Your complaints about digital cameras in terms of reaction time were true many years ago. Since the introduction of the Nikon D-series and the Canon digital SLR line (D30, D60, 10D, 1D, 1Ds, Digital Rebel) they are no longer true. (Earlier, Kodak and probably other manufacturers had fast digital SLRs but they were in the $10K-$20K realm.)
Bottom line: Buy a Canon or Nikon. Unless you never want to change cameras, do *not* buy a Pentax or Minolta or any other brand.
The reason for this is simple. Pro photographers shoot Canon or Nikon, meaning those brands have the best selection of lenses and accessories if you ever wish to upgrade. Or if you want to rent a 15mm or an 800mm lens from your local pro shop just for the hell of it. Or if you want a nice fisheye, and so on and so on.
If you fit into the may-upgrade-at-some-point category, I'd recommend Canon (I own both). Canon seems to be beating Nikon on the price-performance camera body benchmark thanks to the Digital Rebel and the 10D. Lenses aren't as different. A Canon EOS 5 can be found cheaply used (I bought mine new from B&H in 1999), and is a nice prosumer body. The Rebel 2000 is much lighter and is cheaper.
Good luck! You'd probably do better, though, by checking out existing resources like photo.net. They answer this question in some detail.
Contrary to what Brett says above, the article was deleted at least half a year ago, not "two months ago."
Also, if you actually take the time to *read* the Slate article, you'd see that Time said they had permission to publish it only for a week (while the magazine was on the newsstands) and neglected to delete it after that week had lapsed.
drfireman is correct to say I didn't mention Politech in the column. But as far as I've been able to determine, my FBI letter was word-for-word identical to the letters other reporters received. So it's almost certainly irrelevant.
Perhaps a more interesting question: The New York Times runs its own mailing list. In the hypothetical case that reporters were allowed to post to it directly, would they enjoy reduced First Amendment protections and be covered by this law? Or, more realistically, lots of reporters operate blogs, and lots of those blogs permit comments and send email when they're updated... Perhaps all journalists will be ISPs in the future.:)
Well, trog, you're also right in a very limited sense: PGP could suffer from such problems. But there's a big difference between a theoretical possibility and reality, and PGP's source has undergone unusually exhaustive scrutiny. There is no evidence that RSA or any other algorithm used in PGP is crippled inadvertently or intentionally. Time to put this urban legend to rest.
Unless they're wire service photogs with already-past deadlines, serious photographers still use analog. I spent last weekend traveling with President Clinton, and there were precious few photographers on the press plane with digital cameras.
There are many reasons for this, most of which I covered in a Wired article last December.
Eventually digital will catch up, and it is an at-least-theoretically-unnecessary-and-definitely- costly pain to develop and scan in slides and negatives. But digital still isn't there yet.
I was at the hearing; you can find an article I wrote (filed via Palm VII directly from the courthouse) at wired.com. You'll see another there at 6 am et Tues.
The settlement agreement is not private. I have a copy, and quoted from it in my article.
The agreement requires that Jansson "has not assigned or licensed" the rights to cphack etc.
Mattel is claiming victory. Few people in the "real world" read Slashdot and see the furor here. Mattel's attorneys are crowing about the evil "hackers" and the PR flacks are having a field day. I flew back on the plane to DC with one; I know.
They're reading./ -- in fact, attorney Irwin Schwartz introduced part of a slashdot posting during the hearing today as examples of how the evil hax0rs are trying to circumvent the Authority of the Court.
Even though I just linked to the cphack app from my article, I got a subpoena. It's unclear to me what happens next. A reasonable interpretation for me and everyone else is that the subpoenas are void now since the permanent injunction is about to be granted and the case settled.
It would be interesting -- purely from a news perspective -- to see someone else write a cphack2 program that used *none* of the source of the original and just the description of the cryptanalysis outlined in the soon-to-be-no-longer defendants' essay. Shouldn't be too difficult.
The ACLU is going to keep fighting as long as Mattel is insisting (which Irwin is) that the permanent injunction applies to mirror sites and violators are up to contempt charges.
Slashdot Mirror
Your complaints about digital cameras in terms of reaction time were true many years ago. Since the introduction of the Nikon D-series and the Canon digital SLR line (D30, D60, 10D, 1D, 1Ds, Digital Rebel) they are no longer true. (Earlier, Kodak and probably other manufacturers had fast digital SLRs but they were in the $10K-$20K realm.)
Bottom line: Buy a Canon or Nikon. Unless you never want to change cameras, do *not* buy a Pentax or Minolta or any other brand.
The reason for this is simple. Pro photographers shoot Canon or Nikon, meaning those brands have the best selection of lenses and accessories if you ever wish to upgrade. Or if you want to rent a 15mm or an 800mm lens from your local pro shop just for the hell of it. Or if you want a nice fisheye, and so on and so on.
If you fit into the may-upgrade-at-some-point category, I'd recommend Canon (I own both). Canon seems to be beating Nikon on the price-performance camera body benchmark thanks to the Digital Rebel and the 10D. Lenses aren't as different. A Canon EOS 5 can be found cheaply used (I bought mine new from B&H in 1999), and is a nice prosumer body. The Rebel 2000 is much lighter and is cheaper.
Good luck! You'd probably do better, though, by checking out existing resources like photo.net. They answer this question in some detail.
You're looking at the wrong bill, FYI. But many of your criticisms are nevertheless valid for the correct bill.
Contrary to what Brett says above, the article was deleted at least half a year ago, not "two months ago."
Also, if you actually take the time to *read* the Slate article, you'd see that Time said they had permission to publish it only for a week (while the magazine was on the newsstands) and neglected to delete it after that week had lapsed.
No coincidence. The list is up and running just fine, with messages posted to the web site this morning. I just haven't reintalled mhonarc on the new server. See: http://politechbot.com/pipermail/politech/2003-Oct ober/date.html
Perhaps a more interesting question: The New York Times runs its own mailing list. In the hypothetical case that reporters were allowed to post to it directly, would they enjoy reduced First Amendment protections and be covered by this law? Or, more realistically, lots of reporters operate blogs, and lots of those blogs permit comments and send email when they're updated... Perhaps all journalists will be ISPs in the future. :)
The Privacy Snatchers (from time.com)
(Too bad I wasn't able to include the LAPD scandal in that piece.)
Well, trog, you're also right in a very limited sense: PGP could suffer from such problems. But there's a big difference between a theoretical possibility and reality, and PGP's source has undergone unusually exhaustive scrutiny. There is no evidence that RSA or any other algorithm used in PGP is crippled inadvertently or intentionally. Time to put this urban legend to rest.
There are many reasons for this, most of which I covered in a Wired article last December.
Eventually digital will catch up, and it is an at-least-theoretically-unnecessary-and-definitely- costly pain to develop and scan in slides and negatives. But digital still isn't there yet.
Some examples, from my personal photo site:
DMCA protest:
analog
digital
Supreme Court:
analog
digital
B&W portraits:
analog
digital
B&W scenes:
analog
digital
Images that would be very difficult to replicate in digital:
portrait
nude
I was at the hearing; you can find an article I wrote (filed via Palm VII directly from the courthouse) at wired.com. You'll see another there at 6 am et Tues.
./ -- in fact, attorney Irwin Schwartz introduced part of a slashdot posting during the hearing today as examples of how the evil hax0rs are trying to circumvent the Authority of the Court.
The settlement agreement is not private. I have a copy, and quoted from it in my article.
The agreement requires that Jansson "has not assigned or licensed" the rights to cphack etc.
Mattel is claiming victory. Few people in the "real world" read Slashdot and see the furor here. Mattel's attorneys are crowing about the evil "hackers" and the PR flacks are having a field day. I flew back on the plane to DC with one; I know.
They're reading
Even though I just linked to the cphack app from my article, I got a subpoena. It's unclear to me what happens next. A reasonable interpretation for me and everyone else is that the subpoenas are void now since the permanent injunction is about to be granted and the case settled.
It would be interesting -- purely from a news perspective -- to see someone else write a cphack2 program that used *none* of the source of the original and just the description of the cryptanalysis outlined in the soon-to-be-no-longer defendants' essay. Shouldn't be too difficult.
The ACLU is going to keep fighting as long as Mattel is insisting (which Irwin is) that the permanent injunction applies to mirror sites and violators are up to contempt charges.