There's nothing said anywhere in the source code or docs about authentication or authorization. There's an Encrypt() hook in the source code but it's merely a stub function in the section commented "Configurable hooks for use as an application library", which implies to me that encryption is intended to be completely up to the the application.

So the idea is that you're passing around executable bytecode from node to node in the clear, to be unquestioningly executed by the receiving node. Does anyone else see a problem here?

Sure, it's a brand-spanking-new language. It's incomplete. I get that. But the security model cannot be an after-thought for something like this! It needs to be designed into the foundation of a serious IoT framework. As far as I can tell it hasn't even been considered.

What do you think was up with that "safe mode" last week? They obviously saw something in the pics and they needed time photoshop it away and move the probe so the spots would be out of view in future pics. It's aliens, all right!

I didn't say it was a good system, just that it wasn't a new system and therefore didn't need a new category of worker. As a matter of fact I actually expect Uber drivers will end up with all the prestige and advantages of any other day laborers -- which is to say none at all, and living hand-to-mouth unless they're simply using it to supplement some steady form of income.

You forget that unlike copyright, patents actually expire after 20 years. This invention is unworkable now, and is unlikely to be workable within the lifetime of the patent. But, the patent can be considered prior art when someone finally does figure out how to make one of these. In the best case this will be an unencumbered technology by the time it's ready to be used. (Yes, I know that's an idealistic statement, and that anyone actually doing this will be able to file dozens of patents regarding the implementation details. But no one should be able to claim that the basic idea is innovative again.)

We already have this class of worker. It's called a "day laborer". Show up looking for work, or don't, on a day to day basis. Get paid if you show up and somebody has work for you. Drop in and out of the labor pool at will. There's no fancy app to arrange day labor, but apart from that how is driving for Uber any different from hanging around outside Home Depot hoping someone happens by who needs half a dozen cheap construction workers or landscapers?

If you ALSO want me to behave like an employee, controlling my hours, sitting through useless HR presentations, and acting like an agent of a corporation, then I'm an employee and I want the full benefit package. It's pretty black-and-white and has never really been an issue in the dozens of contracts I've been involved in.

Glad that works for you, but you do realize that there are an awful lot of contractors who sign contracts stipulating that they'll be available certain hours, work in a certain place, and even dress a certain way? You're certainly within your rights to respond to such a contract with, "If you're going to treat me like an employee, then I want the full package." A lot of other people would rather be considered contractors despite the employee-like restrictions. It's not a black-and-white contractor-with-only-acceptance-criteria versus employee-with-working-restrictions choice for everyone.

To summarize the linked page...

Intended Use Cases:

• Programming

Really, the only type of programming not listed there is hard real-time. Way to narrow your focus, guys.

Ah, countering Dice clickbait with Medium clickbait. Well played!

No, you misunderstand. You're right that it goes to all contacts indiscriminately. You don't get to pick and choose who. But it's so much better than that. You don't enable it. You don't even have to have any equipment that runs Windows 10. Say you have a guest that you give access to. If they have a Windows 10 machine with this "feature" enabled, the password is shared to all of their contacts. Brilliant!

That wikipedia article is horrible.

You know the nice thing about Wikipedia? When you find poorly written or factually incorrect articles you can actually do something about it instead of just whining about it on an unrelated website.

Read the article? There is no article. There are six tweets (numbered and linked individually), a graph with data sets helpfully labeled "1", "2", "3", "4", and "5" but no other description, and a PDF of the test questions. And some comment about students not understanding the concept of "sparse arrays", but since the term is completely defined in the test materials I can only assume the real concern is that students can't be bothered to read the "unimportant" introductory material before trying to answer the actual test questions.

What do you mean, confusing? There's a link to a jpg that has a lot of lines, and some of the lines are clearly higher than other lines so obviously that means something good.

They were then instructed to press certain keys when images of things like fruits and clothes would appear, indicating a "go." But for images of calorie-dense foods (chips and cake, for example) they were instructed not to do anything, indicating a "stop" action.

It's great that I no longer want to eat chips and cake, but now I've got one hell of a craving to eat a cardigan sweater!

I've got to hang with Theaetetus here. I'm all for poly marriages, but existing inheritance, tax, insurance, etc. laws don't handle more than two people well. Gay marriage doesn't run up against any existing law except the one that says "no gay marriage". You don't have to change anything else when you say, "You know all those laws about a man and woman being married? Yeah, they apply to two dudes or two chicks, too." To include polys you have to redefine how inheritance is divided, how taxes are paid, who's eligible for insurance, etc. etc.

There also need to be new laws for situations that just can't occur in a two-person marriage. For example, what happens when one person wants out of a poly group? With a two-person marriage, a divorce necessarily means the end of a marriage. With a poly group one person leaving is not necessarily the end. What about when one person is unwillingly pushed out of a poly group? Or if the group fissures into two or more sub-groups? What happens if a child of someone in the group turns 18, should they be allowed to marry into the group? Does it make a difference if the child is adopted and not the biological offspring of any existing group member? If members can be added and removed, what are the implications of a continuous marriage that can outlive all of its individual members?

The laws could be changed to make poly unions work. The laws should be changed to make poly unions work. It's just that there are a lot of things that need to be examined for that to happen. It's not just a case of going from "two people of opposite sex" to "any two people". It's a serious qualitative change that will require qualitative changes to the law. Personally I'd love to see a serious proposal to change the laws in question and allow poly marriage. I think we could borrow from laws governing corporations to put something solid together. But I'm not a lawyer. I'll let someone else do the work. I'll vote for the result, to be sure, but I'm not going to kid myself that it's just a matter of adding "or more" between the words "two" and "people".

It's a bit of an odd prize, because all they did was suggest an idea. No working prototype or anything like that, just "wouldn't it be good if..."

Courtesy of The Big Bang Theory....

Leonard: Jimmy, I'm kind of curious why you wanted to see me.
Jimmy: Okay, here it is. I have this great money-making idea. I just need a gear head to get it to the finish line.
Leonard: What's the idea?
Jimmy: This is just between us, right?
Leonard: Right.
Jimmy: Okay. What do you think about a pair of glasses that makes any movie you want into 3D?
Raj: That sounds amazing. First movie I'm watching, Annie.
Howard: How exactly would these glasses work?
Jimmy: How the hell should I know? That's why I need a nerd.