You're missing the point. Climate-change deniers (e.g., morons) aren't DOING science. They're doing politics, religion, economics, wishful thinking, avoidance, and everything else BUT science. They do not deserve any respect in the context of a scientific debate because they're not party to one. Like the equally-moronic creationists, they like to pretend that there's a "controversy" when there isn't, claim that they're being "suppressed" when they're not, allege vast conspiracies when none exist, and use anecdotal, flawed, incomplete, discredited, irrelevant or fabricated evidence as support for all this. They're dishonest, incompetent, or both.

We know (a) the climate is changing -- I prefer the term "global climate weirdness" because I think it's more apropos than "global warming", but I use both and (b) the proximate cause of that change is human activity. Debate still exists over many points surrounding these, such "how fast is it changing?" and "what will be the consequences?" and "what can we do about it?" and "what metrics provide the best assessment of this?" but we're well past the point where serious argument over the basic points is meaningful. As one of the articles I referenced (above) pointed out, the moronic claims of denialists that climatologists somehow forgot en masse about solar input are like claiming that NASA mission planners neglected the effects of gravity.

Re: "denialists". Fine, I'll use a more apropos term, the same one that I use for creationists: morons.

Anyone with a basic understanding of physics will instantly be highly suspicious of theories stating that currently-underway climate change/global warming is a result of sunspot activity. Anyone with a serious understanding of physics will be not only suspicious but annoyed that this nonsense continues to be repeated by the same deniers who no doubt also support flat-earth and creationist drivel, because their tiny little minds simply aren't up to the task of dealing with reality.

I recommend (among other things):
http://www.badastronomy.com/bablog/2007/04/29/is-global-warming-solar-induced/
and
http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2008/02/27/global_warming_deniers/index.htm
and
http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2008/3/9/878/93026/133/472774

The short summary is: the sun's output is one of THE most-studied phenomena in all of astronomy, for what I trust are obvious reasons. Every twitch, every flutter is recorded by hundreds of terrestrial and space-based instruments, then pored over by thousands of scientists, many of whom have spent the entire professional careers doing so, and all of whom are no doubt aware that the sun's output is the single biggest factor to consider when building a mathematical model of climate. Were there actually any evidence showing a relationship between solar output and current climate change -- and there is absolutely none -- then (a) someone would be on track to a Nobel Prize and (b) we would be in deep, deep trouble because while we have ways of controlling other variables influencing climate (such as emissions) we are completely powerless to control solar output.

This farsical sunspot "theory" is no more a theory than my offhand assertion that the reason I can't find my coffee cup right now is that gnomes crept in overnight and relocated it to Thailand.

The appropriate response is the immediate resignation of the Secretary of State, who is clearly incompetent. (Not that this is any surprise given that it is George W. Bush's administration we're talking about.) Failure to learn from and anticipate a repeat of
Aide Says Nothing Was Sinister, Despite Scandal : What's in Passport Files? (which explains how the same thing happened 16 years ago during another incompetent and corrupt Bush administration) indicate that she is unfit for her position. Senator Obama (AND HIS FAMILY) already face unique risks during this campaign; the systemic failure of the State Department to properly secure his personal information is unacceptable. We must have accountability, and in this case, that begins at the top: Condaleeza Rice's obvious negligence is more than enough reason for her to leave her post at once.

Ed Smith: esmith@sequoiavote.com.

First, there is more -- MUCH more -- to this story than mere gerrymandering. This county has a history of electoral corruption that goes back decades. See, for example, coverage here:

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/politics/5552259.html

and here:

http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/politics/5554080.html

There are a number of pending lawsuits concerning this, and while some have tried to dismiss their concerns as the result of mere incompetence, I think any fair reading of the lengthy history rules that out: it's active malice.

I'm enormously proud of these kids: they are defending the franchise at a time when it's under increasing assault from multiple directions. They're showing that They Get It -- that the right to vote is precious, and must be upheld at all costs. They've shown a far superior grasp of what participatory democracy means than the whiners carping about a minor inconvenience to motorists.

Perhaps it'd be entertaining to wardrive around to job sites until locating one that has multiple such vehicle/tool combinations, and randomly shuffle the tagged tools between them.

I highly recommend this terrific (and long) article
on the topic by Neal Stephenson:
http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/4.12/ffglass_pr.html

It's now on WikiLeaks:

http://wikileaks.org/wiki/National_Identity_Scheme_Options_Analysis_Outcome

The point -- okay, one of the many points -- made by framers of the (US) Constitution is that it should not be necessary to "trust the government". They tried very hard to architect a system that would alleviate the need to do that, because they'd already seen what could go wrong.

That's why there are so many checks and balances included; that's why principles of transparency, redress, access, and petition are found throughout it. That's why things like habeas corpus are so important.

It's not perfect -- but it's a magnificent attempt at building a structure that is resilient enough to keep working even when dishonest and corrupt people wind up in positions of power. And as we've learned over the past few centuries, our best course of action when we find ourselves tried by crisis is not the retreat from those principles, but to embrace them. (On those occasions when we've failed, we've come to regret it. See "WWII interment camps", for example.)

In my opinion, if we're going to "trust", we should trust that sticking to Constitutional principles will get us through whatever temporary difficulties we're having. It hasn't failed us yet -- unlike many people, who have on occasion, failed us miserably.

That may not be easy. Some of us might die for it. But that's the price we've paid in the past and no doubt will again in the future in order to defend something far greater than ourselves. I think it's worth it -- and if you listen to their words, I think you'll find that the framers did too.

The databases won't help.

They won't keep the data private. It will be for sale on the open market. (We know this because it's already for sale.)

They won't detect competent Bad Guys, because competent Bad Guys will do whatever's necessary to blend into the background.

They won't help the myriad of ordinary citizens who are caught up in false positives. (See "no-fly list" and similar for examples.)

They won't substitute for effective, clueful, diligent police work. (See "group of people learning to fly planes but not to land them".)

They won't tell you what anyone intends to do.
(See "Timothy McVeigh" and similar examples.)

They won't stop identity theft, extortion, blackmail, or phishing -- instead, they'll facilitate more of it.

They won't stop the insertion or propagation of errors (whether accidental or deliberate). It's very likely that an entire underground industry will arise that profits by deliberate manipulation of these databases.

They won't keep you safe.

One would think that anybody who's read "1984" or who has studied history -- google "Stasi" and start reading -- would already know all these things. Would already know that the mass compilation of data has zero security value. Would already know that it will be abused far more often and earlier than it will be used. Would already know that when citizens of a nation are asking other citizens "May I see your papers, please?" that whatever freedom or liberty is purported to exist is merely an illusion. Would already know that one of the surest ways to hand victory to an opponent is to destroy yourself from within. Would already know that the self-imposed institution of surveilled, indexed, cataloged society is one of the key strategic goals of the adversary.

And it is very foolish to implement an enemy's strategy for them at one's own expense.

First, I believe we need to bring this document to the attention of Cryptome and WikiLeaks...which I'll do shortly unless I see a followup which indicates that someone else already has.

Second, one of the things that those who don't perceive a problem with this should keep in mind is an apropos quote from author Isaac Asimov's "Foundation" novel: "It's a poor atom blaster that doesn't point both ways". ALL governments have long, ongoing, appalling histories of completely incompetent IT security. See the "dataloss" mailing list (via attrition.org) or the PogoWasRight website (http://www.pogowasright.org/) for just two of many attempts to keep up with breaches that have resulted in the loss of private data -- and keep in mind that even they, despite their laudable efforts, can't begin to keep up. There are just too many. Also keep in mind that -- as any experienced security practictioner knows -- the number of publicly-reported breaches is just the tip of the iceberg.

So it's best to presume that any information in the hands of any government will soon thereafter be in the hands of spammers, phishers, blackmailers, other governments, identity thieves, terrorists, etc. All it takes is the next security hole, the next lost laptop, the next misplaced USB stick, the next disk drive discarded without being wiped, or any of a thousand other vectors. (Including disclosure by government employees who may do so for personal reasons or simply to profit.) So even if you are completely comfortable with your government possessing this information (and you shouldn't be) -- how comfortable are you with knowing that the information is/will be in the possession of the scum of the planet? Because it has happened, it's happening right now, and it will happen.

I believe, but am not certain, that Alexander Malec is/was also Czech. I _am_ certain that a collection of his short stories, "Extrapolasis", contains the story "10:01 AM", which made such an impression on me 40 years ago that I can cite author and anthology without looking it up.

I suppose I should re-read that story from an adult's viewpoint (rather than a 10-year-old's) to see if I still have the same reaction. But at the time, having fed myself on a diet of Bradbury and Asimov and Clarke and Heinlein, that story was one of the first that exposed me to a little bit of the darker side of SF. Of course, a few years later I found Harlan Ellison's "Dangerous Visions" anthology and then it was all over.

One of the ironies of this is that the same technology that's being using to do this could also be used -- with lower cost and complexity -- to detect and squelch the output from the millions of spam-spewing zombies (hijacked systems, almost always running some version of Windows) on Comcast's network.

(To a first approximation, this amounts to: identify hosts that have transitioned from making just a few outbound connections to other hosts on port 25 to making huge numbers of connections and either (a) block them (b) throttle the connection rate (c) contact the former owner of the host (d) some combination.)

Perhaps if Comcast did this, it wouldn't find itself frequently competing for the #1 spot on various lists of the world's spam-spewing networks (where, by the way, another often-seen contender is Verizon). But apparently Comcast would rather spend its resources trying to placate The Cartel than spend them trying to be a responsible network operator.

HST was one of the most acute political observers it's every been my pleasure to read. Every time I see what fresh horror our increasingly fascist, increasingly theocratic government has in mind for us, there's a moment when I wonder what HST will say...before I remember that he's gone.

As to his negative qualities, they pale in significance to his genius. Any moron can be polite; only a precious few can be brilliant.

Y'all do realize that all of this airline security is absolutely useless, right? The opponent:

I can't say I'm surprised; this is exactly the sort of pain that Microsoft users have signed up for. It would be foolish in the extreme to expect anything else from a company that has explicitly allied itself with the MAFIAA and invested enormous resources in DRM. (At the expense, I might add, of security, since any operating system with embedded DRM is insecure-by-design.)

What puzzles me is why anyone would expect a different outcome: they've deliberately set themselves up for this by making a series of poor choices (e.g., use of any Microsoft product, acceptance of media with DRM, etc.). It may not be the path they wish, but it's the path they've chosen.

Rsync should work nicely for backup -- I have it in production use for any number of things, one of which is keeping 2 2T RAID-5 arrays sync'd across a WAN. You'll probably want to RTFM on the various flags to figure out what works for you; an off-hand guess would be something involving a subset of -vrlogptHDxz --progress --stats --delete-after with --progress and --stats handy for logging and housekeeping.

One consideration is whether it's worth trying to compress already-compressed data over the wire; often the answer to that is "it's not", so if that's the case for you, one tactic is to segregate "compressible" information -- text, HTML documents, etc. from "pre-compressed" information -- mp3, mpg, etc. -- and use different invocations of rsync on those directories. This is one reason why I suggest --stats, since it'll help you evaluate performance given your combination of CPU cycles, bandwidth, etc.

Another consideration is encryption -- you may want to keep the remote copy encrypted in case it takes a walk one day. If that's the case, it's probably better to do so at the volume level rather than file-by-file.

The primates who continue to back creationism/ID/whatever other name they attempt to disguise it with next week constitute prima facie evidence that the forces of natural selection still have considerable work to do.

I checked the casting call and was rather disappointed to find that it specifies that they'll only consider people between the ages of 25 and 39 -- thus excluding a lot of people, including (for example) the two leads of Discovery's own "Mythbusters" show.

This will also exclude most of us who participated in the annual Rube Goldberg contests that have been held at Purdue University for many years -- and whose participants and machines have been covered by Newton's Apple (PBS), the Tonight Show, David Letterman, Today Show, etc. That's a pity -- the ingenuity and engineering talent shown by competing students in recent years has been very impressive...and I'd like to think that a few of us who now belong in the "fossil" category might still have a trick or two left.

@Teresa, yes, that's pretty much what I'm saying.

Trying to measure spam globally is difficult, because the picture as seen from any one measurement point (even a big one like Google) is often markedly different than that seen from other points. Spammers may target particular countries, domains, networks, groups of end users, mail software or combinations; they may also avoid them. They may "take a break" and work on new methods, then deploy them in test mode or full production. The impact of all this is that it's very common for site A to report a significant increase in spam while site B reports just the opposite. Extrapolate to the scale of the Internet and it's a difficult measurement problem.

Add to this another factor: spammers don't just spam. Like any successful "business", they diversify. They're into spyware, adware, phishing, domain kiting, domain typosquatting, junk faxing, spit, spim, identity theft -- and a host of related areas. So even if a sufficiently diverse set of measurements indicates, let's say, that "spammer X is sending less spam" this doesn't mean that they're not busy. They're most likely just engaged in some other form of abuse at the moment.

And that's the good news. Here's the bad news: we are only at the beginning of the spam problem. It's poised to get worse -- much, much worse. Spammers have demonstrated the ability to innovate on an as-needed basis, and to rapidly deploy those innovations in production. What appears to be coming is much worse than what we've seen to date.

This claim is nonsense.

Even novice anti-spammers know that there are always marked fluctuations in the quantity (and origin, and character) of spam as measured at any one point on the Internet. In order to assess the overall trend, many measurements are needed, taken at a sufficiently-diverse set of points -- i.e., different domains, different networks, different countries, different mail systems.

The worldwide trend in spam is clearly up, with debate over just what numeric value to assign to "up", in part because it constitutes such a high percentage of mail that it may be reaching saturation. (Luckily, well-known, easily-implemented techniques using open-source software and free databases will suffice to block 95% of it with very little effort or cost. That's almost always "good enough", but in instances where it's not, refinement of those same techniques makes it possible to go to 98-99% without too much trouble.)

What is down -- and markedly so -- is the apparent effort that Google is putting into controlling (a) spam outbound from its own servers (b) spam referencing web sites it is hosting and (c) spammer dropboxes on its freemail service. As a result of this failure, Google is increasingly finding itself compared to Hotmail and Yahoo -- the poster children for utter incompetence in running mail systems. (Hotmail's abuse desk is legendary for their cluelessness, including inability to recognize their own IP address ranges even when pointed out to them.)

And of course, one of the consequences of this is that Google is now contributing to the problem.

Facebook is also now spamming -- this appears to
be a new problem, as none of my myriad spamtraps
have caught anything from them previously. It remains
to be seen whether this is a temporary problem, or the
beginning of something larger, or otherwise.