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AT&T’s chief security officer, Edward Amoroso, spoke with Network World about security
challenges he’s considering and AT&T’s response to those challenges: DDoS, botnets,
and hackers - oh my!
Edward Amoroso is the chief security officer at AT&T in Florham Park, N.J., as well as a
professor who has written several textbooks on information security. Amoroso spoke with Network
World’s Jon Brodkin this week in Boston, where he delivered a keynote about network security
during Forrester’s Security Forum.
Tropical Storm Hanna may not be a hurricane, but it's still dumping tons of water on the US East
Coast as it moves northeast this afternoon. Officials have not reported any deaths from the
storm, which is bearing down on New Jersey and will likely travel over Boston very early tomorrow
morning, according to the US National Hurricane Center.
Gamasutra has published a postmortem for the hugely successful Bioshock; nothing contained
within is particularly shocking (though comments have groused that they left out some big snafus),
though I think it's always interesting to see what participants in the creation process have to say
about the success (or lack thereof). The article goes beyond game elements and gets into things
like how design teams were organized. But where does Alyssa Finley, project lead, have to say about
the problems the Bioshock team ran into?:Our goal when we set out to make
BioShock was very clear. We wanted to get to the next level, moving beyond our suite of
critically acclaimed games to make a blockbuster. A lot of factors aligned to make this possible:
the commercial backing of 2K; the game design knowledge we'd acquired from building System
Shock 2; the technological familiarity with our Unreal-based engine that we'd built with
previous games. But we still had to figure out how to make it all big-blockbuster big.
A lot of our problems came from underestimating how big the task of making a triple-A product for
multiple platforms and multiple regions really is. And other problems came from over-estimating our
capacity to solve those problems using our existing procedures and staffing levels.
If there's an over-arching theme of our development, it's that we, like many other developers,
believe that ultimate success in this industry comes from iteration. You have to build, evaluate
(and have others evaluate) and be prepared to throw things away and rebuild.
It's not terribly long, clocking in at 4 pages, and worth a read — even if you weren't a
particular fan of the game. Postmortem: 2K Boston/2K Australia's BioShock [Gamasutra]
I live in downtown Boston and I can rarely use my iPhone 3G in my apartment. I have never gotten a
3G signal inside my apartment and EDGE is either 1 bar or "No Service." If I can make a call it's
frequently dropped. I just had my iPhone replaced for an unrelated issue and I had hoped that it
was just a problem with the phone. It's not. When I called AT&T they said that my area should
have full 3G coverage and recommended I get the SIM card replaced. I went to the nearest AT&T
store and explained the situation to the guy there. He told me a SIM card wouldn't fix my problems.
"AT&T doesn't work inside buildings. Sorry." Uh, excuse me? I asked him why anyone in their
right mind would choose a company that doesn't work inside. He said that their signal isn't as good
as penetrating through buildings as other carriers and that smartphones like the iPhone and
Blackberry use a different signal which is even worse at penetration.
This is absolutely ridiculous. I'm still within the first 30 days of my AT&T contract so I
might cancel it but that's such a pain in the ass and I'm in love with this phone... when it works.
My roommates all have Verizon and their phones work fine.
posted by Dan Guy Three weeks until the Library of Congress
National Book Festival! I hope that everyone within easy commuting distance* is planning to
attend. It's sure to be a fun day, just for the festival itself, plus the forecast calls for a
light dusting of hijinks and shenanigans! There will be cake. I may wear a disguise.
* Since it is on the Mall in D.C. there are many public transportation opportunities, including my
regular standby: the $20 Bolt Bus that departs hourly between
D.C. and NYC, Philadelphia, or Boston. The buses are new, clean, and have free wifi. You could take
it down in the morning and then back up in the evening with a minimum of fuss.
I have received quite a few emails from people having problems with the free
NEVERWHERE ebook, but have no way of knowing what percentage of the overall number of
downloaders these emails represent.
With that in mind, I conduct the following unscientific poll. Please click on the option that best
describes your interaction with the ebook:
The Open Rights Group, of which Mr. G is a patron, is trying to reach 1,500 supporters by December.
They are nearly two thirds of the way there. You can help by joining, and/or posting this widget on
your site or blog:
For those outside the US who have found themselves unable to download Neverwhere,
HarperCollins also offers The Neil
Gaiman Reader. This is not the book of essays of the same name edited by Darrell Schweitzer,
but rather a PDF containing the few few chapters each from Neverwhere, American Gods, Stardust,
and Smoke & Mirrors. It also requires Adobe Digital Editions. (HarperCollins previously
offered a version which worked with regular Adobe Reader. If you're on linux you can probably
find it online by googling.)
There is now a Graveyard
Book shirt available from NeverWear featuring artwork
by Mr. G himself! Available in S, M, L, XL, XXL, and girl's baby doll sizes.
The Flash on Tap Conference has announced
four limited attendance all-day workshops for Flash designers and developers taking place in
Boston at the Park Plaza Hotel and Towers.
The water surrounding Edge of
Darkness was already rather tepid -- I'm going by the comments here on
Cinematical, and the dutiful, but unenthusiastic reporting it's attracted. Were it 1996,
and Mel Gibson was still everyone's favorite
action star, the buzz would be something else.
But now, the rumors might really start flying. Variety
reports that Robert DeNiro has abruptly left the
production, which has been shooting since August 18th, though this was his first week on set. The
only word came from his spokesperson, and it was good and curt. "Sometimes things don't work out;
it's called creative differences."
The Boston Herald has a little gossipy tidbit about DeNiro shooting a golf scene, which
hardly seems big enough to have led to such unworkable tension. Was it the delay caused by
excavating the sand pit? (I'm being sarcastic, of course, because I hate not knowing the truth
behind a dry label like "creative differences.") We can speculate all day as to why -- is it
actually worse than Analyze That, or what?
Shooting will continue, obviously filming around scenes of DeNiro's character as they run around
recasting. Frankly, this could work out for the best -- many last minute casting changes do. But
this film hardly needs the hint of scandal, not when the beleaguered Gibson is involved.
NEW YORK/BOSTON (Reuters) - Dell Inc plans to make fewer computers itself and rely on contract
manufacturers to cut costs, but the company could find it hard to get rid of its North American
factories at a good price.
Owning a car can give you a great sense of freedom…
then you have to figure out where to park it! More and more tools are popping up on the Web to
help you locate both long and short term parking. Here are 15 services that cover everything from
free spots to event parking, long term parking, and more.
Do you use the Web to find parking? If so, tell us about your experiences in the comments.
Parking Comparison Sites
AboutAirportParking.com - Has
listings for over 400 parking lots near over 100 international airports. Can add
optional services like valet, car wash, mechanics and more. You can read more about
this site in our Startup Review.
BestParking.com - Allows you to compare
parking rates of various garages in Boston, New York City, Philadelphia and Washington
D.C. Also offers a mobile version.
ParkingAnytime.com - Locate garages,
lots, free parking and more for a given area. Limited to Chicago, IL during their
beta phase.
ParkingCarma.com - See real-time data
of available parking spaces. If you register, you can reserve parking spaces in
advance. Serves multiple US cities.
PrimoSpot.com - Gives you information on
parking conditions in Manhattan and Brooklyn, and will show you the actual parking rules for a
specific space. The service plans to include more cities. You can read more about PrimoSpot here on
Mashable.
Streetlinenetworks.com - Not operational yet, Streetline is putting monitors in
24,000 San Francisco metered parking spots so people will know where spots are
available. Read a summary of Streetline’s services here on Mashable.
Parking Spot Rentals
CraigsList.org - As with just about
anything else you can sell or rent, CraigsList has numerous listings for parking spaces.
ParkAtMyHouse.com - Specializes in
renting out parking spaces around sporting venues, airports or just about anywhere.Â
Available in Australia, Canada, Ireland, the Netherlands, New Zealand, the UK and the USA.
ParkingHunter.com - Lists available
spaces to rent in cities such as Chicago, New York City, San Francisco, Vancouver and more.
ParkLet.co.uk - Offers listings of thousands
of parking spaces available for rent all over the United Kingdom.
ParkingSpotter.com - Helps you
locate parking spots for major events, airports or everyday use.
Physicist Alan Guth of MIT offers his take on Einstein's famous equation. This podcast was produced
by David Levin and Lexi Krock. Audio editing by David Levin. Music courtesy
www.animalhospitalmusic.com. NOVA is produced by WGBH in Boston. Funding for NOVA is provided by
ExxonMobil, David H. Koch, the Howard Hughes Medical Institute, the Corporation for Public
Broadcasting, and public television viewers. For more on E = mc2, visit www.pbs.org/nova/einstein
In this week's Allspark-powered show, we say hello to Boston PAX and 360 price cuts, goodbye to
Jeff Green and "we'll probably never, ever see you" to the Buffy MMO. Also, somebody's going to win
a copy of Castle Crashers, and if you don't listen, you'll never know that it's not you.
Thanks to Danny Lujan of the JPAG for crunchy, reduced sodium
photochopping greatness. (As an aside, we're running low on photochops, so join the group and fill
the reserves!)
Get the podcast:
[iTunes]
Subscribe to the Joystiq Podcast directly in iTunes (MP3)
[RSS] Add the Joystiq Podcast feed to your RSS
aggregator
[Digg] Like the show? Digg it.
[MP3] Download the MP3
directly
Hosts: Chris Grant, Ludwig Kietzmann and Justin McElroy
In this week's Allspark-powered show, we say hello to Boston PAX and 360 price cuts, goodbye to
Jeff Green and "we'll probably never, ever see you" to the Buffy MMO. Also, somebody's going to win
a copy of Castle Crashers, and if you don't listen, you'll never know that it's not you.
)
and reject those that you are not interested in
(
)
Gamasutra has published a postmortem for the hugely successful Bioshock; nothing contained
within is particularly shocking (though comments have groused that they left out some big snafus),
though I think it's always interesting to see what participants in the creation process have to say
about the success (or lack thereof). The article goes beyond game elements and gets into things
like how design teams were organized. But where does Alyssa Finley, project lead, have to say about
the problems the Bioshock team ran into?:Our goal when we set out to make
BioShock was very clear. We wanted to get to the next level, moving beyond our suite of
critically acclaimed games to make a blockbuster. A lot of factors aligned to make this possible:
the commercial backing of 2K; the game design knowledge we'd acquired from building System
Shock 2; the technological familiarity with our Unreal-based engine that we'd built with
previous games. But we still had to figure out how to make it all big-blockbuster big.
Sarah Palin: 
The water surrounding 
Owning a car can give you a great sense of freedom…
then you have to figure out where to park it! More and more tools are popping up on the Web to
help you locate both long and short term parking. Here are 15 services that cover everything from
free spots to event parking, long term parking, and more.
