Wandering off topic

Hah! That is the game I first played and loved in 1981 on a TRS-80 Model 1 (the one with the 32k RAM expansion you could beat someone to death with). I have often credited this game (and hacking it's internals) with setting me on course for a stellar career in software development. More lately I've been cursing it's name for setting me on course for a unrewarding two and a half decades listening to idiots explain why doing a slovenly, half-assed job is in whichever business' best interests at the time

That icon is a pint of bitter, right?

One of the greats

I still rate Midwinter as one of the greatest games of all time - despite his apparent lack of success in the modern industry, many of the more recent sandbox games (Just Cause 2 and Far Cry 2 to name but a couple) can trace their lineage back to the concepts developed by Mike Singleton. He was one of the true greats

What Steve doesn't know is "Eben" is in fact the Maas Neotek robot formerly known as Julia and he's just failed a Turing test

Trust

As you and many of the posters here have pointed out, you simply cannot trust any online social enterprise to store your precious memories. Here today, gone tomorrow.

There are two needs here that you are using Facebook to address: 1) archival of important data and 2) sharing of content with friends and family

It is easier to arrive at a long term solution by separating the two.

1) can be addressed via the traditional means of offsite backups or the use of a specialized archival service (how MUCH exactly is it worth to you to keep your data? If you want it stored underground in a nuclear bunker, there are companies that provide that service)

2) is trickier but doable - it requires an open standard for social media to be drafted. This would allow people to choose their own implementation for sharing with their friends - many millions would continue to use Facebook and Twitter, while the bulk of the posters on this page would opt for hosting their own standards-compliant server. The standard would ensure that you would be able to "friend" people and "like" content held elsewhere. The biggest obstacle to the execution of this idea is Facebook itself - their value is enshrined in their users' data and any solution that would make it possible for them to move elsewhere would be resisted. However, supporting such an initiative would ensure that they would be able to hold on to SOME market share and would not end up marginalised like MySpace.

There's more than 1 page?

lol I just turned up here to bemoan the lack of an enlargement, and what do I find? Serves me right for glazing over before the end of the first page, I suppose - it's something to do with articles based entirely on unattributed quotes ( I have the same problem with the New York Times ;-) ) ... so I can find a picture of Paris Hilton in a wig on page 5, right?

Lest we forget

The Third Reich's bid to exterminate a significant proportion of Europe's population would never have got off the ground without IBM tabulating machines - they were really handy for counting people and their attributes. I don't see how an honest account of IBMs first 100 years can fail to mention this - it's not like they didn't get paid for them

Virtua Sweeper

So they'll be spending their couple of hundred hours sweeping the streets in Second Life then?

@Steve

According to the docs, you need a valid .Mac account to use Back to My Mac. I surmise that when you fire up the network interface, Back to My Mac will register it's IP with the .Mac service, so the machine can then be accessed from elsewhere.

So your point about the IP being logged and traceable is essentially correct. The webcam part was not necessary. If I was using Back to My Mac, I'd be really careful not to plug my Mac in at my illicit lover or crack dealers house, however

A Linux equivalent would be pretty straight forward to concoct using a few boot scripts and tunneling X over SSH

Paris, because she'd probably leave her laptop on with the webcam running

Where does it stop?

The idea that sharing information is illegal gives me the creeps. The problem lies primarily with where the boundaries lie. Suppose I teach some people how to make a website (it's been known to happen), and they go off and make a website that disseminates information on how to crack set top boxes or how to make a bomb.

Surely I have facilitated the actual crime (hacking/bombing) as much as the website owners?

What about those who publish OS exploits? Should they be held liable for any damage caused by hackers, desptie the fact they are providing a public service?

It's a slippery slope ...

@Anonymous Coward

According to the vast majority of those living there, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip ARE Palestine. In the eyes of most of the world, the West Bank and the Gaza Strip ARE Palestine. However, the vociferous M-16-toting minority of settlers consider the West Bank and Gaza Strip to be Israel.

As said settlers are much closer to Facebooks key demographic than a horde of stone throwing intifadans, Facebooks management are more than willing to distort the truth to quieten the dissent. As you can see, "accuracy" has absolutely nothing to do with it.

I want an avatar with $$$ signs on it - Paris will have to do in the interim

Storm The Register!

Facebook can call the whole damn lot Planet Mars if it likes - it's not a Post Office and has no legal obligation to accuracy - it is one of the most irritating features of the internet that users of software (web sites) consider themselves owners of said software.

/me storms in the front door of the Register wearing a keffiyeh: "All your website are belong to us"

The 3G killer app is ...

data transfer. The only thing it's good for. Forget video calling, forget all those other services - the only useful thing a 3G phone does that a 2G can't is shift data by the bucket load. But to my mind that makes it worth it. Ever tried checking into Facebook via GPRS?

Paris Hilton once accidentally left her 3G phone making a video call after retiring for the night - the rest is history ...

An eye for an eye

Well, I'd hate to be the one to start anything, but has anyone actually asked USAF why they haven't sorted it out yet ... ?

http://www.mildenhall.af.mil/main/contactus.asp