"It would call for a tiny FAT12 partition on each card sold with an IFS driver for a new file system."

M$ would scoff at the idea and laugh the usb/flash memory card vendors back to the bargaining table and possibly entertain raising the royalities. This is because you're forgetting a critical part to having your plan work: User security restrictions in corporate environments; Windows/Mac OS alike. It wouldn't affect the average home user, but think about the implications for I.T. staff in general who would have to field calls from users complaining that they can't read or write to their shiny new flash device. Sure it's a trivial task, but scale it up to several hundred/thousands of systems scattered around different locations and you have yourself an adventure. You could incorporate a script into the login process, but you'll always have that one VIP user that's not connected on the LAN or through VPN, needs it to ASAP and is bitching up a storm until it's done.

In short, one must look at the bigger picture and assume that no plan/idea is foolproof. Just my $0.02..

While technology has certainly changed and the consequences have increased due to a company's online presence, or an individual for that matter, the hype surrounding Conficker reminds me of the infamous Michelangelo Virus doing its deed on March 6. A quick google search revealed an archived memo sent out at Stanford. I'll paste it here as not to /. their webservers unnecessarily; how kind of me. lol!

-- Stanford memo 03/01/1993 --
"NEWS RELEASE

03/01/93

CONTACT: Stanford University News Service (415) 723-****

Michelangelo virus due to strike again March 6

STANFORD -- Employees who use an IBM PC, PS/2 or compatible computer should be aware that there is a small chance their computers have been infected with an infamous computer virus.

The "Michelangelo" virus, which is an especially destructive strain, may erase parts of a user's hard drive. This can happen every March 6, which is the famous artist's birthday, according to security officials in the Stanford Data Center.

The computer must be turned on sometime March 6 for the virus to do any damage. Since March 6 falls on a Saturday this year, the risk of any damage is relatively low, according to Bill Bauriedel, the Data Center's security chief.

However, he said, it is simply good practice to run an anti-virus program periodically to check for the presence of one or more viruses. Michelangelo is only one of more than 700 identified viruses that can infect a computer.

"Even though you may not have the Michelangelo virus, your computer may be infected with something else," Bauriedel said. "While probably not as dangerous as Michelangelo, these other viruses should be disinfected as well - once disinfected, they can't spread from your machine to someone else's machine."

Staffers and faculty who have a Forsythe account and use Samson can download an antivirus program called F-PROT. For instructions on how to perform the download, issue these two commands:

USE WYL.GB.SEC.FPROT and PRINT.

Users without a Forsythe account can exchange a blank floppy for the antivirus program either at the consulting office on the second floor of Sweet Hall or at the Information Security Office in Spruce Hall, room F19.

For more information on matters of computer security, contact ******* at 723-****.

930301Arc3381.html"

While slightly OT, I took a moment to seek out possible alternatives but it seems DD-WRT is still the only 3rd-party firmware to solidly support the WRT54G(S) v5 and above. Is any fellow /.'er aware of firmware that would work well with v.5 and above considering that friends and family happen to have purchased the newer/stripped down versions.

Why would you have to rely on a manufacturer's promise?

I'm sure that there a some great coders on /. and elsewhere that could contribute to the Coreboot Project (formerly known as LinuxBIOS) and add a simple function at the BIOS level to run some form of a RAM scrambling function before processing the poweroff command from the O/S.

Just my $0.02...

Also, which is more economically efficient - to pay people a marginal amount to sit around (unemployment - which comes out of taxes, remember)

In an effort to correct that bit of misinformation, see: U.S. Unemployment Program

For those that don't have a moment to waste, below is a clip of the wiki entry:

----- Snippet -----

"Unemployment insurance is a federal-state program jointly financed through federal and state employer payroll taxes (federal and state UI taxes)"

Well said...

Bill also owes all of us an apology for Microsoft Bob!! Rememeber that piece of crap?? An utter useless "add-on"! What a monumental waste of coding time.

As the saying goes:

"People only hear what they see"...

I second that!

"Only issue I have is lack of 16 bit support for really old DOS stuff which doesn't bother me."

Obviously you haven't tried getting a handful of printers, all major brands might I add, working under 64-bit Vista! A simple google search will reveal how many users have run into such issues with no solution in sight from the vendors. Of course, sales people won't bother letting buyers know about this issue because their concern is to close the sale. Granted, it's a generalization, but it happens to be the case more often than not. Fast forward to that user going through the initial screens, happy with their new powerful PC, only to find out that their printer which worked just fine with the previous PC is not supported on the shiny, latest and greatest OS.

Complete disappointment...

Perhaps you care to rephrase that statement?