'UK Hackers' Condemn McKinnon?

An anonymous reader writes "Whitedust has some interesting commentary on this BBC article which claims that 'UK hackers' have condemned Gary Mckinnon's trial. From the article: 'Another example of some truly awful and misinformed mainstream tech reporting here. The article claims that UK hackers are almost all in support of Mr Mckinnon when in truth as we all know the entire tech community has agreed that Mr Mckinnon is not only an idiot but a deluded attention seeker.'"

Idiot

[gowen]

The article claims that UK hackers are almost all in support of Mr Mckinnon

No it doesn't. It says that some of them who knew him personally are in support of him. It quotes them, too.

The only stupid generalisations are in Whitedust's articles.

More info

[exosyst]

The BBC also have a nice profile on Gary at http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/4715612.stm [bbc.co.uk] It appears he was using some kind of Remote desktop system for the remote control and for the most part he seems to have just pinged and attempted access using a perl script! Not exactly the "ultimate hacker" that the US and the media seem to be inferring.

Re:Harsh punishment for what exactly?

[timon]

Is his harsh sentence for changing/using/leaking/stealing information or just because he embarrassed the Government in the 'post-911' world?

*ding ding ding* We have a winner!

Leaking information is seen to be a valuable tool to "counter critics" (if not a critical job function and patriotic act) unless said leak exposes embarrassing details about illegal/unethical programs, incompetence or other unsavory details. Then it's full steam ahead for the prosecution of the leakers and not the target of the leak, unless the embarrassment is at the Katrina level, of course.

Re:Much Ado About Nothing

[Chr0nik]

I take it you haven't read up on the Pons and Fleichmann "fiasco" lately have you? Not only has it been re-reviewed, but funding for research, although limited, has been approved by the DOE based on the second review's results. The cold fusion reigns have been taken over by others in their place, since they were so utterly shunned, and ridiculed by the scientific establishment. Now the question is not whether or not excess heat has been generated. But whether or not it's a product of fusion, and whether or not the methods of measuring the excess heat are accurate. Most people on the panel agree that it is, due to the presence of tritium ash, a by-product of fusion. They disagree on the amounts of excess heat, and the methods of testing, and they are not going full bore with it. But it's not completely dismissed out of hand any longer.

Not to mention it has been replicated many, many times, by many researchers in many labs at this point. Don't get me wrong, the findings were still negative(or should I say skeptical), which they should be, but they are now receiving funding. And Stanley Pons and Martin Fleichmann, are now back in the fusion game. It's been 20 years since the initial review, and people kept tinkering, and working with it. The DOE now thinks that it's now worth taking a look at. I wonder where it will be in another 20 years, now that they have funding for "Higly focused research efforts". And now that they are not considered paraihs for even researching it.

From the DOE report: The nearly unanimous opinion of the reviewers was that funding agencies should entertain individual, well-designed proposals for experiments that address specific scientific issues relevant to the question of whether or not there is anomalous energy production in Pd/D systems, or whether or not D-D fusion reactions occur at energies on the order of a few eV. These proposals should meet accepted scientific standards, and undergo the rigors of peer review. No reviewer recommended a focused federally funded program for low energy nuclear reactions. Reviewers identified two areas where additional research could address specific issues. One is the investigation of the properties of deuterated metals including possible effects of alloying and dislocations. These studies should take advantage of the modern tools for material characterization. A second area of investigation is the use of state-of-the-art apparatus and techniques to search for fusion events in thin deuterated foils. Several reviewers specifically stated that more experiments similar in nature to those that have been carried out for the past fifteen years are unlikely to advance knowledge in this area.

You can check it out for yourself at www.newenergytimes.com.. BTW if you need to look any further, only a handful of researchers call it "cold fusion", it's more common term lately has been LENR, or Low Energy Nuclear Reactions. There are other sites, but you'll have to sift through the cooks to find them. Personally I don't see any reason why it's not possible, it doesn't break any laws of physics, like a lot of those self running magnet motors and PM devices people are always reporting. The theory seems reasonable. Nothing insanely out of wack, nothing that proposes tapping ether or some esoteric bizarre unknown energy force.