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Comment Re:Doesn't this require access to your network (Score 2) 131

Quote the article: "When the Chromecast receives the “deauth” command, it returns to its configuration mode, leaving it open for a device — in this case, the Rickmote — to configure it. At that point, the Rickmote tells the Chromecast to connect to its own WiFi network, at which point, Google’s streaming stick is effectively hacked."

Imagine Dr. Evil making air quotes: "Security."

In order to give the deauth command, you have to be in the same network as the Chromecast.

So, you can't rick roll a chromecast unless you find a way to get into the network that has the chromecast.

I can see this being a problem in offices and other places where a large number of people connect to the same wifi hotspot but this is not a problem at home.

An easier way to rick roll would be to just pull out your youtube app and then start rick roll on the chromecast. This will stop whatever it is playing before and play the rick roll video.

Comment Doesn't this require access to your network (Score 0) 131

Doesn't this first require that you can get into the chromecast's wireless network first?

If you can get on someone's wireless network, there is a lot of things you can do.

Can't this be easily solved by making the process of jumping to a different wireless router in the configuration mode more secure.

After the hacker leaves the range, then the chromecast will not connect to the original network. I don't know if the chormecast installation tool can reconnect to it and reconfigure the network it connects to.

Comment Re:"Develop" or "Instigate the development of"? (Score 2) 129

Nothing I have read about Snowden indicates that he is actually some sort of uber-hacker or capable of the type of software engineering that this proposal would entail. Is his plan just to use his name to fundraise (In bit coin, I guess. I doubt many people are stupid/brave enough to attach their name to a donation towards anything to do with this guy) and attract talent, or is he honestly going to try and release code himself, which will probably be of poor-to-average quality and expect the world to adopt it?

All that counts is that Snowden has the balls and integrity that is so lacking in the "uber-hacker" department. You can't threaten Snowden, you can't bribe him. An uber-hacker, you can buy him out or scare him.

Anyways, you don't uber-hackers to develop security software. The encryption algorithms are university research level stuff and as long as you understand the basics of it, you're fine. The rest is just writing code around it that a decent programmer should be able to handle well.

Comment Is this real or fantasy? (Score 3, Interesting) 161

I read the article and I can't tell if this is a real problem that is really affecting thousands of users and companies, or a fantasy that the author wrote up in 30 minutes after having a discussion with an old IBM engineer.

Sure, IBM has all these resource prioritization in mainframes because mainframes cost a lot of money. Nowadays, hardware is so cheap you don't have to do all that stuff.

If some young programmer undertook the challenge and created the framework, would anyone use it and test it? Will there be an actual need for something like this?

My point is that an insider information to what is really going on in the cutting edge usage of linux or just some smoke being blown around to an obligated write up.

Comment Re:No real surprise (Score 1) 710

While I don't disagree with that, this report is the wrong one to trumpet about. The asked 250 people a question that is quite ambiguous, and then monitored them for a year. I read the article earlier today on some other site, and it sounded like rubbish for those reasons and others.

They are asking a question that is heavily dependent on the number of children in the household.

Those surveyed were asked if they agreed or disagreed with the statement: “The effects of climate change are too far in the future to really worry me.”

I think the correlation here is electricity usage and children in the household.

Comment Re:An absurd "crisis"! LOL (Score 2) 128

Every minute playing chess would be better spent learning about algorithms, computer programming, or biology.

The last thing any parent or teacher should do is encourage playing chess at any serious level. It's like encouraging people to compute logarithms or trigonometric functions longhand on paper; there's some initial benefit in learning some abstract ideas, but then it's just mechanics. And the same is true for chess, and computers have established this in a dramatic way, by showing that simple but fast and deep searches with very simple heuristics can beat any human who has ever lived. A $0.50 pocket calculator can bet any human at the sine function game!

The argument made in that article that chess is somehow good for the goals of "STEM" makes me laugh out loud, but simultaneously weep that the idea was proposed with apparent sincerity...

Every minute spent training for a marathon is useless because we have cars. A $50 junker can beat the fastest marathon runner.

Why is learning about algorithms useful? For every algorithm you learn, there are at least a dozen implementation of the said algorithm.

Comment Re:NSA destroying American jobs (Score 1) 143

NSA spies on everyone to "protect" us from tyrants that would spy on everyone. Makes sense. As a bonus the NSA has also done a fantastic job trimming down American tech industry jobs. Given the rampant unrepentant Orwellian spying surely every foreign government and corporation is eager to buy American technology products now.

I was reading some books published in the 2008 and 2009. NSA was viewed as the stalwart of the security aspect of the internet, valiantly contributing to security software and keeping things organized and secure in that front.

I think NSA should have done the opposite of what they did. Instead of spying, they should have created anti-spying tools and issued alerts on spying and privacy aspects of modern technology.

Even if they created spying technology, it should have been created to prevent such spying by putting those tools out in public and letting security researchers figure out methods to solve these security and privacy problems. US software would then be seen as solid and trustworthy, and the whole world would have no problem using US software knowing that it is constantly monitored for security and privacy.

Comment Re:The Chinese market won't last forever (Score 1) 143

Non-Chinese companies (sometimes thru Foxconn) employ Chinese workers to build parts (ex: processors) and/or entire devices (ex: phones). Some of the managers in the Chinese factories are Chinese. I'd guess the repair people, who repair damaged manufacturing equipment, are Chinese.

So they learn to staff and run a factory that manufactures electronic devices. Now that they know how to do so, why do they need American companies? They will start manufacturing the parts themselves, moving in the direction of making the entire device themselves. Once they can make their own devices, the government can require that their people buy those devices, only if made by they were made by Chinese companies. For "security reasons", of course.

I suggest Tim Cook remember that the Chinese market won't last forever. Sooner or later, Chinese companies will make phones, tablets, etc., and the Chinese people will buy those devices, not Apple devices.

Anything can happen in the future. We want phones now and cheap and they can make it now. If you care so much about the future and craft it so cautiously, even the smallest of changes in technological advancements will wreck all your future plans.

Technology moves so fast and China has always been one step behind, one version behind. Doesn't mean they will ever catch up unless they invest heavily in R&D and actually catch with the big boys. By the time they learn something, it has been improved on and moved on. Sure, they can catch the low margin markets in mature technology but never in high margin technology.

On the other hand, maybe they will catch up and make competing products. Are you really scared of a little competition? On the other hand, technology will move even faster with a larger consumer base and a larger number of companies making cutting edge products.

Comment Re:scientists are deceitful shits (Score 1) 178

Well, feel free to not use any of the things developed from scientific advances. I hear that caves are comfortable year round, and herbs and grasses picked from the mountainside can make a fine salad!

Scientific advances happened long before peer review and scientific advances are happening in spite of peer review.

Peer review is just a fancy concept invented to make it look like scientific publication is blind to "politics". It is quire the opposite. Scientists are asked to volunteer their time to review peer papers without pay or compensation. The hidden compensation is that they get to push their friends and colleague's work ahead of the pack and the favor is returned.

If you check journals and publications, you will find the same group of people publishing over and over again in the same set of journals and publications. If you read through them, you can tell they are churned out papers aimed at a publication rather than some scientific advancement.

Comment We are so bad at predicting the future but still (Score 4, Insightful) 56

We are so bad at predicting the future but we still do it over and over again. We are mostly wrong and we always forget how wrong we were

Here are some of the future wearable and apple stories on slashdot from the past:

We have said some pretty crazy things and we have been saying the age of wearable for almost five years.

Comment Re:Not new (Score 1, Informative) 253

In 1999, my company offered an 18 year old summer intern a programming job. He turned us down to attend college. Spending 4 years doing calculus and reading The Count of Monte Cristo was not going to improve his earnings potential. Spending 4 years in a real office doing real programming would have improved his earnings potential.

Keep telling yourself that.

An 18 year old is not going to enjoy spending his entire day with fat middle-aged office drones. He would rather go to college, party, make friends and score with other 18 year old girls.

He can always go back to a programming job anytime he wants.

Comment Re: Two sides to every issue (Score 4, Informative) 401

The law was changed over 15 years ago to allow the same H1B to be used when changing jobs.

You can transfer an H1-B, but the employer who currently holds it has to approve the transfer. The employer holding it can refuse to perform a transfer, and prevent the operation.

The law you refer to assumes cooperation between the parties.

It's occasionally found for some companies to basically hold "H1-B" and "Green Card Application" hostages to work at lower wages. I've worked at a couple of companies which I later found out employed this tactic, and I've seen several contracting agencies that contract for work, H1-B in workers, and then take up to 70% "commission" on the contract wages on top of everything else.

Technically, there is no such thing as a H1B transfer, there is only an H1B application. Only the hiring company is involved in an H1B application. It is utter and absolute made-up nonsense that the former employer has to approve anything.

I have heard that H1B and green card petitions are treated as mini-promotion steps. Instead of raises or promotions, sponsorships are given. Perhaps some smaller unscrupulous "contractor" organizations will do that. In the larger corporations, H1B and green card petitions are done as soon as possible as company policy and promised as such before employment is finalized.

Comment Re: Two sides to every issue (Score 2) 401

Basically, it's a step to get someone off H1B status and into a permanent resident of the US.

This makes no sense. Why would an employer want a permanent resident instead of an H1B? A permanent resident can quit and go work elsewhere, and is no better than hiring a US citizen. But an H1B visa is tied to a specific company, so if they quit their job, or are fired, they are sent back to where they came from, at their own expense. As an employer, I love H1Bs, because I can make them work long hours on tight deadlines, and if they complain I can threaten to send them back to Bangalore. Also, since H1Bs have to be paid the same as US citizens, I can use them as an excuse to hold down salaries across the board. If a US citizen employee starts whining about wanting a raise, I can tell him that if I give him a raise, I will be legally required to give the same raise to all of the H1Bs, and since there isn't enough money in the budget for that, it mean no raise for you! Heh, heh.

The law was changed over 15 years ago to allow the same H1B to be used when changing jobs.

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