Peterkro
Mar 13, 03:01 PM
If you choose not to have nuclear power, you're choosing to have oil - and all the problems that brings with it.
That is not true at all,it's not a binary choice.As I've said before the most effective answer in the short term is to stop wasting energy unnecessarily.Given the lead time and cost overruns on Nuclear plants it's not economically viable:
"The period before 2030 forecasts nuclear power to be using the existing technology of fissile reactors, with more advanced technologies coming online after 2030 (See Figure IVA.2.).
The 2030 IEA Reference forecast follows a �business as usual� scenario. In this forecast, nuclear power trails alternative methods of power generation by approximately 3 to 1, and thus declines in percent of total electricity produced from 16% to 10%. In the IEA Alternative Policy forecast, nuclear power grows at a more rapid rate, but it is outpaced by alternative power generation technologies, declining from 16% to 14% of total electricity generated. The Alternative Policy case assumes that there is an effort to curtail global warming that includes measures to boost the role of nuclear power."
http://www.npc.org/Study_Topic_Papers/25-TTG-Nuclear-Power.pdf
That is not true at all,it's not a binary choice.As I've said before the most effective answer in the short term is to stop wasting energy unnecessarily.Given the lead time and cost overruns on Nuclear plants it's not economically viable:
"The period before 2030 forecasts nuclear power to be using the existing technology of fissile reactors, with more advanced technologies coming online after 2030 (See Figure IVA.2.).
The 2030 IEA Reference forecast follows a �business as usual� scenario. In this forecast, nuclear power trails alternative methods of power generation by approximately 3 to 1, and thus declines in percent of total electricity produced from 16% to 10%. In the IEA Alternative Policy forecast, nuclear power grows at a more rapid rate, but it is outpaced by alternative power generation technologies, declining from 16% to 14% of total electricity generated. The Alternative Policy case assumes that there is an effort to curtail global warming that includes measures to boost the role of nuclear power."
http://www.npc.org/Study_Topic_Papers/25-TTG-Nuclear-Power.pdf
ezekielrage_99
Aug 29, 11:17 PM
I think people are missing the point....
Anyway who really gives a crap what a bunch of pot smoking tree hugging hippies think.
I know I don't :cool:
Anyway who really gives a crap what a bunch of pot smoking tree hugging hippies think.
I know I don't :cool:
arkitect
Apr 15, 11:22 AM
By hateful things, you're talking about people like the Westboro Baptist Church and their picket signs, right?
Certainly you don't mean, say, this from the Catechism of the Catholic Church:
2358 The number of men and women who have deep-seated homosexual tendencies is not negligible. [They do not choose their homosexual condition; for most of them it is a trial.] This inclination, which is objectively disordered, constitutes for most of them a trial. They must be accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided. These persons are called to fulfill God’s will in their lives and, if they are Christians, to unite to the sacrifice of the Lord's Cross the difficulties they may encounter from their condition.
You may not agree with that, but if you find it "hateful", you've basically decided to check out of any possibility of rational argument.
So there is no big
BUT
?
Really?
;)
You are just being disingenuous. I think you just did not quote the part that says it is only OK with the Catholic church if gay men and women do not give physical expression to their gay "inclinations".
the difficulties they may encounter from their condition
Makes it sound like leprosy…
Certainly you don't mean, say, this from the Catechism of the Catholic Church:
2358 The number of men and women who have deep-seated homosexual tendencies is not negligible. [They do not choose their homosexual condition; for most of them it is a trial.] This inclination, which is objectively disordered, constitutes for most of them a trial. They must be accepted with respect, compassion, and sensitivity. Every sign of unjust discrimination in their regard should be avoided. These persons are called to fulfill God’s will in their lives and, if they are Christians, to unite to the sacrifice of the Lord's Cross the difficulties they may encounter from their condition.
You may not agree with that, but if you find it "hateful", you've basically decided to check out of any possibility of rational argument.
So there is no big
BUT
?
Really?
;)
You are just being disingenuous. I think you just did not quote the part that says it is only OK with the Catholic church if gay men and women do not give physical expression to their gay "inclinations".
the difficulties they may encounter from their condition
Makes it sound like leprosy…
slu
Oct 7, 02:55 PM
Of course Android might surpass the iPhone. The iPhone is limited to 1 device whereas the Android is spanned over many more devices and will continue to branch out.
Over years ush, in laden
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BUSH BIN LADEN was done.
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BUSH BIN LADEN was done.
BUSH BIN LADEN was done. osama
BUSH BIN LADEN was done. death
BUSH BIN LADEN was done.
BUSH BIN LADEN was done. Osama
Games
Bush - in Laden family
Back to Bush and Bin laden.
Mousse
Apr 25, 06:14 PM
Part of the problem is that God has always been a terrible communicator. ;)
Nope. Unlike Captain Kirk. God is a firm believer in the Prime Directive (http://memory-alpha.org/wiki/Prime_Directive).:D
Anyhow, back on topic as why I'm religious? I don't see the need to reinvent the wheel. There's already someone who has perfected the moral system: Jesus. His moral system, IMO, is the best one. It's a hard system to follow, but if--big IF... no HUGE @$$ IF--everyone can follow that system of morals, the world would be a lot better place.
Nope. Unlike Captain Kirk. God is a firm believer in the Prime Directive (http://memory-alpha.org/wiki/Prime_Directive).:D
Anyhow, back on topic as why I'm religious? I don't see the need to reinvent the wheel. There's already someone who has perfected the moral system: Jesus. His moral system, IMO, is the best one. It's a hard system to follow, but if--big IF... no HUGE @$$ IF--everyone can follow that system of morals, the world would be a lot better place.
iJohnHenry
Mar 26, 03:16 PM
Confucius say: Foolish is man who questions skunk in ancient tongues.
Rt&Dzine
Mar 12, 11:27 AM
The main island of Japan, the complete land mass, has moved sideways by eight feet (about 2.5 metres). And the earth, the entire planet, has shifted on its axis by about four inches (10cm)... according to geophysicists reported over at CNN. (http://edition.cnn.com/2011/WORLD/asiapcf/03/12/japan.earthquake.tsunami.earth/index.html)
This earthquake ranks 5th for strongest earthquakes accurately recorded.
It shifted the Earth four inches on its axis. If I understand correctly the 2010 Chilean earthquake actually shifted the Earth's axis. I wonder how often either of these events happen.
EDIT: The JPL now thinks that the Japan earthquake shifted the Earth's axis. I've found out this occurrence is somewhat "common".
This earthquake ranks 5th for strongest earthquakes accurately recorded.
It shifted the Earth four inches on its axis. If I understand correctly the 2010 Chilean earthquake actually shifted the Earth's axis. I wonder how often either of these events happen.
EDIT: The JPL now thinks that the Japan earthquake shifted the Earth's axis. I've found out this occurrence is somewhat "common".
Rodimus Prime
Mar 14, 01:53 AM
Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 4_1 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/532.9 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/4.0.5 Mobile/8B117 Safari/6531.22.7)
You have nothing with no wind.
Even if wind farms were 100% efficient, they don't hold a candle to nuclear output.
Besides, we don't have room here in Japan for wind farms so it makes no difference.
Alternative energy is not a viable source everywhere in the world, plain and simple. That's all I'm saying.
I was trying to explain that then 30% number is you can count on 30% of the total out put nation wide at any movement in time.
I am not talking about some random wind turbine giving 30% of their out put all the time but when you have lot of turbines spread all over the country you can count on 30% of them.
As for a problem with nuclear power is water. They require a LOT and I mean a LOT of water per MW compared to lets say Coal. One of our current largest problem is having enough water to cooling and producing power.
You have nothing with no wind.
Even if wind farms were 100% efficient, they don't hold a candle to nuclear output.
Besides, we don't have room here in Japan for wind farms so it makes no difference.
Alternative energy is not a viable source everywhere in the world, plain and simple. That's all I'm saying.
I was trying to explain that then 30% number is you can count on 30% of the total out put nation wide at any movement in time.
I am not talking about some random wind turbine giving 30% of their out put all the time but when you have lot of turbines spread all over the country you can count on 30% of them.
As for a problem with nuclear power is water. They require a LOT and I mean a LOT of water per MW compared to lets say Coal. One of our current largest problem is having enough water to cooling and producing power.
RogueWarrior65
Aug 30, 10:31 AM
Greenpeas never gave a damn until Apple was a red-hot company again. Same thing with Creative. You waited THIS long to bitch and moan about your intellectual property?
No lawyer ever gives a crap unless the target has lots of money.
No lawyer ever gives a crap unless the target has lots of money.
PsyD4Me
May 7, 11:03 PM
I don't understand why someone would stay with AT&T if they are having so many dropped calls. With Verizon offering phones like the Droid Incredible and Motorola Droid it is possible to switch to a more reliable carrier and still have an "iPhone like" experience. I don't see the iPhone coming to Verizon anytime soon. If you really want an iPhone then just get a Touch and get a Verizon Android phone to go with it.
Of course it is your money, but I would be upset if I was paying my phone bill every month and not getting reliable service.
There's just nothing like the iPhone experience
Of course it is your money, but I would be upset if I was paying my phone bill every month and not getting reliable service.
There's just nothing like the iPhone experience
makinao
Mar 11, 02:48 AM
Satoneko and everyone else in Japan: Please take precautions for aftershocks. In my country, the worst earthquake disaster when two separate 7.0 earthquakes hit the same area within minutes of each other, and aftershocks continued for several days. The worst may not be over. We're hoping for everyone's safety.
*Just read another 6.4 quake just happened.
*Just read another 6.4 quake just happened.
gorgeousninja
Apr 9, 06:36 AM
Oh, and try to be more mature in your reply next time please. That was uncalled for and childish.
actually the post was funny and to the point, your coming across as arrogant and ill informed.
actually the post was funny and to the point, your coming across as arrogant and ill informed.
jeff1977
Apr 9, 12:14 AM
Apple doesn't care what you plug into the 30 pin adapter. Go here (http://www.itechnews.net/tag/iphone-controller/) to see all kinds of button-rich controllers for the iPhone, iPod Touch and iPad. Some plug into the connector and some operate the game over wifi, and one allows both methods. Before commenting, let Google be your friend. :)
By all kinds did you mean 'all three'? That's all there is on your link. Before exaggerating, let being realistic be your friend. :)
By all kinds did you mean 'all three'? That's all there is on your link. Before exaggerating, let being realistic be your friend. :)
MacFly123
Mar 18, 02:50 PM
I can maybe get behind the whole 'dishonest' thing, but... seriously. If I have an iphone and an ipad, and I decide to surf some sites or stream music through pandora on my ipad using tethering instead of doing those exact same actions on my phone, I'm now 'stealing' that data even though it would have been the exact same usage?
I realize there are other scenarios you could bring up that would be more like 'taking advantage' of the system, but me personally- if I'm using the data in a way I feel is no different than I would be using with my phone, I don't have any bad conscience about it whether it's allowed or not.
I thought I made clear in my post that this is simply double billing what is supposed to be an unlimited plan for many and I do NOT agree nor think it is ethical for the carriers to do this! But, when people sign a contract and agree to the terms doing otherwise is not being honest. Plain and simple.
I realize there are other scenarios you could bring up that would be more like 'taking advantage' of the system, but me personally- if I'm using the data in a way I feel is no different than I would be using with my phone, I don't have any bad conscience about it whether it's allowed or not.
I thought I made clear in my post that this is simply double billing what is supposed to be an unlimited plan for many and I do NOT agree nor think it is ethical for the carriers to do this! But, when people sign a contract and agree to the terms doing otherwise is not being honest. Plain and simple.
darkplanets
Mar 13, 10:17 AM
I too don't expect anything like Chernobyl. But, it doesn't help when a Government "Official" tells the media that there is nothing to worry about then another "Official" mentions that there could be a meltdown or something.
Government officials are government officials-- they will never outright tell you the truth, because 9 times out of 10 they're uninformed about it or were told to say something they may not necessarily believe. They usually try to cover their bases-- see this way the government is covered in case something does happen.
well flooding the inner containment vessel with seawater + added boric acid is by all means an absolute last resort option in any playbook
(hardly a DIY solution: many reactors have the option and external connectors to do just that)
afterall they don't even know the situation inside because the temperature sensors aren't working anymore
also since that water can't be exchanged directly it means that they might have to cool the containment construction from the outside with additional water
I'll definitely agree with you there; it's not ideal, but it will work. Remember that BWRs will continue to make heat post control rod insertion. Boric acid itself isn't that toxic... in fact it can be rather useful in many chemistry situations. Also, if we're talking blunt toxicity, remember you make boric acid through borax, something we use every day in detergents. The LD50 for Boric acid is actually higher than table salt, although there are some reproductive health concerns. I think the biggest problem we're seeing here was the lack of redundancy for external power supplies, and the potential lack of modern safety systems-- as per my previous post, there's supposed to be a wide range of safety measures to assure that this never happens, but due to it's age, who knows.[/quote]
As a consequence the German government for example is already thinking about taking back their early decision to extend the use of their current nuclear plants
This is what I dislike. Not to get all political here, but alternative energy, however nice, is nowhere even close to providing the power we need. Windmills cannot ever meet energy demand; we're talking about a 5% fill if we put them everywhere. They're also too costly at this point for their given power output. Solar energy, though promising, still has a piss poor efficiency, and thus isn't ready for prime usage for some time. There's really no other alternatives. Despite these few instances (usually caused by human error) nuclear power is actually quite safe... but most people aren't educated enough to know whats actually the deal, and instead listen to the likes of Greenpeace and so on, who coincidentally also have no idea what they're talking about. If Germany is that concerned, they should be upgrading their safety systems, not abandoning it.
While the thread seems to be focused on the crisis at the nuclear power station, pictures are emerging showing the devastation left behind by the tsunami...
That is far more destruction than the power station could bring.
Government officials are government officials-- they will never outright tell you the truth, because 9 times out of 10 they're uninformed about it or were told to say something they may not necessarily believe. They usually try to cover their bases-- see this way the government is covered in case something does happen.
well flooding the inner containment vessel with seawater + added boric acid is by all means an absolute last resort option in any playbook
(hardly a DIY solution: many reactors have the option and external connectors to do just that)
afterall they don't even know the situation inside because the temperature sensors aren't working anymore
also since that water can't be exchanged directly it means that they might have to cool the containment construction from the outside with additional water
I'll definitely agree with you there; it's not ideal, but it will work. Remember that BWRs will continue to make heat post control rod insertion. Boric acid itself isn't that toxic... in fact it can be rather useful in many chemistry situations. Also, if we're talking blunt toxicity, remember you make boric acid through borax, something we use every day in detergents. The LD50 for Boric acid is actually higher than table salt, although there are some reproductive health concerns. I think the biggest problem we're seeing here was the lack of redundancy for external power supplies, and the potential lack of modern safety systems-- as per my previous post, there's supposed to be a wide range of safety measures to assure that this never happens, but due to it's age, who knows.[/quote]
As a consequence the German government for example is already thinking about taking back their early decision to extend the use of their current nuclear plants
This is what I dislike. Not to get all political here, but alternative energy, however nice, is nowhere even close to providing the power we need. Windmills cannot ever meet energy demand; we're talking about a 5% fill if we put them everywhere. They're also too costly at this point for their given power output. Solar energy, though promising, still has a piss poor efficiency, and thus isn't ready for prime usage for some time. There's really no other alternatives. Despite these few instances (usually caused by human error) nuclear power is actually quite safe... but most people aren't educated enough to know whats actually the deal, and instead listen to the likes of Greenpeace and so on, who coincidentally also have no idea what they're talking about. If Germany is that concerned, they should be upgrading their safety systems, not abandoning it.
While the thread seems to be focused on the crisis at the nuclear power station, pictures are emerging showing the devastation left behind by the tsunami...
That is far more destruction than the power station could bring.
Sounds Good
Apr 5, 09:36 PM
Dragging your Applications folder to the right hand side of the Dock as a stack shows every single application you have installed on the computer, just like the Start Menu.
What if I just want my top 10 favorites? In Windows I just drag the icon (of whatever I want) to the Start button, then drop it into the list of my favorites (I'm not sure of the actual term for this). Can this be done on a Mac?
Since I open the same 10 or 12 programs or folders or files many times throughout the day, every day, this is pretty important to me. It would absolutely mess up my work flow to lose this feature.
What if I just want my top 10 favorites? In Windows I just drag the icon (of whatever I want) to the Start button, then drop it into the list of my favorites (I'm not sure of the actual term for this). Can this be done on a Mac?
Since I open the same 10 or 12 programs or folders or files many times throughout the day, every day, this is pretty important to me. It would absolutely mess up my work flow to lose this feature.
Bill McEnaney
Mar 27, 08:46 AM
I have a great one: until 1973 the DSM listed homosexuality as a mental illness until they looked at some evidence and found the only harm associated with being gay was the harm inflicted on gay people by hateful a-holes, and without the a-holes, gay people are as happy and well-adjusted as anyone else.
I meant what I said I didn't know whether homosexuality was a mental illness. But I think it's important to distinguish between a mental illness and a that has psychological and/or environmental causes. Mental illnesses include clinical depression, schizophrenia, bipolar, and others. Inferiority complexes, poor self-esteem, and some irrational fears, say, are psychological problems, not mental illnesses. I think homosexuality is a psychological problem with psychological and/or environmental causes. Many same-sex-attracted people think they're born that way or even that homosexuality is genetic. I disagree with them. I think homosexuality begins when the same-sex-attracted person is about 2. If homosexuality were genetic, why are some identical twins born heterosexual when their twins turn out to feel same-sex-attractions?
I wouldn't be surprised to know that the American Psychiatric Association changed the DSM because of political pressure from special interest groups who disagreed with what the APA thought about homosexuality.
Remember what I said about induction and the asymmetry between confirmation and refutation because even an inductively justified majority opinion can be false.
Obviously not. You are seriously presenting Joseph Nicolosi as your expert on homosexuality? Next up: Hitler's critical study of Judaism.
That sounds like an ad hominem attack against Nicolosi. I agree with him and with his coworker who gave the lecture.
I thought you said you didn't know either way. You seem to have taken a position. To wit, the wrong one. There is no evidence supporting the theory that homosexuality itself is either a consequence or a cause of any harmful mental condition. This is why credible evidence-driven psychologists (not Nicolosi) do not practice under that theory. Attending a psychologist who promotes this discredited and prejudiced viewpoint is no different from seeking the counsel of an astrologer or homeopath.
I may not have written clearly enough because I am taking a position, Nicolosi's position. Is there a chance that Nicolosi's same-sex-attracted critics dismiss his opinion because they're biased? Gelfin says that there's no evidence that homosexuality has psychological causes. But Nicolosi and his colleagues think they are presenting such evidence. Maybe they are presenting evidence for that I might think there's no evidence for something when there's undiscovered evidence for it or when others have discovered evidence that I've ignored deliberately or not.
I meant what I said I didn't know whether homosexuality was a mental illness. But I think it's important to distinguish between a mental illness and a that has psychological and/or environmental causes. Mental illnesses include clinical depression, schizophrenia, bipolar, and others. Inferiority complexes, poor self-esteem, and some irrational fears, say, are psychological problems, not mental illnesses. I think homosexuality is a psychological problem with psychological and/or environmental causes. Many same-sex-attracted people think they're born that way or even that homosexuality is genetic. I disagree with them. I think homosexuality begins when the same-sex-attracted person is about 2. If homosexuality were genetic, why are some identical twins born heterosexual when their twins turn out to feel same-sex-attractions?
I wouldn't be surprised to know that the American Psychiatric Association changed the DSM because of political pressure from special interest groups who disagreed with what the APA thought about homosexuality.
Remember what I said about induction and the asymmetry between confirmation and refutation because even an inductively justified majority opinion can be false.
Obviously not. You are seriously presenting Joseph Nicolosi as your expert on homosexuality? Next up: Hitler's critical study of Judaism.
That sounds like an ad hominem attack against Nicolosi. I agree with him and with his coworker who gave the lecture.
I thought you said you didn't know either way. You seem to have taken a position. To wit, the wrong one. There is no evidence supporting the theory that homosexuality itself is either a consequence or a cause of any harmful mental condition. This is why credible evidence-driven psychologists (not Nicolosi) do not practice under that theory. Attending a psychologist who promotes this discredited and prejudiced viewpoint is no different from seeking the counsel of an astrologer or homeopath.
I may not have written clearly enough because I am taking a position, Nicolosi's position. Is there a chance that Nicolosi's same-sex-attracted critics dismiss his opinion because they're biased? Gelfin says that there's no evidence that homosexuality has psychological causes. But Nicolosi and his colleagues think they are presenting such evidence. Maybe they are presenting evidence for that I might think there's no evidence for something when there's undiscovered evidence for it or when others have discovered evidence that I've ignored deliberately or not.
driftway
Aug 14, 10:17 PM
I have had ATT for almost three years now - and I haven't had one dropped call.
hahahahahahaha That was a good one.
hahahahahahaha That was a good one.
ddtlm
Oct 12, 06:02 PM
MacCoaster:
Missed your request for ASM directions for a sec there. :) Anyway, I use NASM. Available here:
http://sourceforge.net/projects/nasm
I do my assembly in a .asm file, and use a C program as a wrapper to make things easy. C program, including my C loops. Notice that is't ugly and I manually change it to test different things, but hey it works. You can do better Im sure. :)
#include <math.h>
unsigned int asm_func1( );
unsigned int asm_func2( );
unsigned int asm_func3( );
unsigned int C_func1( )
{
Missed your request for ASM directions for a sec there. :) Anyway, I use NASM. Available here:
http://sourceforge.net/projects/nasm
I do my assembly in a .asm file, and use a C program as a wrapper to make things easy. C program, including my C loops. Notice that is't ugly and I manually change it to test different things, but hey it works. You can do better Im sure. :)
#include <math.h>
unsigned int asm_func1( );
unsigned int asm_func2( );
unsigned int asm_func3( );
unsigned int C_func1( )
{
nagromme
Oct 7, 02:12 PM
I think point 3 is the biggest problem with the iPhone OS and will be what in the long run what will let others over take it.
Valid points, except you're looking at a micro-niche of power-users, while the iPhone's massive growth comes from a much broader market than that. Android will (and does) take some power-user market share, and I look forward to seeing where it goes.
The big thing though is DEVELOPER share. Apps. Android will run--in different flavors--on a number of different phones, offering choice in screen size, features, hard vs. virtual keys, etc. That sounds great--but will the same APP run on all those flavors? No. The app market will be fragmented among incompatible models. There's no good way out of that--it's one advantage Apple's model will hang on to.
Valid points, except you're looking at a micro-niche of power-users, while the iPhone's massive growth comes from a much broader market than that. Android will (and does) take some power-user market share, and I look forward to seeing where it goes.
The big thing though is DEVELOPER share. Apps. Android will run--in different flavors--on a number of different phones, offering choice in screen size, features, hard vs. virtual keys, etc. That sounds great--but will the same APP run on all those flavors? No. The app market will be fragmented among incompatible models. There's no good way out of that--it's one advantage Apple's model will hang on to.
KnightWRX
May 2, 05:51 PM
Until Vista and Win 7, it was effectively impossible to run a Windows NT system as anything but Administrator. To the point that other than locked-down corporate sites where an IT Professional was required to install the Corporate Approved version of any software you need to do your job, I never knew anyone running XP (or 2k, or for that matter NT 3.x) who in a day-to-day fashion used a Standard user account.
Of course, I don't know of any Linux distribution that doesn't require root to install system wide software either. Kind of negates your point there...
In contrast, an "Administrator" account on OS X was in reality a limited user account, just with some system-level privileges like being able to install apps that other people could run. A "Standard" user account was far more usable on OS X than the equivalent on Windows, because "Standard" users could install software into their user sandbox, etc. Still, most people I know run OS X as Administrator.
You could do the same as far back as Windows NT 3.1 in 1993. The fact that most software vendors wrote their applications for the non-secure DOS based versions of Windows is moot, that is not a problem of the OS's security model, it is a problem of the Application. This is not "Unix security" being better, it's "Software vendors for Windows" being dumber.
It's no different than if instead of writing my preferences to $HOME/.myapp/ I'd write a software that required writing everything to /usr/share/myapp/username/. That would require root in any decent Unix installation, or it would require me to set permissions on that folder to 775 and make all users of myapp part of the owning group. Or I could just go the lazy route, make the binary 4755 and set mount opts to suid on the filesystem where this binary resides... (ugh...).
This is no different on Windows NT based architectures. If you were so inclined, with tools like Filemon and Regmon, you could granularly set permissions in a way to install these misbehaving software so that they would work for regular users.
I know I did many times in a past life (back when I was sort of forced to do Windows systems administration... ugh... Windows NT 4.0 Terminal Server edition... what a wreck...).
Let's face it, Windows NT and Unix systems have very similar security models (in fact, Windows NT has superior ACL support out of the box, akin to Novell's close to perfect ACLs, Unix is far more limited with it's read/write/execute permission scheme, even with Posix ACLs in place). It's the hoops that software vendors outside the control of Microsoft made you go through that forced lazy users to run as Administrator all the time and gave Microsoft such headaches.
As far back as I remember (when I did some Windows systems programming), Microsoft was already advising to use the user's home folder/the user's registry hive for preferences and to never write to system locations.
The real differenc, though, is that an NT Administrator was really equivalent to the Unix root account. An OS X Administrator was a Unix non-root user with 'admin' group access. You could not start up the UI as the 'root' user (and the 'root' account was disabled by default).
Actually, the Administrator account (much less a standard user in the Administrators group) is not a root level account at all.
Notice how a root account on Unix can do everything, just by virtue of its 0 uid. It can write/delete/read files from filesystems it does not even have permissions on. It can kill any system process, no matter the owner.
Administrator on Windows NT is far more limited. Don't ever break your ACLs or don't try to kill processes owned by "System". SysInternals provided tools that let you do it, but Microsoft did not.
All that having been said, UAC has really evened the bar for Windows Vista and 7 (moreso in 7 after the usability tweaks Microsoft put in to stop people from disabling it). I see no functional security difference between the OS X authorization scheme and the Windows UAC scheme.
UAC is simply a gui front-end to the runas command. Heck, shift-right-click already had the "Run As" option. It's a glorified sudo. It uses RDP (since Vista, user sessions are really local RDP sessions) to prevent being able to "fake it", by showing up on the "console" session while the user's display resides on a RDP session.
There, you did it, you made me go on a defensive rant for Microsoft. I hate you now.
My response, why bother worrying about this when the attacker can do the same thing via shellcode generated in the background by exploiting a running process so the the user is unaware that code is being executed on the system
Because this required no particular exploit or vulnerability. A simple Javascript auto-download and Safari auto-opening an archive and running code.
Why bother, you're not "getting it". The only reason the user is aware of MACDefender is because it runs a GUI based installer. If the executable had had 0 GUI code and just run stuff in the background, you would have never known until you couldn't find your files or some chinese guy was buying goods with your CC info, fished right out of your "Bank stuff.xls" file.
That's the thing, infecting a computer at the system level is fine if you want to build a DoS botnet or something (and even then, you don't really need privilege escalation for that, just set login items for the current user, and run off a non-privilege port, root privileges are not required for ICMP access, only raw sockets).
These days, malware authors and users are much more interested in your data than your system. That's where the money is. Identity theft, phishing, they mean big bucks.
Of course, I don't know of any Linux distribution that doesn't require root to install system wide software either. Kind of negates your point there...
In contrast, an "Administrator" account on OS X was in reality a limited user account, just with some system-level privileges like being able to install apps that other people could run. A "Standard" user account was far more usable on OS X than the equivalent on Windows, because "Standard" users could install software into their user sandbox, etc. Still, most people I know run OS X as Administrator.
You could do the same as far back as Windows NT 3.1 in 1993. The fact that most software vendors wrote their applications for the non-secure DOS based versions of Windows is moot, that is not a problem of the OS's security model, it is a problem of the Application. This is not "Unix security" being better, it's "Software vendors for Windows" being dumber.
It's no different than if instead of writing my preferences to $HOME/.myapp/ I'd write a software that required writing everything to /usr/share/myapp/username/. That would require root in any decent Unix installation, or it would require me to set permissions on that folder to 775 and make all users of myapp part of the owning group. Or I could just go the lazy route, make the binary 4755 and set mount opts to suid on the filesystem where this binary resides... (ugh...).
This is no different on Windows NT based architectures. If you were so inclined, with tools like Filemon and Regmon, you could granularly set permissions in a way to install these misbehaving software so that they would work for regular users.
I know I did many times in a past life (back when I was sort of forced to do Windows systems administration... ugh... Windows NT 4.0 Terminal Server edition... what a wreck...).
Let's face it, Windows NT and Unix systems have very similar security models (in fact, Windows NT has superior ACL support out of the box, akin to Novell's close to perfect ACLs, Unix is far more limited with it's read/write/execute permission scheme, even with Posix ACLs in place). It's the hoops that software vendors outside the control of Microsoft made you go through that forced lazy users to run as Administrator all the time and gave Microsoft such headaches.
As far back as I remember (when I did some Windows systems programming), Microsoft was already advising to use the user's home folder/the user's registry hive for preferences and to never write to system locations.
The real differenc, though, is that an NT Administrator was really equivalent to the Unix root account. An OS X Administrator was a Unix non-root user with 'admin' group access. You could not start up the UI as the 'root' user (and the 'root' account was disabled by default).
Actually, the Administrator account (much less a standard user in the Administrators group) is not a root level account at all.
Notice how a root account on Unix can do everything, just by virtue of its 0 uid. It can write/delete/read files from filesystems it does not even have permissions on. It can kill any system process, no matter the owner.
Administrator on Windows NT is far more limited. Don't ever break your ACLs or don't try to kill processes owned by "System". SysInternals provided tools that let you do it, but Microsoft did not.
All that having been said, UAC has really evened the bar for Windows Vista and 7 (moreso in 7 after the usability tweaks Microsoft put in to stop people from disabling it). I see no functional security difference between the OS X authorization scheme and the Windows UAC scheme.
UAC is simply a gui front-end to the runas command. Heck, shift-right-click already had the "Run As" option. It's a glorified sudo. It uses RDP (since Vista, user sessions are really local RDP sessions) to prevent being able to "fake it", by showing up on the "console" session while the user's display resides on a RDP session.
There, you did it, you made me go on a defensive rant for Microsoft. I hate you now.
My response, why bother worrying about this when the attacker can do the same thing via shellcode generated in the background by exploiting a running process so the the user is unaware that code is being executed on the system
Because this required no particular exploit or vulnerability. A simple Javascript auto-download and Safari auto-opening an archive and running code.
Why bother, you're not "getting it". The only reason the user is aware of MACDefender is because it runs a GUI based installer. If the executable had had 0 GUI code and just run stuff in the background, you would have never known until you couldn't find your files or some chinese guy was buying goods with your CC info, fished right out of your "Bank stuff.xls" file.
That's the thing, infecting a computer at the system level is fine if you want to build a DoS botnet or something (and even then, you don't really need privilege escalation for that, just set login items for the current user, and run off a non-privilege port, root privileges are not required for ICMP access, only raw sockets).
These days, malware authors and users are much more interested in your data than your system. That's where the money is. Identity theft, phishing, they mean big bucks.
jessefoxperry
Sep 12, 04:34 PM
is apple.com not loading for anyone else? it was fine before with the new content, now everything in the middle is missing. /itunes /ipod still work like they should. weird.
carlgo
May 9, 12:31 PM
There is only one rational, consumer-friendly way to deal with this: allow carriers of our choice and offer plans that reflect the amount of use.
Right now it is like if you buy a BMW you can only use Shell gas and have to sign a contract to buy 200 gallons a month even even if you don't drive much. And, you have to pay for 200 gallons even if you do want to drive a lot, but the gas isn't even available!
Of course, you should have known that there are no Shell stations nearby and that others are driving around in perfectly good Fords and Kias that can fuel up at any of the other gas stations in town.
Maybe you really did believe the Shell employees who said a new station would be up soon. Of course, you do know that they might be tempted to sign you up to a contract that forced you to buy gas that wasn't actually available? Sort of a double-dip, eh?
And, maybe you didn't realize that many of the Shell stations that are open, in neighboring towns, only have one pump and that there are long lines of people waiting to fuel up their BMWs.
Shell says that they will build more stations, but mostly they just put new logos on the existing pumps and advertise more. Turns out that more pumps cost money and are opposed by many residents.
So, Shell simply charges more for the existing gas! And, they sell apps and BMWs and gas cards in the convenience store. Now they make so much money from all this that they actually give a large percentage back to BMW!
BMW is able to sell their cars for half the price because of this subsidy. Selling a very desirable and expensive car cheap and locking customers into a kick-back exclusive arrangement to regain the profit margin is genius. And, Shell can charge enough to cover the kickback and still make a huge profit. Pure genius.
The head of BMW, the improbably-named Herr Jobs is renowned all over the world for pulling off this marketing arrangement and greatly enriching both BMW and Shell. This business model will be studied for a hundred years.
In fact, it is so successful that other gas companies want to sell gas for BMWs as well. The problem is that it would cost a fortune to change their gas formulation to work in BMWs and they want BMW to instead change the fuel system to work with their gas.
Herr Jobs sees no reason to change the arrangement with Shell because he gets the financial breakdown every day and he first looks at the column showing the take from Shell.
As a kid, Herr Jobs loved Scrooge McDuck and hoped someday he would be diving into huge piles of money in the basement of his lavish new McMansion. Now he can do that!
It will all end. In time we will be able to buy the gas of our choice, from stations that are open in our area and which have fast, friendly service. We will actually be able to buy just the gas we need.
It is just hoped that this change will happen sooner than later because we consumers will certainly be better off when it does. Don't worry about Scrooge McDuck. He is a resilient old duck who will do quite fine and will remain the Head Duck on the pond as long as he wants.
Right now it is like if you buy a BMW you can only use Shell gas and have to sign a contract to buy 200 gallons a month even even if you don't drive much. And, you have to pay for 200 gallons even if you do want to drive a lot, but the gas isn't even available!
Of course, you should have known that there are no Shell stations nearby and that others are driving around in perfectly good Fords and Kias that can fuel up at any of the other gas stations in town.
Maybe you really did believe the Shell employees who said a new station would be up soon. Of course, you do know that they might be tempted to sign you up to a contract that forced you to buy gas that wasn't actually available? Sort of a double-dip, eh?
And, maybe you didn't realize that many of the Shell stations that are open, in neighboring towns, only have one pump and that there are long lines of people waiting to fuel up their BMWs.
Shell says that they will build more stations, but mostly they just put new logos on the existing pumps and advertise more. Turns out that more pumps cost money and are opposed by many residents.
So, Shell simply charges more for the existing gas! And, they sell apps and BMWs and gas cards in the convenience store. Now they make so much money from all this that they actually give a large percentage back to BMW!
BMW is able to sell their cars for half the price because of this subsidy. Selling a very desirable and expensive car cheap and locking customers into a kick-back exclusive arrangement to regain the profit margin is genius. And, Shell can charge enough to cover the kickback and still make a huge profit. Pure genius.
The head of BMW, the improbably-named Herr Jobs is renowned all over the world for pulling off this marketing arrangement and greatly enriching both BMW and Shell. This business model will be studied for a hundred years.
In fact, it is so successful that other gas companies want to sell gas for BMWs as well. The problem is that it would cost a fortune to change their gas formulation to work in BMWs and they want BMW to instead change the fuel system to work with their gas.
Herr Jobs sees no reason to change the arrangement with Shell because he gets the financial breakdown every day and he first looks at the column showing the take from Shell.
As a kid, Herr Jobs loved Scrooge McDuck and hoped someday he would be diving into huge piles of money in the basement of his lavish new McMansion. Now he can do that!
It will all end. In time we will be able to buy the gas of our choice, from stations that are open in our area and which have fast, friendly service. We will actually be able to buy just the gas we need.
It is just hoped that this change will happen sooner than later because we consumers will certainly be better off when it does. Don't worry about Scrooge McDuck. He is a resilient old duck who will do quite fine and will remain the Head Duck on the pond as long as he wants.
fishkorp
Mar 18, 05:47 AM
I'm waiting for the class action lawsuit as this is wrong. The service that people have bought is not somehow giving them more bandwidth or a higher amount of download data simply because they are tethering through the phone. The phone can only download so fast to begin with so any device you connect to it will still be limited.
Will never happen. The contract you signed with AT&T specifically says the required data plan cannot be tethered without an additional fee. You agreed not to do it, they have every right to punish those that break the contract.
Will never happen. The contract you signed with AT&T specifically says the required data plan cannot be tethered without an additional fee. You agreed not to do it, they have every right to punish those that break the contract.
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