Also it's a very interesting time. Right after they find out that the recent breach by the Chinese Government got the personnel files with information for all executive employees up to cabinet level (including the security clearance data) they reveal that the Chinese (and Russia) got secret personnel information after all via the Snowden leaks. Something seems weird about this timing.

First (as stated in the summary): "Have the actions of Snowden, and, apparently, the use of weak encryption, made the world less safe?"

Second (not asked, but as important as the first): Was it worth it? Did the revelations made the world a better after the revelations?

IMO yes, it was worth it. Having secret programs authorised by secret laws and secret alliances to reduce or remove the privacy of the population as a whole for some geopolitical goal is not something that should happen in democratic countries.

This is a weird subject matter for a book review to be on Slashdot. I don't want this to be dismissed like one of those "this is not news for nerds / stuff that matter" comments so I will develop further about why this is my opinion:

1. From Slashdot's own Book Review Guidelines (emphasis mine): "In particular, we're interested in reviews of books on programming, computer security, the history of technology and anything else (including Science Fiction, cyberpunk, etc.) that fits under the "News for Nerds" umbrella."

The reviewed book doesn't seem to fit any of the name checked categories and even to fit in the more general "News for Nerds" umbrella seems to be very generous for most interpretations of what a "nerd" would be in this context (of computer, technology, science fiction and cyberpunk).

2. Here are the reviews from the past 12 months. Despite of the lack of reviewers the theme is almost always related to technology (even if as a pretext to discuss infosec, law enforcement and natsec). Curiously the same reviewer that submitted this review submitted most of the barely related ones.

by Saint Aardvark: Book Review: Networking For System Administrators (subject: infrastructure, sysadmin)
by Michael Ross: Book Review: Drush For Developers, 2nd Edition (subject: web development)
by benrothke: Book Review: Future Crimes (subject: infused, cybercrime, law enforcement)
by benrothke: Book Review: Data and Goliath (subject: infosec, privacy, law enforcement)
by benrothke: Book Review: Core HTML5 2D Game Programming (subject: game programming)
by benrothke: Book Review: Designing and Building a Security Operations (subject: infosec)
by Saint Aardvark: Book Review: FreeBSD Mastery: Storage Essentials (subject: infrastructure)

2014

by MassDosage: Book Review: Build Your Own Website: A Comic Guide to HTML, CSS, and WordPress (subject: web development)
by benrothke: Book Review: Spam Nation (subject: cybercrime)
by benrothke: Book Review: Bulletproof SSL and TLS (subject: infosec)
by benrothke: Book Review: Countdown To Zero Day (subject: infosec, cyberwarfare, natsec)
by benrothke: Book Review: Measuring and Managing Information Risk: a (subject: infosec)
by sobczakt: Book Review: Scaling Apache Solr (subject: networking, infrastructure)
by benrothke: Book Review: Architecting the Cloud (subject: networking, infrastructure)
by benrothke: Book Review: Social Engineering In IT Security Tools (subject: infosec)
by benrothke: Book Review: Introduction To Cyber-Warfare (subject: infosec)
by benrothke: Book Review: Data-Driven Security: Analysis, Visualization (subject: infosec)
by benrothke: Book Review: Hacking Point of Sale (subject: infosec)

I don't want to speculate about the motivations for this review to be on slashdot but this seems to be a recurring theme: to inflame the audience with polarizing subjects and what more polarizing now than "who is more to blame for the Iraq mishaps: 43rd or 44th?".

But between this and the monstrosity that attempt to change the target audience that Beta was the most visible aspect we (the loyalty audience) will sure be needing a new home very soon.

However, these electronics will continue to operate normally until at least September, when the deactivations should actually begin. Until then, the system will only mount a database with information on the equipment in use in Brazil.

This is a new low, blatant lies in the summary only for cheap country based hate and some pageviews. Good job!

1) "Java Only for now, more coming soon!"
2) "Alpha"
3) The linked article is a "product announcement" on Newsforge

This is slashvertisement for a vaporware product. Although this is promising, there is nothing concrete there to call it "what we need to unify the open-source community", not even an alternative to Google codesearch.

Btw, is alpha the new beta?