Posts by Chris C

Evidence preferred, but not necessary

In this day and age, in virtually any trial it seems (but especially a technology-related trial or an emotional trial such as murder or any trial involving children), evidence is no longer required. It's preferred to have actual evidence, but it's not necessary. Today's juries will convict regardless of whether or not evidence exists or proof was established. It's groupthink at its finest. If you want an example, just look at the previous comments here. There are a number of people who appear to believe he did it, though I can't possibly understand why.

It's sad that someone's life was senselessly and violently ended prematurely. It's sadder that his family and friends have to carry this with them and try to go on with their own lives. But the saddest, in my opinion, is that our (and by "our", I mean society's) need for "justice" and revenge is so great that things like proof or reasonable doubt are ignored in a pathetic attempt to "solve" everything with the least amount of work possible.

Parallel importing

Complaining about "parallel importing" is nothing more than saying "Waaah! I want more money!" If a company is willing to sell a product at a specific price point, why is it illegal to buy that product at that price? Just because the company doesn't make as much money as they'd like? Guess what -- there's no guaranteed right to profit. Where will they draw the line with "parallel importing"? Right now they seem to draw the line at country borders, but it doesn't have to stay that way. "What's that, you bought our product is a neighboring city? I'm sorry, but that's illegal. You must buy it in your home city." There's literally no difference.

If a company is selling a product at a specific price, and I'm willing to pay that price, the government shouldn't get in the way. It's a legitimate and fair trade. I give them the cash they're asking for, and they give me the product I'm asking for. Everyone is happy. They only complain when they find out I live somewhere else.

And before someone starts talking about different prices for different economic areas, let me be the first to say "I don't care". If a company is willing to sell a product at a specific price, then anybody should be able to buy it from that location at that price. For example, if a company in the UK is able to buy software from the US and still sell it for less than the company is charging, then that shows the fallacy of the "but it's because of our higher operating costs" argument.

Verisign

Boy, I sure am glad that Verisign has been given irrevocable, perpetual control over .com. It's nice to have a company that'll stand up for the rights of the domain owner and not simply transfer the domain to whoever complains... Oh, oh wait, nevermind.

And we wonder why the world wants to do away with ICANN? No more proof is needed to see that the Internet is a US-owned and US-controlled property, and we're all just renting space.

Idiots

Is this really such a difficult concept for the majority of the commenters here to understand? As a web publisher, you have COMPLETE AND TOTAL CONTROL over your own website (unless you've been hacked). The fact that you CHOOSE to use an advertising engine which does not give you advance notice of which advertisement will be shown in a specific location at a specific time does not change that. You still have COMPLETE control over your own web site.

There's a simple solution -- if you don't like the rule, stop displaying adverts (or at least stop using the ad engines in question). "Waaah! But my advertising revenue! Waaaaah!" Cry me a river. There is nothing that says you can do whatever you want with impunity, and there is no god- or government-given right to host a web page. If you find that you cannot host a web page without violating any laws, then again, there's a simple solution -- don't host the web page. It really is just that simple.

As for "Whose interest are they protecting", are you actually suggesting there should be different laws for commercial entities and non-commercial entities?

Most (all?) advertising engines do not give you advance notice of what ad will be served when. But that doesn't mean that's the way it needs to be, nor does it indicate that that's the way it should be. There was once a time when all computer data was unencrypted, too, but we've moved away from that.

Oh, and as for "Pretending the web is a newspaper doesn't make it so. A newspaper *does* get to see and choose and place an ad, a web publisher does not.", THEY'RE EXACTLY THE SAME THING!! Just because you, as a web publisher, CHOOSE to not view each advertisement that is displayed on your website (and a newspaper does choose to view each advertisement that is displayed in its pages) doesn't change that fact. It's people like you that are trying to twist the system because you find operating within the confines of the law uncomfortable or inconvenient.

re: 250GB sounds fair

"Although 250GB sounds like a small chunk, it is equal to downloading a 8GB HD movie *every day*. If you have a life, you would not be generating this amount of traffic. So to me it sounds fair"

Except when you stop and think that most people watch TV an average of 2-4 hours per day. So one movie per day is *NOT* a lot. Also keep in mind that Comcast (along with the other "high-speed" carriers) explicitly advertise streaming HD video as a selling point of their service. Add to that the fact that various studios, distributors, companies, etc are trying to entice people to legally download their (HD) content instead of buying DVDs.

When you add it all up, 250GB per month is *NOT* a lot. Yes, it's more than most people will currently use, but in this day and age, it's not a lot.

Having said that, I'm extremely happy to finally have a number instead of having Comcast require me to agree to limits that are never disclosed, limits which they actively refused to disclose. It's just sad that this is what it took for them to disclose the limit.

re: Puzzling

"Comcast still has subscribers? Why?"

Because we have no choice. In terms of faster-than-dialup Internet access, we have between one and five choices, depending on whether each of these is available in the area:

1. Cable -- Provides access to the entire town/city. You are limited to the one cable company providing service to your area. Moderate price.

2. DSL -- Provides access only to customers within range of the CO, does not provide access to to entire town/city. In reality, you are limited to the one phone company, though you may be paying someone else who effectively leases the line from the phone company. Low to high price depending on maximum speed and type of DSL (ADSL, SDSL, etc).

3. Satellite -- Provides access only to areas which can get a clear signal to/from the satellite. Some services require dial-up for upstream. Typically there's zero or one providers available. Expensive.

4. Cellular -- Provides access only to areas which can get a clear cellular signal. This is the option which has the most competition because while there are only three of four companies to pick from, "three or four" is still more than the "one" available with cable or DSL. Extremely expensive.

5. Fiber -- Provides access only to specific areas of specific metropolitan cities (at least in the US). You are limited to the one phone company. Price unknown.

My friend just bought a house, and DSL isn't available, so his only choice is cable. My only choices are cable (Comast) and DSL (Verizon). It's easy to say "you should leave and let your money talk"; it's another matter when you have no other option. That's why we call them monopolies.

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re: "Have separate subscriptions" @ranga

I couldn't agree more. In fact, I'm sick of subsidizing all those wimps who feel the need to use SSL when paying by credit card. Don't they know SSL takes up a lot more bandwidth? I'm also sick of subsidizing all those people who endlessly forward email and those who use HTML email. Don't they know all those forwards and all that HTML content uses a lot more traffic than plaintext? Don't even get me started on base64-encoded attachments...

In case you couldn't tell, we call that "sarcasm". An ISP shouldn't care what protocols a customer is using. What they CAN care about is how much traffic and how much bandwidth a customer is using (you did know that traffic and bandwidth aren't the same thing, right?). However, since Comcast sells their service as "unlimited", they have absolutely zero right to complain about any traffic or bandwidth issues arising out of a customer's use of the service.

But since you feel so strongly about it, may I ask why you feel that P2P is worse than any other protocol (for instance, HTTP)? If my neighbor wrote a book and distributed a text copy of that book via P2P, how is that any worse than me VPNing into a client and transferring backup files? Or somebody using Google or another space-for-rent host and uploading files to the host for backup purposes? Hint: it's no different.

The only legitimate thing any ISP can do is throttle an individual user for going over a specific threshold (whether that threshold is traffic, bandwidth, number of connections, etc). And even that is not legitimate when the ISP sells their service as "unlimited". In no event is it valid or legitimate to throttle a protocol. What's next? Throttling HTTP or HTTPS once enough BTers start using ports 80 or 443? How about throttling HTTP (80) and SMTP (25 and 587) for everybody if one customer is sending out lots of spam? Maybe throttling DNS (53) if people still insist on using names instead of IP addresses? You see how stupid it sounds? But in reality, those scenarios are no different than what Comcast is already doing. And if you even think of saying "But they would never do that!", please bang your head on your keyboard until you're unconscious.

@Nigel

"Please, every Google-hater here, please list all the bad things that have happened precisely because Google keeps usage statistics. All I'm seeing here is fear and paranoia."

Ah, so you're a fan of the "if it hasn't happened yet, it won't happen" game? Perfect! I have not died yet. I guess that means I'll never die. Sounds good at first, but I might grow bored after 600 or 700 years. Also, I have never been hit by a vehicle. Does that mean I can walk across the street without looking without fear of being hit?

Or, if you'd like a better analogy, a couple of years ago, TJX's network had not yet had its bleeding-edge WEP encryption cracked, and crackers had not captured the details of 49 million accounts. But we all know how that turned out.

Up to 9/11, the US government had not systematically stripped away the rights guaranteed to us by our Constitution, and they at least gave the impression of honoring the Bill of Rights. That's not the case anymore.

Just because something hasn't happened YET doesn't mean it won't happen. And in this case, "fear and paranoia", as you put it, is justified. With overzealous governments, "law enforcement" agencies, and good old witch hunts, having your search data stored for so long can come back to bite you in the ass. Especially if you happen to enter a search query which either was acceptable and now is not, or that can be taken out of context. For example, imagine the government's interest in search records for "Anthrax" before and after the US' anthrax-in-the-mail problem. Or a search for "holy war punishment due".

In the current political climate, paranoia is justified. Yes, we can eliminate the problem of stored search queries by not using search engines, but the point of this post was to point out the idiocy of your comment.

Deep-linking and idiots

First, the issue of deep-linking. To all of you on here claiming how easy it is to prevent, please, share with the class. Tell us how easy it is. And while you're telling us, keep in mind that there are security products (and probably even some proxies) which strip the referrer header, so you can NOT rely on the value (or even the existence) of the referrer header in your method.

For the idiots saying she's being greedy -- I agree that $250k is excessive, but I think she's trying to make a point. The point being that the city does not have a right to abuse its powers. If she just got a check for $500 or whatever, it wouldn't be sufficient enough to make the mayor/city say "Well, maybe we shouldn't try that again". I understand this is punishing the taxpayers, but what's the alternative? Let the city do whatever it wants without recourse?

For the idiots saying she should just drop it -- why? She had to hire (and pay) a lawyer to get justice. And lawyers aren't cheap. Why should she have to pay what is probably thousands of dollars because the mayor and/or city wanted to abuse his/its power? Why shouldn't she be compensated for what she actually had to pay? As for the punitive damages, why shouldn't she be compensated for the hassle they illegally put her through?

Laughing all the way to the bank

Yes, we in the US pay for every text sent AND received, whether it's unsolicited or not. And (at least with Verizon Wireless), there's no way to disable incoming texts, so you get charged whenever someone sends you a text, even if you don't want it, even if it's advertising or spam.

To put the 20-cents-per-text cost in context, I just checked AT&T Wireless' website and looked at their data plans. I know, I know, data is not texting, but it offers a valid byte-to-dollar comparison. Let's assume 200 bytes per text message, as mentioned above (seems like a fair number).

AT&T Wireless' rates:

http://www.wireless.att.com/businesscenter/business-programs/mid-large/wwan.jsp

http://www.wireless.att.com/learn/international/roaming/affordable-world-packages.jsp

http://www.wireless.att.com/learn/popups/iphone-data-info.jsp

Business plan of $8.99 for 1MB with overage fee of $0.02/KB --> $0.02/KB = $0.00001953125/byte = $0.00390625/text --> $0.20/text is 51.2X this cost --> 20-cents-per-text is 50X (5,000%) more expensive than this data plan.

iPhone plan of $59.99 for 50MB with overage fee of $0.005/KB --> $0.005/KB = $0.0000048828125/byte = $0.0009765625/text --> $0.20/text is 204.8X this cost --> 20-cents-per-text is over 200X (20,000%) more expensive than this data plan.

Business plan of $29.99 for 20MB with overage fee of $0.001/KB --> $0.001/KB = $0.0000009765625/byte = $0.0001953125/text --> $0.20/text is 1,024X this cost --> 20-cents-per-text is over 1,000X (100,000%) more expensive than this data plan.

So the cost of sending or receiving a text message ranges from 5,000% to more than 100,000% more expensive than transmitting the same number of bytes in a data plan. Ma Bell never even dreamed of those kinds of profits.

@Paul

"If you normally eat a reasonable meal at a restaurant and then one day they offer you an all you can eat deal do you stay there eating constantly till, ala Mr Creosote, you explode?"

I don't use BitTorrent, and my internet usage is pretty low, so I'm in no danger of reaching any reasonable cap. But I still feel the need to respond because comments like this get under my skin.

The amount of data you request via downloading (or provide via uploading) is completely irrelevant. There are three simple points that need to be made:

1. Comcast claims you get "up to" a specified bandwidth, 8Mbps down and 1Mbps up in my case.

2. Comcast claims you have unlimited usage.

3. You pay a monthly subscription fee for the service specified in those first two points.

I could add a fourth point, in that Comcast explicitly promotes their cable internet service as being used for downloading and streaming music and movies. This is what they show in their television advertisements, so it's not unreasonable for people to participate in actions that are explicitly promoted in the advertisements.

Given these points, it would be logical to conclude that you are allowed to use your full bandwidth all day long without penalty. Now, if Comcast wants to remove "unlimited" and instead specify a cap, that would be fine. Then people would know that it is a limited capacity they can consume for their monthly subscription payment. But Comcast doesn't want to do that. They want to use the word "unlimited" while providing a limited service. In other words, they feel the only way people will pay for their service is if they advertise and sell it under false pretenses.

For people that like analogies, how about comparing your cable or DSL line to a T1 line? I know, you don't like that analogy because a T1 line is much more expensive than a cable or DSL line. But it's the most fair analogy, as the points are identical -- they each promise a maximum bandwidth and unlimited usage for a specified monthly fee. The difference is that with a T1 line, you're actually able to use your full bandwidth for as long as you want.

Napalm? Are they serious?

OK, by a show of hands, how many of us here have had "documents" at one time or another explaining how to make things like Napalm and Thermite? I know I did. And that was back in the wild west days of BBSing circa 1992. Have I ever "manufactured" it, or even thought about it? No. But I probably still have those files somewhere. Not to mention the hacker/security CDs being sold around that time as well.

Sadly, people like our commenter Philip are the ones in charge. People who think they can tell the good people from the bad people simply by the way they look or the way they answer (or don't answer) certain questions. It's like when a person looks nervous when being questioned by the police, and idiots say "Look at how nervous he is, he MUST be guilty". Because a normal law-abiding citizen (or worse, a legal alien/non-citizen who can be deported at the drop of a hat) certainly wouldn't be nervous when questioned by police trying their hardest to intimidate and coerce a confession.

There was a time when ACTIONS were illegal and THOUGHTS were not. Why? Because you cannot predict future actions based on thoughts. And for the record, you cannot predict intent, either. At least not with any real degree of accuracy. Last summer, I spent over 100 hours drawing up detailed plans for a new desk. Guess what? I never built it. About seven years ago, I bought a home gym, and I even went so far as to set it up. Guess what? I never used it. For those missing the point, let me spell it out for you -- you cannot predict the future. Even if you have 100% accurate information about a person's actions and intent, you cannot predict the future. Someone looking at the plans for my desk would surely have thought I was going to build it. Someone watching me buy the gym and set it up surely would have thought I was going to use it. That's the funny thing with us humans -- we're fickle. We do things for no reason, and we change our minds for no reason.

But while people are getting ready to flame me, let me add some fuel by saying this -- what's wrong with a person THINKING something negative? I don't like it, but as long as they're not acting on it, I don't really have a problem with it. What if I was planning on robbing a bank, and really did intend to do so, but then changed my mind at the last minute? While I would not have really done anything, I'm quite certain I would have broken some laws with "conspiracy" in the title. But what harm would I have done to society? How would society have suffered because of my thoughts and not-acted-upon plans?

Let people have their thoughts, good or bad. Judge people only by their actions. You cannot legislate thoughts. Once you attempt to, you have removed the most basic of freedoms, and you can no longer be considered "free" is any way.

@David Wiernicki

Forgive me if I misinterpreted your tone, but it's late and I'm tired, so I can't tell if you're being sarcastic or not. If not, let me point out that using the hosts file is by no means new. It's been around for years (if not decades). That's how I set it up at one of my clients about 8 years ago, before they installed a transparent proxy with web filtering. They have a Windows server and all Windows workstations, so I created a text file they could edit and add to, and this file was copied to all users' hosts file (both Win9x and WinNT) in the login script. Of course, iptables+Squid+DansGuardian on the proxy/firewall is a much better option in my opinion, even for homes if the home has multiple computers.

re: Dell Fog Computing

"or Dell Mist Computing"

I think you have an extra 't' in there...

Annoyance

While I understand authors' and publishers' desire to "protect" their product so as to protect their revenue stream, the old "you must have the CD in the drive" is one of the most annoying things in my opinion. When you've got 10-20 games or more (heck, even if you only have one or two), it's extremely annoying to have to swap discs (or find and insert the game disc) simply to "prove" that you own it. I should be able to use the discs to install the game, then put them away for safekeeping and to prevent scratching the discs. Then again, the vendor/publisher probably loves scratched discs because it means you have to buy another copy of a game you already paid for once.

On a side note, I have a problem with this statement: "Given that Reloaded is an illegal piracy group..." I'd love to say I'm just being pedantic, but it does seem as if people in and of themselves are now considered illegal. It doesn't seem that long ago that actions were what was illegal, not people or thoughts. Then again, back then it was "innocent UNLESS proven guilty" instead of the now-used perverted and completely-different-meaning "innocent UNTIL proven guilty".

What a coincidence

This must be one heck of a coincidence, as my family and I just watched "Real Genius" last night.

re: reliable, fast, and large

"True, RAID is a bad backup policy but a 1TB removable drive starts at $100...that's faster and is off site storage"

1TB hard drive for $100? Off the back of a truck maybe...

I just love these disk-lovers who don't know what they're talking about. AC, have you actually SEEN the throughput of your beloved 1TB removable drive? Have you actually SEEN the throughput of tape drives (no, your old Travan drive doesn't count)? Modern tape drives have ACTUAL throughput up to 160MB/sec (9GB/min). I've actually seen throughput of 5-7GB/min on an LTO-3 drive. You're seriously delusional if you think an external USB drive will reach anything close to that. Hint: 480Mbit/sec = roughly 48MB/sec. In other words, your USB 2.0 drive has a maximum THEORETICAL throughput of about 2.8GB/min. Most 3.5" internal SATA drives don't even come close to reaching 160MB/sec.

So what were you saying about removable drives being faster than tape?

Immature and pathetic

Even setting aside for the moment that the person in question is dead, how immature must you be to find a cut-off title bar amusing or funny (especially considering you read the full title in the first half of the title bar)? I bet you get a kick out of saying "boobies", too. What are you, 7 or 8 years old? Then again, given the fascination with Paris Hilton and the Eee girl...

@rundata

"Where do you yanks get this false information from??"

The same place the rest of the world gets the notion that the US is still "land of the free" and "home of the brave", that the US people are accurately represented by their president, and that we in the US have a great selection of broadband providers.

Shock and awe

If this is to be believed, then this is the REAL "shock and awe". Am I the only one sitting here, mouth open in amazement (and, quite frankly, disbelief) at those numbers?

A processor that can handle 256 BILLION float-point operations per second?

A 1.30PB/s interconnect to link the systems? What kind of interconnect can even come close to that? Even if that 1.30PB/s is a total of the combined 38,900 systems, that would still be 35.04GB/s per system. That's almost 3 times the maximum DDR3 bandwidth (12800MB/s), and about 4.38 times the maximum PCI Express bandwidth (8GB/s).

As other commenters have said, I hope they have their own power station because between powering these systems and powering the A/C needed to cool these systems, they'll definitely need it.

Just some rough numbers because I'm bored... If each processor uses 50W, that would be 1.945MW for the processors. 26PB storage at 1.5TB/disk (we won't even consider RAID, controllers, etc) = 17,333 disks at 8W each = 139KW. So just considering the processors and non-RAID storage, that's 2MW. I think we can all agree that's a massive lowball number since it doesn't include other system components, RAID, controllers, AC-to-DC loss, etc... And then think of the A/C needed to pump out 2MW worth of heat in the summer.

Wow. Just, wow.

Ugh

Given what we know about the P4, I seriously hope it's a P3 or below. The P4 simply added heat, energy required, and slowness. Many of my own calculation routines using standard ADD/SUB/MUL/DIV perform noticeably slower on a P4 than a P3. I haven't worked with floating-point, so I can't say anything there.

As for the people questioning why use old technology, I would counter with "Why not?" Just because a Core 2 Duo or Athlon 64 X2 is available doesn't make it the best tool for the job. If I need to light a candle, sure, a flamethrower would probably do the trick, but it's what we call "overkill".

re: Modernization?

"Why not a safer langue like eg. Eiffel with design by contract and automatic garbage collection? ... Or maybe the pilots...wouldn't hear of anything that might imply the use of the word safety?"

Are you actually implying that "automatic garbage collection" is "safe"? I don't work in C, but even accepting as true all the bad things people say about it, any "automatic" processes cannot possibly be considered "safe". When you're talking about keeping planes in the air and controlling weapons, you need 100% control, nothing more, nothing less. Executing any code that is not in the source is unacceptable, as is deviating from the source in any way. When lives are hanging in the balance, and the difference between life is death is measured in milliseconds, you can't trust that the "automatic garbage collection" won't release something at the wrong time, or that "automatic" processes won't be running and thus delay execution of the actual program code.

blast-proof?

What is a "blast-proof" case? Perhaps they meant something more like "blast-containing", but even that wouldn't be completely accurate since it obviously could only handle a blast up to a maximum energy output. My guess is it wasn't a perfect translation. Nothing is "blast-proof". Anything can be blasted/destroyed with sufficient energy.

AI replacing NI

I seriously hope the industry can accurately get AI working in the not-too-distant future. With a growing lack of Natural Intelligence, the Artificial kind starts to look good. But I must say, I do find it amusing that Yahoo is turning to Artificial Intelligence to reign in users lacking in Natural Intelligence.

Sad

As twisted and off-color as I can be at times, like many of us here I'm sure, I can't help but feel ashamed by association at the few "joke" comments here and by that chart. A person is dead, and all some sick fucks can do is make a joke of it. If you want to make a joke about some redneck shooting himself in the testicles because he decided to use a bullet to replace a fuse in his truck, go right ahead and I'll join you. But when someone is murdered, it's nothing to joke about.

If the information in this article is accurate, I hope he gets life in prison and is quickly killed by a fellow inmate. No sense forcing the taxpayers to fork over their hard-earned money to keep a murderer alive. His victim didn't get that privilege, so neither should he.

Unbelievable

Some of these comments so far are unbelievable. This woman's life has been ruined, and some of you just can't help but jump on her back and blame her for it. She may not have been the perfect teacher, but no teacher deserves this. Even if she is found not guilty and there is no conviction, she will likely never be able to get a job working with or around children again simply because of this arrest (an arrest that any halfway-intelligent person knows should not have been made).

I know it's hard, but try using your brain a bit (you do have a brain, right?) and do some actual research. For $deity's sake, The Reg listed the related articles at the bottom of this article, you don't even need to search for the information.

But if you're really feeling smart, ask yourself which is more likely -- that an unprotected computer is filled with malware and is showing endless popups, or that a substitute teacher is actively viewing porn in a classroom. As for notions of "typed URLs" and "manual clicks", that's meaningless since any program (such as past ATI and Realtek driver installations) can insert "keystrokes" into the buffer and/or "click" a link or button.

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re: Jury Trials

"...in the States, jury pay is terrible, so any reasonably intelligent person will have a reasonably decent job". Really? Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't the unemployment rate the highest it's ever been? Companies are cutting raises (if not rolling back pay) and laying people off. Unemployment in my state has extended its benefits because there aren't enough "decent jobs" for people. I understand what your point was, and I don't necessarily disagree with it, but that's a lot different than saying any reasonably intelligent person will have a reasonably decent job.

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re: Whom to blame

No, she was not hired to teach a class which features a computer. She was a substitute teacher. If you cannot tell the difference, please do all of us a favor and simply keep quiet while repeating the mantra "ignorance is bliss". And being able to close down popups while using Internet Explorer isn't exactly a common job skill, if it's even possible. Because of Javascript's ability to open any page without prompting or permission, and perform actions on page load and page unload, it is entirely possible to have a never-ending stream of popups. The only way to kill them is to kill the IE process (kill, not close).

Believe it or not, you don't need to use a computer to teach a class. While that may not seem very "Web 2.0", it's still true nonetheless. Not being able to control IE on a malware-infested system says nothing about a person's ability to teach a class, just as your ability to enter a comment here says nothing about your ability to change the oil in your car.

I just love people who hear one piece of information about a long drawn-out issue and feel they can speak authoritatively about the subject.

Intentions

"The interpretation ... is alarmist and scare-mongering and deflects from the intention which was to improve consumers' rights."

The thing is, laws are laws. It doesn't matter what your intentions are. What matters is people's interpretation of the law. Here's a suggestion -- craft the law using clear and unambiguous language so that nobody has to guess your intent, and so that there is no way to misinterpret it. Don't forget, even if everyone agrees and holds to your intention now, it doesn't mean future civil servants will.

I bet the US' founding fathers never intended for the US to turn out this way.

I have a hunch the people who crafted child-porn laws never intended for under-18 girls to be arrested for voluntarily (and without coercion) posting semi/nude pictures of themselves on the Internet or sending those pictures to their boy/girlfriend.

I bet the UK lawmakers who crafted the sex-offender rules never intended for a man simulating sex with a bicycle in his locked hotel room to be arrested and have his name on the sex offender list for the rest of his life.

re: The issue isn't partisan

"Still... it is better than most countries which have no laws against the government spying on their citizens. Not only do most countries allow it, but there isn't any judical oversight."

The Bush administration illegally allowing the NSA (and $deity knows who else) do blanket warrant-less wiretapping of US citizens on domestic land is proof that there is no judicial oversight here, either. Yes, we have the ILLUSION of oversight, but that's all it is -- an illusion. This retroactive immunity for the telecoms companies is yet more proof (as if more was needed).

And I do not agree that the situation in the US is better than "most countries which have no laws..." In those other countries, you know the score. In the US, you're told that the government isn't allowed to do certain things, so you're given a false sense of security/reality. Other countries admit to what they do. The US does it and lies about it. And you think the US is better?

re: Unconstitutional

No, this law will not be overturned. Not any time soon, at least. Yes, it is illegal. But it won't be overturned because it's a matter of "national security" which trumps judicial oversight. With those two little words, the government is allowed to do literally anything.

"Stop sign because fascism is unAmerican." Silly American. I thought everybody heard, but apparently you didn't get the memo. America 1.0 is history (literally). This is America 2.0 where not agreeing with the hive-mind is unAmerican. Remember in 2003 when we started the war? It was considered (and publicly stated) that protesting (or even simply not showing support for) the war was "unAmerican". Now the hive-mind has changed its opinion, so it's OK to not support the war. In fact, now it's turning so much that supporting the war is starting to be considered "unAmerican". Welcome to America 2.0. Please be so kind as to leave your rights (and your own thoughts) at the border.

Let's kill the grid!

I can't help but think electric cars will completely destroy the electric grid unless we find a miracle first. Many places (such as California) already have massive problems supplying power to the point where they either have or are considering legislation to allow the power companies to remotely shut down people's aircon (I don't see how they would do that, but that's another discussion).

Even if you trickle-charge your car (or battery pack which you'll use to charge your car), you'll likely still be using 10-15 amps to do it. When you already have a severely-stressed electric grid, what do you think the effect will be when you have millions of people each using an additional 10-15 amp draw?

re: Thomas

"Or why, when it's set to 'hide when minimised'... , the 'X' button closes the entire application?"

Umm... Because the "X" button is the CLOSE button? "Hide when minimized" means exactly that -- when MINIMIZED (hint: the "_" button). Even an application that hides when minimized should close when told to close.

And yet

re: So let's be clear ...

"Vista has been at GA for a year and a half, and has had its first service pack. It is now the only version of Windows which is available at retail, and has been pre-installed for over a year. Only Vista offers Direct X 10, which is being used by new games. Yet its take-up in the business sector is still minimal, and MS are saying 'it really isn't as bad as everyone says'."

You forgot the part where companies such as Intel and IBM have publicly stated that they will not use Vista because of its incompatibilities and poor performance. That wasn't exactly a "pro" on the Vista pro/con list :)

re: *Even* on a 3 Ghz P4??

Heh, I got a kick out of that comment, too. I find it absolutely amazing how many of the Vista supporters point out things like that as if they're some major feature. These people actually seem surprised that an operating system (even with no applications running) can manage to operate on what really is high-end hardware. Yes, we have faster processors out there, but 3GHz really is high-end, as is 1GB+ of memory. These same people act as if it should be expected that your newer, faster, expensive computer visibly runs at the same speed as the "outdated" one you're replacing. If it runs at the same speed, then why am I "upgrading"?

If you told me ten years ago that my Athlon 64 3800+ 1GB system or my Core 2 Duo T7200 2GB notebook would visibly run as slow as my K5-166 64MB system, I would have said you were crazy. Systems with 20-30X the raw speed performing just as slowly? It would never happen. And yet here we are. The operating system should be small and fast. Quite frankly, so should the GUI. And patching any software product (for example, the browser) should not require a reboot.

Great idea!

Hey, what a wonderful idea! Let's ignore the fact that the Internet in general requires "broadband" access now -- www.theregister.co.uk (221KB), www.yahoo.com (221KB), www.msn.com (188KB), www.bestbuy.com (446KB), www.netflix.com (170KB), www.whitehouse.gov (315KB), www.fbi.gov (714KB), www.dhs.gov (226KB), www.uspto.gov (345KB), www.myspace.com (667KB), www.facebook.com (175KB), www.nytimes.com (584KB), www.washingtonpost.com (765KB), www.massrmv.com (264KB), www.mass.gov (195KB), www.citibank.com (437KB), www.bankofamerica.com (230KB), www.chase.com (214KB), www.hsbc.com (241KB), www.holidayinn (490KB), www.bestwestern.com (314KB), www.delta.com (222KB), www.southwestair.com (458KB), www.united.com (379KB), www.ryanair.com (262KB)...

That's just typical web browsing. That doesn't even begin to cover the countless megabytes of patches for the various software packages we use -- WinXP SP3 (316MB), Office 2003 SP3 (117MB), Office 2007 SP1 (218MB), Windows Vista SP1 32-bit (544MB) and 64-bit (873MB), browser updates at 5MB+, antivirus updates at 10-40MB+, the monthly patches from Microsoft...

Now let's remember what "dial-up" means. The maximum theoretical speed of an analog dial-up modem is 56Kbps. The maximum speed allowed in the US is 53Kbps, and the typical connection speed is 33.6-45Kbps. Those people who have ISDN (very rare in the US) have 64 or 128Kbps. A 1MB download takes 4.06 minutes at 33.6Kbps, 3.03 minutes at 45Kbps, 2.13 minutes at 64Kbps, and 1.06 minutes at 128Kbps. A "small" 10MB antivirus update would take between 10.66 minutes (128Kbps) and 40.63 minutes (33.6Kbps) on dial-up. The 32-bit Vista SP1 (544MB) would take between 580.26 minutes [9.67 hours] (128Kbps) and 2,210.53 minutes [36.84 hours] (33.6Kbps).

Ignoring the convenience aspects of the Internet (general browsing for entertainment), if Europe is anything like the US, many companies now require you to apply for employment through their websites -- the companies will not accept applications anywhere other than their website. Similarly, many companies require you to contact them via email. Credit cards, utilities (phone, cable, etc), and others typically pester you with HTML-laden email. And let's not forget the friend or relative who needs to send pictures from their digital cameras using up countless megabytes of our inboxes.

There's also the hypocrisy of it. If a person buys a pirated DVD or CD from ebay, and it arrives through the post, will the person be banned from using the post after "three strikes"? I understand this law was most likely crafted with good intentions. The problem is that the punishment does not fit the crime.

Having said all that, is small-scale copyright infringement (receiving one, or even three, pirated films/albums) a crime in Europe? In the US, I think (though I could be wrong) that only large-scale infringement is a crime; small-scale is a civil matter.

re: facts or bile

I'm guessing you define "average household" as one that does not have a refrigerator, stove, washer, dryer, microwave, hair dryer, computer or TV. And such a definition would probably fit in the early 1900s, but not in the early 2000s.

Average LCD TV (let's say 125W), receiver (60W), subwoofer (11W), and DVD player (7W) used for 6 hours = 1.218kWh

Smaller average LCD TV (let's say 100W) used for 4 hours = 0.400kWh

Average computer (80W), monitor (35W), speakers (10W), router (8W), and cable/DSL modem (9W) used for 6 hours = 0.852kWh

(3) 25W lamps used for 6 hours = 0.450kWh

1600W hair dryer used for 15 minutes (3 people, 5 minutes each) = 0.133kWh

That's just what I could think of off the top of my head, and it's 3.053kWh per day in addition to refrigerator, stove/range/oven, washer, dryer, and microwave. A total of 9kWh per day MIGHT be possible if the family does not use the stove/range/oven often, does not have a washer or dryer, does not go into the refrigerator often, does not use the microwave often, uses fluorescent lights, and does not leave lights turned on when not in use.

For the record, my daily use (excluding my two computers) is 5-6kWh. I live alone, and I don't pay for heat. I use 20W energy-efficient fluorescent lamps, and I only have one lamp on at a time. I only use the stove about once every week or two, and that's only about 20 minutes to cook pasta. I don't use the microwave, and I don't have a washer, dryer, or hair dryer.

re: HOW DARE THEY

"Are you people seriously indignant that MS is giving money to charity? Does your hatred of MS really extend THAT far?"

In this case, yes. I would be the first to applaud Microsoft giving money to charity if it was actually a noble or altruistic effort instead of a ploy to get people hooked onto their products or to get people to hand over personal information. I also have a problem with corporations or individuals giving money to charity and then banging on their drum so that everybody knows about it.

You know what I do when I make a donation to a charity? I write a check (or fill in the form on their website). I don't tell anybody about it because I don't need to. I don't need the recognition. I give money because I want to help, not because I want to influence people's opinion of me.

"I bet if google did the EXACT SAME THING it'd be wonderful and generous and the best thing ever."

You don't know me very well. And judging from the comments recently on Google-related articles, more and more people are waking up to the fact that Google is not the savior, and is not the great company people used to think they were (and perhaps they truly were at one point, I couldn't say for certain).

Choice of format

I don't see a problem with using an electronic format. In fact, I recommend using Microsoft Word 2007's patent-encumbered XML format. With the additional bloat of XML, that should be good to expand that 12TB into about 70TB or so (yes, I'm completely making up that figure, but I suspect XML would increase the size by quite a bit). I wonder how long it would take to load a 12TB Word document...

Okay, fine. Tell Google to be nice and split the log into 1GB files, then put each of the files onto a USB flash drive. I wonder how much Viacom would like to get a shipment of around 12,288 flash drives. Of course, Google could use 256MB flash drives (49,152 of them) if that would be more convenient...

Power savings

Regarding the power savings, it looks like it all depends on what size you're talking about. I've measured my equipment with a power meter, and I can say that my Samsung 19" LCD monitor uses 30W max whereas my KDS 19" CRT monitor used 91W typical in graphics mode, higher in text modes, and sometimes up to 229W. So for 19" (and presumably smaller), LCD definitely seems to be more energy-efficient.

I have a non-HD 52" projection TV I bought around June 2000 that uses 130-170W on and 25W sleep, and since I can't justify the expense of replacing it until it stops working, I haven't looked at TVs since then. Based on my experience with LCD monitors, I was expecting LCDs to be more energy-efficient in larger sizes as well. My 27" non-HD 1.33:1 CRT TV uses up to 75W (0.214W/sqin). A Samsung 27" 16:9 LCD TV I just looked up uses 110W according to their specs (0.353W/sqin). I tried looking at a lot of other LCD TVs, too, but couldn't find any power usage listed (either on stores' or manufacturers' websites).

It looks like LCD panels don't "scale" very well in terms of energy efficiency or power savings over CRT. So if you're getting a small TV for a bedroom, LCD would probably be more energy-efficient. Anything larger, though, and it looks like CRT is more energy-efficient. Space consumption, placement, and aesthetics, however, are another issue.

Wait for it...

"Are the authorities *really* suggesting that privacy is useless to law-abiding people?" -- in a word, yes. The US (and UK) government hopes if it's done slow enough, the sheeple won't realize the country is become a surveillance and control state as in 1984. The only "privacy" you should be allowed is the forced wearing of clothing (can't be showing skin, y'know), and that will be of specified uniforms, likely lycra or spandex so the powers-that-be can easily see if we're trying to hide anything.

While I applaud the ACLU and EFF for sticking to their principles, this has no chance of succeeding. The government will simply pull the "State Secrets" / "National Security" line and get the case squashed. The US government (at least the current administration) has shown in no uncertain terms that it does not care about laws or Constitutional rights. Those only come into play when it benefits the government. When they becomes inconvenient, it's best just to overlook them.

Shock, surprise

So a Microsoft employee knows more people who left to join Google then returned to Microsoft than the other way around. Gee, could it be because he, himself, works at Microsoft? Big surprise there.

People who left Microsoft to go to Google are now being re-hired by Microsoft. Big shock there, too. With Ballmer's desire to "f'cking kill Google", I wouldn't be surprised at all to see massively overwhelming bonuses and/or salaries offered to people to get them to leave Google and return to Microsoft (and I suspect they'd be generously compensated for any information they happen to bring back with them).

10% of Google software is broken? Wow, color me shocked again. Maybe that's why they consider all of their products "beta". Nah, that couldn't be it. Like I've said before -- at least they're honest about it (as opposed to Microsoft who releases beta software as "production" quality; code which is so buggy it requires updates to patch newly-found vulnerabilities every single month, even 7 years after its release).

Google operates like an army of 5-year-olds? Seriously, did anyone reading this think any differently? I thought we knew this years ago. The spat between the two over their private jet was a clear indicator for those not already paying attention.

"Microsoft do software development in more professional way than Google. Their engineers are better. Their development process is better." -- Is this the same Microsoft that originally told the European court that is didn't have any documentation about its products' protocols and APIs, and thus could not provide interoperability information?

"Their products are better." Yep, gold star there. People are jumping at the chance to shell out their hard-earned cash for Vista and Office 2007. There's a reason Dell and others and still offering systems with Windows XP, and there's a reason the few remaining copies of Office 2003 are grossly overpriced (well above the price they were selling at before Office 2007 was released). But maybe he's talking about hardware products -- how's the Xbox360 RROD situation going?

"Google was like a kindergarden - young and not experienced enough people" -- young and not experienced are not necessarily bad qualities.

"an office full of fun and entertainment" -- wow, we certainly wouldn't want that. Nothing kills the work ethic, makes a person miserable, and results in great levels of stress more than an office full of fun and entertainment.

"...lack of traditions in development of high quality software products." -- but Google's role isn't to develop high-quality software products. Google's role is to sell advertising. And based on their financials every year, they seem to do a great job of it. Their software products are just the method they use to sell advertising. It doesn't need to be perfect as long as it gets the job done (as long as it sells advertising).

There is no opt-out

"NebuAd says it anonymizes all user data. And users can opt-out of the system. But the opt-out is cookie-based. If you install a new browser or move to a new machine, the tracking starts anew."

If it requires a cookie to be placed on the user's machine, it's not an opt-out at all. There are any number of reasons to not use cookies, ranging from security-conscious to fear of the unknown (since many non-IT people tell others that cookies are only used to track your movements and activities). There are also any number of methods to not use cookies, ranging from disabling them in your browser to disabling them via security products to using a browser that doesn't support cookies to manually or automatically rejecting cookies based on certain criteria.

Using a cookie as an opt-out method means that people using browsers which don't support cookies, people using security products which block cookies, and people manually/automatically rejecting cookies are not allowed to opt out. Any opt-out method which makes it impossible for even one user to opt-out is completely unacceptable. What's next? An opt-out method that requires an ActiveX applet?

Could they be learning?

Wow, could Microsoft actually be learning something here? In my opinion, $70 per year for Office still isn't a great price if you only have one machine, but if you actually have two or three systems you want to install it on, then the $70/yr price point does seem reasonable to me. My problem is that I don't want "online" software. I want the standard offline software, even if it is limited to one year (like antivirus products). If they offered the standard offline software at this price point, I think they'd see a lot more interest (and a lot less piracy).

What's "reasonable"?

"A judge dismissed the suit early last year in finding that Hatfill was a public official and had not shown that the newspaper had published information it reasonably may have believed to be false."

That's the problem with defamation (and libel and slander). You can talk to one total crackpot who gives you a wild made-up story, and then you can go and spread that story with immunity because you did not "reasonably" believe it to be false. What about reasonably believe it to be true? Why isn't that a factor?

According to that rule, I could tell a journalist (even as a bad joke), and they could print in the newspaper tomorrow, "court-worker-x shows porn to children". Because it's a court worker, it's a public official. And the journalist has no reason not to believe me, so they do not reasonably believe it to be false. That journalist could effectively ruin court-worker-x's life and because they do not reasonably believe it is false, there would be no consequences (especially in this climate of "won't somebody think of the children").

re: "Anthrax-sniffing dogs" -- "If a dog sniffs anthrax on you, surely that means you've got the anthrax..." -- I sincerely hope you're being sarcastic and I'm just too tired to detect it, because dogs, even trained dogs, will very likely make some mistakes (false-positive or false-negative). Let's ask that Japanese airport how perfect sniffer-dogs are.

Pathetic

The US patent office is getting more and more pathetic and ridiculous every day. Why is it that whenever you combine two things, it's viewed as some novel (and supposedly non-obvious) "invention"? Using pressure-sensor pads instead of physical buttons doesn't change anything. If anything, it's simply a design choice. It most certainly is not an "invention". Then again, when you can get a patent on literally any existing product simply by adding the phrase "on/in a computer"...

Zero emissions?

I would really like to see an independent, non-biased report about these claims of "zero emissions" and the true total emissions for battery-powered cars versus fuel-powered cars. All of the pro-electric people seem to overlook the fact that the electricity needs to be generated somewhere, then distributed to the "refilling" location. Then there's the issue of battery life and having to replace the batteries, what the emission and environmental (toxicity, chemicals, etc) "costs" to produce the batteries, distribute them to the service stations, etc. I'd also like to see a report on the effects of weather and temperature on battery-powered cars (since most batteries don't hold a charge well in cold temperatures).

I'm not pro-electric or anti-electric, but if we're going to even think about basing our future on something, it would be nice to have all available information before we make a decision.

re: State Lotteries

You beat me to the point of state lotteries, though for a different reason. My home state (Massachusetts) has a strict "No gambling" law... except for the state lotteries and Keno. It's always good to see protectionist, monopolistic, and hypocritical thinking on the state level as well as the federal level.

As for the WTO... The WTO sided with Antigua and ruled that the US illegally prevented US citizens from gambling at Antigua's gaming businesses. The US' response was to literally do nothing except snub its nose and say "So what! What are you going to do about it?". The WTO did nothing.

Then there was allofmp3.com, which by all accounts was operating perfectly legally according to Russian law (whether by legal loophole or not, it was still considered legal by the Russian authorities). But because the RIAA didn't like it, the US government threatened Russia saying that if allofmp3.com was not taken offline, the US would block Russia's entrance into the WTO. And the WTO did nothing.

The WTO is just as powerless as the UN when going up against the US government, which is just more proof that the US is "the greatest superpower in the world". Sadly, that power, which could be used for good, is used as a form of control instead. The US Civil War was fought to abolish slavery. Now the government is using more subtle indirect methods to return to slavery, and too many people seem to be all-too-willing to accept their shackles. For those who will deny that -- when your freedom is taken away (freedom of thought, freedom of expression, freedom to speak your mind, freedom to assemble, freedom of religion, etc), you are a slave. The fact that you can walk to the store without asking permission doesn't change that.

No comment yet of the obvious

14 comments so far, and none asking the question we should all be asking (maybe because it's obvious?) --

WHAT WERE THEY THINKING?!?

"The research asked 50 people from ten countries to surf the web unprotected and see what spam they picked up"

I'd like to know what "unprotected" means in this context. No firewall? No antivirus? No anti-spyware? No anti-spam? Java and Javascript allowed with no restrictions? Downloading anything you are prompted to (OK, most people probably do this one already)?

The only way I would recommend anyone even consider browsing with an unprotected system would be with a dedicated system used only for that task, a dedicated Internet connection used only for that system, and a certified letter from the researchers saying everything done was at their request, indemnifying the user of all responsibility. With everything out there (OS exploits, browser exploits, media player exploits, Safari's download-without-asking, etc) and all the possibilities (becoming part of a botnet, being used unknowingly for illegal p2p use, exploits/javascript download child porn images or "terrorist" materials, etc), it's just too risky. There's no way in hell I'd take the chance of the feds showing up at my door or risk being sent to jail to become part of a survey.

re: Or just....

I know you're just joking, but please, don't even suggest it. As an adult who can still hear high-pitched sounds that most people can't, I can tell you it's not just annoying, it's actually painful. That's my problem with those devices -- assaulting (even if only aurally) one section of the populace to keep away another section of the populace should never be allowed (especially when there are already laws to "protect" you).

@Edward

No, you're not the only one. Some of the authors like Apple and will apparently post anything and everything about them, and some hate Apple and like to point out their inconsistencies, hypocrisy, etc. Personally, I think both sides could tone it down a bit.

More on-topic, I see no purpose for this article other than to advertise for the Dutch company. At least I hope that's it. Please tell me this article wasn't written to stroke Apple's ego about using a recyclable insert instead of plastic. It's not like they're pioneers in that regard. Other manufacturers have been doing it for over 15 years (motherboards, CD/DVD drives, video/audio cards, processors, etc). But then some people think everything Apple does is new and "innovative".

Can we get it over here?

Can someone make this available to people in the US? It would be nice to hear English around these parts again. Not only that, but we could massively reduce governmental waste of our tax dollars by removing the "necessity" of translating and printing government documents in multiple languages. I find it quite sad that countries who do not use English as a first language have a greater percentage of English-speaking citizens than the US (or at least large portions thereof).