Don't get me wrong here, I can absolutely see the reason for antitrust laws.
However, it's cases like these that the law seems a little, well, silly. How can a company like Microsoft possibly provide updates for every single program? IE and WMP are both part of the OS. They come with the OS at no extra charge, and fill in important functionality. Should they be prevented from being bundled and integrated into the OS? If we do prevent them from being bundled, who suffers? Microsoft in profit margin, or the consumer being left with a massive inconvenience? Or both? And if we don't allow these programs, where does it stop? explorer.exe?
The only logical conclusion is that people want fascism. People no longer really want freedom.
Those two don't really follow on from each other. If I were to say, for example, you don't like the colour white, so therefore you must really like black. You're almost right. People no longer really care about freedom. Think about it. We have the freedom to do many, many things, but we actually do only a tiny portion of these things. People don't care about the freedom to do things they simply don't do, so the government feels that these freedoms are up for grabs. This leads to the mistaken assumption that the US is sliding into fascism, but I highly doubt people will stand for something that most people do to become illegal. You are becoming less free, not not free.
Which other EULAs? I know that they exist, but which ones? It is important. For example, if Musicmatch Jukebox had a EULA like that, no problem. We would simply not download it, not agree to its EULA, and be done with it. Windows has had the extremely frustrating effect of becoming the standard OS, in case you've had your head under a rock for the past zillion years. Either we, or people close to us, must agree to this EULA sooner or later (Linux just isn't quite feasible enough yet). What it says will affect us somehow, if only minorly, in the best case scenario.
But hey, don't let the facts get in the way of a good/. bashing.
...certain underdeveloped projects, and how they'll be affected by this partnership. Wine and NTFS support, most notably. I doubt Microsoft will be able to ignore them, but to support them could be quite damaging to their Windows market share. Perhaps they will develop closed source alternatives exclusively for Suse? Perhaps that is what this entire thing is about. To boost Suse as a standard distro through developing closed source applications for it, and thus helping to make closed source more acceptable in Linux.
Can you point to a valid study which demonstrates that kind of success rate over the success rate of a skilled interrogator without the polygraph?
No I can't. I'm not that well versed on the subject. All I know is basically word-of-mouth.
However, I don't think I could even if I was an expert. One big problem is that such a study has to be big to show any reliability. For that study, variables need to be controlled. You need to be able to control the standard(s) of the interrogator(s), and the interviewee(s). The more people you use, the harder it is to control all the variables, and the more money/time required. If you use fewer people, the greater the burden (since the study should include many trials). It also means less variety.
Put it this way: can you point out a valid, feasible method to do such a study?
...congratulations for formulating your own opinions, despite the white noise of "if you are not with us, you are with the terrorists", such as the parent post. I completely disagree with you, but I shall fight to the death your right to say it.
For those who think that Google wouldn't do that, wake up. Google could do anything. Seriously, it's called branding. It is certainly possible that Google serves as the friendlier face of the CIA's data mining operations. Google is nice and cuddly, friendly, passive, succeeding through failure to get past our defences. The question is, how are they (ab)using that position?
...put a notfud tag on this article? This is FUD, no doubt about it. I guess what this guy was trying to say was that he believed it, but the possibility of it being true does not prevent it from spreading Fear for your privacy, Uncertainty over the search engine most people use, and Doubt.
If you can't get consistent, reliable results out of it, it doesn't work (period).
If that is the case, nothing works. Everything has some rate of failure. If lie detectors are unreliable, all it means is that they will serve as an indication, rather than the be-all-and-end-all of the truth.
If I design a method to detect whether people are lying, which consists of flipping a coin for each answer and flagging answers corresponding to "heads" as lies, it will certainly correctly identify some lies.
Your method, if well tested, would come up with about 50% reliability, correct? Since there are two options, and the results are evenly spread, it doesn't even indicate slightly whether or not they are lying. If I were to invent a machine for that purpose which I'd call, say, a polygraph, and it had, say, a 75% success rate (extremely conservative estimate), it would tell the operator that there is a 3 in 4 chance of them lying. That's a significant improvement over 1 in 2. Since the operator wouldn't just be adept in operating the machine, but also judging people's responses manually, it would be a useful tool in identifying some of the more calm interviewees, and the reliability of the overall procedure would significantly improve. That's why polygraphs work. When people use them well, they really can help differentiate between truth and lies. It's not that much of a problem that the machines themselves don't have a 100% success rate.
Firstly, let me say, many people are afraid of polygraph machines, and rightly so. They represent a rather large invasion on someone's privacy. People always have something to hide, so I'm not surprised that such sites, like the one linked by the parent post, exist. I'm also not surprised that polygraphs are not popular here on/.
It's true, the polygraph is not a valid scientific procedure for detecting lies. That's because they don't detect the lies so much as the responses of people. And I would consider the procedure for detecting and analysing such responses scientifically valid. Sure it isn't 100% successful, but it is enough to be reasonably sure. Procedures don't have to be reliable in order to be valid. From what I understand of it, you can often tell if there is some doubt over the result anyway.
Certainly it's much more than just some simple interrogation device.
I think it would be abhorrent to allow such a device to be used against a defendant in our criminal justice system
I wouldn't, I'd just take it as evidence with very low credibility. Mistakes happen, innocents are prosecuted, so it's all about weighing up the risks. And look where we ended up. We now have an extremely accurate version that is practically fit to use in criminal cases.
it is better that 10 guilty men should go free than that 1 innocent man should be condemned
Again, not a black and white matter. Most would agree that it is better to incriminate one innocent man with a parking ticket, than to let ten guilty, unrepentant serial murderers go free.
Not meaning to troll or flamebait here, but it mildly irks me when people simplify this much.
I agree. This new revelation is disturbing. No one should know where you are. That is a matter that is private and should be known to you and only you. In fact, stop being seen in public and stop communicating with others. These two actions are singularly responsible for 99% of all privacy loss.
*snort*
Sorry. I couldn't keep a straight face for that long.
I personally think the worship of God Mammon is evil.
That brings up an interesting question. Do you think it'd be unreasonable to celebrate money/capitalism? It is to us now what the church was to us in the middle ages...
I personally like visual basic. I especially appreciate it because it was how I, and some others I know, got into programming in the first place. At first, I loved the novelty of dragging and dropping to create forms. Then I marvelled in amazement at how the stuff I write in the "code" section made the program do stuff. Then I found out more and more about slightly more advanced functions and then a few API calls. Suddenly I started to feel the urge to use more lower level and powerful programming languages like Pascal and C++. Now, I'm trying to program for the Gameboy Advance (fun stuff there).
I owe it all to visual basic, and believe me, I'm not ungrateful.
The Internet is fantastic. It is a monument to freedom of information. It transcends law and can be different in different countries. It's flexible, so China censor their little corner of the Internet (despite statements that they do no such thing), while the US can let just about anything go. All countries can have access to it on their terms.
Please don't impose the US on the Internet. It's the last place I can feel truly free.
Slashdot Mirror
Intel's response:
"Yeah? Well we have larger penises! QED!"
Don't get me wrong here, I can absolutely see the reason for antitrust laws.
However, it's cases like these that the law seems a little, well, silly. How can a company like Microsoft possibly provide updates for every single program? IE and WMP are both part of the OS. They come with the OS at no extra charge, and fill in important functionality. Should they be prevented from being bundled and integrated into the OS? If we do prevent them from being bundled, who suffers? Microsoft in profit margin, or the consumer being left with a massive inconvenience? Or both? And if we don't allow these programs, where does it stop? explorer.exe?
You're almost right. People no longer really care about freedom. Think about it. We have the freedom to do many, many things, but we actually do only a tiny portion of these things. People don't care about the freedom to do things they simply don't do, so the government feels that these freedoms are up for grabs. This leads to the mistaken assumption that the US is sliding into fascism, but I highly doubt people will stand for something that most people do to become illegal. You are becoming less free, not not free.
Which other EULAs? I know that they exist, but which ones? It is important. For example, if Musicmatch Jukebox had a EULA like that, no problem. We would simply not download it, not agree to its EULA, and be done with it. Windows has had the extremely frustrating effect of becoming the standard OS, in case you've had your head under a rock for the past zillion years. Either we, or people close to us, must agree to this EULA sooner or later (Linux just isn't quite feasible enough yet). What it says will affect us somehow, if only minorly, in the best case scenario.
/. bashing.
But hey, don't let the facts get in the way of a good
...certain underdeveloped projects, and how they'll be affected by this partnership. Wine and NTFS support, most notably. I doubt Microsoft will be able to ignore them, but to support them could be quite damaging to their Windows market share. Perhaps they will develop closed source alternatives exclusively for Suse? Perhaps that is what this entire thing is about. To boost Suse as a standard distro through developing closed source applications for it, and thus helping to make closed source more acceptable in Linux.
Now all we need to do is wait until 2010 for hardware that can run it.
However, I don't think I could even if I was an expert. One big problem is that such a study has to be big to show any reliability. For that study, variables need to be controlled. You need to be able to control the standard(s) of the interrogator(s), and the interviewee(s). The more people you use, the harder it is to control all the variables, and the more money/time required. If you use fewer people, the greater the burden (since the study should include many trials). It also means less variety.
Put it this way: can you point out a valid, feasible method to do such a study?
...congratulations for formulating your own opinions, despite the white noise of "if you are not with us, you are with the terrorists", such as the parent post. I completely disagree with you, but I shall fight to the death your right to say it.
For those who think that Google wouldn't do that, wake up. Google could do anything. Seriously, it's called branding. It is certainly possible that Google serves as the friendlier face of the CIA's data mining operations. Google is nice and cuddly, friendly, passive, succeeding through failure to get past our defences. The question is, how are they (ab)using that position?
Doesn't anyone find this guy's signature ironic for this situation?
No?
Never mind.
...put a notfud tag on this article? This is FUD, no doubt about it. I guess what this guy was trying to say was that he believed it, but the possibility of it being true does not prevent it from spreading Fear for your privacy, Uncertainty over the search engine most people use, and Doubt.
Your method, if well tested, would come up with about 50% reliability, correct? Since there are two options, and the results are evenly spread, it doesn't even indicate slightly whether or not they are lying.
If I were to invent a machine for that purpose which I'd call, say, a polygraph, and it had, say, a 75% success rate (extremely conservative estimate), it would tell the operator that there is a 3 in 4 chance of them lying. That's a significant improvement over 1 in 2. Since the operator wouldn't just be adept in operating the machine, but also judging people's responses manually, it would be a useful tool in identifying some of the more calm interviewees, and the reliability of the overall procedure would significantly improve.
That's why polygraphs work. When people use them well, they really can help differentiate between truth and lies. It's not that much of a problem that the machines themselves don't have a 100% success rate.
The reason beeeing that they do work.
I'm starting to get the feeling that people are blocking their ears, singing "La la la, I can't hear you, la la la, people can foil them, la la la..."
They do work. Not for everyone in every situation, but it's not enough to say they just don't work, period.
Firstly, let me say, many people are afraid of polygraph machines, and rightly so. They represent a rather large invasion on someone's privacy. People always have something to hide, so I'm not surprised that such sites, like the one linked by the parent post, exist. I'm also not surprised that polygraphs are not popular here on /.
It's true, the polygraph is not a valid scientific procedure for detecting lies. That's because they don't detect the lies so much as the responses of people. And I would consider the procedure for detecting and analysing such responses scientifically valid. Sure it isn't 100% successful, but it is enough to be reasonably sure. Procedures don't have to be reliable in order to be valid. From what I understand of it, you can often tell if there is some doubt over the result anyway.
Certainly it's much more than just some simple interrogation device.
Again, not a black and white matter. Most would agree that it is better to incriminate one innocent man with a parking ticket, than to let ten guilty, unrepentant serial murderers go free.
Not meaning to troll or flamebait here, but it mildly irks me when people simplify this much.
I guess they missed that unalienable right in the declaration of independence.
I sense a great disturbance in the force, as if millions of /.er's bubbles burst...
I agree. This new revelation is disturbing. No one should know where you are. That is a matter that is private and should be known to you and only you. In fact, stop being seen in public and stop communicating with others. These two actions are singularly responsible for 99% of all privacy loss.
*snort*
Sorry. I couldn't keep a straight face for that long.
I personally like visual basic. I especially appreciate it because it was how I, and some others I know, got into programming in the first place. At first, I loved the novelty of dragging and dropping to create forms. Then I marvelled in amazement at how the stuff I write in the "code" section made the program do stuff. Then I found out more and more about slightly more advanced functions and then a few API calls. Suddenly I started to feel the urge to use more lower level and powerful programming languages like Pascal and C++. Now, I'm trying to program for the Gameboy Advance (fun stuff there).
I owe it all to visual basic, and believe me, I'm not ungrateful.
That probably explains your post's moderation: 50% Interesting, 50% Insightful.
The Internet is fantastic. It is a monument to freedom of information. It transcends law and can be different in different countries. It's flexible, so China censor their little corner of the Internet (despite statements that they do no such thing), while the US can let just about anything go. All countries can have access to it on their terms.
Please don't impose the US on the Internet. It's the last place I can feel truly free.
Was that a question or a subtle message to the developer?
That's got to be the best advice I've hear all year. Thank you.