oh, they cant use THAT email but they VERY well can use that as a reason to begin investigating you. Just because the current set of evidence is inadmissable does not mean they are not going to try and find MORE evidence later on.
Its not just what they are currently after - remember that the FBI has to continually justify its existance by targetting and 'destroying' dangerous criminals. And its always nice to have a list of extra targets at hand.
Is to see how the claims get handled. If basic security proceedures were not followed (patches, closing off extraneous ports, etc) will the claim be paid? If they are paid, it will set a bad precendent, and give companies an excuse to maintain poor security, hire less qualified admins, and just file claims when bad stuff happens.
If they DO deny claims based on lack of basic preparedness, it could benefit the overall community by making it worth the company's pocketbook to make sure their admins are well trained, and have the equipment and software they need. Lawyers LOVE it when companies have insurance policies - it means larger settlements for them.
Methamphetamine Anti-Proliferation Act & You
on
Cookiegate Explained
·
· Score: 2
Check out this link on the ACLU website. The riders that are attached to this legislation are going to increase the police powers of the goverment, effectively giving them the ability to shut down websites that they consider 'dangerous', and do computer search and seizures without notification. Its scary. And it already passed the Senate unanimously. I wrote my represenatative in Congress, and he fed me back some pap about how the Act was good, I was just misunderstanding it. I think the language is pretty clear on this one.
the world isnt made up of large companies
on
Microsoft Quickies
·
· Score: 1
Its made up of lots of medium and small ones. YES large companies can afford to do all of that, but smaller and medium sized ones can't afford the solutions you are listing.
I work for and with those companies as a living. I am not a 19 year old kid playing with Perl (I do play with perl though!). They cannot afford the sheer level of staffing required to keep up with the patches, fixes, etc that problems like the recent outlook virii/trojan horses/worms have caused.
The real world is made up of little people, not big companies. Big companies only employ a very small percentage of the workforce as compared to small and medium businesses.
This isn't socialism, this is being practical. Microsoft is a monopoly, and monopolies are allowable as long as they don't break certain rules. MS not only broke those rules, they were very proud of breaking them, and have refused again and again to modify their business practices.
They claim there is no precedent for what is being done to them - two words "Standard Oil." There's the precedent. Or the movie making industry in the 30's who owned the movies, the distribution process AND the theaters.
MS could not even innovate a new way to be a monopoly!
Last night, while channel surfing I ran across Bill Gates and Steve in their little press conference. I really had no intention of actually listening to it, but I found myself caught and amazed.
Bill isn't stupid. Neither is Steve. But they are both publically insisting that MS did no wrong. Bear with me here a second, I know *we* all know otherwise. However, during mediation, MS *did* propose solutions to 'curb' their business practices, which while mild were at least a tacit admission of guilt. Now they are not only saying that they will fight to the finish on the judgement, but that they will also fight even having to do the remedies that they originally suggested themselves.
Up until now, MS has relied on a rather stupid public to believe that they were the injured parties, but between these very publically contradictory actions, and realization that consumers are having about the fact that they are not allowed to actually have full copies of the software that they purchased, public opinion is rapidly going to turn against MS. And that is one factor that they have been heavily relying on.
No matter how big their PR machine gets, their horrid business practices are now too glaring to be remedied... and I expect to see public support not only eroding away, but a growing customer base looking for alternatives to having to use MS. OSX, anyone? I bet the people at Apple are grinning like fiends.
But it also would help drive the Linux desktop market. And that would be a good thing to get Linux a larger market share and more widespread acceptance.
Strange bedfellows, yes.. but no stranger than the announcement that Perl and Python are going to become part of Visual Studio 7.
IE and Office for Linux will come out? If they appear on the shelved in less than 3-6 months after the breakup is official, you know that MS has been actively prepping ports for those products during the whole trial process.
I hope though, that the Justice Dept continues tight monitoring even after the breakup - each of these companies still has the potential to develop into a new monopoly. Old practices are going to die hard.
The demo was too much of a tease. Waiting was getting unbearable. Yes, I was expecting a bit more out of the engine, but I will take playability (which it has) and fun over bleeding edge graphics any day. The pizza delivery guys in my neighborhood are going to be *very* happy...
...lack of community, lack of continuity
on
The Leased Life?
·
· Score: 5
Especially if you work in IT, your life may have a deep sense of transience. IT people travel more, get transferred more, and tend to spend more time isolated than any other group (except maybe labratory scientists!).
Leased houses, apartments, cars, etc just fit into a sense of never quite belonging, or being there. We develop online communities (like Slashdot, or my old MUD, Tsunami) to combat the transience of the of our lives. As long as I can get online, I can be with my friends, I can be informed, I can be part of a group.
I don't know if this wandered off-topic or not, but all of these things seem to be symptoms of a growing seperation between physical ownership and the things we metaphysically own (like friendships).
What saddens me is this is one of my fav shows. We just moved into a new apartment this past weekend, and we were finally able to get digital cable (yay!) which meant FoodTV which meant Iron Chef. No more borrowing videotaped shows from friends.
I had perused ironchef.com and it was a very cool fan site. I could see if they were upset that they didnt have the domain name, and wanted to buy/make an offer for it so they could create their own info site, but to blast down the very people who have, in a large part, been the reason that this show has taken off in the US is sad. I am not even sure how the copyright issue can be stated, since it seems to fall under fair use. Ironchef.com only had a few stills, no video that I was aware of, and focused on the content of the show. Trademark dilution.. maybe, but it seems it would be hard to prove it in court.
I am going to have to think long and hard about this one, I am really torn. I have written a letter of protest to both the Food Network and also to Fuji. I don't know what good it will do, but its worth a shot.
Is that these holes still exist on systems because admins are being LAZY. Lazy thinking 'I am running a *nix-based system and therefor I am more secure than Winblowze.'
Here's a nice reminder: if you aren't constantly working on your security, SOMEONE ELSE IS! And I am not refering to your assistant admin, either.
Maintaining box/network security is a full-time job. And its a case of constant vigilence. You cant operate on the rules of it 'cant happen to me.' One look at Attrition.org's mirror site should prove you otherwise.
So take this as a wake up call. Before you get woken with a call...
*more ramblings - can you tell its a slow day at work?*
The article states: "Accessing and damaging a computer or system is a felony of the third degree, facing a seven-year sentence and $15,000 fine. Interfering with a computer, system, or network or giving out a password or other confidential information about a system is a misdemeanor of the first degree, with a maximum penalty of five years and $10,000 fine. "
What scares me is the part where they refer to 'other confidential information.' That is such an amazingly grey area. And what constitutes giving out a password? Once again, the focus should be on 'illegally obtaining passwords.' This is a section where the victim (piegon in a scam) could be prosecuted for their unwitting part in a crime. (Remember the IQ of the average user).
Attacking back is just going to give the government and industries a reason to try and pass more controlling legislation. Its too close to them being able to create a "Wild West" analogy, where they would have to protect the "innocent women and children."
There have long been accepted channels for handling these situations, such as contacting the sysadmins for the ISPs, *cough* the FBI & local police (Okay, I know, they are often clueless, but they arent going to get MORE clueful if we keep going AROUND them!), etc.
Powell's Bookstore in Portland, OR is the largest new and used bookstore in the US. They link up with smaller bookstores as well, and can often get out of print and rare books with amazing ease. Their website is http://www.powells.com
Oh, I saw it.. but it was so buried I considered the mention negligable... I should have probably stated myself more clearly but I had someone jabbering in my ear while I was typing. (I know, I know, not an excuse!)
That story is really misleading - and an attempt, accurate or not, to focus on technologies such as Napster for the loss of sales. It reeks of being a 'study' set up for Exhibit A in a lawsuit. Other major technology factors such as BUYING A CD ONLINE were apparently ignored. Additionally, how does this fit in with the huge increase in sales/profit that the RIAA has reported for the past 2 years?
I tend to buy most of my CD's online these days, unless I am hunting through used cd stores. Its easier, faster, and less stressful. That, and the selection is infinitely better.
...They are growing pains of our government, and hence, by extension, ourselves coming to terms with what we have wrought.
Once we accept that we are going to have bad laws, we can then take the next step: not only working with our congresspeople to see these laws repealed/amended but also to work towards creating sensible legislation that will protect the users, creators and infrastructure of the internet.
We cannot just sit here and make commentary after commentary - we have to make sure we are heard. Right now the major corporations and organizations (MS, RIAA, MPAA) have our leaderships ears. Hence, they are controlling what kind of legislation is being put out there. Send links to articles and threads to your congressman, to your senator, to your city mayor and your state governor, because laws and regulations are being considered on all levels.
the intro is awesome....waiting for my copy....
on
Acts Of The Apostles
·
· Score: 3
A friend of mine had actually pointed me to the online chapters a few days ago.. and my copy is already on order.
In a way, I wish I kinda hadn't peeked yet, though, because the way he builds the story is terrific, and I am half-afraid of losing the pacing. Not to mention the HUGE delay (TWO DAYS!) in being able to read more.
My suggestion: If Hemos' review is good enough to get you interested in buying it, buy it blind, and then read it from beginning to end.
What I am curious about - since the laywers for Metallica are making an accusation that the Napster users who were offering Metallica songs for download are breaking the law - and if any of those users were *wrongly* accused, what remedy do they have?
If I am wrongly accused of a normal crime, I have channels I can go through to see recompense. What recompense does DMCA allow? Any?
When you are going to release a product that allows so much interoperability, one would assume that those very functions that allow that interoperability would be slammed, nuked, beaten and in every way imaginable explored, repaired, and THEN the software released.
But it appears that MS is relying on the general public to act as its beta testers, to search out and discover these holes. They are complacent, non-proactive, and basically riding on the assumption that people will continue to use their products no matter how low the quality level goes.
This is one area.. where the communities like Open Source can really shine. Because opening your code to peer review keeps you on your toes. It allows different minds to work together cooperatively to create a better software package. And in the end, everyone benefits.
I know this is a bit of a rehash of stuff I have said before, but since we all know that MS is paying very close attention to everything written here on/., maybe repeating some basic concepts will beat the idea into their brains...
.doc &.xls were how most viruses used to get passed -- *cough* back in the 'old' days.
It took new and improved MS Outlook to allow more fun ways of nuking computer systems.
The solution isnt to back track, but to figure out how to go forward while sandboxing the current problem so that any code executed in Outlook stays within Outlook.
When is MS going to actually create solutions that address the problem in an adult manner? Resolving an issue by simply creating a new way to ignore it is the actions of a 5 year old child, and should not be the reactions of a company that is supposed to be a market leader.
Intelligent file distribution via email has become a standard for many companies to distrubute information to their employees. Good thing there are MUCH better clients out there - I hope they take this opportunity to grab some market share from the bloated behemoth that is MS.
Flatrabbit has pointed out something very important here... how places like Slashdot, where the 'smart masses' can come to discuss ideas, concepts, technologies, hot grits, etc constantly challenge us to keep our eyes open, consider the impact of new laws and technology not from a company viewpoint, but from a cultural one.
I was very pro-'let the market decide what technologies were best.' It took my friends, who are some very serious open source/linux/BSD/Mac enthusiasts to get me to realize that so much potential was being wasted and destroyed because the very people who wanted to innovate could not do so unless they did it on MS's terms.
I don't always agree with the editorials on here. I don't always agree with my fellow posters. But I have learned a tremendous amount not only about the current state of the community, but also where our potential for growth lies, and where I want *my* growth to be.
Kudos not only to the Slashdot team, but also to everyone here who has posted real thoughts and ideas and kept the ball rolling.
Slashdot Mirror
oh, they cant use THAT email
but they VERY well can use that as a reason to begin investigating you. Just because the current set of evidence is inadmissable does not mean they are not going to try and find MORE evidence later on.
Its not just what they are currently after - remember that the FBI has to continually justify its existance by targetting and 'destroying' dangerous criminals. And its always nice to have a list of extra targets at hand.
Is to see how the claims get handled. If basic security proceedures were not followed (patches, closing off extraneous ports, etc) will the claim be paid? If they are paid, it will set a bad precendent, and give companies an excuse to maintain poor security, hire less qualified admins, and just file claims when bad stuff happens.
If they DO deny claims based on lack of basic preparedness, it could benefit the overall community by making it worth the company's pocketbook to make sure their admins are well trained, and have the equipment and software they need. Lawyers LOVE it when companies have insurance policies - it means larger settlements for them.
Check out this link on the ACLU website. The riders that are attached to this legislation are going to increase the police powers of the goverment, effectively giving them the ability to shut down websites that they consider 'dangerous', and do computer search and seizures without notification. Its scary. And it already passed the Senate unanimously. I wrote my represenatative in Congress, and he fed me back some pap about how the Act was good, I was just misunderstanding it. I think the language is pretty clear on this one.
Its made up of lots of medium and small ones. YES large companies can afford to do all of that, but smaller and medium sized ones can't afford the solutions you are listing.
I work for and with those companies as a living. I am not a 19 year old kid playing with Perl (I do play with perl though!). They cannot afford the sheer level of staffing required to keep up with the patches, fixes, etc that problems like the recent outlook virii/trojan horses/worms have caused.
The real world is made up of little people, not big companies. Big companies only employ a very small percentage of the workforce as compared to small and medium businesses.
This isn't socialism, this is being practical. Microsoft is a monopoly, and monopolies are allowable as long as they don't break certain rules. MS not only broke those rules, they were very proud of breaking them, and have refused again and again to modify their business practices.
They claim there is no precedent for what is being done to them - two words "Standard Oil." There's the precedent. Or the movie making industry in the 30's who owned the movies, the distribution process AND the theaters.
MS could not even innovate a new way to be a monopoly!
Last night, while channel surfing I ran across Bill Gates and Steve in their little press conference. I really had no intention of actually listening to it, but I found myself caught and amazed.
Bill isn't stupid. Neither is Steve. But they are both publically insisting that MS did no wrong. Bear with me here a second, I know *we* all know otherwise. However, during mediation, MS *did* propose solutions to 'curb' their business practices, which while mild were at least a tacit admission of guilt. Now they are not only saying that they will fight to the finish on the judgement, but that they will also fight even having to do the remedies that they originally suggested themselves.
Up until now, MS has relied on a rather stupid public to believe that they were the injured parties, but between these very publically contradictory actions, and realization that consumers are having about the fact that they are not allowed to actually have full copies of the software that they purchased, public opinion is rapidly going to turn against MS. And that is one factor that they have been heavily relying on.
No matter how big their PR machine gets, their horrid business practices are now too glaring to be remedied... and I expect to see public support not only eroding away, but a growing customer base looking for alternatives to having to use MS. OSX, anyone? I bet the people at Apple are grinning like fiends.
But it also would help drive the Linux desktop market. And that would be a good thing to get Linux a larger market share and more widespread acceptance.
Strange bedfellows, yes.. but no stranger than the announcement that Perl and Python are going to become part of Visual Studio 7.
Napster and the Offspring are proof that intelligent people can reach amicable solutions if they just talk to one another.
Now THERE'S a business model for the new millenium!
IE and Office for Linux will come out?
If they appear on the shelved in less than 3-6 months after the breakup is official, you know that MS has been actively prepping ports for those products during the whole trial process.
I hope though, that the Justice Dept continues tight monitoring even after the breakup - each of these companies still has the potential to develop into a new monopoly. Old practices are going to die hard.
The demo was too much of a tease. Waiting was getting unbearable. Yes, I was expecting a bit more out of the engine, but I will take playability (which it has) and fun over bleeding edge graphics any day. The pizza delivery guys in my neighborhood are going to be *very* happy ...
Especially if you work in IT, your life may have a deep sense of transience. IT people travel more, get transferred more, and tend to spend more time isolated than any other group (except maybe labratory scientists!).
Leased houses, apartments, cars, etc just fit into a sense of never quite belonging, or being there. We develop online communities (like Slashdot, or my old MUD, Tsunami) to combat the transience of the of our lives. As long as I can get online, I can be with my friends, I can be informed, I can be part of a group.
I don't know if this wandered off-topic or not, but all of these things seem to be symptoms of a growing seperation between physical ownership and the things we metaphysically own (like friendships).
(just my 2 sleep and caffeine deprived cents!)
FORGING is a crime. Falsely representing yourself as someone else, its a crime. As in illegal.
Spam is also wrong and evil, so this seems more of a case of two wrongs making him well... more wrong.
What amazes me is that he actually considered this to be a defensible argument. The depths of human stupidity never cease to amaze me.
What saddens me is this is one of my fav shows. We just moved into a new apartment this past weekend, and we were finally able to get digital cable (yay!) which meant FoodTV which meant Iron Chef. No more borrowing videotaped shows from friends.
I had perused ironchef.com and it was a very cool fan site. I could see if they were upset that they didnt have the domain name, and wanted to buy/make an offer for it so they could create their own info site, but to blast down the very people who have, in a large part, been the reason that this show has taken off in the US is sad. I am not even sure how the copyright issue can be stated, since it seems to fall under fair use. Ironchef.com only had a few stills, no video that I was aware of, and focused on the content of the show. Trademark dilution.. maybe, but it seems it would be hard to prove it in court.
I am going to have to think long and hard about this one, I am really torn. I have written a letter of protest to both the Food Network and also to Fuji. I don't know what good it will do, but its worth a shot.
Is that these holes still exist on systems because admins are being LAZY. Lazy thinking 'I am running a *nix-based system and therefor I am more secure than Winblowze.'
...
Here's a nice reminder: if you aren't constantly working on your security, SOMEONE ELSE IS! And I am not refering to your assistant admin, either.
Maintaining box/network security is a full-time job. And its a case of constant vigilence. You cant operate on the rules of it 'cant happen to me.' One look at Attrition.org's mirror site should prove you otherwise.
So take this as a wake up call. Before you get woken with a call
*more ramblings - can you tell its a slow day at work?*
The article states:
"Accessing and damaging a computer or system is a felony of the third degree, facing a seven-year sentence and $15,000 fine. Interfering with a computer, system, or network or giving out a password or other confidential information about a system is a misdemeanor of the first degree, with a maximum penalty of five years and $10,000 fine. "
What scares me is the part where they refer to 'other confidential information.' That is such an amazingly grey area. And what constitutes giving out a password? Once again, the focus should be on 'illegally obtaining passwords.' This is a section where the victim (piegon in a scam) could be prosecuted for their unwitting part in a crime. (Remember the IQ of the average user).
Just a few rambling thoughts from yours truly.
Attacking back is just going to give the government and industries a reason to try and pass more controlling legislation. Its too close to them being able to create a "Wild West" analogy, where they would have to protect the "innocent women and children."
There have long been accepted channels for handling these situations, such as contacting the sysadmins for the ISPs, *cough* the FBI & local police (Okay, I know, they are often clueless, but they arent going to get MORE clueful if we keep going AROUND them!), etc.
Powell's Bookstore in Portland, OR is the largest new and used bookstore in the US. They link up with smaller bookstores as well, and can often get out of print and rare books with amazing ease. Their website is http://www.powells.com
Happy Reading!
Oh, I saw it.. but it was so buried I considered the mention negligable... I should have probably stated myself more clearly but I had someone jabbering in my ear while I was typing. (I know, I know, not an excuse!)
That story is really misleading - and an attempt, accurate or not, to focus on technologies such as Napster for the loss of sales. It reeks of being a 'study' set up for Exhibit A in a lawsuit. Other major technology factors such as BUYING A CD ONLINE were apparently ignored. Additionally, how does this fit in with the huge increase in sales/profit that the RIAA has reported for the past 2 years?
I tend to buy most of my CD's online these days, unless I am hunting through used cd stores. Its easier, faster, and less stressful. That, and the selection is infinitely better.
...They are growing pains of our government, and hence, by extension, ourselves coming to terms with what we have wrought.
Once we accept that we are going to have bad laws, we can then take the next step: not only working with our congresspeople to see these laws repealed/amended but also to work towards creating sensible legislation that will protect the users, creators and infrastructure of the internet.
We cannot just sit here and make commentary after commentary - we have to make sure we are heard. Right now the major corporations and organizations (MS, RIAA, MPAA) have our leaderships ears. Hence, they are controlling what kind of legislation is being put out there. Send links to articles and threads to your congressman, to your senator, to your city mayor and your state governor, because laws and regulations are being considered on all levels.
A friend of mine had actually pointed me to the online chapters a few days ago.. and my copy is already on order.
In a way, I wish I kinda hadn't peeked yet, though, because the way he builds the story is terrific, and I am half-afraid of losing the pacing. Not to mention the HUGE delay (TWO DAYS!) in being able to read more.
My suggestion: If Hemos' review is good enough to get you interested in buying it, buy it blind, and then read it from beginning to end.
What I am curious about - since the laywers for Metallica are making an accusation that the Napster users who were offering Metallica songs for download are breaking the law - and if any of those users were *wrongly* accused, what remedy do they have?
If I am wrongly accused of a normal crime, I have channels I can go through to see recompense. What recompense does DMCA allow? Any?
When you are going to release a product that allows so much interoperability, one would assume that those very functions that allow that interoperability would be slammed, nuked, beaten and in every way imaginable explored, repaired, and THEN the software released.
/., maybe repeating some basic concepts will beat the idea into their brains...
But it appears that MS is relying on the general public to act as its beta testers, to search out and discover these holes. They are complacent, non-proactive, and basically riding on the assumption that people will continue to use their products no matter how low the quality level goes.
This is one area.. where the communities like Open Source can really shine. Because opening your code to peer review keeps you on your toes. It allows different minds to work together cooperatively to create a better software package. And in the end, everyone benefits.
I know this is a bit of a rehash of stuff I have said before, but since we all know that MS is paying very close attention to everything written here on
One can always hope...
.doc & .xls were how most viruses used to get passed -- *cough* back in the 'old' days.
It took new and improved MS Outlook to allow more fun ways of nuking computer systems.
The solution isnt to back track, but to figure out how to go forward while sandboxing the current problem so that any code executed in Outlook stays within Outlook.
I wish I could say I was surprised.
When is MS going to actually create solutions that address the problem in an adult manner? Resolving an issue by simply creating a new way to ignore it is the actions of a 5 year old child, and should not be the reactions of a company that is supposed to be a market leader.
Intelligent file distribution via email has become a standard for many companies to distrubute information to their employees. Good thing there are MUCH better clients out there - I hope they take this opportunity to grab some market share from the bloated behemoth that is MS.
Flatrabbit has pointed out something very important here... how places like Slashdot, where the 'smart masses' can come to discuss ideas, concepts, technologies, hot grits, etc constantly challenge us to keep our eyes open, consider the impact of new laws and technology not from a company viewpoint, but from a cultural one.
I was very pro-'let the market decide what technologies were best.' It took my friends, who are some very serious open source/linux/BSD/Mac enthusiasts to get me to realize that so much potential was being wasted and destroyed because the very people who wanted to innovate could not do so unless they did it on MS's terms.
I don't always agree with the editorials on here. I don't always agree with my fellow posters. But I have learned a tremendous amount not only about the current state of the community, but also where our potential for growth lies, and where I want *my* growth to be.
Kudos not only to the Slashdot team, but also to everyone here who has posted real thoughts and ideas and kept the ball rolling.