This is the same as Children. You can tell them not to touch a hot pot only so many times. Eventually, they WILL touch it.
Generally, this doesn't hurt too much, and heals very quickly, but it's a part of learning that most of us have gone through at one point or another in our lives. This is similar. I don't see Homeland security being hacked completely, because they won't have overly vital machines connected directly to the internet. I DO however see a worm wreaking havok (similar to Nimda, or Slammer) and brutalizing their desktops. People will go ballistic, and talk about how terrible it would have been IF... Nothing serious will have happened. HOWEVER, unlike chindren, they won't simply learn not to touch a hot pot. Instead, they'll take one of a few courses. I'll outline 3 possible ones. First, move to something we'd prefer them to run. That would mean listening to geeks, and historically, we totally suck at selling people on the benefits of changing to Linux. We simply don't speak their language. Linux is kicking butt right now because the economy sucks. Free is an easy sell. I'm not off the Linux bandwagon, I'm just honest. Nobody cared about money in the Oil & Gas industry 2 years ago. Now, they do. Second, will be to create a vendetta against a potential threat, regardless of the reason for it's existance. The potential threat will be overstated, but we'll hear about it on the news over and over until we accept it as truth. The solution will eventually be a cyberwar, where people who aren't completely open to a 100% invasion of any and all privacy will simply be branded as terrorists, and we'll hear the usual "you have nothing to fear if you're acting appropriately". Third is perhaps the most sensible, yet it makes the least # of people happy. They could just accept that there will always be risks. People will always make bad choices, and accidents will always happen. This isn't neccessarily bad, it's just how it is. They're working well most of the time, and really, neither draconian laws, nor Linux will resolve this 100%. They've made a large investment in one direction. Changing course may make sense eventually, but it'll take significant amounts of time and effort. They may perhaps be better off picking a strategic time to change that direction than making a knee-jerk reaction to an incindent. They'll need to make major changes in order to move to 64 bit apps. Change then. That's probably another year or more away. So plan now, and move then. For the next 18 months, stay with the status quo. Recient history has shown which they'll choose. It's not the one I'd prefer. Now having said that, this article isn't a choice FOR windows, so much as it's a choice to CONTINUE with windows. I don't really think that there was a huge evaluation done, so much as there was a "Windows NT support is about to die, we need to license some new software. We've already installed it, so we should probably get legal now too." ----- Original Message ----- From: "Nick W" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Sunday, July 20, 2003 11:32 PM Subject: Re: (clug-talk) [OT} M$ gets contract for homeland security > that could be disastrous.... > > > At 08:52 AM 7/19/2003 -0600, you wrote: > >"Microsoft Warns of Flaw in Windows - Wed July 16, 2003 21:35 ET > > > >SEATTLE (Reuters) - Microsoft Corp. MSFT.O said on Wednesday that > >a critical flaw in most versions of its flagship Windows software > >could allow hackers to take control of a computer over the > >Internet to steal, delete and snoop on a user's data." > > > >http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml;jsessionid=Y0M2NV3G133DGCRBAEZSFEY ?type=technologyNews&storyID=3104528 > > > >...they'll come around :) > > > > > >On Fri, 2003-07-18 at 21:34, Frank Ledderhof wrote: > > > M$ gets homeland security contract. Can you spell O-P-E-N S-E-A-S-O-N? > > > :c0 > > > > > > http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/zd/20030716/tc_zd/44819 > > > <http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/zd/20030716/tc_zd/44819> > >-- > >Marcel Lecker <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > > Nick W ([EMAIL PROTECTED]) > MSN Messenger: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Yahoo: foolish_gambit > ICQ: 303276221 > Website: www.fromthecrosstothethrone.com > > > >
