So back in June, Apple came out with their iPhone.  I’ve always liked how it looks, but given that there are so many features missing from it, I decided to keep my unlocked Sony Ericsson W810i.  However, as of late, I’ve been given the opportunity to acquire a free iPhone.  So, for the purpose of deciding which one to use, I’m going to outline the advantages and disadvantages of the $400 iPhone as compared to my two-year-old W810i.

Disadvantages:

• It’s much bigger
• No MMS (picture messaging)
• No third-party app support and no Java - you’re stuck with the software that came with it
• No voice recording
• No video recording
• No cut-and-paste
• Can’t assign personal music tones
• No AIM/iChat
• No voice tags for voice dialing
• Semi-difficult to unlock
• No memory card slot

Advantages:

• It looks pretty
• Better browser
• Wi-Fi (but since there’s no support for third-party applications, there’s no way to run Skype or VoIP)

As far as the iPhone’s other claims to fame — MP3/video player, Google Maps, a working web browser, and YouTube — that stuff existed in other phones long before the iPhone came out.  Frankly, I think the reason it sold so well is that it looks really cool and Americans were largely unaware of what cell phones could already do.  Don’t get me wrong.  I’m not criticizing Apple for coming out with it, I just wish they incorporated some basic cell phone features.

I’ll give the iPhone a shot, but it’s hard to imagine going without some of these standard features.

Although I’m not a very eloquent writer, I’ve tried to stress the importance of voting machines running on Open Source software, instead of Closed Source software.

Please understand: There is no point in having elections when the voting machine source code is a secret (aka. Closed-Source).  No point whatsoever.

How much faith would you have in a system where everyone passed their ballots under the door of a dark closet where one man is trusted to announce the results at the end?

Would that make sense to you?  Would you trust that man to be honest?  Would you still bother voting?

Of course not.

However, this is exactly what closed-source voting machines are.  There are a handful of guys who write the code and then keep it a secret.  That code is then used to tabulate the results, and then we just trust whatever it says.

Doesn’t anyone realize how bat-shit-insane that is?!?

Think I’m nuts?  Watch this video:

Want to watch someone actually rig a random voting machine? Watch the last half of Hacking Democracy:

Here’s a short clip about a different Diebold model, although it’s not documented as well as the video above:

Background: Source Code, Open Source, and Closed Source
In the world of software development, there are two major schools of thought.  In one, source code, which is basically just a set of instructions for a computer, is developed in private and is generally kept secret.  This is the closed-source model of development that companies like Microsoft use to develop Windows, Office, and dozens of other applications that you may use daily.  In contrast, the source code for open source software is readily available.  Anyone is free to download, examine, or even modify one’s own copy of open source software.  Two examples are the linux-based Ubuntu operating system and OpenOffice.org office suite.

When it comes to operating systems, the choice between open and closed source software is often a matter of security. That is, in the closed-source world, security largely depends on the secrecy of the source code. Since the source code can only be reviewed by a finite number of experts within the firm that created the software, there are inevitably mistakes that slip through the cracks. Mistakes that are found after the software is released can only be fixed by the software vendor, and the whole world has to wait until a fix is available. Having access to source code makes it much, much easier to find mistakes. That’s why closed-source vendors keep it a secret.  So, when source code of closed-source software gets leaked to the public, it’s considered a disaster, especially when most of the world depends on the software in question.

In contrast, source code in the Open Source community is available for the whole world to see. Mistakes that would otherwise go unnoticed are caught early in the development process, and mistakes that are found after the initial release can be quickly fixed by anyone.  That fix (usually in the form of a software “patch”) can then be made available to the rest of the community.  It is not necessary to wait for a fix from the software vendor.

Source Code and Voting Machines
I could drone on about how the closed-source development model is responsible for almost all of the most damaging computer worms, but instead let’s look at how these two development models apply to voting machines.  This is actually very simple.  Every computerized voting machine I have ever seen implemented operates using closed-source software that runs on closed-source operating systems.  As long as that’s the case, worrying about physical security and chain-of-custody is almost pointless.  As soon as someone finds a way to exploit a mistake in the software, he could exploit the mistake to manipulate the voting machine.

Premier Election Solutions (formerly Diebold Election Systems, Inc or DESI) has the lion’s share of the computerized voting machine market. Their source code, which was written using the closed-source development model, has been leaked more than once.  A book could be written about the security flaws in their code, but suffice to say that anyone with access to a voting terminal (read: tech-savvy voters) could completely change the ballot file.

Closed-source software has no place on public voting machines!  The very notion is ridiculous, but it’s a growing trend in the United States.

Hacking Democracy
If you’re still not convinced that America is facing a serious problem, please watch this video in entirety.  The last half hour is the most important part:

Have I mentioned that Tim Swanson and B.K. Marcus are two of my heroes?  The first time I read B.K. Marcus’s piece on why spectrum should be private property, I almost had a Glenn Beck moment.  If you’ve ever thought for a second that the FCC might be good thing for America, you must read these two articles:

• The Spectrum Should Be Private Property: The Economics, History, and Future of Wireless Technology by B.K Marcus
• The Spectrum Swindle by Tim Swanson

Every American has been screwed by the FCC.  A vast, vast majority of them will never know just how much they’ve been affected, but sadly they all have and will pay the price.

This news is a few days old but is critically important, none the less. A federal judge in Vermont has ruled that the right not to divulge his PGP (Pretty Good Privacy) passphrase is protected by the 5th amendment. A pseudo-anonymous blogger points out the significance:

If this becomes a precedent, it will be distinctly different from European countries such as the U.K, where a new law provides for up to two years of jail time simply for refusing to reveal a key.

As people’s digital storage increasingly becomes an integrated part of their identity, the right to keep certain data private will become increasingly important. The right to keep encryption keys private will increasingly mean the freedom to keep certain thoughts private, whether they are stored in wetware or digital form.

Click here to read the story on News.com Since the ruling, the DOJ has refused to answer any questions regarding their stance on citizens being forced to reveal encryption keys.

Until I read Jeff Tucker’s piece today about the POP-mail generation, I had almost completely forgotten why I fell in love with Gmail in the first place.

It’s not the way it organizes my email, or the incredible spam-filtering. The real reason I love Gmail is that I’ve tried just about every email client known to man, and they all eventually crash, resulting in either a tremendous waste of time trying to clean it up or a total loss of data. With Gmail, the burden to keep things working is on Google, not me. No more strange error messages, no more searches that take five minutes, no more repairing of databases, no more worrying. It just works. And if it ever stops working, they’ll have millions of unhappy customers to answer to, and thus great incentive to rapidly fix it. Whereas, if Outlook breaks, I’m just plain fucked.

“Remember when you had to turn around in your seat to parallel park? Ok, maybe you still do, but if you drive a Nissan, those days may soon be behind you. The company’s ‘Around View Monitor system’ displays a virtual bird’s-eye view of the car and what’s around it. Video from four small video cameras with wide-angle lenses — two mounted on the underside of the wing mirrors, one at the front under the grill and one at the rear under the license plate — is displayed on the navigation system monitor so that it appears to be a view from above the car and sonar sensors at each corner of the vehicle provide an audible warning when it is coming close to an object or person. And as if that weren’t enough… the system also projects the car’s future course based on the current direction of the wheels.”
Read the article or Posted in Cool Links, Technology | No Comments »