Funny, I've been using 192.168.2.100 for at least the last 7 years. I've switched ISPs, seen ISPs (and their servers) come and go, but that server has been rock solid. Except for that one time when it was going through fsck on a 6TB volume, then I had to fall back to 192.168.2.1 for a while (which is just a cache of whatever upstream server it got from DHCP).

Actually, there are a few major GTM (Global Traffic Management) schemes that do use the IP address of your DNS server, rather than your actual IP. They basically abuse the DNS system with super-short TTLs and give a different response to the DNS query based on the IP of the downstream DNS server. So, if you use a DNS server located on the east coast of the US when you're on the west coast, you'll get an east coast server even if that service has a west coast datacenter available.

This is done primarily to free companies from the burden of having to design proper geolocation into their app/service, turning it into a more plug-n-play solution while breaking several of the finer points of DNS (like proper caching). This type of traffic management could easily be contributing to Comcast's DNS troubles, as it drastically increases load on the entire DNS infrastructure. Paul Vixie did a good detailed write-up about this type of traffic management a few years back. Unfortunately it's probably here to stay, and is used by some very major corporations and online services.

If you want the most reliable DNS service, and want to be directed to the closest servers for the services you use, your only real option is to run your own recursive name server. A simple caching name server isn't enough, and will curse you with many of the same problems you see from your upstream. Fortunately, recursive name servers are pretty simple to set up, in both the *nix and Windows worlds.

Remember when /. was "news for nerds, stuff that matters?" When the heck did it become "propaganda distribution for damn hippies, shit that just enough people care about to be really annoying?"

Did these people miss the part of elementary school science class where when you water a plant, most of that moisture later evaporates and condenses into clouds in the sky, which then become rain and come back to earth? Or maybe the part where those acres and acres of green things also take CO2 and turn it back into O2, which allows us humans to keep breathing successfully?

Someone needs to offer these people a nice juicy top sirloin with a side of bacon if they'll just shut the hell up. If I want more legumes I'll eat a can of baked beans with my steak, dammit.

RMFP. I didn't say anything about who it would be sold to or who/what it was designed for, and those points are completely irrelevant to mine.

To recap:
1) If there's a way to put it together, there's a way to take it apart. This is true no matter who it's sold to. The defense industry tends to hire clever people, who are often clever at disassembly as well.
2) It kind of sucks to have your data wiped if your phone takes a major spill and thinks you're trying to break it open. This is still true if you work on sooper sekrit stuphs. The suckage of a broken phone is not predicated on the usage model of the phone. There may be a good reason for that level of security, but having your data wiped from it unnecessarily would still make for a bad day.

In summary, don't be such an ass.

Ooohhhh, look who knows so much...

How do you know what industry I'm in, or what phone they'll want me to carry?

If there's a way to put it together, there's a way to take it apart. Also, it kind of sucks to have your data wiped if your phone takes a major spill and thinks you're trying to break it open.

If you judge people based on their choice of free or low-cost email provider then you, sir, are the hack. I've been using Yahoo email since they bought Geocities (and used Geocities email before that, as back in the day they were the only ones to offer pop3/smtp access for free).

In all those years, there have only been a few noticeable outages, mostly very short-term. Their service is fast, reliable, and they keep making improvements. Why would I switch?

I generally assume anything I allow on a network will be read or looked at by someone. I'd imagine all photos uploaded to most online services are scanned/flagged by some automated process looking for kiddie porn, and then anything flagged is reviewed by a human, and true violators reported to LE.

Is it an invasion of privacy? Fair question. It's probably somewhere in the EULA for OneSky, I didn't read the whole thing though so I'm not sure. Was it obnoxious and extreme to kill someone's account because they had nude pictures of their kids uploaded? Yes.

I have a Lumia 925. I read all the warnings and things I had to click "Allow" or "OK" on when setting up the phone. I also just went and read the article. To summarize, it boils down to "the phone is uploading and transmitting exactly what I agreed to when I clicked 'Allow' when setting up the phone."

It uploads my text messages... obviously, because I turned on text message backup.
It uploads my pictures... well yes, I turned on backup/auto-upload of my pictures to OneSkyDriveWalkCrawl.
It uploads my location... when I have it attached to my pictures, or when I turn on the "find my phone" feature, or use mapping and location services.
It uses a MSFT proxy for web stuff, if I turned on the "speed up my browsing by using a proxy service" option. It asks on initial setup if I want to use this service.

In essence, *yawn*.

Forget hacksaw, apply your favorite exploding target and a high power rifle. I guarantee it will be wireless, and no one will be accessing it anymore.

As a result, there are now two brands of hardware that I will refuse to purchase. I swore off (and at) Belkin when I bought one of their APs and it wouldn't let me change the network for its management IP. It was hardcoded to 192.168.1.0/24, and their "customer service" response was "by design, FOAD."

I have a few of their surge suppressors, but generally anything with the Belkin name doesn't come into my house after that experience. Also, I'll never buy one of their PDUs for the datacenter - if their consumer support is that bad, why would I trust them in the enterprise?

Dear Businesses: Enterprise purchasing decisions are made by people who are also consumers who buy stuff for their homes.

Something about this just seems like a bad idea.

Oh, and we would never again have a true full moon - some of it would be missing.

And which both countries are likely willing to sell to just about any other country for the right price. "You no let us build oil pipeline through your country? What if we give you whiz-bang, now you will? Da? Good. We set."

You really think China won't supply some of these NK for a beta test against any one of the proxy nations of their most hated trading partner?

And if those countries won't supply them, the French will surely buy a few from somewhere and then sell them to whoever can pony up the cash (or diamonds, or whatever else the French may want these days).

If we blew the annoying countries to bits in the first place we wouldn't be here to have missiles shot at us.

FTFY.

They can... but the tech may not be quite there yet. Or it might be, but we don't know. High enough intensity lasers that can be aimed and focused on an incoming hypersonic missile and stay aimed/focused long enough to take it out are sort of challenging to build, I'd wager. Also, if fired from an aerial platform, one would have to be a bit careful about any miss taking things out on the ground. People might react badly to being scorched by lasers from the sky, after all. Not to mention burning flesh is an awful smell.

So right, as I was saying... technically complex.