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Comment I didn't realize "rule of law" was negotiable? (Score 1) 242

by v1 (#45737697) Attached to: Panel Urges Major NSA Spying Overhaul

to balance the interests of national security and intelligence gathering with privacy and 'protecting democracy, civil liberties, and the rule of law.'

Am I reading that right? The "rule of law" is getting "balanced" by something else? I didn't think LAW was negotiable? Maybe that's the problem here? Someone's trying to "strike a balance" between legal and national security?

Government policy shouldn't be trying to draw a line between security and legality. Legality is THE LINE that is not crossed over, ever. If you can't do it legally, that means you shouldn't BE doing it. The correct response is not to consider bending the laws.
Transportation

Red Light Camera Use Declined In 2013 For the First Time 348

Posted by timothy from the drones-are-the-replacement dept.
SonicSpike writes "2013 may be a turning point for red-light cameras across the United States. According to the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety (IIHS), a non-profit largely funded by auto insurance companies, this year is the first time in nearly two decades that the number of American cities with red-light cameras has fallen — the systems were installed in 509 communities as of November 2013. While a single-year drop may not ultimately mean much, legislators across the country are increasingly agitated about the cameras. Bills are also pending in Florida and Ohio that would ban the devices entirely. A state representative in Iowa has also twice introduced legislation to ban RLCs (he was not successful). Part of this backlash has to do with the (sometimes accurate) perception that RLCs are a moneymaking scheme, pure and simple."

Comment Re:submit to legal department (Score 1) 310

by v1 (#45601755) Attached to: Ask Slashdot: Application Security Non-existent, Boss Doesn't Care. What To Do?

That will only work if the chief legal counsel believes the odds are against them.

Don't forget that an action that saves a few thousand dollars, that has a 10% chance of costing a million, is still a very bad risk, statistically speaking. That risk/loss multiplier is frequently a game-changer. We don''t buy insurance because we think we're going to run into a tree, we buy insurance because we can't afford it if we do - the odds of it happening aren't high, but aren't small enough to be able to ignore, and the loss if it happens is simply too great.
Patents

Jury Finds Newegg Infringed Patent, Owes $2.3 Million 324

Posted by Soulskill from the battle-lost-war-continues dept.
Jah-Wren Ryel sends this quote from Ars: "Newegg, an online retailer that has made a name for itself fighting the non-practicing patent holders sometimes called 'patent trolls,' sits on the losing end of a lawsuit tonight. An eight-person jury came back shortly after 7:00pm and found that the company infringed all four asserted claims of a patent owned by TQP Development, a company owned by patent enforcement expert Erich Spangenberg. The jury also found that the patent was valid, apparently rejecting arguments by famed cryptographer Whitfield Diffie. Diffie took the stand on Friday to argue on behalf of Newegg and against the patent. In total, the jury ordered Newegg to pay $2.3 million, a bit less than half of the $5.1 million TQP's damage expert suggested. ... TQP's single patent is tied to a failed modem business run by Michael Jones, formerly president of Telequip. TQP has acquired more than $45 million in patent licensing fees by getting settlements from a total of 139 companies since TQP argues that its patent covers SSL or TLS combined with the RC4 cipher, a common Internet security system used by retailers like Newegg."

Comment Re:Mind Readers? Thought Crime? (Score 2) 670

by v1 (#45522159) Attached to: Driver Arrested In Ohio For Secret Car Compartment Full of Nothing

Possession of a scale and drugs of almost any quantity here will get you "with intent to distribute" tacked on. An ex dealer I know said all the dealers in town have small personal safes they keep their scales in. That totally confused me until they filled me in on that minor little legal detail. (not that a safe often stops the cops, but apparently it can help)

It is amazing how "intent" can be made illegal. How can you really prove intent without a telepath?

Comment other benefits of less ethanol (Score 3, Informative) 330

by v1 (#45444399) Attached to: Can the US Be Weaned Off Ethanol?

I live in Iowa. We grow a lot of corn here. But there are other crops, things like soybean and sunflower. You know what happens when the demand for ethanol goes up? The price of corn goes up. And then what? People stop planting as much soybean and sunflower because corn is making them more. And then what? The price of soybean and sunflower goes up because there's a drop in supply.

And that's why a large bag of sunflower seed for my birdfeeder darn near doubled in price a few years ago, everyone was pulling out their sunflower and replacing it with corn. You don't really notice all these effects until they start hitting you.

Farmers will hedge their bets, plant multiple kinds of crops in case one of them tanks due to weather, but the ratio they mix in varies, to balance return and risk. When return on their main crop goes up, they can take bigger risks by pulling more of the less profitable crops out.

Comment Re:long burn? (Score 1) 73

by v1 (#45429659) Attached to: India's Mars Mission Back On Track After Brief Hiccup

I had considered that, but the issue there is, underburn results in not getting as far away from a gravity well as you intended, and that should introduce an exponentially increasing energy requirement to recover. In other words, if you only burn 10 liters in the time you meant to burn 12, you can't just burn 2 and make up for it, because it's going to require a little more than that to get where you should be?

Comment long burn? (Score 2) 73

by v1 (#45415753) Attached to: India's Mars Mission Back On Track After Brief Hiccup

five minutes is a pretty long correcting burn... I hope they didn't go through most of their spare fuel in the process. (TBH I wouldn't have expected them to have that much available in the first place, lifting spare fuel isn't like throwing a spare headlight in the trunk, five minutes' fuel is more like throwing a spare tire in the back seat) Anyone have any data on how much "buffer fuel" they carried, and how much they went through with this fix?
The Military

The Feathered Threat To US Air Superiority 195

Posted by Soulskill from the curse-you-big-bird dept.
Hugh Pickens DOT Com writes "Mark Thompson writes in Time Magazine that Air Force pilots flying the T-38 Talon can rest easy, knowing that their cockpit canopy can survive hitting a 4-lb. bird at 190 mph. Unfortunately, the Northrop supersonic jet trainer has a top speed of 812 mph. 'To my knowledge, the training planes are the only ones in the Air Force fast enough to make a bird strike lethal, and with a windshield too flimsy to deflect one,' wrote one Air Force pilot. Midair collisions between birds and Air Force aircraft have destroyed 39 planes and killed 33 airmen since 1973. That's why the USAF is seeking comments to 'identify potential sources, materials, timeframe, and approximate costs to redesign, test, and produce 550 T-38 forward canopy transparencies to increase bird strike capability.' The move follows a T-38 crash on July 19 in Texas triggered by a canopy bird strike. 'The current 0.23 inch thick stretched acrylic transparency can resist a 4-pound bird impact at 165 knots which does not offer a capability to resist significant bird impacts, and has resulted in the loss of six (6) aircraft and two pilot fatalities,' the service acknowledged. 'Numerous attempts since 1970 were made to evaluate existing materials and redesign a transparency that could withstand a bird impact of 4 pounds at 400 knots.' Previous efforts have foundered because they'd require expensive cockpit modifications to the twin-engine, two-seat supersonic jet. 'Although it would increase the level of bird impact protection,' the Air Force said, 'the proposal was cancelled due to the high cost of the modification.'"

Comment Re:And nothing of value was lost... (Score 2) 330

by v1 (#45307233) Attached to: Microsoft To Can Skype API; Third-Party Products Will Not Work

I'd agree with that. "skype" is becoming a verb at this point. "I'll skype you when I get home".

Too bad to see MS is gonna kill backward compatibility with hardware. I know a LOT of people still using skype vers 2 because of all the crap that happened to it recently. MS sure loves to increment product version numbers. Oooo look we moved the Close button, bump the version!
Communications

Microsoft To Can Skype API; Third-Party Products Will Not Work 330

Posted by timothy from the message-loud-and-clear dept.
Mark Gibbs writes "If you've recently fired up Skype you may have noticed a dialog box with a warning appear briefly (at least on OS X) then vanish. If you're fast enough to catch it you'll find that it's warning you that some application you're using that works with Skype will stop working in December, 2013. This applies to all sorts of software supporting headsets, cameras, ... you name it."

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