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Comment Re:Why? (Score 1) 377

by Dushnock (#33380254) Attached to: Intel Buys McAfee
Hi,

I guess I've never used McAfee from a home end user perspective, but from a corporate perspective it is a pretty solid product. (...)
I don't see how any of this is a bad thing. (...)
Home computing is not the bigger market here.

Couldn't agree more. I'm getting tired of whiners who can't help complaining about McAfee... as you mention, I guess they're mostly home users. Last time I used (stopped using) McAfee on a home computer was about 1999.
Been using (managing) it at work for some years now and I'm quite happy. It does take 'some memory' not too much CPU (depends on the config) and it keeps computers are work (reasonably) safe. No software is perfect and this one is no exception, but it's definitely not worse than any other and better than many (or most). And it's definitely more manageable!
I guess this will bring mostly change in the embedded world and possibly in appliances.
Serge
PS: for the conspiracy theorists (help, they're gonna introduce special 'kill AMD feature') get a life (or a brain, or both).
Intel

The Big Technical Mistakes of History 244

Posted by kdawson from the seemed-like-a-good-idea-at-the-time dept.
An anonymous reader tips a PC Authority review of some of the biggest technical goofs of all time. "As any computer programmer will tell you, some of the most confusing and complex issues can stem from the simplest of errors. This article looking back at history's big technical mistakes includes some interesting trivia, such as NASA's failure to convert measurements to metric, resulting in the Mars Climate Orbiter being torn apart by the Martian atmosphere. Then there is the infamous Intel Pentium floating point fiasco, which cost the company $450m in direct costs, a battering on the world's stock exchanges, and a huge black mark on its reputation. Also on the list is Iridium, the global satellite phone network that promised to make phones work anywhere on the planet, but required 77 satellites to be launched into space."
Communications

The Truth About Net Neutrality Job Loss 187

Posted by Soulskill from the watch-out-for-net-neutrality-death-panels dept.
snydeq writes "Robert X. Cringely investigates recent claims that passing net neutrality regulations will result in nearly 1.5 million lost jobs by 2020, finding the report at the center of these claims suspect. The report, put forward by The Brattle Group, conjectures that net neutrality adoption would curtail broadband growth by 16 percent, costing 342,065 jobs in that sector alone. The 'total economy-wide impact,' however, of such a policy would result in five times as many job losses by 2020, they say. The study is the latest of several weighing the economic impact of net neutrality, including those by law schools (PDF) and free-market think tanks alike. The Brattle Group report (PDF), however, should be met with skepticism, Cringely argues, in large part because the lobbying firm who paid for the report, Mobile Future, is anchored most notably by AT&T. Moreover, the report is 'based entirely on a single assumption: Regulating US telecoms in the late 1990s and early 2000s hurt them to the tune of about 15 percent per quarter, relative to the cable companies.' Yet, as he points out, regulation was not alone in causing this sector shrinkage. In fact, the Baby Bells' own bureaucratic intransigence was much to blame."
Robotics

The Best Robots of 2009 51

Posted by samzenpus from the best-of-show dept.
kkleiner writes "Singularity Hub has just unveiled its second annual roundup of the best robots of the year. In 2009 robots continued their advance towards world domination with several impressive breakouts in areas such as walking, automation, and agility, while still lacking in adaptability and reasoning ability. It will be several years until robots can gain the artificial intelligence that will truly make them remarkable, but in the meantime they are still pretty awesome."

Comment Re:Now *that's* circular (Score 1) 147

by Dushnock (#29464979) Attached to: Google Offering Print Versions of Online Books

And what about copyright holders ?

Google has scanned books that are still under copyright. Now you may go and print those books avoiding the editors and publishers and Google and ODB get a buck each, while the authors and copyright holders (families and such) don't...

So now, it seems that Intellectual Property (in this case it is) only works for some...

Comment Re:Well, now ... (Score 1) 569

by Dushnock (#29387143) Attached to: Which Filesystem Do You Use On Portable Media For Linux Systems?
Amen to that !

File permissions security isn't all that useful on removable media like it is on the boot drive (and other internal drives).

Actually, I'd say that file permission are completely useless on removable media. As someone pointed out :

If I have the drive in my hand, I can plug it into any computer I want and access it as root anyway.

That's why, when you think of security w.r.t. portable drives, you go for encryption !
sma
Patents

EFF Attacks Online Gaming Patent 126

Posted by Zonk from the foundation-smash dept.
I Don't Believe in Imaginary Property writes "The EFF is attacking more bogus patents. This time they're going after the 'method and system of playing games on a network' which covers tournament ladders, online rankings and advertisements. The patent in question has already been asserted against a number of small companies who know that licensing it is cheaper than litigating. Ars Technica's coverage mentions that Netrek looks like a good source of prior art. 'Netrek, an online multiplayer game with origins in the mid 1980s, makes use of much of the same technology described in Goldberg's patent. Much of the code for Netrek is open source, and its development is archived online; the source code was first posted to Usenet in late 1989. The EFF has also documented other instances of prior art with the assistance of students at the Cyberlaw Clinic at the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard Law School.'"
IBM

IBM Slams Microsoft, Calls OOXML "Inferior" 238

Posted by kdawson from the yer-mama's-ugly-too dept.
cristarol sends word that Microsoft's accusation, that IBM has sabotaged Redmond's attempts to have the Office OpenXML format approved by the ISO, has drawn a heated response from IBM. Ars Technica has the story. "'IBM believes that there is a revolution occurring in the IT industry, and that smart people around the world are demanding truly open standards developed in a collaborative, democratic way for the betterment of all,' IBM VP of standards and OSS Bob Sutor told Ars. 'If "business as usual" means trying to foist a rushed, technically inferior and product-specific piece of work like OOXML on the IT industry, we're proud to stand with the tens of countries and thousands of individuals who are willing to fight against such bad behavior.'"
The Internet

Online Parent-Child Gap Widens 201

Posted by kdawson from the hable-con-elle dept.
The Secret to Raising Smart Kids writes "A new study by Dafna Lemish from the Department of Communication at Tel Aviv University has found that there is an enormous gap between what parents think their children are doing online and what is really happening. 'The data tell us that parents don't know what their kids are doing,' says Lemish. The study found that 30% of children between the ages of 9 and 18 delete the search history from their browsers in an attempt to protect their privacy from their parents, that 73% of the children reported giving out personal information online while the parents of the same children believed that only 4% of their children did so, and that 36% of the children admitted to meeting with a stranger they had met online while fewer than 9% of the parents knew that their children had been engaging in such risky behavior. Lemish advises that parents should give their children the tools to be literate Internet users and most importantly, to talk to their children. 'The child needs similar tools that teach them to be [wary] of dangers in the park, the mall or wherever. The same rules in the real world apply online as well.'"

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