foil-hat time.
Heh... A month from now I'll be dining on crow, won't I?;-)
I own two, one of which is 'bespoke' and I just got it a few months back. I had another, which is where I fell in love with them, that is a 1995 740Li. My son still drives it today and he can easily afford another vehicle.
However, yes, they're very expensive to maintain. They are not cheap to run, not even remotely. Fuel consumption varies with use, quite a bit too. If I drive like I'm sane then I get 28 MPG or so. I can easily get that down to the 18 MPG range by changing my driving style. If I'm really gentle then I can get it up and over 32 MPG as an average but that's assuming a long trip with no stops and doing everything just so. It also helps that I have a standard.
Because I have a car collection my local mechanic sends someone in every Saturday to work in my garage for me. (I have air, a number of tools, and a lift already in place.) They don't usually do much work on my BMWs - aside from tune ups, brakes, etc... I'll have them change the oil most of the time too but the cars still end up going to A Plus Auto (a European sports car specialists - they work on things like Porches and Ferraris a lot of the time) and they are very expensive but they know what they're doing. I send (or will send) my current car there twice a year and my collector will go once a year even if it doesn't need to. I'll have them throw it on the computer (where applicable) and change all the fluids, pads, spark plugs, wires, rotate and balance, etc... Usually they spend four hours on it, they also detail it if I ask and they put it on a trailer and bring it back a couple of days later.
So no, it's not cheap but it is pretty fun. I also don't have to spend as much as I do on them, surely. I do so because I enjoy automobiles and I feel that I'm obligated to treat them well. While I do own them they do have some historical value and I should take care to keep that in mind. My collection isn't that large (around 35 cars at the moment) and is unusual in its scope. My cars are not all classics or antiques. Most serve a different function. I have, for instance, a factory reconditioned Porche 911 in Targa trim and a custom modified 1982 Volvo 245. I have a 1986 Toyota Supra and a 2014 Ford F-250. I have a 1973 Jeep Wagoneer and a 1988 Nissan Maxima.
They're all quite specific and varied. I own not one "trailer queen." Each and every one is driven or welcome to be driven - in fact, they're pushed beyond their design limits. It's kind of funny to put a Maxima on the top of a mountain through an old "tote road" and carefully across the rocks.
Yet, daily, I drive my BMW. Quite literally, I own a vehicle of most every practical style and I still generally drive a sport sedan. My sedan choice is, almost invariably, a BMW. I maintain them well and I get very good value for the dollar. I have no complaints.
I figured I'd offer you another perspective, another anecdote as it were, and share my experiences and why I made the choice. I am not, by any means, an expert mechanic or anything - I'd suggest that I know more than most but I don't even generally do my own work on my cars. However, I've had great reliability and great experiences. I think those are worth paying extra for.
The best part is you can append gibberish to it and tell everyone that you've done lots of work and nobody will know the difference. Hell, it might actually do something useful!
I am going to admit that I write (or have written) some Perl. I've even given it away. I'd also like to take this time to apologize for my Perl.
I wrote a "safe list" script for a friend, it was really damned simple. People signed up and sent email messages to each other for the purposes of MLM - that's not why I wrote it, that's just what people did with it. It had a small but functional administration panel. It was about as secure as a screen door. Usernames and passwords were in a plain text file - you were SUPPOSED to move it and chmod it but I don't think anyone ever did even though it was mentioned a few times in the README.TXT.
Anyhow, he wanted to sell the script. I said that was cool. I was more interested in the code so I made a few versions. It was usually purchased a few times and then hit Usenet in.zip form. They could have at least taken my email out of the damned thing if they were going to steal it. I've long since dropped that email. The last version (released in something like 2002) was free for the taking and my friend charged to install and customize it as he'd learned a little by then.
So here's the easiest to install script and the least secure thing on the internet - plain text files, indeed, and I *still* see it installed from time to time. I can only imagine that the email address still gets emails from people asking what chmod means or how to upload the file or how they put it in their C drive and nobody seems to be able to access it from the internet.
Yup... My Perl... Breaking machines, frustrating users, and being insecure for 25 years and running.
A little part of me is kind of proud of that but my formal statement is, indeed, an apology.
Meh... I kind of like Perl. Nobody can tell the difference between my gibberish and good code. Given my roundabout logic process I look like a straight up genius. Well, that and I can't actually manipulate data well so a flat file is about as complex as I tend to get.
Yes, yes there's a bunch of reasons I hired professionals.
They'll just use payment processors in the US (or elsewhere) and tell the EU to stuff it in their ass. The EU has no power outside of the EU. If they don't want people accessing, say, Google then the onus is on them to stop it at their borders. Good luck with that. The US isn't going to be able to afford to bail them out again so hopefully they don't go all mental midget and bomb themselves into rubble as they're wont to do.
I'd love access to that information displayed in real time and in aggregate in a customizable display that takes up where my current instrumentation panel exists. What I do not want is a third party to have access to that information. However, I'd love a touch screen instrument display that enabled me to configure a number of "dashboards" with varied metrics and display formats for alternative driving scenarios. I just don't want Google, Apple, Microsoft, or Cannonical to have access to that.
I'd also love to be able to access that data for further review in a manner of my own choosing. It would be awesome to be able to compile that information and crunch some numbers and mash it up with things like a map. I'd then like to be able to choose to share it, if I wanted, with other interested parties. I think it would be good fun and amuse me for hours. I'd pay quite a bit for it, actually. Now that I think about it, I may see if someone can do it. It'd be neat to have a whole integrated information panel as well as an info-tainment panel that can be easily customized and skinned. I'll look around and see what's out there. Maybe someone's already done it and I don't know about it.
That's what I expect them to do. "So long, suckers." With the ability to host anything anywhere they don't really have to comply with this. The more difficult it is, the more likely they'll simply move servers to a new location and drop the office and encourage staff to relocate.
We've got a ways to go before we get to the level of their society that made them finally make that choice. It's likely to happen but not likely to happen in my lifetime. I'd rather it be resolved peacefully but, well, what do I know?
Do you know how many eyes have been all over the project just to find flaws - specifically security flaws? I'm not saying there aren't any - I'm saying they're really damned unlikely. Here's an interesting article, it's not too long and not too deep, for you.
That was quite a while ago. Since then we've had people crawl all over the code. It's there. Review it if you want to. Hell, you'll be famous if you find a security issue.
Vista wasn't a bad OS once the first service pack came out. Literally, I had no problems with it. I should also mention that I had a box with ME on it that ran like a champ - however, it was specifically designed for ME and whatnot. But it did stay running and was no problem - being able to access the restore function from outside the OS was absolutely awesome.
Anyhow, I liked Vista when it came out and liked it even more when it got its first service pack. The problem was that it was a rather huge change from the XP days and was even further from the 9x days. I actually kept a couple of boxes on it instead of moving to 7 and I have an MSDN subscription so it's not like I was lacking licenses to do so.
I'm actually going to let my MSDN subscription lapse, finally. I've paid for it for a very long time now but I don't even use Windows much at all any more. I've been pretty happy with my return to Linux and have also been playing with GhostBSD a lot. I can't get VMWare for GhostBSD and I much prefer it to the other offerings. I also can't get Opera to work on it properly. What I need to do is suck it up, install it instead of using it in a VM, and just stick with it for a few months. I've yet to take that plunge.
Either way, Vista was pretty good and its reputation is largely undeserved. It was/is stable and I never had a security incident that I am aware of. I often ran with absolutely no live-running antivirus application. I ran it on a whole host of varied hardware stacks and never had an issue. I was quite impressed, to be honest. It's not like I'm exactly gentle with my OS, I tend to try to break stuff as doing so intentionally is a way for me to learn new things. If I'm not breaking and fixing something then I'm not really learning.
Amazingly enough, one's attitude (while forking) might actually result in a negative response. I don't see much in the way of negativity in this particular case - good on them for trying. However, nobody's obligated to do your work for you. If you want a feature or function then add it. If you can't then you're shit out of luck or you can pay somebody who can. Being able to modify the code is the whole point of free - a secondary aspect is the price but that's not the point.
If you can't weld and work as a mechanic you can't build you own car very well. Nobody is obligated to make one that suits your needs (but you're free to ask). If you want then you can pay someone to do so. If your ideas are good enough then someone might build one that you can buy.
That's the obligatory car analogy.
If you go stomping off in a snit then you're probably going to be looked at oddly. This really seems pretty tame considering. Most people are wishing them luck. A few are saying good riddance but not most of them. I, for one, wish them the best of luck and I hope it works out for them. I hope that they're able to get some sponsorship and are able to push and pull code between the two in a harmonic relationship. I hope that it gives others, those who aren't inclined to tolerate Linus, a place to go so that they'll shut the hell up and stop trying to cause even more drama with their ego-fueled desire to make everyone conform to their wishes instead of trying to fit the hell in. But that's just me.
Slashdot Mirror
This... If you go back through my posts I've been warning folks that they will need to regulate themselves or be subjected to draconian laws and absurd restrictions written by people who aren't them and don't have their interests in mind. I'm not even a hobbyist, I don't even own a drone or want to. However, as I've said time and time again - you will be hurt if you don't police yourselves.
Why am I interested? This doesn't affect me. So, why? Because I hate the very idea of people's rights being limited without just cause. Frankly, lots of things that don't belong regulated will be. Use situations that have no business being regulated will be. This will be overly broad, ill defined, and subject to the vagaries already inherent in the system so prosecutorial discretion will likely be rampant. I don't wish that on anyone.
It's the environment we're in. If you're not proactive then you'll get hammered on by those who either hate you or want to control you. Some sort of outreach program would be good but it may be too late for that now. If you could have set up a site and then gotten manufacturers to link to it in their packaging or something that might have been a good start. I suspect it's too late for any of that now.
Heh... We had engineers and programmers making six figures but I'm sure you'll lie and say you're not only worth that but earn more than that.
You're dismissed. Your preconceived notions do not match reality and reality will not conform to your ideals but you'll still whine. I repeat, fuck off back to your basement. Let us know when you've actually done something. Until then, stay out of the way and stop harassing those who do, who can, or are trying to.
I could be mistaken but I seem to recall that this was something they had admitted to. As an outsider, I suppose, I will defer to your knowledge.
Well, from my observations, you got "mirage" right. It's definitely a mirage.
Hmm... First you say:
If by "calling her out on her bullshit" you mean misrepresenting her ideas to mean whatever you want them to mean and then "debunking" that?
Then they say:
If you are not seeing the videos and posts that address the points she was making, you should know something that some people suffer from confirmation bias and really only look in their own echo chambers for information.
Then you say:
Well, you haven't managed to come up with anything. If it exists, please, point it out.
And:
We can all accept that she made mistakes using those examples.
Might I suggest that you're too close to the problem and unable to opine objectively? You ask for evidence, you get evidence, you agree with evidence, you dismiss the evidence, you then continue to believe what you've already decided even though you agree with the evidence provided.
As an outside looking in, I'm not a gamer, it does appear that this whole "gamergate" thing is indeed about a developer fucking a reporter in order to get better reviews and that being unethical. Some of those gamers take their games pretty damned seriously and want ethical reporting and full disclosure before they pay good sums of money for their entertainment. They were then shit on and told that they were just sexist for wanting to have ethics in reporting.
Now, sure, at that point they kind of jumped the shark... I don't disagree. Since then we've had unplayable games released that were praised yet simply appear to be being praised because of the gender or sexuality of the developer. And again, the gamers went off the rails. Seeing a pattern start to develop here? I am... I bet it is different than what you see. I see the problem going back to ethics in journalism and the industry as a whole.
Anyhow, this does indeed tie in to the overall subject of the thread and it relates to your sub thread but I don't think you can actually help. You're unable to be objective - your mind is clearly made up. I've seen your other posts in this thread. Your bias is evident and no amount of evidence, as you show above, is going to allow you to be honest with yourself.
That's okay, humans aren't rational generally. You're irrationally basing your opinions due to feelings and that's okay. We're not rational machines, we're rationalizing machines.
So... Uh... How are YOU doing? ;-) I kid... I just figure it was all too (in)appropriate to pass up.
Welcome to Slashdot. Now fuck off home. (No, not really, I just figure you might as well get a 'proper' welcome.)
Anyhow, I think you're correct. Some have an aptitude and an interest. Encourage those that do and stop trying to shoehorn people into roles they neither want or are capable of. I have no idea what your gender is but I hope that you're given (or take) the chance to learn. You sound young so now's the time. It will not be easy but it will be rewarding.
Nice try. but like three anonymous cowards whined about it and the rest wished him good luck or were entirely off topic. If you are going to go for revisionist history you should probably wait until the article is a little further from the front page. (I suppose it could have changed since I last read it but that's how it was when I read it. Everyone, for the most part, including myself was wishing him good luck and hoping that they'd push and pull.)
Build something and PROVE YOUR POINT or fuck off back to your basement with your nasal whinging. It is merit based. You have no merit. If you want some then earn some. Get the fuck up off your ass and do something constructive. If you're right and your way is better you will attract the best and brightest. That's how it works. You don't get to whine and change the existing projects. Build your own. Enough people have explained this to you - there it is in nice simple language anyone can understand.
Hmm... Not sure if I have an appropriate comment.
My buddies still stop by my place to drink and whatnot. I have a pool table and all that stuff. I'm not home but they still stop by and use my place. Everybody knows where the key is.
Anyhow, we all put our change into a jug that goes to a water cooler. At my Memorial Day party there's a competition. The person who carries the jug the most times around the house wins the change in it. No straps or other devices are allowed and anyone is open to compete but it's pretty damned heavy. We should weigh it sometime.
I'm not sure that qualifies as collecting. It averages around $400 though.
If you count stock, I sold my business for a XXX digit sum. It was grown from the ground up. It was created at the cusp, highly immature and risky as hell. Yet it succeeded. It thrived. It grew and, as the sphere matured, it grew in ways I'd have never expected. The compute power increases made us thrive and manipulate data in new and interesting ways - also, we could store data that was impossibly large just a few years before.
Now, to share a few things...
We were merit based. I'm not hiring you just because you have a vagina.
We had multiple women employees and they were very good at what they did.
We were, at times, assholes to one another - bad work means you do it again.
We had an unbelievably low turn-over rate - truly mind blowing.
We didn't give a shit who you slept with but you don't need to bring that shit into the office.
We probably, eventually, knew your family and wept when you did or celebrated with you.
We did things thought impossible, or improbable, on a regular basis.
We only wanted the best and not some absurd hire because of hurt feelings or supposed inequality.
We had multiple races - including myself.
Screw those who argue that things shouldn't be based on merit. It's infantile and absurd at the very front. Where you pee from or who you love hasn't a damned thing to do with it. If you can't do the work get the fuck out of the way and stop trying to hinder those who can. You don't deserve shit, you earn it. You don't even earn it on your own - you earn it with the help of those around you. Your drama and juvenile fantasies have no place in the real world. You can rightly fuck off back to your basement if you don't comprehend this - it's not difficult.
However, don't worry. We did open-invite interviews where you'd be reviewed by your peers before hiring. You'd have not made it past the interview process. Keep your drama queen shit off my code and out of my face.
Simple enough? The conversation has been had, it's over. Whining isn't going to change this. It's just going to piss people off even more. What you can do is what matters. If you can't do then shut the hell up and learn from those who can. Keep your drama to your friends. I'm not your friend.
[sum total redacted, none of your business and I don't need my ego stroked - suffice to say a lot]
I'm going to giggle when the judge comes down from the bench and punches you in the nuts. I take it that you're not actually a lawyer? I'll give you a hint - judges don't really like 'small print' stuff. They will come down off the bench and kick you in the nuts, perhaps even literally. There's no back door to law. If you're breaking the law it is illegal (not necessarily immoral, don't conflate law with morality) by definition. Life (and the courts) don't take kindly to the ideas set in books and movies.
I agree. Add to that, it is from the NSA... The NSA... Yet it is used all over the place. Why? Because millions and millions of eyeballs have been all over that code specifically looking for security flaws. Hell, even I've had a look, for what it's worth. I don't believe it has been given a formal audit but I know it has been reviewed by individuals and peer reviewed by many. I don't use it, I have no need for it, but I would use it in a heartbeat. If, by some chance, I need granular access controls then SELinux is on the top of my list.
You'd write your own ticket if you could prove a flaw in the code. I'm positive that countless people have tried to find it leaking back and they've done so with the ability to fully monitor their traffic - not just using Wireshark on the same box. They've done so while looking at individual CPU threads and state readers for memory. They've mashed, hacked, poked, prodded, reviewed, logged, and prayed to Grace Hopper in hopes of finding a back door. What do we have? Silence where we're expecting (hoping, even) for noise.
Add to the fact that the NSA uses this, it'd be pretty silly for them to have it even remotely insecure. Not that there couldn't be but there very likely isn't and all evidence suggests that there isn't. The code is right there online - a search away. The time has passed to blindly distrust it. We've reached the point where the burden of proof is on those who claim there are issues.
I publicly laughed at people and called them stupid for trusting it when it first came out. I stand by that. My point then was the same as it is now. Let those who know have a peek before blindly trusting it. Well, they have. While I expected to learn of something, nothing came of it. Also, it'd be a pretty silly spot to try to hide a back door. Anyhow, we've gone past the point where the code has been reviewed and deemed safe. At this point, the onus is on them to prove the back door. They're fast approaching tin-foil-hat time.
Heh... A month from now I'll be dining on crow, won't I? ;-)
I own two, one of which is 'bespoke' and I just got it a few months back. I had another, which is where I fell in love with them, that is a 1995 740Li. My son still drives it today and he can easily afford another vehicle.
However, yes, they're very expensive to maintain. They are not cheap to run, not even remotely. Fuel consumption varies with use, quite a bit too. If I drive like I'm sane then I get 28 MPG or so. I can easily get that down to the 18 MPG range by changing my driving style. If I'm really gentle then I can get it up and over 32 MPG as an average but that's assuming a long trip with no stops and doing everything just so. It also helps that I have a standard.
Because I have a car collection my local mechanic sends someone in every Saturday to work in my garage for me. (I have air, a number of tools, and a lift already in place.) They don't usually do much work on my BMWs - aside from tune ups, brakes, etc... I'll have them change the oil most of the time too but the cars still end up going to A Plus Auto (a European sports car specialists - they work on things like Porches and Ferraris a lot of the time) and they are very expensive but they know what they're doing. I send (or will send) my current car there twice a year and my collector will go once a year even if it doesn't need to. I'll have them throw it on the computer (where applicable) and change all the fluids, pads, spark plugs, wires, rotate and balance, etc... Usually they spend four hours on it, they also detail it if I ask and they put it on a trailer and bring it back a couple of days later.
So no, it's not cheap but it is pretty fun. I also don't have to spend as much as I do on them, surely. I do so because I enjoy automobiles and I feel that I'm obligated to treat them well. While I do own them they do have some historical value and I should take care to keep that in mind. My collection isn't that large (around 35 cars at the moment) and is unusual in its scope. My cars are not all classics or antiques. Most serve a different function. I have, for instance, a factory reconditioned Porche 911 in Targa trim and a custom modified 1982 Volvo 245. I have a 1986 Toyota Supra and a 2014 Ford F-250. I have a 1973 Jeep Wagoneer and a 1988 Nissan Maxima.
They're all quite specific and varied. I own not one "trailer queen." Each and every one is driven or welcome to be driven - in fact, they're pushed beyond their design limits. It's kind of funny to put a Maxima on the top of a mountain through an old "tote road" and carefully across the rocks.
Yet, daily, I drive my BMW. Quite literally, I own a vehicle of most every practical style and I still generally drive a sport sedan. My sedan choice is, almost invariably, a BMW. I maintain them well and I get very good value for the dollar. I have no complaints.
I figured I'd offer you another perspective, another anecdote as it were, and share my experiences and why I made the choice. I am not, by any means, an expert mechanic or anything - I'd suggest that I know more than most but I don't even generally do my own work on my cars. However, I've had great reliability and great experiences. I think those are worth paying extra for.
The best part is you can append gibberish to it and tell everyone that you've done lots of work and nobody will know the difference. Hell, it might actually do something useful!
I am going to admit that I write (or have written) some Perl. I've even given it away. I'd also like to take this time to apologize for my Perl.
I wrote a "safe list" script for a friend, it was really damned simple. People signed up and sent email messages to each other for the purposes of MLM - that's not why I wrote it, that's just what people did with it. It had a small but functional administration panel. It was about as secure as a screen door. Usernames and passwords were in a plain text file - you were SUPPOSED to move it and chmod it but I don't think anyone ever did even though it was mentioned a few times in the README.TXT.
Anyhow, he wanted to sell the script. I said that was cool. I was more interested in the code so I made a few versions. It was usually purchased a few times and then hit Usenet in .zip form. They could have at least taken my email out of the damned thing if they were going to steal it. I've long since dropped that email. The last version (released in something like 2002) was free for the taking and my friend charged to install and customize it as he'd learned a little by then.
So here's the easiest to install script and the least secure thing on the internet - plain text files, indeed, and I *still* see it installed from time to time. I can only imagine that the email address still gets emails from people asking what chmod means or how to upload the file or how they put it in their C drive and nobody seems to be able to access it from the internet.
Yup... My Perl... Breaking machines, frustrating users, and being insecure for 25 years and running.
A little part of me is kind of proud of that but my formal statement is, indeed, an apology.
Meh... I kind of like Perl. Nobody can tell the difference between my gibberish and good code. Given my roundabout logic process I look like a straight up genius. Well, that and I can't actually manipulate data well so a flat file is about as complex as I tend to get.
Yes, yes there's a bunch of reasons I hired professionals.
They'll just use payment processors in the US (or elsewhere) and tell the EU to stuff it in their ass. The EU has no power outside of the EU. If they don't want people accessing, say, Google then the onus is on them to stop it at their borders. Good luck with that. The US isn't going to be able to afford to bail them out again so hopefully they don't go all mental midget and bomb themselves into rubble as they're wont to do.
I'd love access to that information displayed in real time and in aggregate in a customizable display that takes up where my current instrumentation panel exists. What I do not want is a third party to have access to that information. However, I'd love a touch screen instrument display that enabled me to configure a number of "dashboards" with varied metrics and display formats for alternative driving scenarios. I just don't want Google, Apple, Microsoft, or Cannonical to have access to that.
I'd also love to be able to access that data for further review in a manner of my own choosing. It would be awesome to be able to compile that information and crunch some numbers and mash it up with things like a map. I'd then like to be able to choose to share it, if I wanted, with other interested parties. I think it would be good fun and amuse me for hours. I'd pay quite a bit for it, actually. Now that I think about it, I may see if someone can do it. It'd be neat to have a whole integrated information panel as well as an info-tainment panel that can be easily customized and skinned. I'll look around and see what's out there. Maybe someone's already done it and I don't know about it.
That's what I expect them to do. "So long, suckers." With the ability to host anything anywhere they don't really have to comply with this. The more difficult it is, the more likely they'll simply move servers to a new location and drop the office and encourage staff to relocate.
We've got a ways to go before we get to the level of their society that made them finally make that choice. It's likely to happen but not likely to happen in my lifetime. I'd rather it be resolved peacefully but, well, what do I know?
Do you know how many eyes have been all over the project just to find flaws - specifically security flaws? I'm not saying there aren't any - I'm saying they're really damned unlikely. Here's an interesting article, it's not too long and not too deep, for you.
http://www.itwire.com/business...?
That was quite a while ago. Since then we've had people crawl all over the code. It's there. Review it if you want to. Hell, you'll be famous if you find a security issue.
Millions of eyes have been on it since its inception. Here's an interesting read:
http://www.itwire.com/business...?
I stand by my point. If you want to check it check it. The code is there.
I can't believe I'm going to say this but...
Vista wasn't a bad OS once the first service pack came out. Literally, I had no problems with it. I should also mention that I had a box with ME on it that ran like a champ - however, it was specifically designed for ME and whatnot. But it did stay running and was no problem - being able to access the restore function from outside the OS was absolutely awesome.
Anyhow, I liked Vista when it came out and liked it even more when it got its first service pack. The problem was that it was a rather huge change from the XP days and was even further from the 9x days. I actually kept a couple of boxes on it instead of moving to 7 and I have an MSDN subscription so it's not like I was lacking licenses to do so.
I'm actually going to let my MSDN subscription lapse, finally. I've paid for it for a very long time now but I don't even use Windows much at all any more. I've been pretty happy with my return to Linux and have also been playing with GhostBSD a lot. I can't get VMWare for GhostBSD and I much prefer it to the other offerings. I also can't get Opera to work on it properly. What I need to do is suck it up, install it instead of using it in a VM, and just stick with it for a few months. I've yet to take that plunge.
Either way, Vista was pretty good and its reputation is largely undeserved. It was/is stable and I never had a security incident that I am aware of. I often ran with absolutely no live-running antivirus application. I ran it on a whole host of varied hardware stacks and never had an issue. I was quite impressed, to be honest. It's not like I'm exactly gentle with my OS, I tend to try to break stuff as doing so intentionally is a way for me to learn new things. If I'm not breaking and fixing something then I'm not really learning.
Consider it yours for the taking, modification, and use as your own. You needn't even give me credit. It, my good AC, now belongs to you. Enjoy.
Amazingly enough, one's attitude (while forking) might actually result in a negative response. I don't see much in the way of negativity in this particular case - good on them for trying. However, nobody's obligated to do your work for you. If you want a feature or function then add it. If you can't then you're shit out of luck or you can pay somebody who can. Being able to modify the code is the whole point of free - a secondary aspect is the price but that's not the point.
If you can't weld and work as a mechanic you can't build you own car very well. Nobody is obligated to make one that suits your needs (but you're free to ask). If you want then you can pay someone to do so. If your ideas are good enough then someone might build one that you can buy.
That's the obligatory car analogy.
If you go stomping off in a snit then you're probably going to be looked at oddly. This really seems pretty tame considering. Most people are wishing them luck. A few are saying good riddance but not most of them. I, for one, wish them the best of luck and I hope it works out for them. I hope that they're able to get some sponsorship and are able to push and pull code between the two in a harmonic relationship. I hope that it gives others, those who aren't inclined to tolerate Linus, a place to go so that they'll shut the hell up and stop trying to cause even more drama with their ego-fueled desire to make everyone conform to their wishes instead of trying to fit the hell in. But that's just me.