agiacalone

I was there too.

Napster was good because it was new. And the music was yours when you got it.

Never used NAV. Never cared to. Linux didn't need it.

Hated Flash too, and never used it. Internet was still great without it.

WAP was new, too. But Ethernet existed, and we wired our house.

Used Firefox/Netscape Navigator. Avoided IE pages like the plague.

I do malware research. You're grossly underestimating how common malware is today. Ever hear of ransomware?

Not everything on the Internet is better today. Some things are, but many are not.

And don't even get me started on the cesspool that Reddit is.

Search engines? I'm still using web rings. ;-)

Been using Standard Ebooks for a while now, but wanted to drop by here and say how great this site is! It's replaced P.G. for me (for whatever is on this site, at least) and I like the much nicer formatting on the texts. It's great on both my physical Kindle and Apple Books on my iPhone.

Curiously, what is the alternative? Chromium-based browsers?

Sorry, but I don't trust Google's push to Manifest V3.

I work as a lecturer on a college campus. Printed QR codes are everywhere.

I even give a lecture to my advanced compsec class where I take a bunch of real flyers from all around campus and replace them with my own QR code.

Ad networks are a high traffic way to spread malware. I would never recommend disabling a blocker, especially on commerce sites.

> emanating from somewhere in the northern constellation Ursa Minor.

I've heard about some great publishing corporations out of Ursa Minor. Guide research?

Great article, but also should read (2020)

You had my hopes up for a new entry. :)

Frank had a 2000" TV. You could watch The Simpsons from 30 blocks away!

(This is a Weird Al reference)

Maybe you don’t, but for some people, it’s lethal.

https://www.justsecurity.org/10318/video-clip-director-nsa-c...

Yes, it's any ham test in the U.S.

The sw code (morse) portion was eliminated back in the 2000s.

This is a pretty gross mischaracterization of ham radio.

There are exams, sure. But the entry level one(s) are typically not that bad. Something a high-school grad could do in an afternoon.

Fortune? Most exams now are free, although there are some clubs that charge a token fee (~$10 USD or so). Radios from China are cheap and cost around $25.

Sure, the hobby can get really expensive, but it doesn't have to be.

And "standard phrase" is not even accurate. Typically, people "ragchew" on repeaters with the Tech license, but that is not it either. Digital modes, RC/Model airplane control, satellite coms, APRS (GPS tracking), etc.

Weird to think that, in the not-so-distant-future, we'll be doing most of the social engineering attacks on LLMs.

If it's Boeing...

   ...I don't think anyone is going...

I admit that I have not. But I have used it near other equipment and it causes interference. My Kenwood HT does not.

I forgot about that one use case. But it's not allowed for most practical purposes in the U.S. at least.

Yes, the FCC would (theoretically) just revoke your license to prevent you from doing it again if they so wanted.

Also, the ham bands as a whole cannot be used for profit-motives or any financial gain. People often forget this rule. Not to mention the (kind of absurd, IMO) rule against any form of encryption.

I have one too, and it gives off tons of spurious emissions (RF interference).

I pretty much only use it for experimentation and receive.

Nah. The real one to use is Librewolf.

https://librewolf.net/

One of the previous posts mentioned that it changes for them frequently, and I'm pretty much the same way. But for right now:

Fiction: The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy

Non-Fiction: Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance

I haven't allowed any mobile app permissions to access my contact list since the option became available to selectively disallow permissions on iOS.

Why would I subject my friends to extra spam/data mining? I never thought this was a good idea.

Apple ][ for me, but essentially the same game.

https://archive.org/details/hitchhiker-guide-to-galaxy-manua...

I tried so damn hard to beat the game...but in the end, I needed the Invisiclues guide. I was also 9 years old, but I got pretty far (missed the vector plotter puzzle and the end one with Marvin). Even so, it's one of my more proud achievements. :)

I totally forgot about this Taco Bell. I used to go there with my dad in the late 80's/early 90's (I grew up in that area).

I don't recall them selling alcohol in those days (I was also much too young to drink then) but it was pretty cool even back then.

Interesting, and I don't disagree that it can be faked...but that's a whole other issue.

For example sake about one of the jobs: it was for a project management position in a big old tech company with three letters.

> Does AI cheating in school matter much? The primary party that loses out from the cheating is the cheater because they will fail to learn

Sure, I suppose. But the secondary effect is that others with the same Uni degree now have their degree valued less in the eyes of whomever hires the cheater and they fail to do their job right.

Or, much worse, the cheater gets someone hurt or killed. Tech can kill people--just ask Boeing (guess who has large hiring events at my Uni!).

> Universities will not confirm or deny if a particular party got a degree

Hmm. I've had several jobs in the past which, as a contingency of being hired, must show proof of a Uni degree via official transcripts. Mine charges $12 for the privilege of printing out your record on "official paper", stamping it, and mailing it to your presumptive employer (or grad school) on demand.

> > Cheating is widespread because there are people in those courses who aren't interested in the material

This is only part of the issue, IMO. Students (especially CS/Engineering students) are usually overloaded with work.

I've caught otherwise motivated students cheating simply because they're stressed to perform and didn't want to fail--especially since they've usually gotten pretty far in their coursework once they get to me--and the stress got the better of them.

No excuses for them (and I fail cheating/plagarism along with my Uni policy) but lack of interest isn't always the motivating factor.

> I just think assessments should be more holistic

I'm with you on this, but aside from the time issue which I brought up in a previous response, this has been attempted at Uni before. In the 1960s, UCSC attempted to eliminate all grading and assessments and had professors write a narrative about their students. It worked from a knowledge perspective, but was absolutely lambasted in the wider media and academic circles.

https://old.reddit.com/r/UCSC/comments/wpmgax/does_anyone_kn...

> Why not use more oral exams? ... I understand time is probably a factor

We do this, actually. Usually in the form of project demos when students complete a longer project.

But also consider: I have ~200-250 students a semester. Even at 10 minutes a student per semester (and really...how much can I learn about a student in 10 minutes??) that's a whole lot of hours.

I also don't get paid hourly. I also don't get paid a lot. Teaching isn't exactly a high-paying job in the state Uni system.

Uni CS lecturer here: It's not the writing itself that is important, it's the ability to communicate ideas and express one's own thoughts.

I use writing on exams as a way to determine what the student actually knows about a particular thing. It's not a perfect metric by any stretch, but it's one of the few that we have to test knowledge of a subject (theoretical knowledge) versus a practical demonstration (project or code).

This is neat! Kudos to your grandma.

Edit: I got it in 18 guesses