Comment Why GitHub? (Score 2) 152
Wouldn't it be a better campaign to urge Windows users to keep using their existing hardware with linux instead...?
Will California's New Bot Law Strengthen Democracy? (newyorker.com) 185
On July 1st, California became the first state in the nation to try to reduce the power of bots by requiring that they reveal their "artificial identity" when they are used to sell a product or influence a voter. Violators could face fines under state statutes related to unfair competition. From a report: Just as pharmaceutical companies must disclose that the happy people who say a new drug has miraculously improved their lives are paid actors, bots in California -- or rather, the people who deploy them -- will have to level with their audience. "It's literally taking these high-end technological concepts and bringing them home to basic common-law principles," Robert Hertzberg, a California state senator who is the author of the bot-disclosure law, told me. "You can't defraud people. You can't lie. You can't cheat them economically. You can't cheat 'em in elections."
California's bot-disclosure law is more than a run-of-the-mill anti-fraud rule. By attempting to regulate a technology that thrives on social networks, the state will be testing society's resolve to get our (virtual) house in order after more than two decades of a runaway Internet. We are in new terrain, where the microtargeting of audiences on social networks, the perception of false news stories as genuine, and the bot-led amplification of some voices and drowning-out of others have combined to create angry, ill-informed online communities that are suspicious of one another and of the government. Regulating bots should be low-hanging fruit when it comes to improving the Internet. The California law doesn't even ban them outright but, rather, insists that they identify themselves in a manner that is "clear, conspicuous, and reasonably designed."
California's bot-disclosure law is more than a run-of-the-mill anti-fraud rule. By attempting to regulate a technology that thrives on social networks, the state will be testing society's resolve to get our (virtual) house in order after more than two decades of a runaway Internet. We are in new terrain, where the microtargeting of audiences on social networks, the perception of false news stories as genuine, and the bot-led amplification of some voices and drowning-out of others have combined to create angry, ill-informed online communities that are suspicious of one another and of the government. Regulating bots should be low-hanging fruit when it comes to improving the Internet. The California law doesn't even ban them outright but, rather, insists that they identify themselves in a manner that is "clear, conspicuous, and reasonably designed."
Comment Re:since it is summer (Score 3, Insightful) 254
The sun is already up too early during summer, another half hour would make it a lot worse...
We should just accept that winter sucks, the nights are long no matter how we play with the clocks...
Just stick to summer time, that way at least the change to the sucky part of the year is gradual, and not a sudden one-hour shift a lot of people hate.
Not to mention that the one hour shift this way and that still causes issues in most IT systems that need to be cleaned up each year after the change... (mostly when the same time "repeats").
Comment Re:Not DST (Score 5, Informative) 254
The submission may have been a bit misleading, but it is not DST that is proposed to get abolished, but the DST change. So, each country is free to chose the timezone they'd like to remain in after the DST change is ended. There is a specific question for this in the poll as well (keep summer time, keep winter time or "don't care").
I sure as hell hope the DST change will be ended, and we'll stick to summer time.
Submission + - EU Commission runs poll about Daylight Saving Time changes (europa.eu)
mitch0 writes: The European Commission started an online consultation about the summer time changes in the EU. Citizens can express their opinion about the summer time change by filling out a short online survey. The consultation was started after some member states expressed the opinion that the daylight saving time should be abolished within the EU. There were some local motions in member countries as well, but these cannot really proceed without full coordination with all member states.
So far it seems that most of those wanting to end the daylight-saving change would stick to summer time all-year round, but the questionnaire has a specific question about this issue so a more representative result is expected after the survey is closed in the middle of August.
So far it seems that most of those wanting to end the daylight-saving change would stick to summer time all-year round, but the questionnaire has a specific question about this issue so a more representative result is expected after the survey is closed in the middle of August.
Submission + - "Most serious" Linux privilege-escalation bug ever is under active exploit (arstechnica.com)
operator_error writes: Lurking in the kernel for nine years, flaw gives untrusted users unfettered root access.
By Dan Goodin — 10/20/2016
A serious vulnerability that has been present for nine years in virtually all versions of the Linux operating system is under active exploit, according to researchers who are advising users to install a patch as soon as possible.
While CVE-2016-5195, as the bug is cataloged, amounts to a mere privilege-escalation vulnerability rather than a more serious code-execution vulnerability, there are several reasons many researchers are taking it extremely seriously. For one thing, it's not hard to develop exploits that work reliably. For another, the flaw is located in a section of the Linux kernel that's a part of virtually every distribution of the open-source OS released for almost a decade. What's more, researchers have discovered attack code that indicates the vulnerability is being actively and maliciously exploited in the wild.
"It's probably the most serious Linux local privilege escalation ever," Dan Rosenberg, a senior researcher at Azimuth Security, told Ars. "The nature of the vulnerability lends itself to extremely reliable exploitation. This vulnerability has been present for nine years, which is an extremely long period of time."
The underlying bug was patched this week by the maintainers of the official Linux kernel. Downstream distributors are in the process of releasing updates that incorporate the fix. Red Hat has classified the vulnerability as "important."
By Dan Goodin — 10/20/2016
A serious vulnerability that has been present for nine years in virtually all versions of the Linux operating system is under active exploit, according to researchers who are advising users to install a patch as soon as possible.
While CVE-2016-5195, as the bug is cataloged, amounts to a mere privilege-escalation vulnerability rather than a more serious code-execution vulnerability, there are several reasons many researchers are taking it extremely seriously. For one thing, it's not hard to develop exploits that work reliably. For another, the flaw is located in a section of the Linux kernel that's a part of virtually every distribution of the open-source OS released for almost a decade. What's more, researchers have discovered attack code that indicates the vulnerability is being actively and maliciously exploited in the wild.
"It's probably the most serious Linux local privilege escalation ever," Dan Rosenberg, a senior researcher at Azimuth Security, told Ars. "The nature of the vulnerability lends itself to extremely reliable exploitation. This vulnerability has been present for nine years, which is an extremely long period of time."
The underlying bug was patched this week by the maintainers of the official Linux kernel. Downstream distributors are in the process of releasing updates that incorporate the fix. Red Hat has classified the vulnerability as "important."
Ask Slashdot: Spreadsheet With Decent Programming Language? 332
First time accepted submitter slartibartfastatp writes "Spreadsheets are very flexible tools for data analysis and transformations, the obvious options being MS Excel and LibreOffice. However, I found increasingly infuriating to deal with the VBA--dialect functions or (even worse) its translated versions. Is there any spreadsheet that allows usage of a decent programming language in its formulae? I found PySpread intriguing, but still very beta (judging from its latest release version 0.2.3). Perl or even javascript would be better options than =AVERAGE(). Do you know any viable alternatives?"
Comment Re:Add Support for Visual Studio (Score 1) 1154
Vim "integration" is pretty nice with the vrapper plugin.
Comment Re:Charity begins at home (Score 1) 355
My current phone is a Motorola Defy, and with CM7 it's the best phone I had so far. The form-factor is ideal, it's water resistant and generally works just fine. The stock moto rom was unusable, the operator-branded one even more so, but there's nothing wrong with the hardware.
My only minor issue with it is the use of the magnetic sensor to detect docking, which doesn't play nice with my magnetic-latch phone holder, but even that can be worked around by uninstalling the stock cardock and clock applications.
Comment Re:What about a new password element? (Score 1) 310
Read parent post again. It's about the average user using the same (or the same with minor variation) password on a number online forums etc. With the proposed change even if one of those sites is hacked (or the owner is teh evil), they won't be able use that info on other sites the user may have an account on (with usually the same username/password).
At least that's how I understand it.
cheers,
mitch
At least that's how I understand it.
cheers,
mitch
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