81–90 of 157 posts
That's approximately 100 lava lamps each at 100W = 10,000W = 10kW/h * 20.4 cents = $2.04/h * 24 = $48.96/day $1,489.20/month. Ignoring the fact that is very little money in Silicon Valley. Lava lamps consume a large amount of electricity in order to generate the heat they need. There are cheaper better ways to generate randomness, this is purely for spectacle clearly. It makes me nervous more than anything. If that's…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
For sure. In another office they use a geiger counter (a much more standard way to get randomness, and probably easier to setup). That said, this doubles as a public art installation in their lobby - something many companies spend thousands (or millions!) of dollars on. So it's not just PR, it's actually surprisingly practical.
I know I'm nitpicking here - it's a private art installation.
I might be prejudiced, but this looks like a big PR stunt/done for the cool factor kind of thing. Aren't there simpler/saner alternatives for getting good randomness?
It is entirely, 100% a publicity stunt with no practical importance whatsoever.
It's also a fairly novel way to explain to people that `random()` isn't truly random.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Geiger counter might happen to be very vulnerable to collocated attacks. Overwhelm counter with non-random radiation, compromise a batch of keys produced during the burst,
Are you suggesting a gamma ray beam? Or neutron beam? (You couldn't do an alpha particle beam - that's stopped by a sheet of paper... and the beta particle ray would have difficulty with the building construction). This then goes to the question of "where are you getting a focused gamma ray beam that has sufficient rate that you're able to modulate the period between two detection events?"
If it's an internal source and it is properly shielded, this becomes much harder.
That's approximately 100 lava lamps each at 100W = 10,000W = 10kW/h * 20.4 cents = $2.04/h * 24 = $48.96/day $1,489.20/month. Ignoring the fact that is very little money in Silicon Valley. Lava lamps consume a large amount of electricity in order to generate the heat they need. There are cheaper better ways to generate randomness, this is purely for spectacle clearly. It makes me nervous more than anything. If that's…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Geiger counter might happen to be very vulnerable to collocated attacks. Overwhelm counter with non-random radiation, compromise a batch of keys produced during the burst,
Are you suggesting a gamma ray beam? Or neutron beam? (You couldn't do an alpha particle beam - that's stopped by a sheet of paper... and the beta particle ray would have difficulty with the building construction). This then goes to the question of "where are you getting a focused gamma ray beam that has sufficient rate that you're able to modulate the period between two detection events?"
Earlier quoted context omitted.
It is entirely, 100% a publicity stunt with no practical importance whatsoever.
Yes, the article and the form in which it is exhibited is a PR stunt. However, that doesn't mean it's not practical in any capacity....if you locked this away in a room and never told anyone, it would still hold a utility for the company. Are there alternatives? Sure, but again that doesn't make it impractical. It's also a fairly novel way to explain to people that `random()` isn't truly random.