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Comment Oh my. (Score 1) 469

"helps government agencies track down terrorists and uncover financial fraud,"

Other ethnic backgrounds not hired Palantir:
- North Korean
- Russians
- Iranians
- Cubans
- Chechens
- Former/current ISIS members

"Asians" may be a tad too broad. Chinese nationals? Hell, yes. I know of quite a few places that do something similar. The problem is that the idiots doing the screening cannot differentiate between a 2nd generation US citizen from Vietnamese or Hong Kong families, and someone who only a little while ago carried a nice red book and quoted the chairman.

What are the other 17 non-Asians? White, black, hispanic, pakistani, japanese, egyptian, etc?

Comment Encryption was expensive (Score 1) 125

by Lieutenant_Dan (#52959715) Attached to: What Vint Cerf Would Do Differently

Computationally that is, I don't think it would have flown in the early 90s and the adoption rate would have been the same it was with SSL (and TLS). It wasn't not so long ago that I actually had to provide resource impact reports on servers where everything would be encrypted. Nowadays (unless you deal with extreme large volumes), encrypting (using an symmetric key that is) doesn't have a significant impact. Web servers, load-balancers, etc can support it without breaking a sweat.

Comment Self-righterous bullshit; the "company" is pissed (Score 1) 80

If I was that Ziegler fellow I'd be consulting a lawyer. Spouting that shit publicly, verges (ha!) on defamation.

I'm not saying what Ziegler was right, although in this day and age, one should show very little loyalty to any corporation because they basically claim "people are our most precious resource" but treat employees like shit.

I've seen staff where I worked, take a few weeks off or take a leave of absence. What they do, is try another job and see if it suits them. They quit the original job, or they quit the new job. I'm not going to judge people too much when they do this, hell, the company is always evaluating if they should terminate you.

At this moment I have two contracts. Place A does not know of place B, but place B knows of me working at place A and they don't care. The type of work is very different and they're not in the same sector. Sure place A could claim some crap, but if they do, I just have to walk and move on to the next gig. They can claim some BS excuse anyways, doesn't matter.

Submission + - Bandcamp: the Holy Grail of online record stores (rocknerd.co.uk)

Submitted by David Gerard
David Gerard writes: Is Bandcamp the Holy Grail of online record stores? Hell yes. Unencumbered downloads in any format you like, excellent discoverability and a ridiculously better experience than any other download store. Musicians too: "The interface and the available tools are all so well-thought-out it’s genuinely a pleasure to use." They also like that they straight-up get 85% of the take.

Submission + - The timing of error messages contributes to them being ignored (byu.edu)

Submitted by sandbagger
sandbagger writes: A new study from BYU, in collaboration with Google Chrome engineers, finds the status quo of warning messages appearing haphazardly — while people are typing, watching a video, uploading files, etc. — results in up to 90 percent of users disregarding them.

Researchers found these times are less effective because of "dual task interference," a neural limitation where even simple tasks can't be simultaneously performed without significant performance loss. Or, in human terms, multitasking.

Submission + - Kim Dotcom's Mega 3, with Bitcoin: two bad ideas that go worse together (rocknerd.co.uk)

Submitted by David Gerard
David Gerard writes: "Colourful racing identity" Kim Dotcom has a scheme for his third Mega enterprise: combining MegaUpload with Bitcoin. It is entirely unclear how anything about this makes sense, but I'm sure that with a trustworthy soul with an impeccable track record like Dotcom at the helm, nothing can possibly go badly for anyone involved.

Submission + - Ask Slashdot: Handling Windows Updates after October 2016 (slashdot.org)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: We've read about the changes coming to Windows Update in October 2016. Average Joe and Grandma Flo will end up getting the cumulative update via WU each month which includes non-security updates. For more discerning users with existing Win 7 / 8.1 systems, one can disable WU and download the security-only update each month. But what happens when it's time to wipe and reload the OS? Or what about installing Windows on different hardware? Admittedly, there are useful non-security updates worth having, but plenty to avoid (e.g. telemetry).

How does one handle this challenge? Set up a personal WSUS box before October to sync all desired updates through October 2016? System images can work if you don't change primary hardware, but what if you do?

Or should one just bend the knee to Microsoft, go to the nearest drug store, and stock up on KY?

Submission + - SingularDTV: using Ethereum for DRM on a sci-fi TV show about the Singularity (rocknerd.co.uk)

Submitted by David Gerard
David Gerard writes: SingularDTV is an exciting new blockchain-based entertainment industry startup. Their plan is to adapt the DRM that made $121.54 for Imogen Heap, make their own completely premined altcoin and use that to somehow sell two million views of a sci-fi TV show about the Singularity. Using CODE, which is explicitly modeled on The DAO ... which spectacularly imploded days after its launch. There's a white paper, but here's an analysis of why these schemes are a terrible idea for musicians.

Submission + - Mobilize to attack climate change just like we did in WWII (newrepublic.com)

Submitted by mspohr
mspohr writes: Bill McKibbin has an article in the New Republic which lays out the case for a broad effort to mobilize our resources to fight climate change.
"For years, our leaders chose to ignore the warnings of our best scientists and top military strategists. Global warming, they told us, was beginning a stealth campaign that would lay waste to vast stretches of the planet, uprooting and killing millions of innocent civilians. But instead of paying heed and taking obvious precautions, we chose to strengthen the enemy with our endless combustion; a billion explosions of a billion pistons inside a billion cylinders have fueled a global threat as lethal as the mushroom-shaped nuclear explosions we long feared. Carbon and methane now represent the deadliest enemy of all time, the first force fully capable of harrying, scattering, and impoverishing our entire civilization."
"By most of the ways we measure wars, climate change is the real deal: Carbon and methane are seizing physical territory, sowing havoc and panic, racking up casualties, and even destabilizing governments. "
He includes analysis of just what it would take in terms of industrial mobilization to stop polluting with CO2. The answer is, a lot, but it is possible.

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