cstross

31 ms·

301.
by cstross 7y ago
I'm pretty sure you can fingerprint a device by gathering data about the binaries (and versions thereof) installed on it. I'm pretty sure that Facebook also know whose instance of the FB app is running on the device in question. E
302.
by cstross 7y ago
About bloody time! Apple don't keep their scripting languages updated. For example, macOS Mojave 10.14.6 ships with perl 5, version 18, subversion 4 (v5.18.4) in /usr/bin/perl; but my homebrew setup provides perl 5, vers
303.
by cstross 7y ago
How is this not utterly illegal in the EU, per GDPR? (Which was drafted to stop indiscriminate data acquisition on human subjects: I'm assuming that metadata about the core libraries on your phone, in conjunction with FB's user me
304.
by cstross 7y ago
You might want to read up on Doggerland: https://www.nationalgeographic.org/maps/doggerland/ The TLDR is that a huge low-lying basin of fertile land around what is now the British Isles was inundated at the end of
305.
by cstross 7y ago
"Should" is a word that ought to be banned from this sort of discussion. It's illegal in this country—the UK—to drive at night without lights. Doesn't stop it happening, though. Either someone forgets to turn the lights
306.
by cstross 7y ago
A secondary issue is also policing culture. As a cost-saving measure due to Westminster-imposed spending cuts, the Scottish government merged all six regional Scottish police forces into a single force, Police Scotland, in 2013. This involv
307.
by cstross 7y ago
Dirt cheap by military supplier standards. Makes a lot of sense as a small drone/cruise missile engine. Coming soon to a wannabe State Level Actor's arsenal! I'm thinking Da'esh here, but could equally well be white supr
308.
by cstross 7y ago
Posted because it's a reminder of what can happen when our supply chains are insecure. (As a result of this incident, tamper-proof packaging on over the counter meds became a thing …)
309.
The Chicago Tylenol Poisonings(talkmurderwithme.com)
2 points by cstross 7y ago|1 comments
310.
by cstross 7y ago
Arm Holdings is now owned by Japan's Softbank, because a Conservative (business-first) administration thought selling off the family silver was a fine idea. This is pretty typical of the UK government's approach to the computer ha
311.
by cstross 7y ago
If you’re a fan of that form factor you need to investigate GPD (Game Pro Devices) and One Netbook, both of whom produce miniature PCs; GPD started with the GPD Win, a pocket console-sized PC with a 5.5” screen optimized for running Windows
312.
by cstross 7y ago
The subtitle is worth a mention: it’s a history of the development of liquid rocket fuels (in the USA — written in the early 1970s, it predates the opening up of Soviet rocketry to the west). Written by a chemist specializing in high energy
313.
by cstross 7y ago
The perils of living on a spinning oblate sphere strike again! Software would be so much simpler on a ringworld ...
314.
by cstross 7y ago
It used to be the case during the Cold War that there was an unspoken, tacit understanding that assassination would not be used as a tool against the leadership of the great powers: assassins are cheap, so if it became established as a tool
315.
by cstross 7y ago
Not really: it's been used at least once on a satellite launch vehicle that made it to orbit: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Arrow
316.
by cstross 7y ago
The 787 is weird (and possibly unsafe) for at least two significant reasons. Firstly, Boeing totally re-invented their approach to assembling planes. Previously they built most of the aireframe components and assembled them in their own p
317.
by cstross 7y ago
When the USA does that, it's called Extraordinary Rendition: https://www.opensocietyfoundations.org/voices/20-extraordina... Their main claim to legality is sufficiently questionable that they legislated to deny o
318.
by cstross 7y ago
From where I'm standing this looks like someone put a lot of effort into re-inventing Perl, minus the documentation and user community.
319.
by cstross 7y ago
Did you not notice the one child policy in China? (It came along after Brunner published SoZ, so I'm calling it a win on the predictive front, although they discontinued it more recently.)
320.
by cstross 7y ago
Please note that the ISS was assembled on orbit from many small components and subassemblies: the largest module was IIRC about 22 tonnes, while the ISS itself is around 420 tonnes. The Soviets pioneered this with Mir, and ISS was designed
321.
by cstross 7y ago
Novelist brain is now feverishly working out ways to use this in a crime novel. (Probably one involving a smart serial killer.)
322.
by cstross 7y ago
The National ID Card controversy wasn't simply about a photo-ID card (as noted, UK driving licenses are biometric photo-ID cards—and have been since before the NID was mooted). The real problem was the integration of a National Identit
323.
by cstross 7y ago
Historically, the Royal Air Force used to go around recruitment fairs with a bunch of (analog) machines designed to test the hand/eye coordination of possible trainees -- use a couple of geared wheels to keep the dot on the moving targ
324.
by cstross 8y ago
I forgot the point I was trying to make while giving the background! It's not that the engineers of yesteryear were brilliant while today's engineers are second-rate: it's that what they were doing back then was in some respe
325.
by cstross 8y ago
No, there's more to it than that. Firstly, from 1903-1968 aerospace was in a period of exponentially improving performance (range, speed, altitude) comparable to Moore's Law. But from the mid-60s onwards the rapid improvements sto
326.
by cstross 8y ago
Article totally misses another major issue with an aging demographic: UX concerns. I'm 54. A UI with clutter, or carousels that move too fast, or text in a small font (or one with low contrast against the background color/image) i
327.
by cstross 8y ago
The iPhone is the gateway drug these days, but I didn't start out with one: I started out with an iPod Touch. The iPod Touch is a great companion device for a non-iPhone that supports tethering -- it lets you dip a toe in the iOS ecosy
328.
by cstross 8y ago
Speaking solely for myself: I can't get to London for the march on Saturday (I live in Scotland) and even if I could, I'm middle-aged, with dodgy knees and a bad foot. Signing the petition is therefore a proxy for more direct acti
329.
by cstross 8y ago
This is nothing new. I know a number of other SF writers who are professional futurists, with selling books as their side hustle; others who do consulting gigs for industry from time to time. In general, corporations pay more than publisher
330.
by cstross 8y ago
Yes, but Boeing built 744 of the things, and only 78 (or fewer) are still in USAF service (I believe NASA has one …). So the ones being upgraded are from a late production batch (the B-52H) and presumably by that point Boeing had standardiz

More ›