Comment Re:Here's the full story. (Score 1) 682
The real WTF is that he's not using parent.countOfPenises().
US Senators: NSA Lies In Fact Sheets 295
Bruce66423 writes "The Guardian reports that two U.S. senators have written to the NSA telling it to amend its 702 provisions fact sheet (PDF) which, they claim, contains inaccuracies. However they can't actually say HOW they are inaccurate, because they would be compromising classified information. So the U.S. government uses taxpayer money to lie to the people... there's a surprise!"
From the letter: "In our judgment, this inaccuracy is significant, as it portrays protections for Americans' privacy as being significantly stronger than they actually are." But they go on to say "We appreciate your attention to this matter. We believe that the U.S. government should have broad authorities to investigate terrorism and espionage, and that it is possible to aggressively pursue terrorists without compromising the constitutional rights of ordinary Americans. Achieving this goal depends not just on secret courts and secret congressional hearings, but on informed public debate as well."
Comment Re:If you don't like metro... (Score 1) 800
What Mac have you used that had a UI like that? One running Windows 8? Macs do NOT use a "Start Screen", they have the Dock. Odldly enough I've heard people complain that the enhanced taskbar in Win7 was too Mac-like.
Comment Re:Microsoft is in deep shit now! (Score 1) 295
Not quite $780 but pretty close.
Comment Re:The reason people talk loudly on their cell pho (Score 1) 350
I think that depends on the phone. My iPhone 4S most definitely has what you describe.
Comment Re:Cost vs injury (Score 1) 499
Reminds me of something I heard very often from two wise men: Don't drive like my brother!
Comment Re:No - Move Forward Instead (Score 1) 267
Really? How many times have you used a cell phone and been unable to make a call? I mean not just a dropped call that you redialed and it worked but completely unable to make or receive calls in an area of normal coverage under non-emergency conditions? I have not had that experience for at least 15 years now.
Are you serious? This past week I was completely unable to make or receive calls in an area of normal coverage. I live on the south shore of Long Island, NY.
Comment Re:Lightning, not Maps, is the iPhone 5's big prob (Score 1) 173
AFAIK, no HDMI interface is even announced let alone available
http://www.theverge.com/2012/9/13/3329062/apple-lightning-hdmi-vga-cable-adapter-coming-months
'An Apple spokesperson told The Verge that Lightning to HDMI and Lightning to VGA cables "will be available in the coming months."'
My understanding is that the 30 pin adapter they are selling provides analog audio but not iPod control
http://www.macworld.com/article/1168555/what_apples_new_lightning_connector_means_for_you.html
'Apple has confirmed to Macworld that these adapters support analog and USB audio-out, as well as syncing and charging. However, the adapters don’t support video-out or iPod mode, the latter a special mode that lets particular accessories, such as car stereos and some whole-home-audio systems, display your iPod’s menus on the accessory’s own screen.'
And as a commenter in this article points out, the iPod will still play audio over these systems since that's handled by the analog interface.
some of this is a desire to manage DRM
What DRM? None of the music on my iPhone has any DRM on it! The "FairPlay" DRM was removed from iTunes store music in early 2009.
Submission + - Google Says It Won't 'Manually' Review YouTube Vids for Infringement (wired.com) 1
thomst writes: David Kravets of Wired's Threat Level blog reports that Google has clarified its change in policy on automatic takedowns of YouTube videos for copyright infringement. On Wednesday, Thabet Alfishawi, rights management product manager for YouTube, said in a blog post that Google had "improved the algorithms that identify potentially invalid claims. We stop these claims from automatically affecting user videos and place them in a queue to be manually reviewed.” In its clarification, Google now says that videos flagged by its Content ID algorithm will be placed in a queue for "content owners" to review, if they decide to do so. In other words, the "manual review" is entirely optional, and the review, if any, will be done by the "content owner", rather than by Google itself — all of which begs the classic question, "Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?"
Submission + - Boeing proposes using gas clouds to bring down orbital debris (gizmag.com) 1
cylonlover writes: Boeing has filed a patent for a method of disposing of dead satellites and other debris orbiting the earth by hitting them with a puff of gas. The method, which is still at the conceptual stage, is designed to slow down satellites, forcing them to re-enter the atmosphere without sending up more space junk that itself will need disposing of. The idea is to send a small satellite into orbit containing a gas generator. This generator can be a tank of cryogenic gas, such as xenon or krypton, or a device designed to vaporize a heavy metal or some relatively heavy elements like fluorine, chlorine, bromine, or iodine. This gas would be released as a cloud in the same orbit as the debris, but traveling in the opposite direction.
Comment Re:Fiber to the premises is too costly (Score 2) 76
You don't have FiOS, do you? In addition to my regular ol' modem, there's a big fibre link and battery backup box bolted to the wall of my basement. Ignoring the fact that fibre line and the splicing is pricey, theres a lot more equipment required for each home, for which Verizon foots the bill.
Wired Writer Hack Shows Need For Tighter Cloud Security 132
Nerval's Lobster writes "Between 4:52 and 5:12 on August 3, attackers used Wired writer Mat Honan's Apple ID to wipe his MacBook, before seizing control of his Gmail and other online identities ('My accounts were daisy-chained together,' he wrote in an Aug. 6 postmortem on Wired), and posting a message on Twitter for all to see: 'Clan Vv3 and Phobia hacked this twitter.' In the wake of Honan's high-profile hack, there are some key takeaways. Even if a typical user can't prevent a social-engineering attack on the company hosting their cloud account, they can armor their online life in ways that make attacks more difficult. First, two-factor authentication can prevent an attacker from seizing control of those vital 'hub' accounts (such as Gmail) where users tend to store much of their most vital information. Google offers two-step verification for signing in, as does Facebook. The truly security-conscious can also uncouple their cloud accounts; for example, making sure that iCloud and iTunes use two different sets of credentials. That might rob daily life in the cloud of some of its convenience, but it could also make you a harder target."
Update: 08/08 01:17 GMT by S : This high-profile security breach has had an impact already: Apple has suspended password resets through customer support, and Amazon no longer lets users call in to change account settings.
Comment Re:the 4 last digit of CC are unsecure (Score 3, Informative) 222
What?!! Apple requests the CVV2 code of your credit card for verification, not the last 4 digits of the number. The CVV2 code is never shown on a statement or invoice anywhere, and since they're processing credit card transactions they can only store it hashed.
Comment Re:Maybe it's just me (Score 1) 563
What makes you think there's no power saving on a Hackintosh? Out of the box I've got things like speedstep enabled (thank you Gigabyte board) and the hard drives spin down too (I think I left it at the default of 15 minutes). I have noticed that sometimes when I do something as innocuous open the context menu in Win7, it waits for all six of my internal disks to spin up before doing anything.
Comment Re:Maybe it's just me (Score 1) 563
Well first of all, no it's not a Mac. It's a Hackintosh built with off-the-shelf PC parts running a dual boot with Mac OS X and Windows 7. Also, there's a huge difference between Bootcamp drivers and iTunes. For one thing, iTunes is running on what is essentially a port of Cocoa/CoreFoundation to Windows. Much of the Bootcamp driver package is provided by hardware manufacturers and is most definitely not written in Cocoa. On my older MacBook Pro I've had no issues that I could attribute to the Bootcamp drivers.
