That switch that you use to turn your phone off is nothing but a sensor switch. Its not a physical on/off switch disconnecting the battery from the phone circuits. When you press it, the OS on the phone is programmed to start shutting down certain circuits within the phone. It keeps other circuits powered up so that it can sense that same switch to bring the phone back up to its normal powered state.
That being said, someone can reprogram the phone to 'look like' its powered off. It can still be recording audio/video to the local memory, or whatever it wants to, and even use the transmitter periodically without being noticed by the owner.
The phone can be reprogrammed fairly easily by someone who gains control of the device. How easy is that? I've seen a demonstration by an expert that took all but 15 seconds to have root on a popular phone. All that was needed was an IP address of the data connection for the handset. In an instant they had the equivalent of ftp and could have done anything on that phone, including staging a boot loader/update waiting for the next time you cycled the phone's OS.
For someone who has the power of the courts behind them, they can easily have the phone company push an update out to the phone to do the same thing. Nobody needs to hack your phone, and they can then completely control the outward appearance of the devise without you knowing anything about it.
Other than having an RF monitor next to the phone you likely won't be able to detect it. A small RF monitor can be purchased and hacked to add a audible warning if the phone becomes active, if you are the tin foil hat type. Otherwise, if the phone is active and uses the network the battery will get slightly warm, even when turned off, so you might be able to tell that way. A cheap way to tell is a liquid crystal temperature strip adhered to the outside case where the battery compartment is. This is also a help if your phone has a battery drainage problem with certain apps, because it will tell you when the battery is being drained, and how quickly, for whatever reason.
I would get the Eye-Fi, an Android MP3 player with WiFi & bluetooth, and set up the wireless card access to it. Using a USB 12V regulator to keep it powered, and a volume encryption for the SD card in the player. That way you can tuck it away under the seat, glove box, or somewhere it won't be seen. They might check your cell phone for files, but it won't be there.
This setup comes with the side benefit that you can sound cool at the same time, if your car has blue-tooth audio, or a blue-tooth/FM transmitter/converter you can control the music from anywhere in the car.
Agreed, and there is also the fact that the neural network at the back of the retina does preprocessing of the image information, so that the brain is not taxed with that task. A larger retina also allows for a larger neural net to process the same basic amount of information. Just because the retina is larger does not mean there are more rods and cones thus increasing the amount of data needed to be processed by the brain. A larger image does not equal a higher fidelity image!
This theory seems very subjective given the limited amount of information on hand needed to show a direct cause and effect relationship necessitating their extinction. If so, why are these animals not extinct then?
as we share no mitochondrial DNA and the quantity of admixture is ~%4 at most.
That would only indicate that Homo Sapien women were either promiscuous or raped by Neanderthal males, and then the women raised the offspring as their own. Mitochondrial DNA is passed down directly from the mother to the child, so it basically says that Neanderthal men were not welcome in the Homo Sapien society in general, but that cross breading still happened. Whether or not Homo Sapien male DNA was shared with Neanderthal women is yet to be determined, as far as I know. It probably worked both ways but because they went extinct long ago we may never know that side of the story until we sequence more late Neanderthal period bone fragments.
You can if you always use throw-away addresses (such as sneakemail.com provides for a fee, there are many others as well).
Whenever I sign up for a new service I use a custom throw-away address, labelled for that particular site, and if it gets hacked/used for spam or other I can go back to change the address (and/or password) with that service to an new throw-away address. All email get forwarded to my real address(s) of my choice, and when I start receiving mail I don't want I automatically know who got hacked/scraped/or-sold-me-out. (Yahoo is by far the worst, so don't go there without throw away's.)
Remediation is simple because I know the source of the problem, and they don't even own my real address. I can simply turn off the spam with a flick of the switch, so to speak. Knowing 'who sold you out' is priceless.
Normally it is just the signed binaries that are permitted to run on the system, but an organization can add rules that permit unsigned code to run in certain circumstances. In that sense there is no published white-list, only cryptographic data that is being validated. To fix the problem Bit9 merely had to revoke a single signing key, but then all kinds of programs would stop running all at once. I have not heard yet what else exactly had been signed by that same key.
.
The trusted keys are distributed by the software, so this is very different than the SPAM blacklists that you are referring to.
System memory check summing has been done, but behaviour analysis is VERY cpu intensive, and as such nobody has come up with a commercial solution (to my knowledge) that can efficiently secure a system at runtime based of true system behaviour heuristics. This is a personal area of interest in my own research.
Yes, Bit9 software is a default deny paradigm, and so anything that is allowed to run on your system needs to be explicitly allowed, so malware can't get onto your system so easily (buffer overflows are still possible). That being said, Bit9 did not protect one of their all important signing keys, so the hacker used it and signed a whole lot of bad stuff they had in their tool bag. The hacker thereby added all his malware to the permitted white-list because they were signed by an authority that is trusted by the software protecting the systems. Who could be more trusted than the software company who protects your computer?
Setting up an SSL proxy and borrowing his sessions to his bank account, Amazon, Buy.com sessions could be quite fun. Wait until things start showing up on his doorstep, like a brand new WiFi router. He'll get the point.
The problem is they are using your network, so its your IP address. If its P2P WiFi they have no network of their own to tell the authorities about, so you would be incriminating yourself.
Or install the capacitive type auto alarm into the door frame. All they have to do is go for the door handle and it changes the oscillator circuit frequency to trip the circuit and thus whatever is attached to the alarm.
You could then hook the alarm trigger to the lights inside/outside the shop and have everything light up like a Christmas tree as soon as the door or window is touched. Using metallic coated glass or the break resistant wire mesh in the glass would help detect slackers. Nothing would spook a burglar quite as much as having the building "know" they are there, and show that the building itself is quite ready to take them on.
Also, Once they are in the building, any video system on the premises is history. If you have to resort to video cameras as a solution, then use those that can be set up with motion detection and have them trigger the lights, not just sit back and observe the break in. An active defence is always better.
How long before it goes viral on the file-sharing services?
Perhaps this is a new marketing plan? First, make it unobtainable by those that _really_ want to play it, add some more media hype with the rating system to make it even more desirable, and then hope that they eventually buy a legal copy once they are old enough to do so. Might work... well sort of. If they have a bootleg copy while under 18 they can't admit to having it, but when they are of legal age its still bootleg, so they might have to buy it so they can share with their younger friends. Somehow this doesn't sound like the rating system is doing its job, and the first game probably hasn't even hit the market yet.
I was going to write the same but you beat me to it!
A proper test would allow gauging of the prospective employees (#1) comprehension of the problem description, their (#2) ability to transcribe those requirements into code that solves that problem, and the (#3) efficiency at which the program actually runs. That would define a good programmer to me.
If one deliberately defines the test to introduce some minor ambiguity into the problem description, one could better assess the persons desire to correctly understand the problem, and if they blindly code away without requesting clarification of the finer points in the description then they are not the best candidate. If you give them a resource to specifically ask questions and they don't use it (#4), then that is not a good sign. Having the assertiveness, drive, and determination to correctly analyse the problem before even coding is one of the highest qualities I would value. Think before you even start to code.
Yes because not investing in the huge R&D effort to port Office to "Linux" (which one?) is the same as filtering an API usage based on device ID.
Supporting Linux is really quite simple. You take the Mac port that already exists and recompile it using the Linux header files. Done. Give me the source code and I'll hand you a binary. I port things all the time and its not really that hard fro someone that knows what they are doing. Its not that Microsoft can't port it, its that they won't, because it gives everyone an OS exit strategy after the strangle hold on document support/creation/compatibility is over.
Microsoft document formats are a moving target, simply to keep the competition behind the curve, not because any new features were needed. If they didn't keep changing the file format people would not have to upgrade after every new version is released. That is why they hated ODF standards enough to waste MILLIONS in creating an alternate standard that could not even be implemented in a compatible manor. Even when they paid Novel MILLIONS to add OOXML support to OpenOffice, Novell was FORBIDDEN BY CONTRACT to implement the binary blob compatibility where Microsoft stuffs all the real MS proprietary implementation. What's the point of having a "standard" that isn't even a standard?
BTW - A far as I can see, Microsoft has nothing to complain about with Youtube. Google has a published API. If Microsoft wants to use a different language they can reimplement that API using C#, DCOM, powershell or *.BAT if they want to. They just want something to complain about to the authorities to keep Google in hot water as much as possible.
Different? Ok, "Go Fight Against Malaria" and "Say No To Schistosoma" are both trying to cure the #1 and #2 parasitic diseases worldwide.
Malaria is known to be in the US and has several medications to treat it. The CDC will tell you that Schistosoma does not even exist in the US, but I acquired it at the age of 10, and it wasn't until I purchased my own lab equipment around the age of 50 that I finally got an answer to all my bizarre health problems. Statistically I should be dead, several times over. Over 200,000 people die from it every year, and I am clearly one of the lucky ones.
There is currently only one drug (praziquantel) to "cure' (with 60% efficacy) Schistosoma, and it is quickly loosing its effectiveness. There is no other substitute. None. After visiting many pharmacies in my area, it took me three days for me to locate the drug in the USA and tell the Pharmacy where they could get it for me. . Yes Its that bad. Funny thing is I can buy it off the shelf for my dog, with a prescription, but I couldn't buy it anywhere for human consumption? Clearly we need more options and SNTS protein folding analysis will help with that goal.
If you have a few extra CPU cycles to spare, please sign up for one of these two worthy causes!
Actually Google searches most everybody. Thats kind of their busness model isn't it? Its just that in the Soviet when you get searched it will cost you to get it back.
My IP is 127.0.0.1 plz be gentle. Also I'm running Windows XP so don't hack me plz.
You can't fool me. Your address is really 0:0:0:0:0:0:0:1, cuz I get a response back from THAT address every time I ping you!!! Your not even running WinXP either, I have root, so shame on you. Just for lying to me I'm going to reformat your boot drive right now....
#@%%&*** .....
</lost carrier signal>
Step #1, Congress passes a bill requiring, in x years, that all new Law Enforcement weapons have safety interlock mechanisms preventing a suspect from using the weapon if it should somehow be obtained away from that officer. A firearm interlock technology needs to first be certified by Law enforcement before the procurement requirement actually takes effect. Any patents on related interlock technology is required to be licensed, for a reasonable fee to all manufacturers, to prevent artificially high prices for law enforcement. As a result, officers will no longer be shot by their own weapon.
.
Step #2, Gun manufacturers will be forced by market economics to develop a reliable interlock technology or risk the loss of those lucrative Government contracts.They will see the writing on the wall and step up their development plans. Research will finally get serious about developing it.
Step #3, Economy of scale in production of the law enforcement market makes the interlock technology more affordable, since the technology is available to all manufacturers.
Step #4, After a study of the economics of scale in the industry shows that the technology is in fact affordable, Congress creates a reverse incentive for purchasing firearms without the technology as to tip the balance away from the more dangerous firearms. One simple example is requiring that all non-interlocked firearms are stored 'disabled' by a trigger key lock mechanism at all times, and stored under lock an key. Nobody prevents you from having it; its just not very convenient to pull it out and use it on someone. Another possibility is a tax on non-interlocked firearms which directly pays for law enforcement procurement programs to make up for the initial cost of development.
Step #5, Have amnesty gun collections for firearms specifically without the proper interlocks, just to get them off the streets.
Note that the market forces do the brunt of the work, and the Government can uses its economic weight to tip the scales in favour of safer firearms. Nobody including law enforcement is forced to get rid of what they currently have, and gun collectors are not prevented from acquiring whatever arms they choose to collect. The down side is that Law enforcement carries the initial load as for the cost of developing the technology, but then they also benefit from fewer deaths at the hands of criminals. Its a trade off. If I personally had to choose between paying five dollars a year in taxes or seeing 10 offerers die, I would pay the money. No question. The benefit to society in general, as a side effect of market forces, would be monumental, though it will take years for the process to work its way through all the steps described. The market economy is a slow manipulator, but it moves things along in the right direction none the less.
... the answer is definitely Nigerian. Unfortunately there are over 520 languages in use there, so good luck and take your pick. Its no wonder that their English is so poor.
If you are into hardcore hacking or security then Russian is a good choice, but be careful who you deal with overseas. For potential market share by population, Mandarin Chinese. For working with a technology power house of industry Korean, Japanese, and India is an up and coming future market. Spanish/Portuguese also has a broad and economically growing market in south America. It all depends on what kind of software you are intending to develop.
Most of those languages will likely take a lifetime to master. I on the other hand like to know computer languages, because no one tool does the job in every case. I stopped counting at 14 languages some 25-30 years ago, because I found that admitting to knowing some of them only got me assigned to projects I'd rather not be involved with. Sometimes its better not to know too much.
Manglement makes a decision that upsets everyone and lots of people talk about how they are going to start looking elsewhere for employment and the sky will fall and this is terrible, but after the 3 month gripe period, everyone accepts the changes and life moves on.
True, but why exactly is that?
Because it takes about three months on average for the vocal and confident employees to find other employment, get fired, or can be otherwise forced to leave (that option usually takes longer). One place I was at had a 43% turnover in the first two months, but I can't speak for what happened after that, because nobody I really knew was still there.
What the management is then left with is a staff of indecisive and often inferior employees that are easily intimidated by management. They are either not feeling financially secure enough to move on or are just thinking that they are incapable of finding other employment. They are not your 'movers and shakers' and they just feel trapped in their employment situation. Bad Management likes things that way, because those that are left will more likely just bend over and ask for more. Some managers just thrive on that dominance-high.
My take is that If you don't/can't enjoy what you are doing then you are working for the wrong people. Been there, done that, never again!
For most home owners the grid-tied solar setup is the default, due to its economics benefit. Basically when the sun is out your electric meter spins backwards and the power company pays you for your production. When the sun goes down it spins the other way and you pay the power company for the nightly electric rates. Since the setup is synchronized on the power companies 60 Hz carrier in order to put power back into the grid your home system inverter is integrally tied to the grid and can not operate without the carrier signal. When the grid goes down your system shuts down production. If you want power you need a very expensive battery bank to store the power and get no benefit from net-metering, as all your power goes towards charging your batteries. So, if you want power during an outage you buy a much more expensive system that needs regular maintenance, and if you want a system that pays for itself then you have no power when the grid goes down. You need to make a choice.
What if that breech at the door isn't the feds, but some mafiaa goons who tell you to keep doing what you're doing, but they'll protect you for the cool price of all your profits.
In order for that scenario to happen the Mafia have to be better Internet sleuths than the Feds, and the hacker, otherwise they will never know who the hacker is. If the Mafia are not technically adept to hacking they won't be able to track you down, unless you are stupid enough to not be worth their time. If the Mafia are technically adept enough to track you down then they don't need you, your just in the way. Catch 22.
Its the hacker that seeks out the Mafia that will get told to keep doing it. If you are stupid enough to seek them out then you just get what you asked for, lots of money, and a very short life expectancy.
Not me. I'm behind ten proxies and use Tor for everything. I use throwaway e-mail addresses from places like Mailinator. I even registered my gmail account using a hospital courtesy phone... that was in another country.
Unfortunately that may not be enough. They also get the browser fingerprint (app, OS, plugin list including your TOR plugin and version no, and much more...) which is fairly unique statistically, and can say a lot about a person just in itself. If you are not also blocking javascript, cookies, and all web bugs then they already know you uniquely enough to track your movements across the web. TOR is only the "how you got there" part, and they can work around that missing information. They can still get the ID data from the websites when you visit and fill out forms with personally identifying information, and then make some fairly high statistical correlations using that data. If you have even one stale tracking cookie available through your browser then they've got you nailed. In that case your IP cloak behind TOR is meaningless.
btw - Good luck with the Government guys. The advertisers make their job a whole lot easier these days. In fact I would not put it past 'the man' to work out a special deal with them just to track all TOR plugin users specifically, just in case they need all that information on you one day. Like fishing in a barrel when they need that extra bit of information.
You were right to question the stated facts. Microsoft Research has only 350 "employees". Not all that many if you compare it to the combined resources of the others previously sited. IBM for instance has 1593 "researches" alone, and that is bonafide "researchers" not just employees or warm bodies. So the prior statement is provably false by even the quickest and roughest of google searched.
Slashdot Mirror
That switch that you use to turn your phone off is nothing but a sensor switch. Its not a physical on/off switch disconnecting the battery from the phone circuits. When you press it, the OS on the phone is programmed to start shutting down certain circuits within the phone. It keeps other circuits powered up so that it can sense that same switch to bring the phone back up to its normal powered state.
That being said, someone can reprogram the phone to 'look like' its powered off. It can still be recording audio/video to the local memory, or whatever it wants to, and even use the transmitter periodically without being noticed by the owner.
The phone can be reprogrammed fairly easily by someone who gains control of the device. How easy is that? I've seen a demonstration by an expert that took all but 15 seconds to have root on a popular phone. All that was needed was an IP address of the data connection for the handset. In an instant they had the equivalent of ftp and could have done anything on that phone, including staging a boot loader/update waiting for the next time you cycled the phone's OS.
For someone who has the power of the courts behind them, they can easily have the phone company push an update out to the phone to do the same thing. Nobody needs to hack your phone, and they can then completely control the outward appearance of the devise without you knowing anything about it.
Other than having an RF monitor next to the phone you likely won't be able to detect it. A small RF monitor can be purchased and hacked to add a audible warning if the phone becomes active, if you are the tin foil hat type. Otherwise, if the phone is active and uses the network the battery will get slightly warm, even when turned off, so you might be able to tell that way. A cheap way to tell is a liquid crystal temperature strip adhered to the outside case where the battery compartment is. This is also a help if your phone has a battery drainage problem with certain apps, because it will tell you when the battery is being drained, and how quickly, for whatever reason.
This setup comes with the side benefit that you can sound cool at the same time, if your car has blue-tooth audio, or a blue-tooth/FM transmitter/converter you can control the music from anywhere in the car.
http://www.eye.fi/
This theory seems very subjective given the limited amount of information on hand needed to show a direct cause and effect relationship necessitating their extinction. If so, why are these animals not extinct then?
Pugs
Owls
Owl Monkey
Tarsier
Bush Baby
Slender Loris
Goats
Chameleons & Geckos
Dragonfly
Colossal squid
Stalk eyed fly
Spookfish
Ogre faced spider
Mantis shrimp
Gharials
Hippos
as we share no mitochondrial DNA and the quantity of admixture is ~%4 at most.
That would only indicate that Homo Sapien women were either promiscuous or raped by Neanderthal males, and then the women raised the offspring as their own. Mitochondrial DNA is passed down directly from the mother to the child, so it basically says that Neanderthal men were not welcome in the Homo Sapien society in general, but that cross breading still happened. Whether or not Homo Sapien male DNA was shared with Neanderthal women is yet to be determined, as far as I know. It probably worked both ways but because they went extinct long ago we may never know that side of the story until we sequence more late Neanderthal period bone fragments.
Whenever I sign up for a new service I use a custom throw-away address, labelled for that particular site, and if it gets hacked/used for spam or other I can go back to change the address (and/or password) with that service to an new throw-away address. All email get forwarded to my real address(s) of my choice, and when I start receiving mail I don't want I automatically know who got hacked/scraped/or-sold-me-out. (Yahoo is by far the worst, so don't go there without throw away's.)
Remediation is simple because I know the source of the problem, and they don't even own my real address. I can simply turn off the spam with a flick of the switch, so to speak. Knowing 'who sold you out' is priceless.
The trusted keys are distributed by the software, so this is very different than the SPAM blacklists that you are referring to.
System memory check summing has been done, but behaviour analysis is VERY cpu intensive, and as such nobody has come up with a commercial solution (to my knowledge) that can efficiently secure a system at runtime based of true system behaviour heuristics. This is a personal area of interest in my own research.
Yes, Bit9 software is a default deny paradigm, and so anything that is allowed to run on your system needs to be explicitly allowed, so malware can't get onto your system so easily (buffer overflows are still possible). That being said, Bit9 did not protect one of their all important signing keys, so the hacker used it and signed a whole lot of bad stuff they had in their tool bag. The hacker thereby added all his malware to the permitted white-list because they were signed by an authority that is trusted by the software protecting the systems. Who could be more trusted than the software company who protects your computer?
Setting up an SSL proxy and borrowing his sessions to his bank account, Amazon, Buy.com sessions could be quite fun. Wait until things start showing up on his doorstep, like a brand new WiFi router. He'll get the point.
The problem is they are using your network, so its your IP address. If its P2P WiFi they have no network of their own to tell the authorities about, so you would be incriminating yourself.
You could then hook the alarm trigger to the lights inside/outside the shop and have everything light up like a Christmas tree as soon as the door or window is touched. Using metallic coated glass or the break resistant wire mesh in the glass would help detect slackers. Nothing would spook a burglar quite as much as having the building "know" they are there, and show that the building itself is quite ready to take them on.
Also, Once they are in the building, any video system on the premises is history. If you have to resort to video cameras as a solution, then use those that can be set up with motion detection and have them trigger the lights, not just sit back and observe the break in. An active defence is always better.
Perhaps this is a new marketing plan? First, make it unobtainable by those that _really_ want to play it, add some more media hype with the rating system to make it even more desirable, and then hope that they eventually buy a legal copy once they are old enough to do so. Might work... well sort of. If they have a bootleg copy while under 18 they can't admit to having it, but when they are of legal age its still bootleg, so they might have to buy it so they can share with their younger friends. Somehow this doesn't sound like the rating system is doing its job, and the first game probably hasn't even hit the market yet.
A proper test would allow gauging of the prospective employees (#1) comprehension of the problem description, their (#2) ability to transcribe those requirements into code that solves that problem, and the (#3) efficiency at which the program actually runs. That would define a good programmer to me.
If one deliberately defines the test to introduce some minor ambiguity into the problem description, one could better assess the persons desire to correctly understand the problem, and if they blindly code away without requesting clarification of the finer points in the description then they are not the best candidate. If you give them a resource to specifically ask questions and they don't use it (#4), then that is not a good sign. Having the assertiveness, drive, and determination to correctly analyse the problem before even coding is one of the highest qualities I would value. Think before you even start to code.
http://www.gnustep.org/
Yes because not investing in the huge R&D effort to port Office to "Linux" (which one?) is the same as filtering an API usage based on device ID.
Supporting Linux is really quite simple. You take the Mac port that already exists and recompile it using the Linux header files. Done. Give me the source code and I'll hand you a binary. I port things all the time and its not really that hard fro someone that knows what they are doing. Its not that Microsoft can't port it, its that they won't, because it gives everyone an OS exit strategy after the strangle hold on document support/creation/compatibility is over.
Microsoft document formats are a moving target, simply to keep the competition behind the curve, not because any new features were needed. If they didn't keep changing the file format people would not have to upgrade after every new version is released. That is why they hated ODF standards enough to waste MILLIONS in creating an alternate standard that could not even be implemented in a compatible manor. Even when they paid Novel MILLIONS to add OOXML support to OpenOffice, Novell was FORBIDDEN BY CONTRACT to implement the binary blob compatibility where Microsoft stuffs all the real MS proprietary implementation. What's the point of having a "standard" that isn't even a standard?
BTW - A far as I can see, Microsoft has nothing to complain about with Youtube. Google has a published API. If Microsoft wants to use a different language they can reimplement that API using C#, DCOM, powershell or *.BAT if they want to. They just want something to complain about to the authorities to keep Google in hot water as much as possible.
Malaria is known to be in the US and has several medications to treat it. The CDC will tell you that Schistosoma does not even exist in the US, but I acquired it at the age of 10, and it wasn't until I purchased my own lab equipment around the age of 50 that I finally got an answer to all my bizarre health problems. Statistically I should be dead, several times over. Over 200,000 people die from it every year, and I am clearly one of the lucky ones.
There is currently only one drug (praziquantel) to "cure' (with 60% efficacy) Schistosoma, and it is quickly loosing its effectiveness. There is no other substitute. None. After visiting many pharmacies in my area, it took me three days for me to locate the drug in the USA and tell the Pharmacy where they could get it for me. . Yes Its that bad. Funny thing is I can buy it off the shelf for my dog, with a prescription, but I couldn't buy it anywhere for human consumption? Clearly we need more options and SNTS protein folding analysis will help with that goal.
If you have a few extra CPU cycles to spare, please sign up for one of these two worthy causes!
More info on Schistosomiasis
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schistosomiasis
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Praziquantel
Actually Google searches most everybody. Thats kind of their busness model isn't it? Its just that in the Soviet when you get searched it will cost you to get it back.
My IP is 127.0.0.1 plz be gentle. Also I'm running Windows XP so don't hack me plz.
You can't fool me. Your address is really 0:0:0:0:0:0:0:1, cuz I get a response back from THAT address every time I ping you!!! Your not even running WinXP either, I have root, so shame on you. Just for lying to me I'm going to reformat your boot drive right now....
.....
#@%%&***
</lost carrier signal>
.
Step #2, Gun manufacturers will be forced by market economics to develop a reliable interlock technology or risk the loss of those lucrative Government contracts.They will see the writing on the wall and step up their development plans. Research will finally get serious about developing it.
Step #3, Economy of scale in production of the law enforcement market makes the interlock technology more affordable, since the technology is available to all manufacturers.
Step #4, After a study of the economics of scale in the industry shows that the technology is in fact affordable, Congress creates a reverse incentive for purchasing firearms without the technology as to tip the balance away from the more dangerous firearms. One simple example is requiring that all non-interlocked firearms are stored 'disabled' by a trigger key lock mechanism at all times, and stored under lock an key. Nobody prevents you from having it; its just not very convenient to pull it out and use it on someone. Another possibility is a tax on non-interlocked firearms which directly pays for law enforcement procurement programs to make up for the initial cost of development.
Step #5, Have amnesty gun collections for firearms specifically without the proper interlocks, just to get them off the streets.
Note that the market forces do the brunt of the work, and the Government can uses its economic weight to tip the scales in favour of safer firearms. Nobody including law enforcement is forced to get rid of what they currently have, and gun collectors are not prevented from acquiring whatever arms they choose to collect. The down side is that Law enforcement carries the initial load as for the cost of developing the technology, but then they also benefit from fewer deaths at the hands of criminals. Its a trade off. If I personally had to choose between paying five dollars a year in taxes or seeing 10 offerers die, I would pay the money. No question. The benefit to society in general, as a side effect of market forces, would be monumental, though it will take years for the process to work its way through all the steps described. The market economy is a slow manipulator, but it moves things along in the right direction none the less.
why didn't Google buy the patents?
They did. Did you read the article?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Languages_of_Nigeria
</sarcasm>
If you are into hardcore hacking or security then Russian is a good choice, but be careful who you deal with overseas. For potential market share by population, Mandarin Chinese. For working with a technology power house of industry Korean, Japanese, and India is an up and coming future market. Spanish/Portuguese also has a broad and economically growing market in south America. It all depends on what kind of software you are intending to develop.
Most of those languages will likely take a lifetime to master. I on the other hand like to know computer languages, because no one tool does the job in every case. I stopped counting at 14 languages some 25-30 years ago, because I found that admitting to knowing some of them only got me assigned to projects I'd rather not be involved with. Sometimes its better not to know too much.
Manglement makes a decision that upsets everyone and lots of people talk about how they are going to start looking elsewhere for employment and the sky will fall and this is terrible, but after the 3 month gripe period, everyone accepts the changes and life moves on.
True, but why exactly is that?
Because it takes about three months on average for the vocal and confident employees to find other employment, get fired, or can be otherwise forced to leave (that option usually takes longer). One place I was at had a 43% turnover in the first two months, but I can't speak for what happened after that, because nobody I really knew was still there.
What the management is then left with is a staff of indecisive and often inferior employees that are easily intimidated by management. They are either not feeling financially secure enough to move on or are just thinking that they are incapable of finding other employment. They are not your 'movers and shakers' and they just feel trapped in their employment situation. Bad Management likes things that way, because those that are left will more likely just bend over and ask for more. Some managers just thrive on that dominance-high.
My take is that If you don't/can't enjoy what you are doing then you are working for the wrong people. Been there, done that, never again!
For most home owners the grid-tied solar setup is the default, due to its economics benefit. Basically when the sun is out your electric meter spins backwards and the power company pays you for your production. When the sun goes down it spins the other way and you pay the power company for the nightly electric rates. Since the setup is synchronized on the power companies 60 Hz carrier in order to put power back into the grid your home system inverter is integrally tied to the grid and can not operate without the carrier signal. When the grid goes down your system shuts down production. If you want power you need a very expensive battery bank to store the power and get no benefit from net-metering, as all your power goes towards charging your batteries. So, if you want power during an outage you buy a much more expensive system that needs regular maintenance, and if you want a system that pays for itself then you have no power when the grid goes down. You need to make a choice.
What if that breech at the door isn't the feds, but some mafiaa goons who tell you to keep doing what you're doing, but they'll protect you for the cool price of all your profits.
In order for that scenario to happen the Mafia have to be better Internet sleuths than the Feds, and the hacker, otherwise they will never know who the hacker is. If the Mafia are not technically adept to hacking they won't be able to track you down, unless you are stupid enough to not be worth their time. If the Mafia are technically adept enough to track you down then they don't need you, your just in the way. Catch 22.
Its the hacker that seeks out the Mafia that will get told to keep doing it. If you are stupid enough to seek them out then you just get what you asked for, lots of money, and a very short life expectancy.
I think I would rather work for the good guys.
Not me. I'm behind ten proxies and use Tor for everything. I use throwaway e-mail addresses from places like Mailinator. I even registered my gmail account using a hospital courtesy phone... that was in another country.
Unfortunately that may not be enough. They also get the browser fingerprint (app, OS, plugin list including your TOR plugin and version no, and much more...) which is fairly unique statistically, and can say a lot about a person just in itself. If you are not also blocking javascript, cookies, and all web bugs then they already know you uniquely enough to track your movements across the web. TOR is only the "how you got there" part, and they can work around that missing information. They can still get the ID data from the websites when you visit and fill out forms with personally identifying information, and then make some fairly high statistical correlations using that data. If you have even one stale tracking cookie available through your browser then they've got you nailed. In that case your IP cloak behind TOR is meaningless.
btw - Good luck with the Government guys. The advertisers make their job a whole lot easier these days. In fact I would not put it past 'the man' to work out a special deal with them just to track all TOR plugin users specifically, just in case they need all that information on you one day. Like fishing in a barrel when they need that extra bit of information.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Microsoft_Research
http://researcher.ibm.com/researcher/search.php?sn=1