Seems to be a proper beginners guide, however the Bitcoin part is heavily flawed. It should show a intro guide or link to a wallet greening manual as BTC can destroy your anonymity.
If you don't want to build your own generator, random.org provides a service like the ANU Quantum Random Number Server, i.e. provision of unique sets of true random numbers by http request, but generated from atmospheric noise. There's a convenience R package "random" I often use for this purpose. The articles on the website are quite edifying regarding the art and science of random numbers generally. Here's a link to the interface documentation: http://www.random.org/clients/http/
"oh noes. Not this poo again. Save money, and do the following.
- Get a high res webcam - Open it up and remove the filters. - Hook up the device. - From time to time you'll see random white dots appear.
There you have your ultra cheap random number generator."
It would seem that this method would be muchmore expensive and time consuming than a simple web query.
How precisely would this save me money?
It's under your control. There's no chance of an attacker serving you skewed numbers, or of MITM, or etc etc.
That may be important. (Cryptography, for example.)
Some people don't care, they just need some random numbers. People doing modelling like a lot of random numbers that are random enough, but they don't care if that same set of numbers is available elsewhere, or if it's easily repeatable.
Pretty simple. You want random numbers for security.
If you want security, you should not trust a third party. Only yourself.
If you have to generate random numbers yourself; I just provided you a cheap solution.
