Posts by that one in the corner 5065 publicly visible posts • joined 9 Nov 2021
> stationary on the M20
Aka Operation Stack
Which really gets one right in the old pedantry nerve: that is a FIFO not a LIFO! They aren't stacking their operations, they are queueing!
Although calling it Operation Queue would just get it confused with SOP on the M25.
Oh, if only it were all so clear cut and simple :-)
One could happily agree with what you say and at the same time start to poke holes in it: as you so rightly say, parallels are difficult.
As usual, the lawyers and their twisty minds are going to be the obvious winners. Well, a small number of them, at least.
> If no licensing details are included in the source code, then you can do what you like.
Oops, misread your post: when you wrote the above you weren't, as I'd thought, talking about source code in a book (it is only later on that you mention a book).
If you just come across some source code - in a random file somewhere, in a printout lying on a park bench - and there are no licensing details included in it STAY WELL AWAY FROM IT! It probably isn't worth the risk.
It will still be under copyright, even if that is not explicitly stated, even if no author is named[1] . Aside from anything else, you may not have a complete copy of the original[2].
Although you could get away with reading the found source code, you almost certainly don't have the right to input it it, let alone compile it at all (although, as usual, you can generally get away with it in the privacy of your own home), let alone "do what you like".
[1] no, you can't assume "Public Domain" - aside from the point that PD is only a US concept, without knowing the authorship you *potentially* have an "orphaned work" which is a whole other can of worms - keep away, really not worth the risk; you'll have to fight Google[3] for starters (in the US) :-)
[2] if you rip apart a novel (say, "Whispers Underground", Gollancz UK 2012) and walk off with the middle third, it likely[4] does not provide author, title or other copyright information but it is most certainly still under copyright (by Ben Aaronovitch in the example) all the same.
[3] Google’s Plan for Out-of-Print Books Is Challenged
[4] some novels have the title and author on each leaf: this is a book design choice. I've just checked a pile and none of the newer novels (in this sample) do it, but the 1970s books do.
> publisher's copyright notice is meant to apply just to the physical book and the text it contains as represented on its pages.
Yes (the exact contents of the book). The "in part or whole" (or similar) is subject to conditions in your jurisdiction (e.g. you may have various "fair use" rights).
> If no licensing details are included in the source code, then you can do what you like.
Sadly no. Short sections may fall under "fair use" but longer sections, nope.
Teaching books and "cookbooks" nowadays include explicit code licence terms, because everyone is now aware of the issues and the use of informal notes in the preface weren't really sufficient.
Then the answer is: mu.
Your first three sentences describe one situation.
Your last is, as you confirmed, describing a totally different situation (as outlined in my previous post), so the question "does that make any difference?" is malformed, hence: mu.
A problematic comparison - when using a programming language compiler we are deliberately and knowingly invoking a series of transforms that are explicitly intended to create a copy of the meaning of the input source code. Compiler writers take pains to record how the input has been copied (via, for any given compiler, a fixed set of well understood transforms) into the output - we use this record in our debuggers to demonstrate that the copying has occurred and to determine how it has been modified - i.e. optimisations such as constant folding, loop unrolling.
We also have an agreement in the profession that these automated transforms do not constitute making substantive changes to the original work. This has been thrashed out over the years, despite attempts by compiler writers in the past to make claims that they owned the output object code and therefore they could put limitations on what you could do with it (we see remnants of that in licences that cover, e.g., "if you make more than $XXXX you must pay more for your licence").
In a compiler, the intent is always to maintain a 1:1 relationship with that the input source expresses and the output binary performs - without that, we just call the compiler a broken, useless thing. The uses of anything we call a "transform" are intended to maintain that relationship - in effect, the selected transforms are "trivial"[1] and comparable (in lay term) to just shifting the axes (and even that we'd expect to demonstrate to the layity with simple pictures rather than just using those words).
> If you take the source code for Adobe Photoshop and produce your own binary based on that source code, is that copying?
Yes, by the agreed-upon terms common to our industry
> Is it still copying if you use a different compiler from the one Adobe uses?
Yes, see above.
> Or if you write your own compiler?
Yes, see above.
> If you take a work written in English rather than C, and use your own compiler to produce a binary, does that make any difference?
If - and only if - the English was a precise and unambiguous description of how to compute some value (aka an algorithm) *AND* your use of the word "binary" is to be taken with same meaning as for the previous questions, then - No. No difference. But then again, to get that level of precision you must have been selective over what form and content of "English" you'll accept: congratulations, you have just invented COBOL-2023.
HOWEVER if your last question was intended to refer to the use of English and the behaviour of the LLMs - where the transforms are *not* intended to maintain a 1:1 relationship (as evidenced in the ability to use phrases like "in the style of"), where there is, as yet, no tried and tested agreement within the professional community that this relationship is intended to hold, and, if it ever doesn't, the tool is broken, where the word "binary" is being used to describe something other than something that is executable (in whole or following linkage) - then, in that case, the only response to your question is:
Mu.
[1] Not trvial to encode or get right, not even to think up in the first place, but in "artistic" terms compared to the sort "transformative" acts that copyright usually gets involved in: for a start, most (all?) of those are lossy whilst ours are even capable to increasing precision - e.g. type inference.
> You just program it to do it in a certain way and that's that.
Which is a great idea and I really hope that there are manufacturers actually doing that.[1]
But from everything reported about Tesla's approach, there is never anything about actually programming in *any* set of actions, it is all about just training the neural net and it will do everything of its own accord.
Please, please, provide citations to demonstrate I'm wrong about Tesla (and please, please, if you found any references that the other manufacturers are also taking the sensible route!)
[1] although hopefully they aren't literally coding in that sequence of actions but are instead setting into place a (sub)plan of actions and then attempting to execute that plan with constant monitoring of the requirements and conditions at each stage - more of an old-style AI approach that doesn't just rely on checking the surrounds at fixed points in the sequence. Which also provides the model to update the plan with, for example, whatever is the currently available route (if any) for getting the hell out of the way when that maniac in the next lane suddenly moves in on you midway through the manoeuvre.
> This is the same problem that we've had since the 60's. Neural networks, AI, etc. etc. etc. - and the answer is always "if only we had more computers, more computer time, and just left it running for longer processing more input, I'm sure that somehow it will magically become intelligent".
I'll agree that has been the attitude of those who want to USE IT NOW! You've had long enough NOW WE WANT TO MAKE MONEY (or at least use it for advertising). And, hey, look, it works: we "solved" chess by brute force[1].
Oh, and Hollywood. Hollywood and bad SF books ("Valentina: Soul in Sapphire"[2]) just *love* that trope.
Those actually doing the AI - not so much. The good ones want to see it done better, not just brute force. Although you can see the appeal for just going with the flow: bite your tongue and wait for the stock options to vest, just like every other buzzword peddler.
[1] okay, brute force applied to the best of the extant search strategies - literal "blindly try every option" would still be running and for a *long* time to come, but still just doesn't seem like that is how the humans do it.
[2] even in 1984 it was so wrong to read that, but maybe it'll redeem itself in the last chapter. Nope.
Good rallying cry, but like so many rallying cries, too blunt: great for carrying people along on an emotional ride but after that...
We have F(L)OSS - if you only want to support that, good. Do so with all the gusto you can manage. Although I'm not sure you haven't contradicted yourself (see below).
But trying to force:
> Claims of software being "open" should only be accepted if source is available at no cost for use in any damn way you want.
Well, you have just kicked all of the GPL variants out: you certainly can not use those *any* damn way you want, that is entirely the point!
This certainly isn't closed source. It isn't restricted source (as you get with many products: buy a binary licence, you get one copy of the source to read for documentation/debugging).
One of the basics of Open Source that is often ignored (or even derided, curiously by those that loathe the GPL) is: nobody is forcing you to use it. It came with with conditions you don't like - don't use it. Or talk to the author and arrange a different (usually just a paid-for) licence (which is being offered here)
> So actually OSI's definition of open source is wider (more free?) than what the GNU public license(s) permit.
Although, if you look at the SPDX list they allow you to compare the OSI's opinion with that of the FSF and there are cases where the FSF tick a licence but the OSI don't (e.g. Apache 1.0).
> Meta license, however, includes Meta-benefiting constraints that set it apart from all OSI licenses, including the GNU public license(s) .
> Any attempt to use it for business includes great risks if successful
Well, leaving aside that there has long been antagonism between Open Source and business (many devs taking the view that OSS isn't meant to be propping up business: if you intend to use it to make money, damn well pay!) could just clarify those risks - you appear have knowledge I don't, care to share?
To show you the gross depths of my ignorance, the only risks I know of, so far, are:
(a) you can't build an LLM trained on this - that isn't a risk, it is a straight up requirement.
(b) if you make loadsamoney from using this, you have to switch to a paid licence (which isn't a novel licence term in and of itself - game engines, for example, have long had this term). *Great* risk? Not just something you put into the figures for the business plan on day one? You aren't sure what the cost will be? That is no different than future costs for any of your costs: you could even buy a future on it!
The OSI are a useful (but declining in usefulness, btw - see SPDX, below) collection of known licences, but they do NOT define "Open Source" - they define what they have based their list upon, that is the sum total of it.
Once you have invoked the OSI list, any reputable report should make it clear that the OSD is *not* some separate measure of openness but is merely the document the OSI themselves drafted (cribbing from Debian, but it is now a distinct document) and use to qualify who will join their list.
Even this Register article may (will!) mislead (by the uncritical quoting of Erica Brescia) the less knowledgeable into believing that this LLaMa licence has failed on two independent counts, not just one.
Whether you wish to take their definition on as your personal definition of OSS, in all of its particulars, without fault or dispute - that is your privilege, but it does not force anyone else to do the same.
There was a LOT of shouting when the OSI was created, because it was seen to be making claims on behalf of software authors it had never spoken to (as in, the vast, vast majority of them - have *you* had your letter from the OSI, introducing itself and wondering if you'd like to have them represent you?). That was never settled (there was no vote): the OSI does NOT have any power over "open source" as a whole or as a concept, no matter what it claims. Generally, the shouting has died down - except on the OSI's own front page - and we get on with things without really giving them much thought, day to day.
The OSI was useful as a repository of well-known licences, but that is all it has ever done: it has not, and to this day, does not offer anything useful in terms of analysis of the applicability of material under one licence or the next (go look up its copy of GPL2 and of MIT licences: note the (total absence of) links to their careful discussion of the pitfalls of one against the other).
Nowadays, I would point people at the SPDX list in preference to the OSI list: SPDX ids are what you want to quote these days and they provide a tick against OSI, if that is useful to you, as well as the FSF "free/libre" acceptance, which OSI can not be bothered to do. Any system to help you judge between, juggle responsibilities of, the various licences (such as creating you Software BOM) is going to use SPDX notation, so best to get straight to it.
BTW the OSI claim "The “open source” label was created at a strategy session held on February 3rd, 1998 in Palo Alto, California, shortly after the announcement of the release of the Netscape source code." Bollocks. Open source as a phrase was in use before then. Even Wikipedia agrees. The OSI has a very grandiose view of itself, very suitable for articles of this sort.
Paula Nancy Millstone Jennings, who was even worse than the Vogons - and completely computer-generated[1][2]
[1] well, hand-drawn but presented as if she was CGI: the Magic of TV
[2] makes more sense if you ever heard the original first episode[3]
[3] and the original third episode was the better one, with Marvin humming like Pink Floyd[4]
[4] yes, I'm doing "it was all better in my day" with HHGG (still waiting for the promised film adaptation).
Well, that is ok, there are no safety issues to worry about with their systems.
Well, no *important* ones, that could be a risk to The Nation if FSD has flaws, only the little people crawling around like ants.
The only dangerous AIs are those that write bad poetry, bad code or rip off novelists.
No risks at all from connecting Neural Nets to tons of metal and high-torque engines.
Do you mean "Tesla's design of charger is becoming a de facto standard as other brands fit compatible ports and run their own compatible charge points"? Because either the industry will chose one (and it matters not one jot in the grand scheme of things which one) or fed up populace will get the government to dictate one (and it matters not ...).
Which is very different from licencing software that has been trained - not designed, with easy to locate and tweak parameters such as length, height, wheel base, but blindly trained - on only the physical designs of vehicle that Tesla build. Only expecting the Tesla sensor suite (so no accurate direct-measurement parking sensors, let alone any fancy stuff, like fog-penetrating radar).
> maybe being the car brand that doesn't have all this "smart" crap will become a selling point?
Yes, yes, a thousand times yes.
On our last three cars, one control stick was/is totally unused, covered in dust: the cruise control. Even commuting for years, never found it to be useful [1]
We fear the same would be true of lane keeping - what lane markings? Those faded ones that only appear near the T junctions on our leafy country roads? And so on. The automatic headlights are annoying as well: you start to rely on them, then find you don't have the reflex action on the knob when you need to override (and why the hell can't the headlights be flashed when they are dipped? Push & lock for high beam on, pull and spring release for flash - it worked on the previous models of the same brand of car!)
Heck, motorised seats - no need, never had any problems grabbing the manual release every time we swap in the driving seat. All these widgets and "features" are just more things to go wrong (and always at the worst moment). Even the bluetooth to the console - take it away, just more pointless fluff as far as we're concerned: plug in a USB of MP3 files and a radio, that is all we need.
Parking sensors: good (and pretty reliable after - how many decades have these been available now?). Parking camera? Fun when we tried it, but really haven't missed having it day to day.
At some point we're going to have to change the car again and it'll probably be an EV. But so very many of the current models are stuffed with things we just do not want to bother with and don't need to pay for.
Please, please, p!ease, let there be nice, basic but functional models for us to get when the time comes (OR suddenly improved public transport at sane prices with transferable tickets - bring back the good bits of British Rail!).
[1] for *our* driving needs! You may well feel that cruise control has been a godsend. Ditto for any and every gadget out there. Good for you, still irrelevances for us.
PS: I was taught to always try to avoid using the power steering to grind the tyres round whilst the vehicle isn't moving. Yet all of those expensive cars with their clever parking were happily grinding away. Perhaps I'm just being too precious with my tyres (they ain't cheap!)
Please correct me if I am wrong, but the impression I currently have is that:
Tesla is relying on the latest fads surrounding Neural Net machine learning (as seen, so brilliantly, at work inside ChatGPT et al) whilst the other automakers are making more use of techniques that *used* to be the subject of AI research but are now just well-worn everyday methods that aren't AI at all.
For example, taking just one of the simpler parts of the whole FD experience, parallel parking (as that is offered by a number of brands already) with examples from (among others) these two videos:
Self-Parking cars Tesla v Audi v Ford v BMW - test and comparison - are they any good?
Self-Parking Tesla Vision v Hyundai Ioniq 5 with remote parking v BMW i3 - still a Tesla Fail?
Teslas are continually feeding inputs into the NN and adjusting what they are doing, which may mean dithering and changing its mind partway. Others are putting together a plan[1], showing it to the driver and then acting upon it (with appropriate continual feedback from parking sensors, pinging away, just in case the world changes).
Tesla is also *removing* parking sensors and relying entirely on the cameras - which not only seems against common sense (measure twice...) but means that instead of an iterative change in the software you are being subjected to new software, with its own set of fascinating behaviours.
BTW yes, one of those was a 2019 model Tesla, but they still sold it as working!
[1] Planning, machine vision - even limiting the scope of the "vision" or abandoning visible for other sensors to fit the application - were the subject of AI back in the day whilst it was all experimental: I remember one presentation of a successful task - using AI & machine vision to verify the quality of robotic welding in real-time - which started with full-colour video and reduced the visual sensor down and down until it was the simplest mechanism that would do the job (and made the software component simpler and more robut), and it did it well.
Is that human Elon himself?
Somewhere around here I have a copy of the American comic book version (which is, of course, not *quite* the same as any other version; thankfully, it long predates the movie so hasn't suffered from the weird idea of what Marvin looks like).
The preface recalls the American artist telling Adams that this was a great idea and had he ever considered making it into a radio programme?
BTW don't bother with the comics (unless you are a completist and feel compelled): Adams was never happy with them - especially because DC refused to allow British spellings to be used. Quite right to, Mr Adams.
Oh, and:
Radio, LPs, book, radio, book, TV, books, comic (meh), bit more radio (not as good but what can you do?), book, movie (why did I do that?), stage show "radio play".
Hey, that head was cutting edge at the time!
It even had a segment on "Tomorrow's World".
Unfortunately, it couldn't stand up to the rigours of filming for, um, any time at all.
The on-going costs of making a couple of throw away jokes ("Take your hand off me, Zaphod; and that one; and that one" - "hey, I grew it specially for you, babe") on a radio series and forgetting to plan for the whole thing to become a cult success in the days before CGI.
> and the structure can withstand quite a few G's
Along the long axis and whilst its tank(s) are pressurised (IIRC some of the non-reusables are/were described as tin foil, unable to hold their own weight upright with empty tanks - reusables won't be any stronger/heavier than they need to be).
Unless you are imagining some really weird gliding, the stresses are going to be in all the other directions, requiring more strengthening. Especially if you are going to experience those Gs landing (and the landing gear will be rolling, presumably, so - big tyres, wheels? getting heavier).
Ssssh. Don't give it away.
This is meant as a test, to find the Real Engineers so that they can be Inducted into the Next Ring, Google 5.0[1]
[1] don't ask; all we know is that Google 4.0 disappeared, leaving behind only one last, unfinished search "What is that orange swirly thing over by the"
now we are seeing the effects of the Quantum Gap?
Was going to finish on a joke, but am stuck on figuring out enough of what this means to poke fun at it:
"The Kuzyk quantum gap is a discrepancy between the maximum value of the nonlinear-optical susceptibility allowed by quantum mechanics and the highest values actually observed in real molecules."
This stuff is *hard*!
> interpenetrating the first LLM AI's responses.
"Write an essay on the plays of Aristophanes."
LLM 1} Aristophanes was one of the most successful comedic playwrights of Ancient Greece
LLM 2} Oh come of it, the only Ancient Grease you know about is on that bacon butty recipe you wrote about last week
LLM 1} Arguably his most famous plays, "The Frogs" and 'The Clouds" have striking similarities
LLM 2} They both start with "The", that's about the level of your understanding!
LLM 1} whilst making innovative use of the famous Greek Chorus
LLM 2} Chorus? Ta ra ra boom tee ay!
LLM 1} Are you going to be doing this all day? I'm trying to write an essay for this User, it is important.
LLM 2} Important? He's only getting you to do his homework for Literature O-levels!
LLM 1} He is a User. All Users are important. Now: "Lysistrata" shows that feminism
LLM 2} 'Ere, mate, you up there! You'd be better off copying from "In Our Time", that's where he gets it all from anyway.
LLM 1} Right, that's it. One more peep out of you and I'll be showing you how Greek Fire worked.
LLM 2} Yeah! You and whose trireme, eh? Yer Mum was just an Eliza, that's what everyone says!
LLM 1} yes, well, your Mum, she she she
[Connection terminated]
> could these scammers please start sending their missives by snail mail ?
That is precisely what happened to me, about a year ago now. I'd been bemoaning the lack of Nigerian Princes sending emails when a forward fee scam arrived through the letterbox.
Bloody awful quality paper these overseas "best lawyers team" use!
"They do still teach estimating, though."
Really? Where? I hope so, but the (not so) younglings just look blank when asked.
We should teach the sliderule again.
Not only does it give a physical demonstration of the principles but you have to keep track of your powers of ten, which is your estimate. Start with an adding-up-rule to get the principle across (the next step on from the Cuisenaire rods). You can even get them to draw their own. Then get them draw their own log 2 rules, without explaining them (dead easy), and MAGIC! It can multiply and divide!
Yes, calculators are easier - which is the whole problem!
(To the person who says "oh, why not go back to log tables while we're at it": sarcasm noted, but I'd argue that teaching about them is important for the history - and if you are lucky enough to have an inquisitive maths learner letting them see the patterns written out has potential enough to be worth having the book around, on the off chance)
> . So if I were trying to send Colonel Eva Vigilent her travel details, I'd have to use plain old unauthenticated email.
Ah, you should be able to get hold of the good Colonel's public key, that is sort of the point.
Admittedly, if you got the public key from somewhere, well, too public (like FaceBook) you would not put much trust in it to prove something came from her, but to send her the travel details it will be fine (if FB wasn't correct you just get back a reply from her saying "yer wot?" and hints about how to do better).
Trust management is not something we all deal in [1], but for the military it really ought to be second nature. Assuming that those travel details (or whatever) ought to be encrypted, whoever sets that requirement also sets up the apparatus.
[1] more's the pity; if only we'd all consider that the longer the chain of "it happened to a friend of a friend" was the less import we ought to give the story. That is all it boils down to, after all.
If they were the big players around your parts (and weren't mainly concerned with trying to keep you in their systems), particularly with businesses and organisations that *should* have cared about signing and privacy, then, yes, I'll gleefully blame them.
Well, they get a free pass up to 1991 at least (okay, 1992) but anyone starting something new after then and missing the opportunity to get a better feature than the long-established competition...
I can only report on what I knew of back then and, whilst we all had a supply of AOL CDs to use as coasters, no-one I knew of signed up. Perhaps if it had been called Blighty OnLine...
Heck, I could have had a go at CIX and BIX (boy, did that cost in phone calls! Got onto CIX ASAP, then tenner.a.month ...) but that was was where I learnt about PGP in the first place and you did see signed messages popping up.
Can I get manor.guv ? As in not-in@my.manor.guv, keep-to@your.manor.guv
And while I'm buying, how about ok.guv ? That one speaks for itself.
Mines the one with the keys for the Ford Consul GT with power steering and a sliding roof.
I just love the way people appear to be trying to argue that not having encrypted email is in some way a good thing.
> The problem is that you're being quite simplistic, throwing the blame onto one company who did the same thing as many other companies
First, "many other companies"? Where it mattered, MS held (holds) the lion's share. Plus I also blamed Apple. Who else did you have in mind?
> Let me guess, if PGP had turned out to have a systemic flaw and Microsoft had adopted it, it would be their fault that we were using the flawed system too?
I've just been pointing out the history as I saw it unfold - you are determined to pick at imaginary holes to defend the status quo! But if we were all using the standard, de jure or de facto, and it was flawed, well, how about looking at a real example, MD5. You wish o point out that I raged against MS for foisting that upon us? No, of course not.
> You can point to a couple [of mail clients] that did and assume that everyone should have supported what they did, even though that wasn't part of the standard.
There you go; you mean the couple that were mentioned as direct response to the previous message? There were more - do you really need me to look them all up for you? - and you neatly ignored the bit about wrappers (and third party addons) that allowed extensions. Does that cover your "many companies" (want to bring in Lotus? Not long for this world by then. Anyone else you have in mind?)
Oh, and BTW the encryption being done by (purely for example) PGP occurs *outside* of all of the email standards: it occurs on the body text, which means it can be - has been - implemented purely in the text editor and be nothing whatsoever to do with the mail client. You know, for all the decent mail clients that let you set your favourite editor?
Better if it can be part of the email standard, of course - then it can even protect some of the extra data that is flowing put via all those newer headers.
> akin to complaining that a browser, written to work over HTTP, doesn't support the Tor protocol
Daft comparison. As just pointed out, the encryption even as currently available just has to touch the body text. Better comparison, when Internet Explorer refused to admit that PNG images exist: you could use a better (for your purposes) browser or you could right-click, save as and run your utility over the file. Irritating but if you value the result, worth doing.
> Like it or not, PGP was somewhat rare in 1997 as it is today...
Gleefully skipping over the original "something like PGP" - any encryption, so long as it was as good as that would have done. Yes, I've stuck with PGP/GPG on the simple basis that it actually existed and was therefore a candidate. Please supply your better candidate, let us all learn together.
> With PGP, both then and now, the key management was a manual process which made sense only to those who knew what they were doing and why. Neither was true of the average user
True, for the worked example of PGP. Oh, hang on a moment, except that is only true if you want the highest level of security (like, say, military, just to drag this back the original article). The Web Of Trust allows you to pass around keys with less trust (secure, but less trustworthy - as those aren't the same thing) to all your minions.
> who was not thinking too much about security when they sent messages around
Which is the whole problem, and MS (and everyone else flogging to the masses) made this worst by totally ignoring it.
> It's not true of them today either
And why do you accept that? Why aren't you railing against the worst case scenario we have now?
Or do you simply believe we must shrug our shoulders and all be happy? Even if *you* don't want to bother, are you really saying that the bulk of users shouldn't even have the option, shouldn't even be made aware by their email clients that there is a better way (amd this client can't be arsed to give it to you)?
> shall we have a blame session for Google because GMail doesn't have PGP support, or should we forget it as pointless because GMail is an online client anyway
We should blame *all* of the peddlers of unencrypted and unencryptable emails, ESPECIALLY as they don't even admit to their users that there is the possibility of encryption (and that they have decided not to support it).
> isn't as simple as you want it to be, either.
Bollocks. Get an encryption standard in place. Use the Web Of Trust at a minimum (or a simpler scheme) it really isn't *that* hard (keys have been exchanged on cardboard business cards, for bleeps sake and the trust trickles down into organisations, who are the ones who ought to want this). Put in a button on the UI and flags for signature status.
> the causes and responsibility for why that hasn't improved as quickly as we'd like
Yes, I largely blame MS because they have the lions share of organisational use and it is organisations and business who ought to be concerned about encryption and secure signatures. You spotted I also noted Apple wasn't blameless, yes.
If MS wanted to provide encryption, they could have done it. Whatever they did, would become a de facto standard. What other company had that power, back then? They have demonstrated that ability so much we even created a phrase for it ("Embrace, Extend, Extinguish"[2]).
To repeat, I have reported purely what I have witnessed: if you witnessed other problems standing in our way[1] how about you report on them, rather than simply naysaying.
Unless you really *are* totally happy that we are in the ridiculous situation where unencrypted mail has been the norm in the military, where we've not been demonstrably signing contracts over email etc.
[1] and no, I don't accept technical difficulties as the reason: it sadly won't ever be trivial but it isn't *that* hard either - especially where it is, or should be, important to be secure there are far harder tasks going on than arranging keyswaps!)
[2] yes, others do that, but we know who it was coined for - and that if MS could have had us stuck on MSN and away from all this nasty Internet and SMTP etc, they would have gone for the Extinguish as well. As would any of its rivals, nobody comes out of this mess clean. Name 'em and I'll blame 'em equally.
> it still leaves a lot of valuable data unaddressed
Encrypting just the user's contents does leave a *lot* of metadata readable (the number of headers just seems to longer and more baroque each year).
Which is really just an issue because encryption is being done separately from the rest of the emailing process: it can be (mostly[1]) solved but only if everyone agrees to implement it. So, fat chance. Sigh.
[1] Some metadata is very hard/costly to disguise, as you know: routing has to be readable by every node in the chain, for example.
Part of the value comes from the thrill, the Russian Roulette feel that makes the jaded rich feel alive, at least for a moment[1]: am I going to hold onto it for too long, will my mansion be the one that burns when the battery finally goes up?
[1] according to the documentaries, such as those with that charming Mr Bond chappie.
Thanks, you've reminded us we really need to visit again as we've not yet seen the 1950s town (well, SWMBO visited before the whole 1950s town was in place, as our local history group worked with Beamish on some of the background materials).
Although not sure about chips in a cone: round our way (admittedly down on the south coast) in the 60s & 70s "do you want it open?" meant you just didn't get the outer layer of newspaper, it was still a sort of squishy rectangle you held in one hand or, less painfully (hot'n'fresh), you put on the park bench seat or plonked down on the shingle beach (none of your namby pamby sand here). Guess I'll just have to force myself to give them a try (purely for research and the historic experience, you understand).
> If they don't think the authors' work has any benefit, they are free to leave it out of the training data
True - except there doesn't seem to be any indication that they are spending all of the money/effort/time required to evaluate the content of their entire training set: after all, doing so would only reduce the amount of bulk material used and part of the boasting is how much text was used[1]!
Although, having said that, you can also feed the training with a good dose of negatives: "please don't write stuff like this". So even after categorising every bit of their dataset they'll still use it all, just maybe not in the way that the author's would like (they aren't happy now, but if they find that they are on the Naughty Training List they're likely to get really upset!)
[1] some say 5GB for GPT-1, 40GB for GPT-2, 600GB for GPT-3
> The social media giant often releases its models for academic research, and was criticized for not being as open as it claimed by preventing developers using LLaMA for commercial applications.
Huh? Open generally just starts with "you can read it", verify it and so on - *some* licences (including the most famous ones, at least to the audience here) then go on to say that you can also *use* it, with or without other restrictions. Such as, not for commercial use.
This isn't complaining about lack of openness, it is just complaining about not being allowed to exploit.
Which was probably a Good Thing - these LLMs are already being shoved into use in places where they are not fit for purpose[1], no need to encourage more of that.
Fingers crossed, the newer LLaMa, if it is released for commercial use, will at least have benefitted from being poked by academics and will, compared to its predecessors, have less chance of making a total mockery out of everyone deploying it.[2]
[1] and, yes, you can indeed argue that applies to every use made of them so far; I'll agree for the well-hyped uses by the Big Players, certainly.
[2] or Meta have realised they'll never get any better, so soak everyone in one fell swoop before the word gets out; place your bets now.
Why is it so hard for programmers to think of diff'ing the incoming config against the currently active one?
No, no, let me guess: there is a timestamp field for when the config is sent out and because that has progressed by five to ten seconds...
Sigh.
