Comment Re:Peering Agreement (Score 1) 315
That different peer might pay them.
Comment Re:Double Dipping? (Score 4, Informative) 315
You need to ask your government why there is a lack of competition in the ISP market in your country.
Network Neutrality is a non-issue used to cover up the real problem. It is only an issue at all in the USA.
Comment Re:Backups (Score 1) 202
why can't you just encrypt the diff files & upload those?
Comment Re:/etc/resolv.conf (Score 1) 617
I didn't miss any steps, there is no need to edit any configuration files to achieve that goal, the GUI does it all. Why would your sister need to install a 3rd party kernel, or build wireless drivers from source? I've been using Linux professionally for 10 years, since before grub was even around, the only time I needed to edit grub.conf was to do a dual boot with Windows.
Why put your sister through all that hassle when you could just use a modern well configured Linux distro?
Comment Re:/etc/resolv.conf (Score 1) 617
click the system menu, then administration, then network
configure your network devices
click the system menu, then administration, then services
disable & stop NetworkManager, then enable & start network
Comment Re:File size (Score 1) 591
While it would not provide users with full advantages of BitTorrent, it would dramatically reduce the hassle of choosing mirrors. The one closest to you doesn't work or is inexplicably slow? Choose another one, repeat until you get satisfactory results.
Package managers can do this automatically. Bittorrent is a solution to a problem that doesn't exist for Linux updates.
Comment Re:The bigger question is: (Score 1) 591
It's perfectly legal to download copyrighted material with the permission of the copyright holder (unless it breaks any other laws) in every country.
Why would the RIAA or anybody else want to poison Linux updates?
Microsoft Complaints Help Russian Gov't Pursue Political Opposition Groups 249
asaz989 writes "The New York Times reports that Russia selectively pursues software piracy complaints from Microsoft in order to suppress the opposition — confiscating computers for evidence, searching offices, and the like. Microsoft lawyers usually back the authorities in such cases, even when cases such as that of the environmentalist group Baikal Waves, which went out of its way to buy licenses to prevent police harassment and nevertheless had its offices raided, and its computers confiscated. Microsoft participated in this legal process. Published alongside this story, under the same byline, is a related piece on the collusion of Microsoft lawyers with corrupt Russian police in extorting money from the targets of software piracy investigations. In a responding press release, the company states, 'Microsoft antipiracy efforts are designed to honor both [antipiracy concerns and human rights], but we are open to feedback on what we can do to improve in that regard.'"
World's First Transcontinental Anesthesia 83
An anonymous reader writes "Medical Daily reports: 'Video conferences may be known for putting people to sleep, but never like this. Dr. Thomas Hemmerling and his team of McGill's Department of Anesthesia achieved a world first on August 30, 2010, when they treated patients undergoing thyroid gland surgery in Italy remotely from Montreal. The approach is part of new technological advancements, known as 'Teleanesthesia', and it involves a team of engineers, researchers and anesthesiologists who will ultimately apply the drugs intravenously which are then controlled remotely through an automated system.'"
Comment Re:Illegal under Net Neutrality (Score 1) 196
added to that, their connections are contended (50:1 ratio is usual here), all consumer grade connections are contended. so if a few of your neighbours are on bittorrent, you can't play games.
Comment Re:Illegal under Net Neutrality (Score 1) 196
Because some protocols require low latency. Other protocols (such as bittorrent) don't require low latency, but will swallow all the available bandwidth, given the chance & prevent low latency protocols from working as intended, if the low latency traffic isn't prioritised.
Demon is a UK ISP & there's no chance of this net neutrality nonsense happening here, so it's not an issue for them.
Comment Re:Choices (Score 1) 702
break it up so that one company (or the state) owns the lines, they then allow open access to anybody else that wants to lease space on the lines to provide a service.
Comment Re:How is this different? (Score 1) 120
A more competitive isp market would solve the net neutrality problem. then if any isp did do some kind of 'protection scheme' that slowed or blocked a service that you use, you'd be free to switch to another isp that doesn't.
Network neutrality regulations can only cause problems. Sometimes isps need to throttle or block certain types of traffic, to ensure that more important traffic is faster. they need to be free to block ddos attacks, they often need to throttle bittorrent, to ensure that latency sensitive applications still work at busy times, on cheap consumer level connections. It can only increase the price and/or lower the quality of service.
Forget University — Use the Web For Education, Says Gates 393
An anonymous reader writes "Bill Gates attended the Techonomy conference earlier this week, and had quite a bold statement to make about the future of education. He believes the Web is where people will be learning within a few years, not colleges and university. During his chat, he said, 'Five years from now on the web for free you'll be able to find the best lectures in the world. It will be better than any single university.'"
Of course, the efficacy of online learning is still in question; some studies have shown a measurable benefit to being physically present in a classroom. Still, online education can clearly reach a much wider range of students. Reader nbauman sent in a related story about MIT's OpenCourseWare, which is finding success in unexpected ways: "50% of visitors self-identified as independent learners unaffiliated with a university." The article also mentions a situation in which a pair of Haitian natives used OCW to get the electrical engineering knowledge they needed to build solar-powered lights that have been deployed in many remote towns and villages.
What Are Google and Verizon Up To? 120
pickens writes "Robert X. Cringley has an op-ed in the NY Times in which he contends that Google has found a way to get special treatment from Verizon without actually compromising net neutrality, by beginning to co-locate some of their portable data centers with Verizon network hubs. 'With servers so close to users, Google could not only send its data faster but also avoid sending it over the Internet backbone that connects service providers and for which they all pay,' writes Cringley. 'This would save space for other traffic — and money for both Verizon and Google, as their backbone bills decline (wishful thinking, but theoretically possible). Net neutrality would be not only intact, but enhanced.' So why won't Google and Verizon admit what they're up to? 'If my guess is right, then I would think they're silent because it's a secret. They'd rather their competitors not know until a few hundred shipping containers are in place — and suddenly YouTube looks more like HBO.'"
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