[lug] Anyone else hate to get rid of old equipment?

[Nate Duehr]

Right after I sent that, here's an AWESOME example... from the SANS 
newsletter...

TOP OF THE NEWS
  --House Subcommittee Approved Bill to Revamp FISMA
(May 20, 2010)
The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee has approved a
bill aimed at revamping the Federal Information Security Management
Act (FISMA) which is nearly 10 years old. The 2010 Federal Information
Security Amendments Act (HR 4900) would establish permanent positions
of director of cyber security, and chief technology officer.  It would
also abolish certain paperwork requirements and require continuous
network monitoring in place of 3-ring binders.  The bill would also
require IT contracts to address cyber security requirements.  The bill
now goes before the full House; a vote is expected sometime next month.
A companion bill in the Senate is expected to be introduced in the
next few weeks.
http://www.nextgov.com/nextgov/ng_20100520_4353.php

Let's break down the phrase "3-ring binder waste".  First of all, 3-ring 
binders full of paper for tracking computer monitoring are usually 
emptied and re-used for quite a long time.  The paper inside is cheaply 
recyclable back into ... wait for it... PAPER!  Wow.

The article espouses that "continuous monitoring" will replace these 
3-ring binders.  What is required for "continuous monitoring"?  I'm 
pretty sure it entails leaving a metric ass-load of computers turned on 
24/7, processing, storing, cataloging, and alerting on the information 
that used to be done by a human looking at paper in a 3-ring binder.

So... again, an example of manipulation of the "religion".  We'll call 
it Ecumenical Ecology, for a name.  Everything today must be "blessed" 
by an ecologist, and depicted as "greener than thou" to pass the public 
sentiment test.

But when you really THINK about it, banning 3-ring binders of 
information about computer security probably is a larger ecological 
"disaster" than using them in the first place.

It's just that no one's thinking.

Another example: Do I really need a trouble ticket system I can look up 
some piddly problem a customer had in 1997 that's online 24/7?  Or did I 
always just really need a small operations manual (single copy) at each 
employee work location and a really smart person to document the 
niggling problems that come up over and over again?

Oh, and that one brings up my favorite pet peeve: Why have a physical 
work location for information workers at all? Building it, heating it, 
cooling it, traveling to and from it, all utilize resources.  Work from 
home is quite "green", since we're already doing very non-green things 
to keep the Internet and the connectivity of a network to all our homes 
in most Metro and even most rural areas, these days.  Why have offices 
at all?

I could be EASILY convinced to support LAWS that didn't allow 
information workers to travel to work if they can stay put throughout 
the workday.  That would take *how many* cars off the road in cities?  
:-)  Why...? Because it'd save me a lot of money & time!

To steal/mangle a phrase from Orwell: "Telecommuting is Double-plus 
Good!" :-)

Nate