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Submission + - Test Pilot Admits the F-35 Can't Dogfight (medium.com)

schwit1 writes: A test pilot has some very, very bad news about the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter. The pricey new stealth jet can't turn or climb fast enough to hit an enemy plane during a dogfight or to dodge the enemy's own gunfire, the pilot reported following a day of mock air battles back in January.

And to add insult to injury, the JSF flier discovered he couldn't even comfortably move his head inside the radar-evading jet's cramped cockpit. "The helmet was too large for the space inside the canopy to adequately see behind the aircraft." That allowed the F-16 to sneak up on him.

The test pilot's report is the latest evidence of fundamental problems with the design of the F-35 — which, at a total program cost of more than a trillion dollars, is history's most expensive weapon.

Your tax dollars at work.

Submission + - Former L0pht Hacker Mudge Leaves Google to Start Cyber UL

Trailrunner7 writes: One of the longstanding problems in security–and the software industry in general–is the lack of any universally acknowledged authority on quality and reliability. But the industry moved one step closer to making such a clearinghouse a reality this week when Peiter Zatko, a longtime researcher and hacker better known as Mudge in security circles, announced he’s leaving Google to start an initiative designed to be a cyber version of Underwriters’ Laboratory.

Zatko said on Monday that he had decided to leave Google’s Advanced Technology and Projects team and start a cyber UL, at the behest of the White House.

The new project will not be run out of the White House, Zatko said, and the specifics of the plan are not clear right now. But the fact that someone with Zatko’s experience, history, and respect in the security community is involved in the project lends immediate weight and potential to it.

Comment Re:If we're stuck with polls, how 'bout tech polls (Score 1) 144

I'm becoming a bit of a fireworks nerd, actually. I grew up in the big city where firework sales were forbidden, and now I live in the country where you can buy them twice a year. We actually double up on fourth of July and get extras to save for the fifth of November and have a fun time then, as well.

I've gone so far as to research how to create my own fireworks, and I might actually give it a try some day.

Gunpowder is really the original world-transforming technologies.

Comment Copyright (Score 4, Interesting) 111

Steve, I read that you consider yourself a "small-l libertarian." These days a lot of libertarians have come to oppose copyright law, or else favor severe reforms for it. As a publisher, game designer, and libertarian, how do you feel about the subject, and do you feel that these various roles are in tension with each other?

On a related note, in junior high school I bought GURPS Cyberpunk from a friend, only to later find out that that friend had shoplifted it from a bookstore. I've always regretted that. Do I owe you guys some money?

Comment Cryonics (Score 1) 111

Steve, thanks for many enjoyable hours spent gaming and reading your company's books about gaming. I wish I could ask you how to make more hours so that I could still play today!

I have read that at one time you had cryonics arrangements with Alcor Life Extension foundation. Is that still true today? Are you optimistic about your chances? Do you recommend other people follow suit?

Comment Re:Nude == Rude? (Score 5, Interesting) 172

If I were to seek out your daughter specifically, and whip out my penis right in front of her, that would lean towards pedo tendencies & you'd be right. I'd feel the same way if I had a young daughter.

Now if I were to walk along the street naked, go about my own business not bothering anyone, and your daughter would happen to see me in that state, please explain to me how this would 'hurt' her?

Hint: you can't, because it doesn't. More likely the contrary (as in: seeing a naked body every now & then lets kids grow up to be healthy adults). As has been shown at least a few times in serious studies.

The difference here is only in how I would behave towards your daughter (and other people), regardless of being naked or not. If I'm rude, then I'm rude, even with clothes on. If I'm polite, then I'm polite, even if naked.

Although a lot more sensitive, essentially the same thing goes for human sexuality. Suppressing that from public view screws people up more badly than satisfying healthy curiosity on the subject. Or letting people have their pr0n, if they want it.

So GP is right, there is nothing inherently wrong about showing or seeing a naked body. The 'problem' with that is a cultural one, how society deals with it.

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