Suramya’s Blog

These are words you might have heard people mentioning. What exactly is Security Theater? Basically its security precautions that do nothing to make you safer but look impressive and make you feel safer. What am I talking about? Lets take a couple of examples:

In India if you visit a Mall or movie theater they frisk you before they let you come in. They also check your bags for explosives/whatever before they let you in. 95% of the time I have been to either places they just check me from my shoulder to my pockets. I could be carrying a bomb strapped to my feet or in my shoes and no one would know. So how is it making me safer? Its just an additional hassle that I have to go through everytime I want to shop/watch a movie.

Plus to make things even more secure, girls/women are not frisked. They get to walk in without any checks at all. So if I wanted to blow a bomb all I had to do was find a female crazy enough to believe that killing a bunch of innocent people was a good idea and I got the bomb in without issues.

Now lets take a look at the bag check they have. I have gone to the mall a couple of times with my laptop, (No I wasn’t planning on using it there. I took it with me because I didn’t want to leave it in the car) and those of you who know me know what a mess I carry around with me (chargers for my phone, camera, laptop, bluetooth, My camera, couple of headsets etc) and I know its hard to figure out whats in there unless you know (like I do) or you take everything out and look at it. Every time I have taken it inside the guy didn’t spend more that 30 seconds looking through it. I could be carrying anything in there and they wouldn’t know. In-fact once while flying to NY from kansas I was asked what all I had in bag as the security people couldn’t make out what was in it. I had to tell them what all I had in there (Those days I had a blackberry, ipod with their chargers in addition to everything above) before they let me board the flight. So I know you can’t look through the bag in 30 seconds.

So what does all this do? It makes people feel safer. The public sees something being done and is happy. The people in-charge can point to these measures and claim that they are taking actions to protect people. In reality nothing changes to reduce the threat.

Second example: In the sector where I stay all cars leaving the premises after 10 pm have to be logged with the house no where the owner stays. This is supposed stop people from stealing cars from the sector. My question is simple: What is stopping a thief from saying he is from B-xyz and then happily driving away? Nothing. Is there some list where all the cars in the sector are listed? Nope. So the guard has to believe what the person driving the car tells them. So how does it make the sector safer? It doesn’t. What makes people safer is the guards patrolling at random intervals and the patrols. This check at the entrance is just irritating and of no particular use.

Are there other examples of security theater? Absolutely. Though I am not going to go through all of them here ’cause that can fill a book.

Stop being so scared people. If you act scared, they win. Live your life normally. Don’t let terrorists win. When I was in the US in 1999 I was told not to go to Times Square for New Years eve as it was a terrorist target. Guess what I went there and had a blast. If I had acted scared and not gone I would have missed a once in a lifetime experience (I am pretty sure I won’t be around for 2999 celebrations) and nothing would have changed.

I am not saying don’t take basic precautions but there a difference in taking precautions and living scared. Don’t let them win.

- Suramya

Its been a while since I last blogged mainly because of work but another factor is that once you get home from a long day at work you just don’t feel like thinking and creating a coherent blog post, but I guess I should post a bit more regularly.

I was reading Shipra’s blog and she has a post over there about culture shock that got me thinking: What exactly is culture shock?

In my opinion its just a catch all term that covers all the differences between the culture you are from and the culture you are encountering. This can be as small as finding people driving like sane people instead of drug fueled crazies playing carmagedon and as big as finding women walking around barely clothed (on any US/European beach).

Thanks to the global media and the internet the world is a lot smaller and there are lesser number items that could cause shock. Usually its not the big things that strike you, its the small things. As some of you might know I went to the US for my bachelors in 1999 and was there for ~8-9 years. People asked me if I felt culture shock and my answer to that is yes there was a period of adjustment and you can call it culture shock.

Just to give an example, in India its considered extremely rude to call an elder person by their first name but in the US its common and expected. Infact I have been told to stop calling people sir/mam because it made them feel old.

Another example: In the US if you are good friends with a person you hug them when you meet them, it doesn’t matter if the person is a girl and you are a guy. Infact its expected. While in India this wasn’t the case (Now it has changed and this is a common practice. But 8 years ago it wasn’t the case) I remember being a bit uncomfortable with it when I first went to the US and then when I came back I had gotten used to it and attempted to hug a good friend. She very nicely reminded me that this wasn’t the US.. Now whenever we meet we hug each other.

Office manners differ a lot in the US and in India. In the US you call everyone by their first name no matter what their post is and how much above you that person might be in the hiearchy. In India you call your seniors ‘Sir’. The environment is a lot more formal compared to a similar company in the US. Even in the US there is a difference between offices on the East coast and the West coast. The west coast offices (I have only seen offices in California) tend to be a bit more relaxed and easy going while offices on the east coast (Again, only seen New York and New Jersey Offices) are a bit more strict (as compared to the west coast).

Clubbing is completely different in the US, you can’t go to a club dressed in Jeans and sneakers, you have to wear shoes and trousers (semi-formal/khaki’s etc). In India I have gone to a club in Jeans and T-Shirt. The way you dance is also very different and the dance eticates are completely different.

Recently we had our office anniversary party and after the party me and a friend were discussing the party (Basically making fun of everyone who was too drunk to know what they were doing) and she made a comment about one of my co-worker’s who was asking all the girls to dance a bit too enthusiatically and she said that a couple of the girls were uncomfortable with that as he was acting too familiar with them. I was surprised and didn’t really say anything at the time but afterwards I was thinking that I didn’t find anything wrong with the way he was behaving. I guess it was because I had gotten used to the way people behave in Clubs in the US and for me it was normal behavior in a club.

So is culture shock real?
Absolutely.

Is it really that big an issue?
Depends. On where you are from and where you are going. A person from the middle east will have a major culture shock when they come to the US while a person from France might not have that big of a shock.

I will probably post some more of my experiences later but that depends entirely on how much interest this post generates and how lazy I am feeling at the time.

What are your experiences with culture shock? Do share.

- Suramya

You have got to be kidding me…

The US chain Dunkin’ Donuts has pulled an advert following complaints that the scarf worn by a celebrity chef offered symbolic support for Islamic extremism.

This is the image with which the idiots had a problem with:

What I can’t figure out is how a nice looking girl drinking coffee makes anyone think of terrorists. If she was standing next to a bomb/fighter plane etc it would still make sense. But in this case she is standing on an empty road drinking coffee… Scarves are not terrorist symbols people. They are just something that looks pretty.

I think Michelle Malkin(the person who started this silly process needs some serious therapy if seeing a scarf makes her think of terrorists. Whats next? Terrorists wear pants too… so is everyone who wears pants now a terrorist? People do wear stuff just because it looks pretty or they like it. Everything doesn’t have a hidden meaning in it.

Stop living in fear! Stop this stupid campaign of fear!

Thanks to Open… for the link.

Complete story on BBC NEWS

- Suramya

I have recently installed a gear lock in my Honda City. Its a lock that immobilizes the gear so you can’t change gears and is supposedly more secure than the basic car locks.

I was playing with it and realized that even though the lock stopped you from changing gears it is still possible for you to drive the car. All you have to do is press the clutch when you start the car and then just drive slowly. It works if you have left the car in the 2nd gear, if its in the 4th gear then its a bit harder as you have to regulate the clutch also but its possible.

The easiest way around this issue is to leave the car in a gear that makes it impossible to move the car without removing the lock. i.e. if you are parking the car while facing a wall, leave the car in 2nd gear and if you are backing up to a wall or another car then leave it in reverse. So even when someone starts the car they can’t drive away because the only direction they can go in is blocked.

Just thought I should share this.

- Suramya

They are beautiful and endangered! Hug a Bengal Tiger. Together, we can save them from extinction.

Got this message on Facebook today. I guess we are saving them from extinction by providing them with free food and home delivery :-p

- Suramya

Yes, I couldn’t resist making a play on “All your base are belong to us”.

All readers of this blog know that I don’t like DRM (Digital Rights Management) because it restricts access to books/music/media to specific systems and/or Operating Systems. The following news confirms all the stuff I dislike about DRM’d systems.

If a person bought music from the MSN Music store are only allowed to hear it on specific computers and devices. Whats so wrong about that? you ask me. Nothing much except that Microsoft is the one who controls the licensing server and they can decide to shut them down. In fact thats what is going to happen by the end of the summer, MS is going to shut down the MSN music licensing servers and after that no new computers can be authorized to play *your* music that you have paid for.

So lets say you have this laptop and have authorized it to play your music, a few months down the line its hard drive dies so you get a new one and want to transfer your music to the new laptop. Unfortunately you can’t do that, because the licensing servers have been shut down you can’t authorize the new system. So all the money you spent on ‘buying’ that music has been wasted.

In reality with DRM’d files you are not purchasing the music. You are renting it. Other people can decide weather they want to continue allowing access to these files or not. This is my problem with DRM.

Another example, I bought a book online from Fictionwise. It is DRM protected and the reader software only works on Windows. I have switched from a windows system to Linux so I can no longer read the book unless I convert it to another format.Which I can’t do because its illegal to break DRM.

So what can I do? Should I have to keep one machine running windows to read this book? Should I crack it? Buy another copy?

Would you agree to buy a car that would only run on specific roads? No? Then why do we allow DRM’d information that is only accessable on specific computers/OS?

Think about it.

Thanks to open… for the story.

- Suramya

Reporters Without Borders will hold the first International Day against Cyber-Censorship in exactly one month from now. You can take part in the first worldwide, live cyber-demo that will begin at 11 a.m. (Paris time) on 12 March and go on for 24 hours.

Come and demonstrate in Beijing’s Tiananmen Square or chant slogans in
support of Internet freedom in the North Korean capital of Pyongyang. Everyone
will be able to create an avatar, choose a message and brandish it in one of
the countries that are “Internet enemies.” You can protest for 24 hours and
turn the Internet into a way to put pressure on the cyber-censors.

I will be taking part. You should too.

Source: Newswire.ca

Reporters Without Borders Website: http://www.rsf.org/

- Suramya

Steve Jobs was in news a few days ago for his comment stating that Kindle will fail because Americans don’t read anymore. Well.. If that was true it would cause a decline in sales but as Jobs apparently forgot there are a lot of other countries in the world and some of them contain people who do read a lot. Even if 1% of the world wide population bought the Kindle it would make it a smashing success. Which if I remember correctly Kindle is.

The other point is that the people who do read, read a lot. I have been a member of the Book forum the past few days and most of the members over there are people who read atleast a book a week, some like me read a book a day. Just to give you an idea of what quantities of books I am talking about here’s an example: since 26th Nov 2007 I have read 74 novels. This doesn’t include the comics & magazines that I have read. and there are other people who read like this at this forum.

I know that some of the kids nowadays think that reading books is not cool. But you only have to see the line of people waiting to purchase the latest Harry Potter book to see the number of people who do read. Whatever else I may say about the hype for Harry Potter it has made kids interested in reading. So no I don’t think reading is a dying art. I usually do my level best to encourage kids to read and my favorite gift (both to give and receive) is a book.

Though I am not a fan of the Kindle system. Its is a DRM laden system that could have been a lot better without it. I would rather get a PDA and use that to read books as I don’t see the point of buying a device just for reading books and have another device for your general computing needs. I would much rather have one device that does both. On that front I finally found a good e-book reader software for my phone. The screen size is small but it is sufficient to read a book one para at a time which is perfect for when I am stuck somewhere without a book to read and need to pass time. Mostly when I am stuck in traffic or waiting for someone.

Ok, its late at night and I am tired so I will stop rambling now…

- Suramya

The net connection was down the past two days so I caught up on some of the shows I wanted to watch and found this Gem. It is a British comedy that ran from 1990 to 1994. Its based in an old people home where Diana Trent and Tom Ballard are the major characters. Diana is an old “spinster’ (in her words) who complains about everything and makes the life of the manager of the old folks home very difficult with her sarcastic comments where as Tom is a kind person who is always cheerful and spends most of his time dreaming about adventures.

Together the both of them form an unlikely friendship and they constantly wreak havoc amongst the younger staff and management in the home. In one of the episodes the take off for a ride in Diana’s niece’s Farari and send the whole home in a panic while they are trying to locate them.

Much of the humour is derived from how the elderly are expected to behave in their old age and how many of the residents don’t want to settle down and Diana’s sarcastic comments which usually go something like the following:

Jane (One of the staff): What a beautiful day it is…
Diana: Its been raining for 5 hours straight… Whats so beautiful about that?

Or

Tom is talking about God to Diana
Diana: Whenever you talk about God why do you look at the tree tops? Is God a squirrel that lives on the top of the tree?

I like comedies like this where there is no slapstick humor (movies like American Pie) or stupidity so I usually can’t watch more than 10 mins of the so called comedy shows that are currently on TV. No one can be that dumb. Other Comedy shows which I liked are Mind your language, Yes Prime Minister, Jaban Sambhal ke (Hindi version of Mind your language), I Dream of Jeannie and similar shows…

Anyways if you get the chance do watch the show. You might like it. More information on the show is available at the show’s Wikipedia page.

- Suramya

A little while ago the iPhone was released with a lot of fanfare for a very limited audience located in the US who would agree to be locked in an AT&T contract for two years. Almost as soon as it was released hackers everywhere starting taking it apart to get it to work with other carriers. After a lot of trial and error a method was found that didn’t require taking the phone apart and a lot of people installed it. If I had an iPhone I would have installed it, just so that I could use *MY* phone as and when I wanted to.

Then Apple went ahead and released a patch that turned the hacked iPhones (and a lot of unhacked ones) into bricks or very expensive paperwieghts. It may be legal for them to do this because of the User Agreement that people signed when they bought the phone but it sure isn’t ethical. They are now under a bunch of lawsuits because of this and if the courts agree it was wrong of them to brick the iPhones then and only then can the users expect to be reimbursed.

iPhoneSIMFree, the first company that offered an unlocking tool, has released a paid upgrade that resolves the issue and unlocks the iPhone once again but even this is a hack which uses a buffer overflow bug in Safari to run the fix. This lets the users use their iPhones but users of the fix should beware that at any time Apple might fix this issue and include the fix in the next mandatory patch that they push out, converting the phones into expensive paperweights once again…

Now, you might ask how does open source come into the picture? Well, if the iPhone OS was open source this would have never happened. Anyone and everyone would have the right to install whatever Apps they wanted and use it wherever they want.

This risk is there in any closed system. Whats stopping Microsoft from deciding that your data needs to be tracked and installing a patch on your system that lets them do just that? Infact a few weeks ago they installed an updated version of the Windows Update Service on computers that had the updates disabled. What is to stop them for doing it again and how many more of these backdoors are there?

In an Open OS like Linux or Open Solaris, a lot of people look at the code and at some time or other every line of the code has been looked at. This makes it a lot harder to hide backdoors in the OS itself (not impossible. Just very hard), which is not the case with Windows and iPhones. You have to do it the hard way and reverse engineer the system (which is against the law BTW)

Google is rumored to be working on an Open Source OS for the Phones, even Nokia and Samsung are working on an Open Mobile OS. So open systems are the way to go.

If you are looking for alternatives to the iPhone check out this article from Tech republic where they list out the top 10 alternatives to the iPhone. I am drooling over the Nokia N99 (16 GB of internal memory, a 3.2-inch screen, a 9-way joystick control, GPS, WLAN, and a 7.2-megapixel camera that lets you shoot DVD quality movies) right now. That will probably be my next phone. There are a couple of Linux phones out there too but most are still in the development stage… Lets see when they come out.

Well this is all for now. Will post more later.

- Suramya