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Comment Infection Method - Well it's not... (Score 5, Informative) 172

If you dig into the articles to some of the raw analysis you'll discover two things.

1) "It remains an open question regarding how the attackers have gained the root privileges to install the rootkit. However, considering the code quality, a custom privilege escalation exploit seems very unlikely." So it unlikely that they gained root with something new, but it was a web site that was hacked, so the likely vector is something related to what the site it was running. PHP, WordPress, DB Injection, and Apache exploits.

2) "Based on the Tools, Techniques, and Procedures employed and some background information we cannot publicly disclose, a Russia-based attacker is likely."

Comment People Are Hyped - Try to Buy One! (Score 2) 188

Hyped? Pre-sales sold out a month ago. I don't know how much more hype people expected there to be?!? The Amazon and ebay 3rd party sales are already looking to be gouging people by $50-100.

The other interesting bit here is the sale at a loss. If it's less than 10% than the loss will be made up by the the change in value of the yen versus the dollar over the next few months. Add to that manufacturing cost cutting and it will be to profit far faster than the PS3 or XBox.

Comment Re:Looks like the AG actually read the law (Score 1) 817

It's a States Rights issue. The United States sends observers to elections around the world. The OSCE's argument is the Federal Government has existing agreements that allow the observers in polling places and no individual State has the authority to revoke international agreements the Federal Government has entered into.

Comment Japan's lost decade is a good example (Score 3, Interesting) 285

In Japan white collar workers are expected to stay late, even if they are out of work and are just looking busy. It's the total opposite of the Japanese blue collar factory worker experience. A lot of folks think the faux productivity has kept them from getting out of their financial woes. The article focuses on hourly billable jobs like lawyers but a lot of it apply to poor eastern management styles. In particular the focus on reading and writing memo and BS paperwork. There's a lot of rote BS work that goes on.

On the hand I quite enjoy working as an hourly computer consultant. I think my focus is results and I think things like iterative design really shift the focus from hours to what you got done. That brings a lot of value to the client in the end. But there are a lot of consulting companies out there where the focus is utilization and bill (mostly seen in creative services such as Marketing IT or off-shore consulting).

Comment Pennies a Gig (Score 1) 419

The real kick in the pants is the costs for backbone internet are pennies a gig. It's the last mile that's really screwing the consumer. You'll notice Comcast doesn't sell "Internet" they sell Xfinity. I think the market can work, but I think it needs a little truth in advertising. If Comcast had to have a black box that said "Limited Internet Service - We reserve the right to limit/slow down any service for any reason" I think the consumer choice would be more clear.

Comment Buckle Down (Score 4, Interesting) 418

40? Seriously? You've got another 24 years until retirement so you better get your head in the game.

Tried management? Okay what went wrong? Did you just hop in without any personal and professional development? Take classes, do things like toastmasters, you need to refine your skills.

On the other hand maybe you want to stay on the technical side. First realize you are in control. You let yourself get out of date YOU need to fix it. It's not like the concepts are all that foreign. Put your nose to the grind stone. Take classes, join open source projects, Most importantly you're going to need to change jobs. You are likely typecast as the old guy with out of date skills. Figure out what strikes your fancy be it more .Net or Web Stuff, JavaScript whatever.

I would only leave if you truly aren't enjoying computer work anymore.

Comment Re:The reason is simple. (Score 1) 513

BMW for sure, but don't count out the internals. Specifically Apple has a very narrow product line. Whereas an Asus or Dell has a very deep product line. The original issue for PC Makers competing with the Air was two fold. One, traditional PC makers get cost savings in terms of manufacturing and R&D by making things very modular. There's not a lot of different PCBs in Apple products. That makes the inside smaller. But in a more direct way Apple has way more engineering time to spend with each model. That engineering shows in how small the final PCBs are and (in theory) more robust designs. Where Apple will make a million of a specific Air model a PC maker is going to make a tens or maybe hundreds of thousands of any specific model.

In the end the Yugo analogy is fitting. PC makers can't put the same R&D time into their Ultrabook offerings and the on the outside it certainly shows. The jury is still out on the insides. The quality is likely very similar in terms of actual manufacturing (it's all made in Asia anyway), but from what I'm seeing Apple usually does better with power management and battery technology. The end result is the Air usually goes longer and weighs less (although at the sizes we're talking about an ounce or two isn't as obvious).

Bear in mind that PC makers are also getting a subsidy from Intel for the tune of $200M fund to make Ultra Books. But it's not because Intel dislikes Apple. Intel's fear is PC makers might find it easier to engineer a ARM based Ultrabooks.

Comment Re:I think I may know the problem... (Score 1) 513

It's Intel's trademark for a MacBook Air clone. Intel has a $200 million dollar subsidy for pc makers. But in order to qualify you need to adhere to some very specific set specifications. This includes a lot of size and minimum hardware. PC makers have a very hard time competing with Apple because they have a modular configuration system designed to support a very deep product line. Because of that the internals are much bigger than Apple. Whereas apple has a very shallow and focused product line. More focus, smaller, etc.

Now don't confuse this as an anti-Apple move by Intel. Intel's problem is Windows has an ARM version. PC makers started taking the easy way out and started competing with Apple using Non-Intel CPUs.

Comment Re:Article has it Right (Score 1) 480

I would concur. Though I think most companies let jerks of all types stay on, brilliant or not. Companies aren't wired for confrontation. Getting rid of jerks is usually messy. Jerks are usually good about getting their work done, often at the expense of other team members. From that stand point I think they are a net negative.

Comment BING! BING! BINGO! (Score 1) 295

I think the real issue is why didn't the datacenter come up to capacity. To me the answer is BING. That is to say the reports indicate the primary function of the data center was to service the Bing service. Me thinks Microsoft's expectations were a bit high when they signed the contract in the first place.

Comment Keeping Skills Current (Score 1) 397

If the present job keeps your skills current then the 10% pay difference may not be worth the hassle and extra hours. On the other hand if you're just showing up, slacking in the clubhouse while your skills slip away you're going to wake up one way with out the fun job, fun pay check or fun job prospects.

Comment Re:CS != Coding (Score 2) 630

That sounds like something a certain type of Architect might say. You know, the kind of guy that will come up with some harebrained idea wrapped in a ton of design doc fluff and then when it fails shrug it off as someone else's implementation problem. Mind you I've met a lot of great Architect who don't do that, but I've also met a lot that can't code at all and try very hard to have zero skin in the game for the implementation. And when it comes to big applications you need to be much sharper on the fundamental underpinning than the code monkey.

That being said, I think the OP hit on the problem, but the solution is a bit more complicated. We live in a world were companies would rather use "experienced" off-shore resources instead of putting the time and effort into properly training a college hire. There are folks are are fantastic coders out of college but they'd rather work for a start-up or go into consulting than deal with a corporate job that doesn't want to do any training.

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