*> Ever heard of input sanity checking? It was very popular in the say, 60's, 70's and 80's.

Exactly! Guard the borders of your application, regardless of where those borders are: file, UI, webservice, whatever. Do it right at the border and only when you're sure it's not going to blow a hole in the system, then let it through.

And always use whitelists.

Y'know I wonder if the whole Witch thing needs to become a corollary fo Godwin's law?

Us Witches are perfectly capable of hexing you until you glow if you get too annoying ;).

Whilst I can agree with you about increasing specialisation leading to the loss of a sufficient number of peers to give an effective peer review I can't see how there's a link between this and capitalism.

Colour me stupid by all means but where is that link.

Two words. Steam Punk.

Is anyone really surprised? There are people out there who still don't believe that Dad's Army was an early example of reality TV. Government competence levels have not improved in the ensuing years.

PC Pro are a UK based magazine. I used to subscribe until about 1997 when the pro-Microsoft bias got too galling.

Strangely they've just rung me up asking of I want to try out a new subscription. The answer is no, always will be from now on, I prefer my reporting with a lot less bias. This is why I rely on /. for all my IT news.