Back in analog times, the equivalent of modern robocallers was call centers (typically staffed by young women) who would call you to pitch something.

There was a game that people who had some spare time would play to abuse them in the hope of getting on "do not call" lists that got documented on USENET. Wasting their time cost the company who paid them money so the basic scoring was based on how long you could keep them on the phone, or even better their supervisors who were paid more.

Cruel misogynistic players sought to get emotional reactions from the girls who called, with tears as their objective. Horney players attempted to get dates, or if their tastes ran that way, to date the supervisor. Several people posted suggested rules for competitive comparison, and stories of their successes on telecom news groups.

It might be a good idea to create a Reddit group since it isn't obvious how to get a reaction from the machines. Perhaps there is an equivalent to the 2600hz Captain Crunch whistle.

I loved your alternative name for DISCUS. However, an algorithm that improves compression if you have multiple sources, doesn't equal Richard's. In the limiting case, any file can be compressed to a single bit if the only question is whether the only question open is whether it matches the file you have.

The core of Richard's invention is his compression algorithm. Like warp drives and light sabers, it is tech which cannot work as described because of conflicts with well established theory. (Google "shannon information" for details). It doesn't hurt the story, stimulates the imagination, and once you get the joke improves the overall humor.

A "decentralized Internet" is another joke, because IP was inherently decentralized in concept. That plays well with Richard's algorithm which effectively offers warp speed transmission on every route, it will be fun to see what they do with it.

Last year There was a conference on this subject. More at https://www.decentralizedweb.n...

Put all the critical files on an external drive that is only plugged in when the system is isolated. Not perfect, but with good higene and an innocuous configuration on the base it should be fine.

Flips of a single bit in a memory or register are that few modern systems would run for long without error correcting memory. Even ECM has its limitations and most systems eventually crash/panic/blue-screen or whatever and require a reboot.

The costs to improve error resilience go up rapidly and don't have a meaningful upper bound. My working trade off was to design for a mtbf comparable to how long I wanted to keep that job.

A his strong voice is one of the reasons Linux is so popular. I fear for the day a committee makes thedecisions

For the most obscure, if not the most important, I would nominate Unlambda. It excels at giving headaches to unwitting users.

This will be a financial boon to the telecom industry. The black budgets are going to have to come up with money to pay for the storage and retrieval by the telcos. I expect this to be quite profitable for them. There are also going to be some nice contracts for redesigning the systems now that the stakeholders have changed.

Way back in the 70's I encountered a bug in software I only had hardcopy source for. A device would not initialize due to too short a timeout in the code. Timing on the device was controlled by a RC delay circuit, and soldering a resistor in parallel to the one on the device made it all good.

Cool! My solution in the 90's to that problem was to find some ip power switches so I could power cycle the devices remotely. It wouldn't be an acceptable solution today.

The subject novel impressed me with a realistic setting for stories in a relativistic (i.e. sub-light travel only) universe. For how, read the book. One concern I had with its realism was that it assumed many more sunless planets than stars. This article clears that up pending confirmation. Anyone know when this theory started getting serious interest?

In one of his juveniles, I think "Star Beast", the future society's laws have changed. Most reflected his politics (semi-compulsory concealed carry), emancipation of children, etc., but he got wrong the effects of banning smoking in restaurants. So far as I know, high quality scofflaw places allowing smoking never became popular, and he set an important scene in one.

In the 1960's the 600 limo had that as a feature on its air suspension (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mercedes-Benz_600) it really impressed a reviewer at the time. It had a ride like a boat.

Asimov addressed both sides of the issue, but he had a simplistic view of programming an AI that allowed an easy solution to the worst potential problems. The anti-robot camp which won on earth was just wrong by his premiss.

The deep problem is that there is no reason to have any expectations of what an AI will do until it is built and tested. We could eventually see Berserkers, R. Daneel Olivaw, and much in between. Murderous machines are good science fiction, as are dystopias, and other potentially avoidable bad things.