L'Évêque Fou

L'Évêque Fou

Fallacy of Axioms

Fallacy of Axioms

Any problem can be solved by an additional level of indirection. I was listening to a podcast today where someone said the strange thing about religion is that people – even people who otherwise embrace the scientific method – get touchy when asked to provide evidence of God. You can be a

Insurrection and Whataboutism

Insurrection and Whataboutism

One of my relatives posted the following on Facebook: Hey Face Book fact checkers.....please check this out as I have read several things. Is it true that the Mayor of DC shut off everyone's cell phone during the riot or before. Also, who took all the posed

You Said It...!

Political Featured

You Said It...!

Although I sometimes think there's as much harm as good, I'm still on Facebook. It's a convenient place to see and share what's going on in the lives of friends far and near. But it's also a convenient place for

Social Security, the Pyramid Scheme

Social Security, the Pyramid Scheme

This was first an extended comment on Facebook, and probably belongs here as much or more. A very conservative relative posted, ironically, a meme from Occupy Democrats about how Social Security is not a hand-out; it's our right, as people who have paid into it, and attempts to

White Supremacist Buddhist Statues

White Supremacist Buddhist Statues

What do you do when someone claims your photo from Tokyo might mark you a white supremacist?

Wise Restraints That Make Men Free

Wise Restraints That Make Men Free

"Freedom to" thinking tells us that the government should interfere as little as possible with the lives of its citizens, and let the market work itself out. "Freedom from" thinking tells us that government must interfere to remove impediments to liberty.

...as one who had authority

...as one who had authority

[This post was started at IETF 104, and since IETF 105 is in a few weeks, I figure I'd better finish it.] There's an ongoing discussion in the HTTP community over what constitutes authority for an origin. The URI identifies a resource using a scheme (https)

Are Democrats "FOR" abortions?

Are Democrats "FOR" abortions?

I saw a friend's mother post a somewhat slanted comparison of the party platforms, stating that Republicans are "FOR" "protection of the unborn", while Democrats are "AGAINST" this. The unstated implication was that Democrats are "FOR" abortions. This is, um,

Medicare For All, Really

Medicare For All, Really

Medicare For All has promise, but I'm not sure it's politically feasible in the USA. Maybe this is more feasible.

IETF 101: Balance of Concerns

IETF 101: Balance of Concerns

There were many great conversations and much excellent work done last week at IETF 101 in London. As is so often the case lately, many of our decisions had to balance the intersection of privacy and manageability. TLS is the fundamental protocol that provides security on the Internet -- it

IETF 100: War for the Middle

IETF 100: War for the Middle

IETF 100 took place a few weeks ago in Singapore, and across multiple venues, there was one topic that surfaced repeatedly, and opinions vary so widely that we might almost consider it a holy war: middleboxes. Some people I've attempted to describe the problem to hadn't

[Not] Kneeling in God's Country

[Not] Kneeling in God's Country

I've mostly stayed out of the whole "kneeling during the National Anthem" thing. But some things just tick me off, so I'm going to make a few comments. You are welcome to disagree. You are welcome to tell me so. But this is my

QUIC and Streams

QUIC and Streams

In my previous post, I talked about why QUIC matters to the future of the Internet. I'd also like to look a little more closely at why it matters to HTTP specifically. Obviously, the benefits we're able to import from TCP developments will benefit HTTP immediately

What kind of Architect?

There's been an uptick in traffic around here lately, mostly because of people who know me at work or IETF getting exposed to my personal e-mail address on this domain. I joined Windows at the tail end of Vista. Since then I’ve had the pleasure to work

A QUIC Introspective

A QUIC Introspective

In my long-ago last post on HTTP/2, I said that I would follow up with a discussion of QUIC and why I believe it's important. Real life has been unfortunately busy, but it's time now. Firstly, I don't intend to knock TCP. Not

A QUIC retrospection on HTTP/2

A QUIC retrospection on HTTP/2

You may have heard this term "QUIC" floating around the Internet, and not known what to do with it. Is it an adverb? An acronym? A bad pun? And what does it have to do with HTTP/2? Let's do a QUICk survey and find out.

A Parable

Let me tell you a story. Meet the Schmidts. They live in a semi-rural town, and between their jobs, bring in around $56,000/year. Grandpa Schmidt lives with them, and his pension contributes another $21,000 to the family budget. Unfortunately, they're spending more like $82,000/