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matt blaze

@mattblaze

23 Dec

Christmas cryptography: In “A Christmas Story”, Ralphie is shown with what appears to be a 1940 edition of the official Orphan Annie decoder badge, which would be appropriate for the time in which the film is set. The prop used appears to be an original badge. 1/

I know this because I have one in my collection (Enigma machines being too rich for me). Unfortunately, this is where things go a bit off the rails, cryptographically speaking. 2/

These decoder badges had two rings, one with the numbers 1-26, and the other with a permutation of the 26 letters of the alphabet. The badge could be set to one of 26 offsets (a keyspace of under 5 bits) by rotating one ring with respect to the other. 3/

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matt blaze

@mattblaze

16 Dec

For what it's worth, I try really hard to engage productively here, but, probably owing to the nature of the work I do, I'm on the receiving end of a pretty constant barrage of trolls, aggressive attacks, and often bizarrely unreasonable demands here. 1/

Mostly I ignore them. Sometimes I don't, and that's probably not always for the best, but it helps keep me sane and engaged here. I'm genuinely sorry if I'm not always as even tempered as you'd like to think I should be, but I am who I am. 2/

So, yes, I should probably be bigger than I sometimes am. But I'm also only human. As I recent said to someone who's obviously very upset with me: 3/

Read 4 tweets

matt blaze

@mattblaze

13 Dec

@WSJ

Traditionally, we indicate a successful dissertation defense by saying "congratulations, doctor". Not "congratulations, kiddo", as Mr. Epstein of the @WSJ appears to believe.

@WSJ

@WSJ The unspeakably condescending misogyny aside, the editorial betrays a stunning lack of familiarity with what a PhD is and isn't. He seems to think it's supposed to be awarded to those after surviving some sort of very stressful academic hazing ritual without fainting.

You could argue that the overall process of getting a PhD is a kind of hazing, but if so, the dissertation defense is not the most stressful or difficult part of it. It's the (often largely ceremonial) culmination of a much longer process.

Read 7 tweets

matt blaze

@mattblaze

27 Nov

This picture has gotten a lot of attention because of the tiny desk and weird room decor. But geek-Americans like me are focused on something else: the microphone boom and stand, which are emblematic of this administration’s distain for expertise. Let me explain.

The thing is a “C-stand” with a microphone boom pole attached to it with via a grip head and boom holder. These things are not designed to be used together, but points for improvising.

The first thing you might notice is the lack of a counterweight on the boom. It wants to tip over, although the pole is carbon fiber and fairly light so they got away with it. But the real problem is the way the stand is being used.

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matt blaze

@mattblaze

27 Nov

The Trump/Kraken legal strategy makes the most sense (for low values of "sense") if the goal is not to win, but rather to get cases thrown out quickly, setting the stage for you to claim for years that you were victimized by a "rigged system".

If the goal is to be able to continue selling things to the people who supported you for as long as possible, it may work quite well.

The 2021-2024 talking point will be "we filed eleventy zillion lawsuits and the corrupt courts refused to even give us a trial on a single one! You're saying not a single one of our cases had any merit? Don't be naive!". Etc.

Read 4 tweets

matt blaze

@mattblaze

14 Nov

There are a LOT of bad faith claims being made right now about security vulnerabilities and rigged elections, but those citing vulnerabilities as a reason to conduct post-election audits are correct.

Security experts have long advocated post-election audits be done routinely.

Hopefully, moving forward, this will result in bipartisan support for investment in and harmonized standards for securing US election infrastructure.

I hope we can all agree that election security is (and should be) an entirely nonpartisan goal that we all share.

An excellent overview of the security issues in US elections, and the safeguards recommended by experts, can be found in this National Academies study (note free pdf download link): nap.edu/catalog/25120/…

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