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Comment Re:do they have a progressive view? (Score 0) 336

I don't know what you think you're responding to, but that I do not favor Democrats most certainly does not mean I'm a Republican. The GOP is only marginally more conservative than the DNC, and only on some issues. They are all the party of big government and statism, and both parties are rotting from within from graft and corruption. But the trope about Texas being a haven of racist, ignorant rednecks is most certainly a Democrat thing that the OP obviously bought. (It's amusing to watch, considering how intensely racists so many Democrats are.) It's bad enough to have to deal with Rick Perry-style crony Republicanism here in Texas. A bunchy of left-wing Democrats who want even bigger government would only make things worse, so the OP is free to stay wherever he is. He won't be missed.

Comment Re:do they have a progressive view? (Score 2) 336

I would die first before moving to texas. most of my friend also feel the same.

in all my life, I have never heard anyone EXCITED about moving to texas, at least for tech. sure, there is tech there but only for those that can stomach the texas lifestyle and redneck attitudes.

the outright racism and bible-belt feel just is not compatible with many techies' view of what a good living area should offer.

Wow, I'd say that post pretty much serves as a prime example of how to beclown oneself while simultaneously establishing oneself as a bigot of the first degree!

There's a reason that 3 of the top 10 cities of the US are in Texas today, and Austin's rising with a bullet, showing staggering 6.6% growth, a substantial portion of which is tech, although way too much of that is the social/mobile bubble. (Austin is #11 today, Detroit is 18, FWIW...) Yeah, pretty tolerable weather, awesome food and music, really nice people (yep, even "bible-belt rednecks"), a great tech scene w/o the backstabbing attitude, entrepreneurial dynamism and focus on results, Formula 1/SxSW/ACL - why would anyone even consider working here? If there's a weak spot in Texas, BTW, it's Austin, mostly because of its "progressive" dedication to regulating the crap out of everything they can. (Don't get me started about permits here - smart people start or move their companies nearby, not in, Austin...)

Oh, and a friend of mine from Detroit (who happens to be black) told me years ago (when he had been in Texas only a few months) that not only was he shocked to find that there were actually far fewer racists in Texas than in Michigan, but that he preferred even those racists because "at least here in Texas and the South, you know when people have a racist bias!" He didn't find that to be true in Detroit, his home town, despite the fact that he came from a fairly well-connected family (his Mom was in the state congress), which insulated him from some of the racial bias in the first place...

Comment Re:Just one more reason (Score 1) 258

[Just one more reason] to legalize and regulate.

I can see how this kind of story would support legalization (crimes against criminals often go unaddressed), but how would it support regulating? Is theft unusually common with unregulated crops, as opposed to regulated ones?

(Ignorance plea: Heh, it occurs to me that I don't even know what crops are regulated and what isn't. Maybe agriculture is already totally micromanaged by Washington; I sure hear enough stories of corruption (e.g. subsidies) within the topic!)

Comment Re:do they have a progressive view? (Score 0) 336

I would die first before moving to texas. most of my friend also feel the same.

That's fine with us. We'd just as soon you not come.

the outright racism and bible-belt feel just is not compatible with many techies' view of what a good living area should offer.

I like how you gobble up tropes fed to you by your Democratic overlords, and then accuse others of bigotry. It's cute.

Comment Re:However.... (Score 1) 235

To prevent double-use like this, a company should say that you don't get paid until they've fixed the bug and issued a patch for it in their software, all without the exploit ever being spotted in the wild.

One problem with this is that there's already a documented history of companies rejecting bug reports and not paying the bounty, and then some time later include a fix for it in their periodic updates. It's basically the same process that causes a company's "app store" to reject a submitted tool to do a particular job, and then a few months later releasing their own app that does the same thing.

I know a good number of people who've been bitten by the latter, from both MS and Apple. In the case of a bug, it's a lot harder to document that this has happened, but various software guys I know express a strong suspicion that it has been done to them.

It's widely believed that corporations don't have ethics at all, only costs and income, which would easily explain this sort of fraudulent "offers" of rewards with no intent to pay. We've heard here often from lots of people who think that this is right and proper, and that corporations should only be motivated by the bottom line.

When combined with the growing penchant for treating someone who reports a security bug as a criminal "security hacker" and prosecuting people who report bugs in software products, this should reasonably make a sensible developer reluctant to take rewards programs seriously. Given an offer which could get you thanks and some money, or could land you in jail for your efforts, and no way to know beforehand which the company will do, why would you even consider letting them know your name?

(Actually, my name has appeared in numerous companies' lists of honored contributors thanks to my bug reports and patches. But I haven't sent in security-related bug reports to many companies, only to the ones I have reasons to believe I can trust.)

Comment Re:Nonsense (Score 1) 294

Wow, there's a LOT of negativity and assuming that the CAB is only a bureaucratic, bad thing. (It may be, but hear me out - it shouldn't be, and if it is, you can help change that...)

I think part of the problem here could be that the OP is assuming that no good can come from this.

If the CAB is doing its job, then it should be *helping* to determine which patches to apply, why, and when, based on taking into account the hardware, software, networking, and application environments and the "risk" a patch represents to each. That kind of support is a real net plus to a sysadmin. Note that it's implicit that the CAB is either doing or facilitiating this extra work, not just dumping it on the admin. (In that case, it's not really a board, but the worst sort of bureaucratic assemblage holding authority but no responsibility by dictating policy to be implemented by others who have responsibility without authority.)

Yes, this *is* a lot of work, and it *may* be justified, especially if there's been a history of being bitten by patches that were more of less blindly applied simply because a vendor or package owner/author posted them.

As with all process issues, the important thing to understand is "*WHY* are we doing this?" That questions is frequently answered the best by answering other related questions, including, "Is this the best way?", and "How else could we achieve the same goal?" , and perhaps even more important in winnowing down the answers from that one - "What could we do that's 'close enough' in benefits, but way easier to implement and support?"

Asking the right questions is *really* important!

Comment Re:Simple problem, simple solution (Score 1) 359

The real reason is probably a lot simpler: Cost.

Before you break ground on a single-family home in Pleasanton CA, you must cough up in excess of $125,000 (yes, 125 grand) in fees and permits.

I expect said fees and permits are even more expensive in San Francisco proper.

[For comparison, in Los Angeles County a home building permit is $38,000. Here in Montana it's from $50 to $2000 depending where you are.]

Comment Re:Disagree (Score 2) 256

I don't really have a specific argument about the numbers. Truthfully I couldn't pay attention long enough to really find a flaw in the argument. That said, my gut is telling me author is wrong.

Damn, why didn't I think of this?

People, is it true? Would the market bear a "Republican Technology News" site?

Comment Re:ARM laptop, please? (Score 1) 110

Why on earth should I really care what kind of CPU is in my laptop, *especially* if the OS runs on either x86 or ARM?

I think the whole point of the discussion here is that both hardware architectures and OS choices are becoming increasingly fungible, and that trend may only accelerate...

I'm with you on the quality digitizer/touchscreen, though...

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