Posts by b shubin

Finland censors anti-censorship site

Prior "art"

@ Dotes

historically, the Finns were with the other side in that episode (Finland wound up helping the Axis invade Russia), which may explain their totalitarian tendencies, but through a different ideology. Comrade Djugashvili would therefore be the wrong man to blame for this (though he had similar funny ideas that didn't work out so well).

that being said, there are certain WW2 habits in some countries, that don't seem to ever disappear (though where the UK gets it, i don't know). "support your local police, for a more efficient police state."

Time to rewrite DBMS, says Ingres founder

All your db are belong to Web 2.0?

what i hear is just another trendy Web 2.0 pronouncement, like "expertise is dead, long live the wisdom of crowds!" and "we don't need no steenkeeng personal computers, the cloud provides all that we require!" don't even get me started on Sadville.

good to see the old boys trying to keep up, but one of the major virtues of today's enterprise-grade DBMS is that it offers a good balance between data integrity, performance, redundancy, and availability. when H-whatever has the track record to show that it can do as well or better, the time will come to take them more seriously. at the moment, they sound like the semantic-web guys (is web-centric, SaaS vaporware more whispy and nonexistent than conventional vaporware? what is the sound of one hand not giving a sh*t?).

it's 2008, and Web 2.0 solutions are providing new and interesting hacking exploits every week. until the security model is more mature, i'll stick with a DB that exposes no API to anything but the hardened, SELinux-enforcing server in front of it; and since i'm extra-crusty, no PHP, either, you damn kids...now, get off my lawn, before i set the dogs on ya.

Former contractor sues Google for $25m

LART icon needed

agreed with Mr. Hagan. someone requires adjustment with clue bat.

if you are a contractor, submit a proposal (paper trail, primacy of idea). if you convene a meeting at a company like Google, and describe something that works somewhat like the previously mentioned Stellarium, but online, expect to have your idea implemented, minus you.

Google employs some very bright people. why would they pay a contractor to do something they can probably implement faster and better in-house? since the idea has much prior art, they can rightfully claim it is not novel, and hang you out to dry.

he can't be a very experienced contractor, if he thought a corporate slogan would protect him. most companies take ideas from outside and implement them in-house. this happens EVERY DAY. if you want them to use your services, bind them with a contract; otherwise, suck it up.

Toshiba's board to kybosh HD DVD this week?

Best of a bad lot

@ the Microsoft effect

yes, that was probably a factor (but not the only one) in the demise of HD DVD. MS has a very bad history when it comes to intellectual property and standards. generally, any organization that gets too close to MS, that has something MS cares about, ends up getting absorbed, subverted, or destroyed.

because MS IP was embedded in HD DVD, that may have made some of the major players hesitate to support it. they do NOT want to create another 800-pound gorilla like iTunes.

it was the same with Passport, and many other technological solutions MS has offered. they have been the aggressive monopolist for so long, everyone now expects them to act that way every time. they'll have to start playing nice with others (the OOXML vote rigging is evidence to the contrary), and stay nice for quite some time, to change that perception.

i am not a fan of Sony, but they appear to have learned some small things from the rootkit fiasco, and have made some attempts to leverage standards, instead of subverting them (Memory Stick notwithstanding).

LiMo Foundation touts real mobile Linux

Other (very good) options

Symbian and WinMobile are not the only platforms that allow 3rd-party apps. i have a BlackBerry 8800 that runs those quite well, thank you (even after a swim in the lake).

having dealt at length with WinMobile, i have to say it is still intolerable sh*t, though Symbian seems stable enough. BB8800 is the best smartphone i've ever owned; only my Treo 650 was more stable (and could also run 3rd-party apps).

Copyright levy under EU spotlight

GREEEEEED

who said greed has limits? 50 is not enough, 95 years of copyright? are you unwell?

if you're unable to come up with anything else of value in 50 years, you don't need the extension, you need an original thought in your head.

these corporatists, they're crazy, and getting madder by the day.

Microsoft swoops into schools to teach P2P morality

Lessons from the Evil Empire

when totalitarian governments do it, it's called political indoctrination, or propaganda. when corporations do it, it is the same, but with a more pronounced financial motive.

in both cases, it is presented as education.

letting MS present in schools is no different than letting any other corp present in a public education venue, with an assumed government endorsement. how about we get the tobacco, liquor, or pharma companies in there, see what they have to "teach the children"?

this is corporatism in its most refined form. Mussolini would be proud.

US scientists puncture the ethanol biofuel bubble

Great news, in a way

for individual farmers, this ethanol-switchgrass-whatever boom is a panacea. the industrial agribusiness megacorps will jump into it to get federal subsidies, and local small farmers will be able to compete in food production. that WILL save emissions, as locally farmed food will be more economically feasible and available again.

the industrial players are also in a good position to create demand for bioengineered fuel crops, so Monsanto and gang may produce something actually useful, like sugar cane that can grow in temperate, cold, or dry climates (for example). hard to see how a company that spliced cockroach genes into food, would be unable to come up with any Frankenproduct for this demand.

this is a many-sided development, and i don't think we've seen all the possibilities and implications yet. even failure will bring useful results.

Citrix gets around to XenServer update

Brother Bear

Citrix was always too close to MS (and too reliant on them) to risk antagonizing Ballmer in any major way. with MS now pushing Viridian (or Hyper-V, or whatever their marketing ppl call it today), i expect Xen development to slow to a crawl.

oh well, maybe Canonical will do good things with KVM, and then there's always OpenVZ, aka Parallels.

we don't need no steenkeeng ceeetricks...

Gates pumps up Office, slaps down Yahoo!

Silver bullet?

this would be the only way they can counter the proliferation of open development platforms like LAMP, Ruby and Java: nothing is more proprietary than MSOffice app development. this is absolute lock-in.

MS is going to miss the boat again, just like they did with the Internet, but this time, it would be an attempt to lock people into the MSOffice walled garden. the major industry trend today is for server-side functionality with a web-face, and as little client-side app as possible. MS aversion to standards and competition makes this a very unattractive proposition.

at one point, they stated that their goal is software-as-a-service. i believe that this thick-client emphasis is an indication that they have failed to make the transition, and may abandon the attempt, if they haven't already.

Should the IT department be accountable for energy use?

No worries

i think this is a delightful idea. when faced with budget restrictions for energy to provide IT services, we will implement a schedule of blownouts to save money.

then we sit back and wait for the screams to start. 90 seconds should do it.

it seems that everyone STILL conveniently forgets that IT is an enabler: the department delivers services to most or all other departments within the organization. those services are often considered critical by these other departments, because people come to rely on the speed and convenience of information accessibility, processing and communication.

the IT budget is therefore STILL considered an easy target for budget cuts. if the energy line item is included in it, the next round of budget cuts can have only one obvious outcome.

that being said, it is important for the IT department to meter usage and find ways to save energy (incentives can be put in place, initiatives implemented, strategies developed). making the IT energy bill a pain point for the IT department alone is just about the stupidest and most shortsighted idea i've heard in a long time (20 years in corporate America is a VERY long time), especially with the rising worldwide energy prices.

Yahoo! to! reject! Microsoft! offer!

Public ugliness

Y! is a publicly traded company. the Y! board will have to convince its shareholders that the offer is against the company's best interests. the directors are unlikely to succeed in the current economic climate, and will likely face a lawsuit from at least some their shareholders if they try. Y! will probably accept a sweetened offer, as they have no other options.

MS is publicly held as well, and i am certain that some of their shareholders will want to sue to block the deal, as it will add very little to what MS already does; will cost a huge sum (which the shareholders will likely want distributed as a dividend instead); will be subject to extensive antitrust review, which will likely fail in EU, and maybe in the US as well (though MS owns many politicians here); and will present an ugly integration and migration challenge, for a modest return.

i have yet to see a single compelling argument in favor of this deal, so my conclusion is that The Ballmer really pushed out a cockatrice' egg this time: the worst that can happen to MS is that the deal goes through. move on, people, BillG is gone, nothing further to see here...

HTC Vista UMPC to hit the UK within weeks

Options

yes, and is it penguin-friendly, can you run a BSD on it? Vista would eat that 1GB of RAM standing still...

would be good if it was useful for a wider range of tasks than just Solitaire (or "card-assisted masturbation", as it is sometimes called).

MoD goat-bothering boffinry to cease

Similar how?

easy way to judge, put the goats in a sub with the swabbies, then see if you can tell the diff in dim lighting.

HTC Magnum rumours rife following giant phone gag

Portable

i have a pocket that's just the right size...what? no, seriously...i was talking about Paris.

Brown plans to admit wiretap evidence in court

"Security" services

historically, these organizations have consistently attracted people of few and flexible morals. also historically, they usually don't want any evidence of this to get a public airing.

i wouldn't call the entire organization ethics-free (no more so than, say, Halliburton, Enron, Blackwater, Microsoft, or Exxon-Mobil), but history teaches that a significant minority, if not majority, of people usually employed by these outfits, is best suited only for shadow ops or political office.

the argument goes something like: "somebody's got to make the sausage, you know."

this is why they don't want ANY of their activities admissible as evidence. any questionable deed is that much more likely to end up in official records, which can subsequently be subject to disclosure.

SCO details bleak future

Still running

the original SCO product was used in many retail environments, as it was very stable and reliable, and required modest hardware. if SCO continued to sell and support that very consistent UNIX product, they would probably be doing well enough right now.

i personally know of at least one server running SCO, that is still standing.

they chose to take a huge, risky gamble, and lost. Darl and the other vultures will probably get jobs elsewhere, because among C-level officers, it's not what you know, but who.

sad to see a good little company go to waste because of greed and stupidity.

if GWBush's business record is anything to go by, Darl will probably be elected president of something rather critical in the future (much to the detriment of the rest of us), because s*it floats.

Microsoft forgers get jail time in Taiwan

Losing sleep?

hardly. i'm not the one with the furniture fetish and anger management issues ("Ballmer who? i know not of whom you speak...").

if they want to check, they can come on over with a court order/search warrant, and i'll show all my legit licenses for the software i don't run anymore (switched to UNIX/Mac/Linux).

the BSA is just a bunch of rented thugs for the MS legal team. i fail to see how piracy of licensed software is a crime against humanity, when it is really nothing but simple, petty theft.

IPv6 roots planted on the net

Politicians and tech don't mix

@ Dave

you can probably get a subsidy going for the carbon-neutral recycling of IPv4 addresses, and long-term sequestration of residual subnets, so as not to increase global warming. once you get the cash, start an ISP that only serves IPv4-to-IPv6 switchers, and you will likely have very little work to do for the next few years. truly, you can do it with a DSL modem and a single BSD server for routing.

easy business to get into, provided you can get the Gov to fund the subsidy, but considering their record of dealing with tech, this is a minor problem.

Straw: Police can bug MPs without asking Cabinet

Color of interest

@ theotherone

not just in the UK. come visit the US, and discover that bigotry is alive and flourishing, if sometimes silent and present only in action, not in word.

the Brits may have developed it into an art form ("no dogs or Chinese"), but the US has truly made it institutional. even the Black Muslims were silent while the Middle-Eastern Muslims were experiencing the New Crusade (Iraq).

if you want them to care, it has to cost them money or pain; otherwise, they are quite comfortable hating everyone who is not exactly like them.

FTC and DoJ will fight for the right to rule on YaMicrohoosoft!

Errant punctuation

you'll have to `use different marks in random~ places in articles related; /to the New.Improved!YahMiSoft...and insist that: it's an! innovative (feature) of @your writing, and, the, way, {all-periodicals will be *composed* in the future}.

Microsoft! needs! Yahoo! developers! developers! developers!

Tail will wag dog

as long as MS is mostly a marketing company, you can forget that lovingly crafted proposition. the mindset is, "they will use what we sell, and we will make them like it". this worked for a while, but the system is developing friction, and shows signs of breaking down.

i was a Rocketmail customer, then a Hotmail customer, and then a Microsoft customer (not willingly, mind you); now i'm a Hotmail Live subscriber (yep, it costs), and i plan to drop the account as soon as i pull all the messages off it.

what got me started in my switch to UNIX (after 15 years supporting and certifying on MS) was the utter crap that Hotmail became after MS switched it over to Win2000 Server from BSD (which is what Hotmail originally used). the idea was very counterintuitive: "how can free software be better than professionally developed commercial products?" over the last few years, i have turned fully to the Dark Side (Mac is Darth Vader, BSD is the immortal Emperor, Linux is the Imperial Fleet, i think), got training and certs in it, and am never going back.

if MS purchases Yahoo, i will drop that account as well, this time in advance, because i don't want to wind up with yet ANOTHER email account that requires MS software to retrieve and archive email (Hotmail Live is like that - no POP access available). and if i have to go through another UNIX-to-MS back-end migration (Yahoo runs BSD, last time i checked), i will be sorely pissed off.

Punxsutawney Phil predicts six more weeks of winter

Woodland creature botherers

for each (double loser in gathering)

{

get(life);

do { something(useful); something(constructive); } while (NOT(dead));

}

Secret bidder delivers 'open access' to US airwaves

Cocky but effective

Mr. Zuckerberg should take note, this is how it is done: if your young, nonconformist, highly capitalized, publicly traded startup has a QUARTERLY PROFIT of $1.2bn, you can crack jokes about your precisely timed demise, and dispense other levity at your discretion.

if your company has no business model; if you have no idea when or if you will ever turn a profit (or have an income at all); if you're facing a lawsuit from the guys who appear to have some evidence that you stole their idea, from them, in person; and if all you have is investment capital, you should save your wit and your energy for finding your way out of that hole you wound up in...because it's called a "burn rate" for a reason, bitch.

Russian FSB 'protecting' Storm Worm gang

Straw man du jour

yep, Muslims and immigrants are so last week, let's blame the Russians. as Chris Rock said, "that train is never late!"

love that stuff, makes it so much easier to blame and hate the "right" people. i wonder if the Jews and blacks are next, will have to check the list, can't remember the correct order just now...

considering the problems Russia is dealing with at the moment (organized crime, massive corruption, poverty, disease, unrest in many countries along the southern border, NATO expansion in the periphery, fallout from US foreign policy in Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan, and many many more), in addition to managing the largest country in the world (square mileage), i would guess that finding the Storm Trojan authors is pretty low on the list, and protecting them is even lower. if Storm is a problem in the West, so what? the FSB has more important (and far more urgent) things to worry about.

i'd like to see what proof they have, that the FSB would really waste time dealing with these guys at all.

and the thought of blocking communications is just silly, you really don't know how TCP/IP and routing works, do you? besides, all the Western companies (especially many of the banks) that have outsourced development to Russia (the quality of the work is better than what they get from India) will want a word with you about your great idea...

Experience overcomes Microsoft's broken promises

Manual conversion

how? very carefully, but also as quickly as possible. we have a deadline, you know.

are you done yet? never mind the testing, just put it in production, we'll fix the bugs in rollout...besides, you're working with a release-version MS enterprise-level database (or "beta release", as the rest of the world calls it), on a release-version MS enterprise-level OS (or "early beta release", to everyone else).

what could go wrong?

ok, i'm done channeling the IT Director/CEO/MD.

i'll be wearing the pinstriped jacket with armor plating, if you'd be so kind.

Commuter jetpacks offered: $100k, August delivery

Same idiots, different medium

ballistic uncoordinated wankers, coming (more like, crashing) soon to (into or onto) a location near you...

great, the people who don't know how to drive, will now be failing to fly. can't wait. on the plus side, watching one of these idiots crash into a building, a billboard, or a passing helicopter, or better yet, being attacked by a largish bird, would really brighten up my day.

i always thought it was only a matter of time, before the human race introduced its own Darwinian selection mechanisms, this time at the top of the socio-economic ladder. too bad they didn't get to Dubya before he got into power.

"i have a little list, they never will be missed." one can dream, can't one?

was initially going to go with PH icon, because penguins are too smart to mess with a hundred pounds of hazmat, and BillG and Real Steve are too old, but Mr. Jolly seemed more appropriate.

'100% accurate' face recognition algorithm announced

Profit to be made

time to invest in companies importing head-covering accessories, hoodies, and sunglasses, not to mention simple paper filter masks, a la the SARS outbreaks.

once the credulous many catch wind of this research, they will go running for cover, literally. like P. T. Barnum said, there's one born every minute.

the icon is what my composite picture looks like.

Just how cute are cats? W3C can help

A kitty by another name

what a bunch of C LI /V T S. yeah, cli/vts, a neologism for feline, i just invented it.

what were you thinking?

thank you, mine is the pink neoprene jacket...

Drive-by download menace spreading fast

How goofy would that be?

@ Graham Cluley

what if one actually IS Donald Duck (and paranoid)? perception is reality, you know...

any idea yet what the vector is? would having a squid proxy on, say, OpenBSD, in front of your Apache box help? what if it's configured with an ACL? SELinux? whitelist only? what if your site is strictly flat HTML, are you immune? is the Pope Catholic? ...just checking if you're paying attention.

thanks for reading, and any answers you can provide.

Target vuln

@ jrb

if your client doesn't have the IE iFrame vulnerability, or is not vulnerable to a JS exploit, or some ActiveX bug (there's one every couple of months, seems like), it matters not what the server is doing. if the client is not exploitable, it can't be exploited.

how is this not obvious?

bandwagon has nothing to do with it.

why is it that someone always jumps up to defend IE? it's a commercial product, they have paid marketing drones to handle PR. more importantly, who benefits from such spirited (if not always coherent) defense? and if the party that benefits is Microsoft, one has to wonder whether at least some of the defenders are astroturfing.

FTC squelches Ethernet patent squatter's price hike

Madam Chairman

i wonder if she's a Bush appointee, it sounds like one of their usual technology and patent opinions: "Government has no regulatory role in business, because business is holy and virtuous! Where business goes, rainbows, butterflies and unicorns follow!"

bought-and-paid-for corporate whores (without any pretense of reason or moderation), the whole lot of them.

Sun's war against clarity and business continues

Signal to noise ratio

it should not be a surprise that so many blogs are crap, and only add to the noise in the equation. most people's thoughts are not worth writing down, and even when such material is worth putting into print, most people suck at writing, as they suck at communicating coherently by any method.

try to imagine GW Bush's blog, sans speechwriters and handlers. go on. i'll wait for you to stop laughing...

the reason why good blogs are highly regarded (and very uncommon), is the same reason good authors are widely read (and likewise rare). those who thoughtfully consider what they wish to communicate, and then express it effectively and engagingly, are just as uncommon online as they are in literature.

mostly, the blogosphere is nothing more than mental masturbation: some twit unspeakably aroused by his or her own astuteness, bothering a keyboard and taking up bandwidth. such a waste. the world would be better served if all the blogging twits would just get out more (or at least strive to be more thoughtful, knowledgeable, articulate, and most importantly, relevant).

MPAA admits movie piracy study is 29% full of @$#%

Real numbers

here's a statistic you can count on: i am 100% certain that 100% of PR, management and legal personnel at RIAA, MPAA, major studios and big record companies should be immediately promoted to other jobs, and thus put to better use.

what i had in mind for their new assignment, was that wheel from "Conan the Barbarian" (poetic justice), driving a magnetic coil to generate electricity. any of these wonderful people who happen to die while chained to the turbine wheel, can then be used as fertilizer.

you want carbon-neutral, renewable energy, here you go.

those people are not useless, they have missed their calling. i'd love to help.

Dwarves hidden in sports bags target Swedish coaches

Obligatory and offensive

you know this has to happen, don't fight it.

"it was a perfectly safe baggage compartment, until they tossed a dwarf in it..."

number 23 please, the one with the armored vest on the inside.

Spotted in the wild: Home router attack serves up counterfeit pages

Lurv the 99%

@ ImaGnuber

please note that i meant absolutely no disrespect to "the Unwashed", as you put it. i am equally ignorant of the finer details of agriculture (for example), as the 99% are of IT. the ignorance of the masses pays my bills.

unfortunately for the wonderful 99%, i am not the only one who profits. the cablecos and telecoms who provide these devices in wide-open configuration, offer no advice on the topic, and rarely fix the bugs, are the parties abusing the consumers in this case (elsewhere, it is usually the salespeople: "No, it's all ready to go, just plug it in, you don't need to change a thing!"). i can fix some of the issues they create, but it will cost you a bit. alternatively, it may cost you far more if you happen to be one of the tens of millions of people who are ripped off (and there are many scams, more every day).

the fact is that IT (any flavor) requires proper configuration and occasional monitoring; periodic revision, upgrades, and maintenance; and safe usage instructions for the end user. the only thing i have seen that comes close to the required appliance-like level of functionality is this:

http://www.zonbu.com/home/index.htm

nothing else i have seen, Mac, Windows, or Linux/UNIX, comes close to the support and administration these guys offer.

Joe Sixpack vs. Ease of use

in my 20 years in systems and support, it has become obvious to me that the vast majority of Windows users (and most users in general, for Mac, Linux/UNIX, and most other platforms) have absolutely no idea how, why, when or where to change system values in the OS (any version). this is why TweakUI was created, for allegedly easy-to-use Windows, back in the day.

hell, most of them don't even know how to change settings on their mobile phones (much like their VCR/DVD/HDDisc players, that always blink 1200).

for the AC who said that Linux is not user-friendly, you made a completely meaningless statement. our hero, Joe Sixpack (he of the default router subnet, default password, and enabled UPnP), has never seen the admin page of his router, doesn't know it exists, how to use it, or why it matters. he also doesn't know that [insert windows root directory here]\system32\drivers\etc\hosts exists, how to use it, and why, or even what to edit it with (no extension, so Windows will ask what app to open). if you try to explain it to him, he will glaze over in under 5 seconds (i timed it), and will urgently need a beer to revive him.

given any sequence more involved than clicking on icons, 99% of the population is instantly lost (the ones who know enough to be dangerous, are usually the worst). in this respect, UNIX is no different than Windows for the IT-ignorant user (which describes most people): it is black magic, and geeks are its priesthood.

if you're ever sadistically bored sometime, try to explain the mechanics of DNS to non-technical friends, or, better yet, strangers (use the uninterested ones for bonus points), and see if they can edit the hosts settings effectively. the syntax of the hosts file is not user-friendly anyway, it is geek-friendly: /etc/hosts is a UNIX convention, a relic from the original Windows development team's UNIX background, which is why every Mac and Linux/UNIX box has that file, for that same purpose.

ease of use is relative to one's level of expertise. there is a large minority of the population in most industrialized nations, that is still completely ignorant, and even fearful, of computer technology. ease of use of Windows is relative, like ease of use of Mac (better interface anyway), or ease of use of the Linux/UNIX GUIs (there are many, some much easier than others).

personally, i like the AS/400 command line. given admin rights, the damage i can do is about like a UNIX box, but will usually impact the entire company.

PH icon: she is empty and meaningless, like AC's MS-type marketing FUD. happy trails.

Outrage over Nokia factory closure

Check the tin

if you read the label, it says "Capitalism" right here...

it's right in the name, isn't it? Capital, as in "money", which tells everybody what is most important. that 5% is THE significant consideration in a system that nurtures and protects money ("Capital").

please note, i do not condemn or criticize, i merely point out that, when you get a hammer, it is best at driving in nails, and less good for everything else. once you got yourself a hammer, it's rather silly to complain that you can't take out a Phillips-head screw with it. you should get a screwdriver, that's what they're for.

if you wanted something that would care for people, it would be Populism, and if you wanted to nurture society, you'd get Socialism. Communism, unfortunately, does not scale well; it only works in small communal groups, like Eskimo tribes or the early Christians.

that would be why the contracting AC has it right. if you live in a Capitalist state, like the US (in my case), you should incorporate, because the US takes much better care of an S Corp, than it does of a human being.

Boeing knocks back Dreamliner first flight

Learned? Not likely...

my mom worked for them years ago. Boeing is one of the most dysfunctional organizations on the planet, about what you'd expect for something that big and old.

if they learned any lessons from this, it would be a first. their organizational memory doesn't last longer than 2 years, as turnover among talented technical and line employees is absurdly high.

i chuckled when Boeing talked up their new supply chain that they were going to use for the Dreamliner. it sounded like a worldwide nightmare of coordination and management. turns out, that's exactly what it is.

they should have outsourced the coordination and logistics to Toyota, and laid off all those expensive Vice Presidents. would have saved money, and probably delivered on time. now, Boeing is performing the same way they do for the Pentagon: really late, and over budget. the Dreamliner will probably come with some interesting problems, too, like the V-22 did.

typical First-World defense-establishment corporate wankers.

US chief spook pushes electronic dragnet policy

Probable cause

that would be required for detaining and holding a suspect - you know, some basis for charges to be brought.

what Mike "Dr. Strangelove" McConnell here is looking for, would be undesirables, and evidence to be used against them.

we live in a country where King George can declare someone an enemy combatant, and that person will then "softly and silently vanish away", never to be seen, heard from, or charged (but perhaps waterboarded anyway).

every time the King says, "They hate us for our friddums!", i laugh. it may not be as bad here as Saudi Arabia (our close ally, mind you), but sure looks like we're headed that way.

at least the guy supposedly in charge of SA can speak English.

Apple fans hope keynote holds news of sub-notebook

What's in the air

if it's California, and there's something questionable in the air, 30% of it is probably the part of the Asian Brown Cloud that crosses the Pacific.

as for Mr. Jobs, despite having the character of a snapper turtle (as described in a legion of anecdotes by a legion of people), and reputedly being personally unpleasant (dubious habits, marginal social skills, poor hygiene, etc.), he is also highly effective; consider Apple's numbers (now bigger than the entire music business), specifically the figures from before his return, versus what came after. Apple products are starkly different, too, and hugely popular, but numbers are a more effective, neutral metric.

Theo de Raadt (leader of the OpenBSD project) is also considered to be difficult and abrasive, but the project puts out a consistently superior product (one of the most secure OSes on the planet), on time and to spec.

i've never met these guys, so do not know them well enough personally to judge whether i'd want them as friends, but their accomplishments are impressive, and i like their work.

Cambridge University dials up VoIP

Not ready for prime time

so, they decided to get the most expensive system, from a vendor known for half-baked proprietary shite in their "innovation" products?

what could go wrong?

my former employer implemented Cisco VoIP in their call center (thankfully after i left), and in several warehouse locations.

the call center is dying because the system is flaky and Cisco support is unresponsive (so my source tells me); it is worse in the warehouses. the organization opens one ticket a day, on average. they stay open indefinitely.

lessee...crap product, proprietary architecture, indifferent support, ruinous prices...

yep, that's the Cisco i've known for a looong time.

China ramps up space programme

Sourcing

@ Ishkandar

please note, tins and string also product of Chinese industry...

i would think that sort of thing was the first to go. technology manufacturing came later.

the globalization boosters won. they had no idea what the consequences would be. it takes a detachment somewhere between Zen and psychotic, to enjoy this irony.

i can just barely manage it.

Nature sticks entire archive online

Libraries are free

so if you want to do your own research, go to one of those.

if you want someone else to present peer-reviewed science in easily accessible form, you'll have to pay them, otherwise they will quickly deplete their supply of sheckels (giving their time and effort away for free), and have to go get a paying job (this is called capitalism) so they won't starve to death.

@ Don Mitchell

you are, of course, correct: Wikipedia (as an example of unnatural selection of the least sensible, knowledgeable, capable, and sane) was, and still is, an embarrassment to Nature.

yes please, tag number 23, mine has the tin foil hood and asbestos lining, and the missus' is the black rabbit fur collar...

Microsoft opens Server 2008 licensing a smidge

More WIBBLE

@ Mark Rendle

i approve of that one feature, but i still consider the product inferior because of:

-the licensing

-the bugs

-the primitive feature set

-the closed source that is illegal to alter

-the absence of AppArmor/SELinux

-the price

-MS marketing people editing their security and bug advisories,

-the incident response time ("we'll handle it one Tuesday next month")

-the afterthought that is MS documentation

-the endless marketing bull that is misleading at best and deceptive at worst

and i could go on, but you get the idea.

WIBBLE

it is what i do when i consider why i would run a CPU-sucking GUI on a server, and throw in a load of vulns, too. hey, i know, let's put it online!

in UNIX-flavored land, i can install a GUI and disable it at will. do not try that on your Windows box, without a bare-metal backup.

and that's just a start.

there are so many reasons not to, i don't know where to start...

Intel walks out of OLPC project

Owner's viewpoint

our household participated in the Give-One-Get-One, so we actually have one of these units. the project is mostly focused on developing countries (law/order established, food/clothing/shelter available), not on failed states (anarchy, violence and starvation), a distinction most people here have not made (there is a huge difference).

the laptop is highly durable, very portable, and ridiculously well-designed (according to my wife, who is VP of marketing and product development for a company that sells kids' coloring products; her design staff was quite impressed, too). it is very education-focused (there's a small library of material stored in it), and has excellent wireless functionality (preloaded activity sharing apps are aware of the automatic mesh setup the laptop can create, the reception is excellent, etc.), better than the commercial laptops i have seen.

i have about 20 years of enterprise IT systems experience, and my professional opinion is that this is an excellent beginning. there is much material available for download off the organization's website, with many more apps and activities available. some of the features are quite unusual; for example, the unit allows one to measure the distance between itself and another OLPC in range (under favorable conditions, close to 2 miles, or so i've read). the storage is upgradeable via an SD card slot. overall, i am quite impressed.

like much other open source stuff, the platform is under active development, which allows even the developing countries to get involved in its improvement and growth (unlike closed-source solutions, where you get what they give you). this unit is superbly suited for its purpose, and volume production may still pull the cost down to something closer to $100, eventually.

in conclusion, i have to say that the naysayers are full of it. this program has merit, and deserves support. this is regardless of whether Negroponte is a jerk and Intel and Microsoft are warm-fuzzy (religious wars, anyone? i'll kick it off: vi rules!).

the poor nations will definitely benefit from this project. much of the argument against it appears to be pompous posturing and sentimental bull.

FBI's 'idiot dude' fails to boost US Navy terror emails

Real life enlisted

@ AC

having served for 6 years as a trainer in US Army Intelligence, i have to agree with Tawakalna about the US enlisted. to be fair, there are plenty of lieutenants ("butter bars") fresh from OCS, that are so dangerously stupid that they should be put under a sergeant's charge until they grow a clue, but that is another discussion.

as a group, the "lifers" (those who stay in the service until they retire) are noticeably less intelligent and motivated (there are some exceptions, but they are few). they stay because many of them are allowed to be marginally useful. these marginal types would have trouble adapting to the private sector (which already has more than enough drones). the military is a machine, and as long as you are a suitably shaped cog, you will be allowed to remain.

i don't care what the statistics say. about 140 of the 160+ people in my basic training company would have been more useful as fertilizer. if i offended someone who shares that low level of functionality, then good, they deserve it (perhaps the AC is one?).

if the human race doesn't start breeding for ability soon (instead of just for looks, or because it's fun and easy), we may render ourselves extinct.

Microsoft readies Hal 9000

Cause and effect

individuals who suspect they are under surveillance, usually exhibit elevated stress, which will lead to more surveillance, and more stress, etc.

this is the usual MS approach: given an absence of problems, create some, then impose ineffective solutions that require constant tweaking.

if only they used that money to make better software...

Microsoft warns on Home Server bug

Numba Wuun, Sucka!

@ the Hewittt

(3 t's? really?)

very consistent of you.

sure, MS is a wonderful walled garden, where unicorns and butterflies live peacefully together, except when something goes badly wrong, and the Ballmer has to make yet another marketing-driven announcement that everything will be just fine, no worries.

MS never met a standard they didn't try to subvert and/or destroy. they even created a new synchronization standard for Hotmail (DeltaSync), that only works on MS Outlook-type clients (because there weren't enough email protocols already, you see). they eventually provided POP3 access to paid subscribers; this was announced with much pride, and didn't work worth a damn.

i was a Rocketmail user (before the buyout), then a Hotmail user (before the buyout), then a MS Hotmail user (before the server conversion from BSD), and now i'm paying $20 a year because i've had the same email address for 15 years, and there's way too much hanging off that address to switch or drop, and all i need is reliable POP3 access to pull all the stuff off, and guess what?

it's crap now, is what. Hotmail was faster and more reliable when it was running on BSD, so you can take your butterflies and unicorns, fold them up until they're all corners and shove them right up Ballmer's BackOffice.

you remind me of all the Americans who loudly and continuously proclaim that "Amurrikah is numba wuun, w00t!", though most of them never bothered to get passports, and the only time they saw a foreign land was when they watched part of some National Geographic Special, about some primitive tribesmen, once, by accident...

how the hell would you know? the rest of the IT world integrates by virtue of standards, and unless you go outside your walled garden once in a while, you wouldn't even know what a proper, fully compliant DHCP server is supposed to work like, since MS implemented only about half of the standard functionality in Windows Server.