"Calif Bill" wrote in message
...

"John H." wrote in message
...
On Fri, 7 Dec 2007 18:45:19 -0800, "Calif Bill"

wrote:


"John H." wrote in message
...
On Fri, 7 Dec 2007 18:14:25 -0800, "Calif Bill"

wrote:


"John H." wrote in message
om...
On Fri, 7 Dec 2007 12:01:17 -0800, "Calif Bill"

wrote:


wrote in message
...
On Dec 6, 7:12 pm, BAR wrote:
JimH wrote:
"Reginald P. Smithers III" wrote in
message
...
JimH wrote:

The actual phone service is not bad. It all depends on the
quality
of
your internet service. When speeds drop in my area (Time
Warner
sucks)
then the voice quality degrades to unacceptable.

Vonage needs to improve tech support and stop routing these
calls
through
India.
You are correct. I am also concerned that the infringement
lawsuit
might
be the death of them, so I am glad others are getting into the
VOIP
market
at competitive prices.

Indeed.

I could care less if Vonage goes under as there are plenty of
other
options
available.

In the end I could do without any sort of home based phone
service
and
it
may eventually get to the point with us relying only our cell
phones.

Bad move. Keep the land-line for emergencies. It only costs about
$10
a
month.



Maybe we are just stuck in our old habits................after
all,
how
does
the younger generation living on their own survive with *only* a
cell
phone?- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

What emergency would a land line handle that a cell phone won't?

When AC power is down. Landline phones run off large battery banks.
One
of
the reasons that you should have at least one, old fashioned non
wireless
phone in the house. If the power goes out, ou can not call for help
of
service.


Use a cell phone!
--
John H

During some of the fires we have, the cellphone towers get isolated and
no
cell. During the earthquakes the cell either goes out or gets
overloaded.
And we have several seasons here in California. Mudslide, fire, riot,
earthquake.


Those same things could easily take out a land line.
--
John H

Lot less likely. Lots of things take out the AC. And the main feed line
to
the VOIP goes, or a feeder circuit to the cable line goes and you are
dead.


If everything in the world crashes, but does not take out the telephone
land line, then you are correct. That amounts to about $60/month
insurance
(by paying Ma Bell) against that kind of catastrophe. That's too high.
--
John H

My phone runs about $20 a month. Earthlink will supply me unlimited
calling, and DSL for $50 a month. $60 for a wired line seems very high.

Maybe includes long distance charges. My local service here in Florida
(Embarq) without long distance is about 26 bux a month including tax.

As an ATT retiree I get a perk that pays all but about $50 a year for
unlimited domestic long distance. Don't use much as most all calls are on
my cell phone that includes LD.

Actually the local service is only $16 a month if I count the $5 per
Dishnetwork receiver (2) I'd have to pay if they are not connected to a
phone line.

On Sat, 8 Dec 2007 01:52:19 -0500, "Eisboch"
wrote:

Just think. Your words may forever be considered with a chuckle by future
generations of Google archive viewers, just as Teddy Roosevelt's reluctance
to accept or rely upon the horseless carriage as a replacement for horse
drawn modes of transportation. In 1902 he would ride in a horseless
carriage, but insisted that it be followed by a conventional horse drawn
carriage in case of a breakdown or failure of the new fangled contraption.

So be it and I understand your analogy - it is applicable.

However, consider this. Eventually, the automobile led to tractors
which could pull 40 bottom plows 20 miles in one day - 10 miles out,
ten miles back across the plains of Middle America which eventually
led to the dust bowl and the Depression. What was the cost of
applying the technology in this manner over time?

I'm not playing the role of Ned Ludd nor am I a neo-Luddite although I
do share one belief with them - that the rapid adoption and
application of technology has negative effects on individuals, society
or the planet and can outweigh its benefits by many orders of
magnitude.

For example - just now on the news, they had a segment on outsourcing
personal services. They used the example of one couple who outsources
reading their two children a bed time story to a woman in Croatia -
via the Internet. Or the couple who hired a wedding planner in India
to coordinate a wedding in Milwaukee - he lives in San Diego, she
lives in Phoenix and a gentleman who pays a monthly fee for a "virtual
concierge" in Hungary who handles all his scheduling, travel plans,
business lunches/dinners and a host of other personal services. There
is even a book about it - "The Four Hour Workweek".

http://www.fourhourworkweek.com/

That my friend, is a total misapplication of technology.

While I am concerned about social negative effects, my complaint is
about the vulnerability of the system. For example, take the average
home with a couple of kids, three wireless computers, a TiVO with a
wireless connection and VoIP. Think accident with a cup of coffee or
a fall breaking the router. What happens? Do they have a spare? Did
they think far enough ahead about the potential of failure to purchase
a CAT5/6 cable to connect one computer to the modem?

Think back to what happened in Chicago about ten or so years ago when
that 5 dollar part in a phone switch broke collapsing everything from
air traffic control which shut down O'Hare for eight hours to the
Mercantile Exchange and potentially creating financial havoc because
settlements couldn't be executed for 28 hours - the amount of time it
took to find the break in the system.

The larger the digital system becomes, the more centralized the system
is despite the advantages of distributed systems technology - it's
human nature to condense and consolidate. Tom Barbash's 2003 book "On
Top of the World" details the decision of Cantor Fitzgerald to store
back up data off site in New Jersey - originally, they were going to
store it on secure servers on site in the basement of the WTC. Think
about what might have happened if their decision was to keep it at WTC
- one quarter of the world's treasury bond trading passes through
Cantor Fitzgerald. That one simple decision saved the world from the
potential of economic collapse - or at the least slowed conditions as
they tried to reconstruct trading data going back years.

Put simply, the more complex the system, the more complete the
centralization, the more vulnerable the system becomes.

Modified Opinion Disclaimer:

This opinion is offered as is. No claims of economic knowledge,
technical or otherwise; competence or qualifications are implied.

This opinion may be withdrawn without notice in the interests
of forming a different opinion.

Or not caring anymore.

Especially not caring anymore.

Do not fold, spindle or mutilate.

Consider this opinion only under the direct supervision of an adult
not associated with rec.boats. Do not under any circumstances take
any opinion offered in rec.boats as the final word.

No warranty, expressed or implied applies to this opinion.

Whenever possible, place people on hold.

This opinion may cause reactions including, but not limited to,
headache, constipation, liver damage, drinking to excess, heroin
addiction. Seek medical advice.

For a good time call 867-5309 - ask for Loogy.

If signs of belief in alien invasion occur, immediately consult with
advisors from Area 51, Roswell Division.

Do not request medical advice from anybody on rec.boats.

Hire people with hooks.

"Short Wave Sportfishing" wrote in message
...
On Sat, 8 Dec 2007 01:52:19 -0500, "Eisboch"
wrote:

Just think. Your words may forever be considered with a chuckle by future
generations of Google archive viewers, just as Teddy Roosevelt's
reluctance
to accept or rely upon the horseless carriage as a replacement for horse
drawn modes of transportation. In 1902 he would ride in a horseless
carriage, but insisted that it be followed by a conventional horse drawn
carriage in case of a breakdown or failure of the new fangled contraption.

So be it and I understand your analogy - it is applicable.

However, consider this. Eventually, the automobile led to tractors
which could pull 40 bottom plows 20 miles in one day - 10 miles out,
ten miles back across the plains of Middle America which eventually
led to the dust bowl and the Depression. What was the cost of
applying the technology in this manner over time?

I'm not playing the role of Ned Ludd nor am I a neo-Luddite although I
do share one belief with them - that the rapid adoption and
application of technology has negative effects on individuals, society
or the planet and can outweigh its benefits by many orders of
magnitude.

For example - just now on the news, they had a segment on outsourcing
personal services. They used the example of one couple who outsources
reading their two children a bed time story to a woman in Croatia -
via the Internet. Or the couple who hired a wedding planner in India
to coordinate a wedding in Milwaukee - he lives in San Diego, she
lives in Phoenix and a gentleman who pays a monthly fee for a "virtual
concierge" in Hungary who handles all his scheduling, travel plans,
business lunches/dinners and a host of other personal services. There
is even a book about it - "The Four Hour Workweek".

http://www.fourhourworkweek.com/

That my friend, is a total misapplication of technology.

While I am concerned about social negative effects, my complaint is
about the vulnerability of the system. For example, take the average
home with a couple of kids, three wireless computers, a TiVO with a
wireless connection and VoIP. Think accident with a cup of coffee or
a fall breaking the router. What happens? Do they have a spare? Did
they think far enough ahead about the potential of failure to purchase
a CAT5/6 cable to connect one computer to the modem?

Think back to what happened in Chicago about ten or so years ago when
that 5 dollar part in a phone switch broke collapsing everything from
air traffic control which shut down O'Hare for eight hours to the
Mercantile Exchange and potentially creating financial havoc because
settlements couldn't be executed for 28 hours - the amount of time it
took to find the break in the system.

The larger the digital system becomes, the more centralized the system
is despite the advantages of distributed systems technology - it's
human nature to condense and consolidate. Tom Barbash's 2003 book "On
Top of the World" details the decision of Cantor Fitzgerald to store
back up data off site in New Jersey - originally, they were going to
store it on secure servers on site in the basement of the WTC. Think
about what might have happened if their decision was to keep it at WTC
- one quarter of the world's treasury bond trading passes through
Cantor Fitzgerald. That one simple decision saved the world from the
potential of economic collapse - or at the least slowed conditions as
they tried to reconstruct trading data going back years.

Put simply, the more complex the system, the more complete the
centralization, the more vulnerable the system becomes.


Well structured and thoughtfully expressed.

Here's the "what comes first, the chicken or the egg" question though:

Does the technology produce the vulnerability or does the ever expanding
services made available by the technology make themselves vulnerable?

I don't think you can reign in technology or it's application. We may be
required to rethink what and how much of what we want to make dependent on
it. Those of us that are getting long in the tooth will be satisfied with
less, but imagine explaining to a 16 year old that they really don't need a
cell phone.

Which, I guess, is exactly what your point is.

I doesn't matter though. The genie is out of the lamp and there's no
turning back.

Eisboch

On Sat, 8 Dec 2007 19:06:07 -0500, "Eisboch"
wrote:

Here's the "what comes first, the chicken or the egg" question though:

Does the technology produce the vulnerability or does the ever expanding
services made available by the technology make themselves vulnerable?

In my view it's the technology itself that produces the vulnerability.
Complexity follows the rules of unintended consequences - for every
intended expansion or result, you get four unintended consequences.

The problem is that you can't define what those unintended results
will be and that's where the exploitation or fault exists.

I don't think you can reign in technology or it's application. We may be
required to rethink what and how much of what we want to make dependent on
it.

That's a good point and something that I think is missing from the
equation of technological advance.

Access to information is instant. There isn't time to absorb and
process the information - to think and/or ask questions. Last week,
for example, there was a pipeline fire in Michigan which was reported
as "major" - the implication was that all four of the lines from
Canada were involved - the price of oil jumped $3 bucks and change in
seconds. Couple of hours later it was only two involved and finally,
one and it turned out not to be "major" at all - the line was down for
a day. Prices returned down, but the settlement for the day was about
..80¢ higher - restablishing an up trend instead of the prior down
trend based on lack of news.

Back when, it would have taken time to react. Questions would have
been asked, calls made, etc. The event wouldn't have impacted because
time would have been taken to find out what happened. That has
completely changed and is one unintended consequence of instant access
which speculators can exploit to their advantage.

Those of us that are getting long in the tooth will be satisfied with
less, but imagine explaining to a 16 year old that they really don't need a
cell phone.

Agreed.

Which, I guess, is exactly what your point is.

I doesn't matter though. The genie is out of the lamp and there's no
turning back.

I agree with that, but you still have to at least try to anticipate
the results if the Endless Knot we have created dissolves or breaks in
multiple places.

On Sun, 09 Dec 2007 01:36:36 GMT, Short Wave Sportfishing
wrote:

On Sat, 8 Dec 2007 19:06:07 -0500, "Eisboch"
wrote:

Here's the "what comes first, the chicken or the egg" question though:

Does the technology produce the vulnerability or does the ever expanding
services made available by the technology make themselves vulnerable?

In my view it's the technology itself that produces the vulnerability.
Complexity follows the rules of unintended consequences - for every
intended expansion or result, you get four unintended consequences.

The problem is that you can't define what those unintended results
will be and that's where the exploitation or fault exists.

I don't think that's true on the unintended results. Not to say
snowballs don't happen, but most complex systems are well thought out.
Malicious exploitation is another matter entirely.

I don't think you can reign in technology or it's application. We may be
required to rethink what and how much of what we want to make dependent on
it.

That's a good point and something that I think is missing from the
equation of technological advance.

Access to information is instant. There isn't time to absorb and
process the information - to think and/or ask questions. Last week,
for example, there was a pipeline fire in Michigan which was reported
as "major" - the implication was that all four of the lines from
Canada were involved - the price of oil jumped $3 bucks and change in
seconds. Couple of hours later it was only two involved and finally,
one and it turned out not to be "major" at all - the line was down for
a day. Prices returned down, but the settlement for the day was about
.80¢ higher - restablishing an up trend instead of the prior down
trend based on lack of news.

Back when, it would have taken time to react. Questions would have
been asked, calls made, etc. The event wouldn't have impacted because
time would have been taken to find out what happened. That has
completely changed and is one unintended consequence of instant access
which speculators can exploit to their advantage.

That kind of crap happened on trading board floors since people
started yakking and learned the power of rumor. It's simple
irresponsibility and greed, not technology.
Tying the 80 cent gain to that BS is a stretch too. If you listen to
the myriad "reasons" that "analysts" give to any market gains or
losses, it never makes much sense unless it is tied to real
fundamentals. The pipeline didn't even qualify to move the market.
Yak yak yak. Greed, greed, greed.
On the flip side, real info gets to real people, not just insiders,
quickly.

Those of us that are getting long in the tooth will be satisfied with
less, but imagine explaining to a 16 year old that they really don't need a
cell phone.

Agreed.

Which, I guess, is exactly what your point is.

I doesn't matter though. The genie is out of the lamp and there's no
turning back.

I agree with that, but you still have to at least try to anticipate
the results if the Endless Knot we have created dissolves or breaks in
multiple places.

When you consider current complexities and that things aren't breaking
down left and right, it's clear that contingency planning and backup
strategies are well established for most infrastructures.
I know "what ifs" were always a significant part of my job.
It's always going to get down to having thoughtful people in the right
spots. But sometimes the **** will hit the fan anyway.

--Vic

On Sat, 08 Dec 2007 20:14:33 -0600, Vic Smith
wrote:

On Sun, 09 Dec 2007 01:36:36 GMT, Short Wave Sportfishing
wrote:

On Sat, 8 Dec 2007 19:06:07 -0500, "Eisboch"
wrote:

Here's the "what comes first, the chicken or the egg" question though:

Does the technology produce the vulnerability or does the ever expanding
services made available by the technology make themselves vulnerable?

In my view it's the technology itself that produces the vulnerability.
Complexity follows the rules of unintended consequences - for every
intended expansion or result, you get four unintended consequences.

The problem is that you can't define what those unintended results
will be and that's where the exploitation or fault exists.

I don't think that's true on the unintended results. Not to say
snowballs don't happen, but most complex systems are well thought out.
Malicious exploitation is another matter entirely.

I respect your opinion, but even well thought out systems can fail
spectacularly and often for the simplest reasons.

January 28, 1986 - Shuttle Challenger blew up when an O ring failed in
the rocket booster igniting the liquid hydrogen.

February 1, 2003 - Shuttle Columbia disintegrated on reentry after a
piece of foam broke off the hydrogen tank striking the left leading
wing edge.

I'm sure we can agree that space shuttles are very complex systems
with triple and even quadruple system redundancies. Yet, even with
the redundancies, both were laid low by simple mechanical failure.

I don't think you can reign in technology or it's application. We may be
required to rethink what and how much of what we want to make dependent on
it.

That's a good point and something that I think is missing from the
equation of technological advance.

Access to information is instant. There isn't time to absorb and
process the information - to think and/or ask questions. Last week,
for example, there was a pipeline fire in Michigan which was reported
as "major" - the implication was that all four of the lines from
Canada were involved - the price of oil jumped $3 bucks and change in
seconds. Couple of hours later it was only two involved and finally,
one and it turned out not to be "major" at all - the line was down for
a day. Prices returned down, but the settlement for the day was about
.80¢ higher - restablishing an up trend instead of the prior down
trend based on lack of news.

Back when, it would have taken time to react. Questions would have
been asked, calls made, etc. The event wouldn't have impacted because
time would have been taken to find out what happened. That has
completely changed and is one unintended consequence of instant access
which speculators can exploit to their advantage.

That kind of crap happened on trading board floors since people
started yakking and learned the power of rumor. It's simple
irresponsibility and greed, not technology.

Really? Well, allow me to introduce you to something called
programmed trading and specifically October 19, 1987.

While there is still some debate over the exact causes, the most
respected reports on Black Monday (the 1987 one) "Brady Report" by
Nicholas Brady and Mark Carlson's "A Brief History of the 1987 Stock
Market Crash..." state without reservation that programmed trading at
the minimum was responsible for 50% of the total decline and
introduced the negative psychology inherent in any stock/market
fluctuation. Other factors were portfolio insurance selling, the
arbitrage potential between commodity markets and stocks and a flaw in
the European Bourses because of a major weather event.

As you are a "what if" guy and knowledgeable on the subject, I'm sure
you can recognize it as classic cascade failure.

Since then, limits have been placed on programmed trading to limit the
type of cascade failure seen on October 19,1987. but there are still
flaws in the system - fortunately, humans now have the ability to
intervene. Instead of mindless trading, human perspective is brought
into the trading equation.

Tying the 80 cent gain to that BS is a stretch too. If you listen to
the myriad "reasons" that "analysts" give to any market gains or
losses, it never makes much sense unless it is tied to real
fundamentals. The pipeline didn't even qualify to move the market.
Yak yak yak. Greed, greed, greed.

No it's not just greed. It's a case of resetting expectations and
market psychology.

It's instant information that makes the scenario plausible and instant
reaction causes the rise and fall.

And, for the record, yes - rumors have been and continue to be an
important part of any trading cycle - that's a given - can't argue
that.

But, and this is very important, under the old system, it took time to
develop and rationalize a rumor which would affect market movement or
even any particular stock movement - it was "soft" information -
ethereal if you will - that was always suspect. With instant,
theoretically "hard" information, the reactions are also instant and
without buffering. That will establish a higher floor, in particular
in commodities, if only because of the inherent psychology of limiting
losses - a group think gestalt would be another way to put it.

On the flip side, real info gets to real people, not just insiders,
quickly.

Which does what? Think about what you said - real people get "real"
info - or is it "real"? Was that Michigan information that moved the
market "real"? If you are a casual day trader and heard that, what
would be your reaction? Be honest - you are trading commodities and
hear that half of the Midwest's oil supply has blown up - what do you
do?0

Those of us that are getting long in the tooth will be satisfied with
less, but imagine explaining to a 16 year old that they really don't need a
cell phone.

Agreed.

Which, I guess, is exactly what your point is.

I doesn't matter though. The genie is out of the lamp and there's no
turning back.

I agree with that, but you still have to at least try to anticipate
the results if the Endless Knot we have created dissolves or breaks in
multiple places.

When you consider current complexities and that things aren't breaking
down left and right, it's clear that contingency planning and backup
strategies are well established for most infrastructures.

Contingency plans are exactly that - contingencies that we can think
of.

In any complex system, it isn't what you plan for that fails - it's
always the one thing you didn't plan for but in hindsight, was the
most obvious and glaring defect.

It's human nature.

I know "what ifs" were always a significant part of my job.
It's always going to get down to having thoughtful people in the right
spots. But sometimes the **** will hit the fan anyway.

Well, we will probably continue to agree to disagree. :)

Short Wave Sportfishing wrote:
On Sat, 08 Dec 2007 20:14:33 -0600, Vic Smith
wrote:

On Sun, 09 Dec 2007 01:36:36 GMT, Short Wave Sportfishing
wrote:

On Sat, 8 Dec 2007 19:06:07 -0500, "Eisboch"
wrote:

Here's the "what comes first, the chicken or the egg" question though:

Does the technology produce the vulnerability or does the ever expanding
services made available by the technology make themselves vulnerable?
In my view it's the technology itself that produces the vulnerability.
Complexity follows the rules of unintended consequences - for every
intended expansion or result, you get four unintended consequences.

The problem is that you can't define what those unintended results
will be and that's where the exploitation or fault exists.

I don't think that's true on the unintended results. Not to say
snowballs don't happen, but most complex systems are well thought out.
Malicious exploitation is another matter entirely.

I respect your opinion, but even well thought out systems can fail
spectacularly and often for the simplest reasons.

January 28, 1986 - Shuttle Challenger blew up when an O ring failed in
the rocket booster igniting the liquid hydrogen.

February 1, 2003 - Shuttle Columbia disintegrated on reentry after a
piece of foam broke off the hydrogen tank striking the left leading
wing edge.

I'm sure we can agree that space shuttles are very complex systems
with triple and even quadruple system redundancies. Yet, even with
the redundancies, both were laid low by simple mechanical failure.

I don't think you can reign in technology or it's application. We may be
required to rethink what and how much of what we want to make dependent on
it.
That's a good point and something that I think is missing from the
equation of technological advance.

Access to information is instant. There isn't time to absorb and
process the information - to think and/or ask questions. Last week,
for example, there was a pipeline fire in Michigan which was reported
as "major" - the implication was that all four of the lines from
Canada were involved - the price of oil jumped $3 bucks and change in
seconds. Couple of hours later it was only two involved and finally,
one and it turned out not to be "major" at all - the line was down for
a day. Prices returned down, but the settlement for the day was about
.80¢ higher - restablishing an up trend instead of the prior down
trend based on lack of news.

Back when, it would have taken time to react. Questions would have
been asked, calls made, etc. The event wouldn't have impacted because
time would have been taken to find out what happened. That has
completely changed and is one unintended consequence of instant access
which speculators can exploit to their advantage.

That kind of crap happened on trading board floors since people
started yakking and learned the power of rumor. It's simple
irresponsibility and greed, not technology.

Really? Well, allow me to introduce you to something called
programmed trading and specifically October 19, 1987.

While there is still some debate over the exact causes, the most
respected reports on Black Monday (the 1987 one) "Brady Report" by
Nicholas Brady and Mark Carlson's "A Brief History of the 1987 Stock
Market Crash..." state without reservation that programmed trading at
the minimum was responsible for 50% of the total decline and
introduced the negative psychology inherent in any stock/market
fluctuation. Other factors were portfolio insurance selling, the
arbitrage potential between commodity markets and stocks and a flaw in
the European Bourses because of a major weather event.

As you are a "what if" guy and knowledgeable on the subject, I'm sure
you can recognize it as classic cascade failure.

Since then, limits have been placed on programmed trading to limit the
type of cascade failure seen on October 19,1987. but there are still
flaws in the system - fortunately, humans now have the ability to
intervene. Instead of mindless trading, human perspective is brought
into the trading equation.

Tying the 80 cent gain to that BS is a stretch too. If you listen to
the myriad "reasons" that "analysts" give to any market gains or
losses, it never makes much sense unless it is tied to real
fundamentals. The pipeline didn't even qualify to move the market.
Yak yak yak. Greed, greed, greed.

No it's not just greed. It's a case of resetting expectations and
market psychology.

It's instant information that makes the scenario plausible and instant
reaction causes the rise and fall.

And, for the record, yes - rumors have been and continue to be an
important part of any trading cycle - that's a given - can't argue
that.

But, and this is very important, under the old system, it took time to
develop and rationalize a rumor which would affect market movement or
even any particular stock movement - it was "soft" information -
ethereal if you will - that was always suspect. With instant,
theoretically "hard" information, the reactions are also instant and
without buffering. That will establish a higher floor, in particular
in commodities, if only because of the inherent psychology of limiting
losses - a group think gestalt would be another way to put it.

On the flip side, real info gets to real people, not just insiders,
quickly.

Which does what? Think about what you said - real people get "real"
info - or is it "real"? Was that Michigan information that moved the
market "real"? If you are a casual day trader and heard that, what
would be your reaction? Be honest - you are trading commodities and
hear that half of the Midwest's oil supply has blown up - what do you
do?0

Those of us that are getting long in the tooth will be satisfied with
less, but imagine explaining to a 16 year old that they really don't need a
cell phone.
Agreed.

Which, I guess, is exactly what your point is.

I doesn't matter though. The genie is out of the lamp and there's no
turning back.
I agree with that, but you still have to at least try to anticipate
the results if the Endless Knot we have created dissolves or breaks in
multiple places.
When you consider current complexities and that things aren't breaking
down left and right, it's clear that contingency planning and backup
strategies are well established for most infrastructures.

Contingency plans are exactly that - contingencies that we can think
of.

In any complex system, it isn't what you plan for that fails - it's
always the one thing you didn't plan for but in hindsight, was the
most obvious and glaring defect.

It's human nature.

I know "what ifs" were always a significant part of my job.
It's always going to get down to having thoughtful people in the right
spots. But sometimes the **** will hit the fan anyway.

Well, we will probably continue to agree to disagree. :)


Add in AOL. Look what that brought us.

Short Wave Sportfishing wrote:
On Sat, 08 Dec 2007 20:14:33 -0600, Vic Smith
wrote:

On Sun, 09 Dec 2007 01:36:36 GMT, Short Wave Sportfishing
wrote:

On Sat, 8 Dec 2007 19:06:07 -0500, "Eisboch"
wrote:

Here's the "what comes first, the chicken or the egg" question though:

Does the technology produce the vulnerability or does the ever expanding
services made available by the technology make themselves vulnerable?
In my view it's the technology itself that produces the vulnerability.
Complexity follows the rules of unintended consequences - for every
intended expansion or result, you get four unintended consequences.

The problem is that you can't define what those unintended results
will be and that's where the exploitation or fault exists.

I don't think that's true on the unintended results. Not to say
snowballs don't happen, but most complex systems are well thought out.
Malicious exploitation is another matter entirely.

I respect your opinion, but even well thought out systems can fail
spectacularly and often for the simplest reasons.

January 28, 1986 - Shuttle Challenger blew up when an O ring failed in
the rocket booster igniting the liquid hydrogen.

February 1, 2003 - Shuttle Columbia disintegrated on reentry after a
piece of foam broke off the hydrogen tank striking the left leading
wing edge.

I'm sure we can agree that space shuttles are very complex systems
with triple and even quadruple system redundancies. Yet, even with
the redundancies, both were laid low by simple mechanical failure.


Do any of you remember the nation wide telephone problem that occured on
e day in '89? I don't know the specifics of the problem but a bug in SS7
caused all of the major switches across the country on AT&T's network
started shutting down and would not restart. Took a software change to
fix the problem. I believe that the outage lasted about 10 or 12 hours.

On Sun, 09 Dec 2007 14:33:43 GMT, Short Wave Sportfishing
wrote:


Well, we will probably continue to agree to disagree. :)

I don't think we really disagree, more like we view the consequences
of some breakdowns differently.
I think we can agree the shuttle disasters occurred because "simple"
systems failed. Frankly, for all the admiration I have for the teams
that put the shuttles together, the management side let them and
astronauts down. You may feel differently, but I view both failures
as preventable and unnecessary. The o-ring problem was known,
and so was the ice hitting tiles. They took chances they didn't have
to take. Given the tremendous achievements of the shuttle program
it's difficult to come down on them hard, but that's my opinion.
I was really ****ed seeing my heros die, and less so that 40% of the
shuttle fleet was destroyed by an o-ring and a piece of ice.
On the market side, I'm not well versed since I don't trade except
commodity futures on a small-time level, and consider that gambling on
my part. Outside of some floor trader price manipulation to do some
"personal arbitrage" on buy/sell prices, sometimes by hitting stops
- a problem I think has been reduced by computerization - I've had no
complaints since I quit using stops. I've found that supply and
demand always has the final say, and if I'm right I'm right, wrong I'm
wrong.
If you're a day trader, or look at portfolio value fluctuations daily,
that's a psychological issue - and I'm not imputing any of this to
you, BTW, just yakking.
When I first responded to this topic I was thinking of basic
power/communication infrastructures, not Wall Street.
But since I'm here, and you know more this than me, how the hell did
the Great Depression occur, and could it happen again?
Not asking for an essay, as I don't want to put you out and keep you
from testing boats.
My real "economic" concern is that we don't produce our own goods, and
China has us by the balls.

--Vic

On Sun, 09 Dec 2007 09:47:10 -0500, BAR wrote:


Do any of you remember the nation wide telephone problem that occured on
e day in '89? I don't know the specifics of the problem but a bug in SS7
caused all of the major switches across the country on AT&T's network
started shutting down and would not restart. Took a software change to
fix the problem. I believe that the outage lasted about 10 or 12 hours.

I don't remember that, but used a ma bell then, Ameritech. Don't
remember any work outages either, but maybe I was off.

--Vic