The formula you use is much simpler than the one that I use:

12" sub.

Lord of the Flies.

I've run a server from my home before. Many friends of mine do it to. One particular friend has been running a server from home for 20 years. Before dropbox existed, I used it for... well, essentially cloud computing, long before the term existed.

I didn't leave my server up very long only because I didn't know enough to keep it secure. But its not terribly hard, and if you don't use a lot of bandwidth I don't think the ISP will notice.

This was with comcast. I'm not sure if other isps place limits that make DIY servers more difficult.

This isn't specific to email, but its an example of how we should shift away from centralized control, and back towards owning our own information (at least wrt social networks):


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diaspora_(social_network)

True. Whether its an ISP or another email service provider.

It is if you handle it yourself - if you own the machine handling the email and you setup your own software for handling the email. I don't know about windows, but pretty much everyone on linux and mac machines with an ip address could set this up for themselves. For a long time (in the 90s) I received most of my email on a machine owned by a friend of mine.


You are right that, in practice, almost all of our email is handled by entities who are only giving us access to an account that they own. We agreed to their terms, and they are free to change those terms.

Yet it is absolutely within our reach to switch over to a world where all email is encrypted, and sent to personal mail servers, making our email 'ours' once again.

Similar in the sense that it will have no effect on android sales in the US?

It so weird, there are hundreds of blogs and news articles out there with a headline saying "Anrdoid phones banned" or some variation... but within the first paragraph its made clear that this will have no real effect on the sale of HTC's android devices.

But we already knew that people love dramatic, misleading headlines.

http://www.gizmodo.com.au/2011/12/htc-already-has-a-workaround-for-its-us-ban/

I regularly hidemyass.

Cool, thanks for giving me a kick-off point. I wasn't able to follow the links, but from reading the links I googled htc apple patent.

This is a total non-issue to android users, and it won't even interrupt the sale of any android devices, much less all of them. Not even for a day.

A specific implementation of a feature will be blocked from sale in April.

So - HTC changed their implementation. Come april all HTC phones sold in the US will ship with software thats completely uneffected by the ban.


I notice that a lot of pro-apple sites make this seem like a major victory for apple. I don't see it.

I'll give you 20 to 1 odds against android being 'banned' in the US. I guarantee that android based devices will be sold in the US 5 years from now.

I'm sure you are saying this for a reason, though... do you have further details or links to help explain what you are talking about?

I'm passionate about this topic because I despise the way that apple has locked down their devices.

People make false comparisons between android and iOS. Android is a very open platform. It is so open, that hardware manufacturers are free to make their own variation of android which is as locked down as apple's devices. I don't like it, but I think its important to be clear about whose fault it is.

If you care about how corporations are trying to control you and your use of devices that you own, this is very important:

Google does not prevent you from running any programs on android.

Google does take steps to ensure that their app market doesn't have malicious software in it. Google does nothing to interfere with you side-loading 3rd party software from outside the marker.

Certain cell phone service provides and handset makers may have locked down their devices. The open source license google has chosen has made this possible, but Google isn't actively involved.

If you own an android device and find that you are restricted from freely loading programs onto it, this is not intrinsic to android - this was done by the hardware manufacturer or cell service provider.




I own a G2. My phone hasn't been rooted, but I can run all kinds of apps that haven't been approved by google.

This is cool. I heard people speculating whether this could one day lead to thought-controlled devices, at least for the disabled.

True.

I'm not a history expert, but my understanding is that it was not about being taxed, it was about being taxed without representation. It was about being forcibly taxed by a distant government that spent that money on another continent, with no means of influencing how that money was spent.

Cash isn't track-able.

What do you have against tofu? I like tofu.

I didn't know that tofu was ever illegal in Canada.












;)

This is the direction that we will be heading, if we don't do more to stand up for our liberties.