I've been following your president's admirable attempts at healthcare reform with quiet amusement (I live in Israel). The amount of debate your country puts in on this subject is utterly ridiculous. It's not hard - there are MANY countries around the world which have universal healthcare systems which function very well, without costing trillions of dollars. Why not copy one of those?
Here, A portion of income tax is simply labelled "health tax", and is budgeted towards health insurance. It is mandatory and progressive. The insurance is provided by one of several private insurers, who must comply with minimum coverage guidelines set forth by the ministry of health, and they may offer complimentary insurance (which is not expansive - to the tune of 50$ per month per person, max). The most important condition - They CANNOT refuse you coverage.
I honestly think it's a cultural issue - it would seem many US citizens simply can't get their heads around the fact that in a civilized society some services should not be operated for profit. Yes, it's limited socialism, but the cold war is over - you guys won. Get over the fear, guys.
Actually, I'm pretty comfortable in justifying my country's actions by stipulating they are done mostly in self defense.
No need to invoke Godwin.
when rockets start raining down on your town from a neighboring refugee camp, what will be your proposed solution?
As a side note- Yes, I know the issue is much more complex. Yes, I know there are settlements, and bad history and oppression.
However, Israel has outgrown that phase in its history. Everyone except the most hard-core right wingers have accepted the need (and moral duty) to retreat from the occupied territories and allow the Palestinians to form their own country.
We even pulled out of Gaza. Completely. No strings attached. Just upped and went. We also had to evacuate about 10k families, some of them forcibly, so it really wasn't easy. Almost tore our country apart politically, but we did it because it was the right thing to do.
And the people of Gaza did rejoice, and they created their own country and, once they have achieved their long-fought-for dream, settled down to build their future in peace. Sort of. not completely.
Well, actually, not at all. They started bombing Israeli towns across the border. When asked what they want in order to stop the bombing, their answer is "to destroy Israel". It's in their charter. Really. You can check.
So no. I don't have to invoke the Nazis. I'm not happy about what we do, but I'm damned If I'll apologize for it to fools like you.
You know, I usually don't feed the troll, but seeing as you are not being modded down at the moment:
I live in Israel. Roughly 60% of the jewish population is completely secular. There are several parties in the current ruling coalition that are Religion-based, yes.
However:
1) The press here is free. Hell, it's so free that our citizens are getting somewhat tired from scandals being exposed.
2) There are "Arab" parties as well. They are represented in parliament according to the number of votes which they received.
3) I can - and often do - buy pork.
4) I can drive my car during Shabbas and have worked an unfortunate number of Saturdays. Almost all businesses are open 7 days a week.
5) I can convert to ANY religion I want and suffer no repercussions.
6) While we do study the bible (old testament) during our school years, we also study the theory of evolution (and believe you me, there is NO controversy here).
7) Our legal system is mostly based on British laws (due to their brief stay in power here).
You can disagree with current/past actions of the Israeli government (god knows I - and many other Israelis - do), but your attempt to paint Israel as a theocracy is either extremely naive or plain misleading.
So you're either an uninformed fool, or a propagandist asshole. Care to share which?
While what you say is true (there is genuine concern in Israel re: possibility of nuclear capability in Iranian hands), it's buried behind quite a lot of propagandist BS.
Video of Blackhawk helicopters firing on rock throwing palestinians? Link, or STFU.
I currently work for a company providing IP communications via satellite (both inclined and geostationary). Most of our customers are in Africa, and include some of the biggest ISPs in the more developed regions. since the bandwidth market there has been exploding in the last several years. So I know what I'm talking about when I say this guy sounds VERY optimistic.
The idea of using low earth orbit satellites is great as the latency on geostationary is indeed horrible. you're looking at a minimum of 500ms just to reach the ISP installation (in the US and Europe, in our case) and the RTT to your destination on top of that.If you run into another satellite link on the way, that's 1000ms minimum. so 123ms sounds terrific. BUT:
1) The guy flippantly says "If they want a gigabit, we'll give them a gigabit". For a gigabit, you'll need to work several transponders, with some insane modulation scheme (highest practical I've seen is 16psk, they'll need something MUCH more dense). The higher they go, the more error prone they get.
2) LEO will require tracking, or very high power. which means either a very powerful HPA (for the small links - the ones without the 3.5 meter dish) or a very fast tracking system for the large links with the dish. And what happens when you have to switch satellites?
3) They're looking to solve the last-mile issue with WiMax. This will interfere with C-band transmissions, so I'm assuming they will go with Ku-Band or higher, which is extremll sensitive to rain fade. Africa has quite a lot of rain. Combine this with point no. 1, and you're in trouble.
4) The article indicates they will give the customer a VAST or transmission station and all is good. It is not. Africa is not a nice place. equipment gets stolen and sabotaged. This is from sad experience. And if you do not have techs on the ground (which are very hard to find, at least competent ones) you're stuck either telling the customer "sucks to be you" or trying to support him through the phone with the replacement of a transmitter, which is a bit like trying to help someone fix an engine by correspondence.
5) The human factor - Without sounding too patronizing, the guys in Africa (even the more professional ones) need a LOT of hand holding. I truly hope they have a big and competent support department and NOC staff at the ready, who can understand garbled English through a bad phone connection, as these guys will want help with everything. From helping to identify which device in the network is causing congestion on the link, to "IP experts" who will be brought in to bring up a BGP session and will not know how to access the router, and will want your help in resetting the password step-by-step. You can, of course, tell them to manage their own networks, but you WILL lose customers. That's a lesson we learned the hard way.
In short, good luck to them, but if they truly think the technical challenges are the only ones, they're in for a very nasty surprise.
off the top of my head - The desert setting, the many similarities between the Fremen and the real-world beduin culture and the quite extensive use of Arabic (Mujahidin, anyone?).
Look at is this way - If you're not familiar with the MacBook Air, it DOES look suspicious - at least at a cursory glance. I'm actually impressed that they picked up on the fact that the hard drive looks unusual and noticed the alleged lack of ports. If I were building a bomb to look like a fake laptop, these are the two things I'd probably miss. Not to mention the space for a hard drive is the best place to mount some plastic explosives. They were doing their job and doing it thoroughly.
On a personal note - I very recently traveled to the US from Israel, and while I found security people at the airport to be somewhat stern, they were very courteous and professional, not at all like the nightmare I was prepared for from reading Slashdot comments (this is with a laptop, PDA and a KVM switch in my bag).
What I really like about this plot is the fact that there's a spike around the holiday season EVERY SINGLE YEAR. It's nice to know I'm not the only one getting hornier around that period:-)
So far they've hidden behind manipulative language, scare tactics and relying on consumer ignorance when it comes to differentiate between copyright infringement and fair use. At least now they're they're saying it loud and clear.
The battle lines have finally been declared.
Bring it on, bitches!
Funnily enough, just yesterday I finally broke and called my ISP's tech support line after noticing a very big drop in speed for the last few days. From the test I ran it didn't even look like throttling of any specific services - simply congestion on their outgoing pipe to the world (I live in Israel).
Anyway, after 20 minutes of patiently waiting for the guy to run through the script, he asked me to hold for a minute, then asked me to disconnect and reconnect. I got a new IP from a different block from the one I usually get, and lo and behold - link was running at full speed (I'm assuming higher priority on the QoS).
Most of these companies will hesitate to actually let you know they are throttling, and count people just not noticing. If you run some careful tests, save the data and confront them (politely - no need to bite the helpdesk guy's off) there's a very good chance they'll simply make an exception for you rather than admit to throttling. I'm sure most/. users have the technical ability to do this.
The only really annoying part of the conversation was when the guy on the line asked me to download a file from www.microsoft.com (which "sits in New York") and I had to guide through "nslookup download.microsoft.com", some IP locator sites and www.ripe.net to show him the server was not in New York, but sitting in Israel, in his own company's server farm:-)
Worse case scenario (we run out of tubes and can't build more for some reason) - Put it over satellite. You can run quite a lot of data in a single 36Mhz transponder (About 40Mbps in QPSK, 3/4 Viterbi which is very fault-tolerant. A lot more if you use 7/8 8PSK). Latency is somewhat high (500ms for a round trip), but for video streaming, that's not really an issue (jitter is much more critical). It's also quite a bonus to have ALL your infrastructure on the top floor of your building - No more dependency on 3rd parties.
Since the DRM in Vista is so inextricably tied in to the OS, then ANY hack which allows you to run stuff at kernel level will, by definition, be able to break the DRM. Which begs the question: could Sony's next rootkit be a violation of the DMCA, instead of just a huge pain in the ass?
The last two stories (from '05 and '99) actually mention the SAME person and the same company! In 99 he claimed to have found a unified thory of everything, and in 2005, he invented a fuel source ~1000 times more efficient then current fuels...
It also looks like in the 6 intervening years, he STILL hasn't managed to graduate from med school...
The technology is already out in the field (mostly wielded by PIs trying to spot hidden cameras and - much differently - by certain infantry units to spot enemy snipers). I imagine the real breakthrough here is not the detection mechanism, but in the mechanisms involved in the "blinding" process.
The most fucked-up thing about this story is not the blocking of 1399(!) domains, but the fact that fact they CAN be reactivated, if only you pay 199$(!!) for "administration fees". This is not about policing the internet, it's about squeezing more money out of their customers. If this guy pays up, what prevents them from doing the same shit all over again 2 years from now? Hell, I'd like to know what their legal justification is now. Correct me if I'm wrong, but unless they are are hosting the stuff, they have no liabliity here, do they?
Huh. I wonder if this can be used as an admissin on their end of being liable for content and actions of domains registered under them? Talk about watching an avalanche begin....
Slashdot Mirror
I've been following your president's admirable attempts at healthcare reform with quiet amusement (I live in Israel). The amount of debate your country puts in on this subject is utterly ridiculous. It's not hard - there are MANY countries around the world which have universal healthcare systems which function very well, without costing trillions of dollars. Why not copy one of those?
Here, A portion of income tax is simply labelled "health tax", and is budgeted towards health insurance. It is mandatory and progressive. The insurance is provided by one of several private insurers, who must comply with minimum coverage guidelines set forth by the ministry of health, and they may offer complimentary insurance (which is not expansive - to the tune of 50$ per month per person, max). The most important condition - They CANNOT refuse you coverage.
I honestly think it's a cultural issue - it would seem many US citizens simply can't get their heads around the fact that in a civilized society some services should not be operated for profit. Yes, it's limited socialism, but the cold war is over - you guys won. Get over the fear, guys.
As a 30 year Israeli, you sir are a LIAR
. A pitiful, hate-mongering LIAR.
I will say no more.
Actually, I'm pretty comfortable in justifying my country's actions by stipulating they are done mostly in self defense.
No need to invoke Godwin.
when rockets start raining down on your town from a neighboring refugee camp, what will be your proposed solution?
As a side note- Yes, I know the issue is much more complex. Yes, I know there are settlements, and bad history and oppression. However, Israel has outgrown that phase in its history. Everyone except the most hard-core right wingers have accepted the need (and moral duty) to retreat from the occupied territories and allow the Palestinians to form their own country.
We even pulled out of Gaza. Completely. No strings attached. Just upped and went. We also had to evacuate about 10k families, some of them forcibly, so it really wasn't easy. Almost tore our country apart politically, but we did it because it was the right thing to do.
And the people of Gaza did rejoice, and they created their own country and, once they have achieved their long-fought-for dream, settled down to build their future in peace. Sort of. not completely. Well, actually, not at all. They started bombing Israeli towns across the border. When asked what they want in order to stop the bombing, their answer is "to destroy Israel". It's in their charter. Really. You can check.
So no. I don't have to invoke the Nazis. I'm not happy about what we do, but I'm damned If I'll apologize for it to fools like you.
You know, I usually don't feed the troll, but seeing as you are not being modded down at the moment:
I live in Israel. Roughly 60% of the jewish population is completely secular. There are several parties in the current ruling coalition that are Religion-based, yes.
However:
1) The press here is free. Hell, it's so free that our citizens are getting somewhat tired from scandals being exposed.
2) There are "Arab" parties as well. They are represented in parliament according to the number of votes which they received.
3) I can - and often do - buy pork.
4) I can drive my car during Shabbas and have worked an unfortunate number of Saturdays. Almost all businesses are open 7 days a week.
5) I can convert to ANY religion I want and suffer no repercussions.
6) While we do study the bible (old testament) during our school years, we also study the theory of evolution (and believe you me, there is NO controversy here).
7) Our legal system is mostly based on British laws (due to their brief stay in power here).
You can disagree with current/past actions of the Israeli government (god knows I - and many other Israelis - do), but your attempt to paint Israel as a theocracy is either extremely naive or plain misleading.
So you're either an uninformed fool, or a propagandist asshole. Care to share which?
Also, the cation reads: "The gigantic jet observed by Steven Cummer and his team...". The internet is indeed for porn :-)
While what you say is true (there is genuine concern in Israel re: possibility of nuclear capability in Iranian hands), it's buried behind quite a lot of propagandist BS. Video of Blackhawk helicopters firing on rock throwing palestinians? Link, or STFU.
With the exception of a few training jets, the IAF currently flies no Israeli-made planes. All bought in the US. Just a heads up.
I currently work for a company providing IP communications via satellite (both inclined and geostationary). Most of our customers are in Africa, and include some of the biggest ISPs in the more developed regions. since the bandwidth market there has been exploding in the last several years. So I know what I'm talking about when I say this guy sounds VERY optimistic.
The idea of using low earth orbit satellites is great as the latency on geostationary is indeed horrible. you're looking at a minimum of 500ms just to reach the ISP installation (in the US and Europe, in our case) and the RTT to your destination on top of that.If you run into another satellite link on the way, that's 1000ms minimum. so 123ms sounds terrific. BUT:
1) The guy flippantly says "If they want a gigabit, we'll give them a gigabit". For a gigabit, you'll need to work several transponders, with some insane modulation scheme (highest practical I've seen is 16psk, they'll need something MUCH more dense). The higher they go, the more error prone they get.
2) LEO will require tracking, or very high power. which means either a very powerful HPA (for the small links - the ones without the 3.5 meter dish) or a very fast tracking system for the large links with the dish. And what happens when you have to switch satellites?
3) They're looking to solve the last-mile issue with WiMax. This will interfere with C-band transmissions, so I'm assuming they will go with Ku-Band or higher, which is extremll sensitive to rain fade. Africa has quite a lot of rain. Combine this with point no. 1, and you're in trouble.
4) The article indicates they will give the customer a VAST or transmission station and all is good. It is not. Africa is not a nice place. equipment gets stolen and sabotaged. This is from sad experience. And if you do not have techs on the ground (which are very hard to find, at least competent ones) you're stuck either telling the customer "sucks to be you" or trying to support him through the phone with the replacement of a transmitter, which is a bit like trying to help someone fix an engine by correspondence.
5) The human factor - Without sounding too patronizing, the guys in Africa (even the more professional ones) need a LOT of hand holding. I truly hope they have a big and competent support department and NOC staff at the ready, who can understand garbled English through a bad phone connection, as these guys will want help with everything. From helping to identify which device in the network is causing congestion on the link, to "IP experts" who will be brought in to bring up a BGP session and will not know how to access the router, and will want your help in resetting the password step-by-step. You can, of course, tell them to manage their own networks, but you WILL lose customers. That's a lesson we learned the hard way.
In short, good luck to them, but if they truly think the technical challenges are the only ones, they're in for a very nasty surprise.
off the top of my head - The desert setting, the many similarities between the Fremen and the real-world beduin culture and the quite extensive use of Arabic (Mujahidin, anyone?).
Look at is this way - If you're not familiar with the MacBook Air, it DOES look suspicious - at least at a cursory glance. I'm actually impressed that they picked up on the fact that the hard drive looks unusual and noticed the alleged lack of ports. If I were building a bomb to look like a fake laptop, these are the two things I'd probably miss. Not to mention the space for a hard drive is the best place to mount some plastic explosives. They were doing their job and doing it thoroughly. On a personal note - I very recently traveled to the US from Israel, and while I found security people at the airport to be somewhat stern, they were very courteous and professional, not at all like the nightmare I was prepared for from reading Slashdot comments (this is with a laptop, PDA and a KVM switch in my bag).
What I really like about this plot is the fact that there's a spike around the holiday season EVERY SINGLE YEAR. :-)
It's nice to know I'm not the only one getting hornier around that period
So far they've hidden behind manipulative language, scare tactics and relying on consumer ignorance when it comes to differentiate between copyright infringement and fair use. At least now they're they're saying it loud and clear. The battle lines have finally been declared. Bring it on, bitches!
Funnily enough, just yesterday I finally broke and called my ISP's tech support line after noticing a very big drop in speed for the last few days. From the test I ran it didn't even look like throttling of any specific services - simply congestion on their outgoing pipe to the world (I live in Israel).
/. users have the technical ability to do this.
:-)
Anyway, after 20 minutes of patiently waiting for the guy to run through the script, he asked me to hold for a minute, then asked me to disconnect and reconnect. I got a new IP from a different block from the one I usually get, and lo and behold - link was running at full speed (I'm assuming higher priority on the QoS).
Most of these companies will hesitate to actually let you know they are throttling, and count people just not noticing. If you run some careful tests, save the data and confront them (politely - no need to bite the helpdesk guy's off) there's a very good chance they'll simply make an exception for you rather than admit to throttling. I'm sure most
The only really annoying part of the conversation was when the guy on the line asked me to download a file from www.microsoft.com (which "sits in New York") and I had to guide through "nslookup download.microsoft.com", some IP locator sites and www.ripe.net to show him the server was not in New York, but sitting in Israel, in his own company's server farm
Worse case scenario (we run out of tubes and can't build more for some reason) - Put it over satellite. You can run quite a lot of data in a single 36Mhz transponder (About 40Mbps in QPSK, 3/4 Viterbi which is very fault-tolerant. A lot more if you use 7/8 8PSK). Latency is somewhat high (500ms for a round trip), but for video streaming, that's not really an issue (jitter is much more critical). It's also quite a bonus to have ALL your infrastructure on the top floor of your building - No more dependency on 3rd parties.
Well, it IS pretty late, but I read the headline as: "DRM faster then "SPAM". Quite a disappointment, really...
Thank you. I am enlightened.
Since the DRM in Vista is so inextricably tied in to the OS, then ANY hack which allows you to run stuff at kernel level will, by definition, be able to break the DRM. Which begs the question: could Sony's next rootkit be a violation of the DMCA, instead of just a huge pain in the ass?
Holy Crap!
The last two stories (from '05 and '99) actually mention the SAME person and the same company! In 99 he claimed to have found a unified thory of everything, and in 2005, he invented a fuel source ~1000 times more efficient then current fuels...
It also looks like in the 6 intervening years, he STILL hasn't managed to graduate from med school...
"WE BELONG DEAD!!!!!"
Seriously, dude, the bold "soul" really was much, wasn't it?
Well, yeah, sure. Some gamers (Myself among them) are willing to pay very high amounts of cash for high quality gaming. guess what: We have PCs.
Better games, more games, upgradable, does whatever *I* want, and has a keyboard.
If sony is really trying to appeal to the PC gaming crowd, man they have no idea the amount of trouble they are getting into.
Haven't read TFA, but:
The technology is already out in the field (mostly wielded by PIs trying to spot hidden cameras and - much differently - by certain infantry units to spot enemy snipers). I imagine the real breakthrough here is not the detection mechanism, but in the mechanisms involved in the "blinding" process.
The most fucked-up thing about this story is not the blocking of 1399(!) domains, but the fact that fact they CAN be reactivated, if only you pay 199$(!!) for "administration fees". This is not about policing the internet, it's about squeezing more money out of their customers. If this guy pays up, what prevents them from doing the same shit all over again 2 years from now? Hell, I'd like to know what their legal justification is now. Correct me if I'm wrong, but unless they are are hosting the stuff, they have no liabliity here, do they? Huh. I wonder if this can be used as an admissin on their end of being liable for content and actions of domains registered under them? Talk about watching an avalanche begin....
Enter Vista...