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Stories and comments across the archive that link to amazon.com.

Comments · 40,271

  1. Re:This must change by Red+Flayer · · Score: 4, Interesting · on IT and A National Security Letter Gag Order

    Indeed. There may be a moral responsibility to disobey the unconstitutional law, but there is at least technically a legal responsibility to obey it
    Depends on your philosophical roots. The Catholic Church, for example, explicitly stated that the moral responsibility to obey one's superiors supercedes other moral responsibilities. This was in the 4th century CE (IIRC, may have been the 5th century), but has so pervaded Western thought that it remains a huge problem today.

    This is a major reason why a lot of fundamentalist Christians continue to support the President -- it's cultural, even if they are not fully aware of it. Europe was forced to face this problem and try to find a solution in the 1940s and 50s; this remains a large area of psychological study even today. In the US, we touched on the subject during and after Vietnam, but culturally it still remains a problem.

    There are a couple of books that go into it in depth, one is Conservatives Without Conscience light-ish read but very enlightening -- written by a former Nixon staffer, John W. Dean. Dean's book discusses more than this topic, but it's the foundation of his theory that the conservative movement has been taken over by people without an innate moral compass.

    The Closing of the Western Mind: The Rise of Faith and the Fall of Reason -- the other, by Charles Freeman, is much drier, but really, in detail, explains the process by which the western culture became this way, with a focus on the church -- as well as the factors that led to these decisions being made. Not surprisingly, most of them came from a desire for security, an attempt to solidify power, or an attempt to destroy a rival.

    I'm not saying that we don't have a moral responsibility to do the right thing even when ordered not to by our superiors (be they government, church, workplace, etc), I'm just saying that understanding the cultural reasons for people acting this way is the first step to rectifying the problem.
  2. Re:This must change by Red+Flayer · · Score: 4, Interesting · on IT and A National Security Letter Gag Order

    Indeed. There may be a moral responsibility to disobey the unconstitutional law, but there is at least technically a legal responsibility to obey it
    Depends on your philosophical roots. The Catholic Church, for example, explicitly stated that the moral responsibility to obey one's superiors supercedes other moral responsibilities. This was in the 4th century CE (IIRC, may have been the 5th century), but has so pervaded Western thought that it remains a huge problem today.

    This is a major reason why a lot of fundamentalist Christians continue to support the President -- it's cultural, even if they are not fully aware of it. Europe was forced to face this problem and try to find a solution in the 1940s and 50s; this remains a large area of psychological study even today. In the US, we touched on the subject during and after Vietnam, but culturally it still remains a problem.

    There are a couple of books that go into it in depth, one is Conservatives Without Conscience light-ish read but very enlightening -- written by a former Nixon staffer, John W. Dean. Dean's book discusses more than this topic, but it's the foundation of his theory that the conservative movement has been taken over by people without an innate moral compass.

    The Closing of the Western Mind: The Rise of Faith and the Fall of Reason -- the other, by Charles Freeman, is much drier, but really, in detail, explains the process by which the western culture became this way, with a focus on the church -- as well as the factors that led to these decisions being made. Not surprisingly, most of them came from a desire for security, an attempt to solidify power, or an attempt to destroy a rival.

    I'm not saying that we don't have a moral responsibility to do the right thing even when ordered not to by our superiors (be they government, church, workplace, etc), I'm just saying that understanding the cultural reasons for people acting this way is the first step to rectifying the problem.
  3. Frederik Pohl by Illbay · · Score: 1 · on Another Step Towards the Driverless Car
    In the late 70s, I read a very good SF book, Man Plus , by Frederik Pohl. The story was situated in the late 1990s, and everyone commuted to work by getting into the car, telling the system where to go, and settling back to read the news or watch the Today show.

    Sigh.

  4. Re:How to get started? by Kymermosst · · Score: 1 · on Is Assembly Programming Still Relevant, Today?

    This book. Its companion site. SPIM.

  5. Re:CmdrTaco's review by vought · · Score: 1 · on AppleTV Hits the Streets

    Yeah, it's just like an Apple TV for standard TV, except there is no way to hook it up to a standard TV, and no way to watch it on a standard TV, and no Ethernet port, and no remote, and no on-screen interface, but other than that it's JUST like it. The iPod video has no on-screen interface? What's that little LCD just above the click wheel for?

    My point (clearly made, I believe) was that the iPod video is an equivalent device for playing standard def video on standard def TVs - and that the "deficiency" of 720p-only connectivity on the AppleTV is not a missing feature. Additionally, I compared the iPod to the iPod TV by noting the differences in how they connect to content. The iPod video is wired; it uses a dock-and-cable approach while the Apple TV is wireless.

    If you don't think that the iPod video can be connected to a TV, then you should try researching the product before you try to slam me.

    In concept, the iPod and AppleTV are identical. Devices which extend the library of media on your computer to the portable realm (iPod) or living room (Apple TV). In execution, the devices are quite different.

    You missed the point of my post almost entirely and used the opportunity to try and make me appear uninformed - while proving that you are uninformed. Pwned, indeed.
  6. Re:what kind of world do you want to live in? by misanthrope101 · · Score: 1 · on Morality — Biological or Philosophical?

    What I'm curious about is, what do you mean when you say that something is wrong?
    Why do you think I mean anything different than the normal dictionary definition, or what everyone else generally means? I guess you can reduce morality to meaning "things I don't want people to do" but that blurs the distinction between axe-murder and letting kids watch too much TV. The only distinction that I can think of between me and religious people is that they attribute the rules to God, while I just say "Do you really want to live in that kind of world?"

    I'm not sure whether your questions is profound or trivial. You can say "orange" or "door" and I can reply "but what do you mean?" but I'm not really sure that accomplishes much. Words are by their nature imprecise tools, and in using them we are only approximating our real meaning. I don't think we ever really communicate, but we get by okay, usually.

    Back to ethics, you may want to read Tolstoy's The Kingdom of God Is Within You. That, and reading Doestoevsky compulsively over a couple of years, influenced me heavily. Yes, as an atheist I was heavily influenced by two Christian mystics. I'm also big on Emerson and Blake. Well, Blake may not be all that Christian, but he's great. Not that any of this addresses your question.

  7. Bad Mangement by bill_mcgonigle · · Score: 1 · on Google's Second-Class Citizens

    There always seems to be deadlines that require OT and weekends.

    You have bad management. Either they don't know how to do project planning or they do this to you on purpose.

    Let's assume incompetence over malice. Make sure they've read The Mythical Man Month and PeopleWare.

    If they have, they're either not getting it or they don't care. If they haven't maybe they can learn. Then they can become Good Management.

    If none of the above apply, move on - the company can't ultimately be successful with this model. They'll either lose their staff (no product) or wind up with low quality staff (poor product). Clearly some programmers don't mind the abuse but I wouldn't recommend it unless you want an ascetic lifestyle.

  8. Bad Mangement by bill_mcgonigle · · Score: 1 · on Google's Second-Class Citizens

    There always seems to be deadlines that require OT and weekends.

    You have bad management. Either they don't know how to do project planning or they do this to you on purpose.

    Let's assume incompetence over malice. Make sure they've read The Mythical Man Month and PeopleWare.

    If they have, they're either not getting it or they don't care. If they haven't maybe they can learn. Then they can become Good Management.

    If none of the above apply, move on - the company can't ultimately be successful with this model. They'll either lose their staff (no product) or wind up with low quality staff (poor product). Clearly some programmers don't mind the abuse but I wouldn't recommend it unless you want an ascetic lifestyle.

  9. Re:Not quite heavy metal... by raddan · · Score: 1 · on Gifted Children Find Heavy Metal Comforting

    After hearing this and this, I will never go back to metal again. Don't get me wrong, there are certainly some fine musicians in the metal genre, but they all sound banal to me compared to Bach. That even applies to some of the newer metal that I consider to be real works of art.

    When I really need something energetic, I switch to Vivaldi. Like others posting here, I find really energetic, complex music to be relaxing. For some strange reason, I already need to be relaxed to listen to "relaxing music". YMMV.

  10. Re:Not quite heavy metal... by raddan · · Score: 1 · on Gifted Children Find Heavy Metal Comforting

    After hearing this and this, I will never go back to metal again. Don't get me wrong, there are certainly some fine musicians in the metal genre, but they all sound banal to me compared to Bach. That even applies to some of the newer metal that I consider to be real works of art.

    When I really need something energetic, I switch to Vivaldi. Like others posting here, I find really energetic, complex music to be relaxing. For some strange reason, I already need to be relaxed to listen to "relaxing music". YMMV.

  11. Re:Not quite heavy metal... by raddan · · Score: 1 · on Gifted Children Find Heavy Metal Comforting

    After hearing this and this, I will never go back to metal again. Don't get me wrong, there are certainly some fine musicians in the metal genre, but they all sound banal to me compared to Bach. That even applies to some of the newer metal that I consider to be real works of art.

    When I really need something energetic, I switch to Vivaldi. Like others posting here, I find really energetic, complex music to be relaxing. For some strange reason, I already need to be relaxed to listen to "relaxing music". YMMV.

  12. Re:Not quite heavy metal... by raddan · · Score: 1 · on Gifted Children Find Heavy Metal Comforting

    After hearing this and this, I will never go back to metal again. Don't get me wrong, there are certainly some fine musicians in the metal genre, but they all sound banal to me compared to Bach. That even applies to some of the newer metal that I consider to be real works of art.

    When I really need something energetic, I switch to Vivaldi. Like others posting here, I find really energetic, complex music to be relaxing. For some strange reason, I already need to be relaxed to listen to "relaxing music". YMMV.

  13. Re:Not quite heavy metal... by raddan · · Score: 1 · on Gifted Children Find Heavy Metal Comforting

    After hearing this and this, I will never go back to metal again. Don't get me wrong, there are certainly some fine musicians in the metal genre, but they all sound banal to me compared to Bach. That even applies to some of the newer metal that I consider to be real works of art.

    When I really need something energetic, I switch to Vivaldi. Like others posting here, I find really energetic, complex music to be relaxing. For some strange reason, I already need to be relaxed to listen to "relaxing music". YMMV.

  14. Re:Not quite heavy metal... by raddan · · Score: 1 · on Gifted Children Find Heavy Metal Comforting

    After hearing this and this, I will never go back to metal again. Don't get me wrong, there are certainly some fine musicians in the metal genre, but they all sound banal to me compared to Bach. That even applies to some of the newer metal that I consider to be real works of art.

    When I really need something energetic, I switch to Vivaldi. Like others posting here, I find really energetic, complex music to be relaxing. For some strange reason, I already need to be relaxed to listen to "relaxing music". YMMV.

  15. Re:What About Firefox Users? by Some+Kind+Of+Record · · Score: 0 · on Trojan Analysis Leads To Russian Data Hoard
    A fascinating read. Reminded me a real life version of a few stories covered in "How to Steal The Netowork" series.

    I'm kind of sad, though. Reading this makes me feel like a complete idiot and noob.

  16. Re:Bah humbug by br0k_sams0n · · Score: 1 · on Multi-Threaded Programming Without the Pain

    Sorry, those application servers will have to wait until Apache mpm-worker is done destroying mpm-prefork benchmarks. Sheesh, I guess all those developers working on the most popular, successful Web server ever have a lot of learning to do.

    Threads have been a far more efficient way to write socket-based servers for decades. Or, perhaps now you plan to re-write history and know something the late, great R. Stevens didn't. Suggest the OP read his detailed analysis and benchmarks starting here:

    http://www.amazon.com/Unix-Network-Programming-Vol -Networking/dp/0131411551/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/104-5537 299-2831938?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1174574811&sr=8-1

  17. Re:almost, but not quite by Snocone · · Score: 4, Interesting · on Dungeons & Dragons and IT

    Too much freedom brings paralysis, because you don't know what choice to make.

    Interestingly enough, that's also been suggested as a reason for the radical growth behind incidence of depression in modern society. Fascinating book on it here:

    The Progress Paradox: How Life Gets Better While People Feel Worse

    In this he attempts to explain why by any quantifiable measure any member of society at any level in the present day has more riches, more opportunities, and more career options than their counterparts had at any time in history, psychological measures keep insisting that we're more miserable; most spectacularly in the case of females, who have had their career choices open up radically since WWII and have had their incidence of clinical depression skyrocket pretty much in tandem.

    To compress an excellent book down to a sentence, your quote above basically gets it almost right. When your options are all but limitless, you can never be sure you've made the _best_ choice ... and that's where the depression comes from, your always-optimizing subconscious second-guessing yourself into a breakdown. This applies to everything from what brand of dish detergent you picked at the supermarket to your career choice.

    And therefore, we have the paradox that people are actually happier when they have a restricted option of poor choices than when they have an effectively unrestricted option of much better choices; because the first problem is optimizable, the second isn't, and our happiness apparently comes from certainty that we have optimized the available selections, not from the absolute value of the selection.

  18. Re:moral judgement != behaviour by Dan+Hayes · · Score: 1 · on Morality — Biological or Philosophical?

    Empathy is a side-effect of our ability to model other people, it's not the cause of morality (although obviously has a role to play). Simple game theory can show that "moral" behaviour arises as the natural winner in even the simplest of situations as a winning strategy. Go and read Critical Mass which has a large section on this.

  19. Re:I know you hate the RIAA by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0 · on RIAA Caught in Tough Legal Situation

    As a famous musician, I share your pain. But why bother with a blacklist? We just get rid of the problem by making their computers explode.

    Your senator,

    Orrin G. Hatch

  20. Re:Morality? Meaningless. by benjamin264 · · Score: 1 · on Morality — Biological or Philosophical?

    Some may be interested in reading The God Delusion http://www.amazon.com/God-Delusion-Richard-Dawkins /dp/0618680004/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/104-2415610-8971103 ?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1174513222&sr=8-1 by Dawkins which goes into religions' impact on society as well possible explanations of why religion may have developed in societies.

    It seems that every couple weeks an article shows up where I think, 'someone should mention The God Delusion.' Suprised that more have not read it...

  21. The Temptations of Evolutionary Ethics by JungleBoy · · Score: 2, Informative · on Morality — Biological or Philosophical?

    Anyone who is intested in this subject or thinks this is something new should read Paul Lawrence Farber's The Temptations of Evolutionary Ethics . It's basically a history of science trying to derive moral structure from the biological world for the last century and a half. It's an interesting book. Unfortunatly, it is a slow dry read as well.

  22. Old news! by OriginalArlen · · Score: 1 · on Morality — Biological or Philosophical?
    The single most life-changing book I ever read was Beyond Freedom and Dignity" by the psychologist B.F. Skinner. His earlier work on Behaviourism (in a nutshell - science can only speak of observable phenomena. Internal mental states are not, in general, accessible. Humans are composed of atoms and molecules that are subject to the same physical laws as the rest of the world) was criticised by some as suggesting that human behaviour is deterministic, in the sense that it's determined entirely by (a) genetic make-up and (b) learned responses to environmental stimuli. Various religious nutters said this left no room for freedom (of will), dignity - the sense that we are some transcendent sense "Good" because we obey the morals of the society we happen to have been born into. He simply pointed out that "morality" ultimately means "that which enables genes to propogate is good. That which prevents or harms it is bad."

    That really seemed like the end of the argument to me back in 1990, so much so that I jacked in my psychology degree, dropped out of university & left rural Ireland for London and a job scouting for rock bands.

  23. Re:I just bought a PS3 by cxreg · · Score: 1 · on Sony Exec Says Luxury Could Be PS3's Downfall

    Can you find me a Blu-Ray player that's cheaper than a 20GB PS3?

    yes

    (even if only technically true, it's still true)

  24. Re:HDMI cable? by Seumas · · Score: 1 · on New Version of Xbox 360 Looking More Likely

    Buy yourself the Monster Xbox 360 Component cable for $45. If you have a good television, the difference between a good component-out and that which comes in the box is very noticeable.

    Obviously, I haven't yet compared it to the HDMI-out, but I don't know that it is going to be better than a quality component-out. I'll wait until someone has had the chance to test and compare them before I bother getting excited over an HDMI cable.

    As I said in another post in this thread I am not an A/V geek. However, as best I understand the true advancement of HDMI is not the quality of the image, but the implementation of HDCP . I don't know about you, but enhanced digital copy protection does not excite me and I'm certainly not going to spend money to further subject myself to the whims of the data providers and distributors.

    Now, if I'm wrong and the quality really does end up being impressive over a good component-out, then I'll probably go ahead and get it. And even then, how will we know that the console isn't simply designed to detect when component or HDMI is being used so that it can intentional reduce the quality of component, thus promoting the implementation of HDMI eagerly and willingly by consumers, thereby introducing HDCP into every home without anyone actually stopping to contemplate what they're subjecting themselves to?

  25. An Interesting Read On The Subject by bc90021 · · Score: 2, Informative · on NASA Confirms Solar Storm Near 2012

    Bringing up the Mayan Calendar, and the sun's various cycles, is a book called "Apocalypse 2012". (Not an affiliate link.) It's not as dire as the title might sound, though the author (Lawrence E. Joseph) does explore some of the various issues with that date. One concept he examines is that as the solar system moves around the galactic center, the earth has been shielded from various radiations it will no longer be shielded from after that date.

  26. Re:Deal with the hype and complexity, Hal Porter. by CRCulver · · Score: 1 · on Why the Semantic Web Will Fail

    We see little in the way of tangible results.

    See Visualizing the Semantic Web , ed. Geroimenko and Chen (Springer-Verlag, 2005). Even five years ago when the first edition of this book appeared, the Semantic Web was already a reality in that the technologies around it were already mature enough to be used on internal projects. Sure, the Average Joe using Flickr might not even encounter this, but it's long been possible for developers (even relative amateurs) to powerfully manipulate semantically tagged data.

  27. So sad... by Slipgrid · · Score: 2, Interesting · on How Scientific Paradigms Relate

    That show a problem with the way people think about science. Read E. O. Wilson's Consilience: The Unity of Knowledge on why we should apply the scientific method to all field, even humanities, and why we should try to speak about all fields with a common language.

    For instance, an example of applying science to humanities, would be writing about history in a scientific way. May not seem important if you view the people on Earth in as the only society, but if you were trying to compare the history of peoples on many different planets, then it would be very important.

    People with a computer science background should know the importance of having a common language to speak, or speaking in the simplest terms. If someone throws acronyms at you, they likely don't know what they are talking about. All field, psychology, history, and cs are related. They should use common terms, or so Wilson would have you believe.

    A truly liberal education would show you that all fields relate, and depend on one another.

  28. Re:Setting up for disaster by Metasquares · · Score: 1 · on GM Mosquito Could Fight Malaria

    Yep.

  29. Re:Aw poor Scoble by pionzypher · · Score: 1 · on Scoble Bites The Hand That Fed Him

    Ahh yes, you're just a linux troll - go have fun with open office. Ahh, speaking of trolls. Go back and read my post. I run vista, and I don't mind it.

    It's great that you've been using google for almost a decade. A little telling that you apparently have trouble with it after that long. Might I suggest a book that might help you?

    That said, I agree with you about spam killing the internet and search engines in general being in need of something different.
    Do me a favor, and at least watch the trolling. I'm not linux evangelist, but let's face it. These are features that are neither completely new or revolutionary.

  30. Re:That's nothing, think of DRM by happy_place · · Score: 1 · on Most Digital Content Not Stable

    Read the book 1491... http://www.amazon.com/1491-Revelations-Americas-Be fore-Columbus/dp/1400032059/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/102-72 03278-8316165?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1174416457&sr=8- 1 Modern Archaeological theory is beginning to rethink a lot of what it knew about the native americans and the times just prior to the arrival of European settlers. They propose now that The Majority of populations (upwards of 90%) of native americans died due to disease. This created a huge vaccuum in the people, in which even the Native Americans could no longer keep their thriving and sophisticated civilizations running any better than you could if 1 out of ten poeple in your community were to suddenly die. You'd be forced to head back to the ways of the stone age, too... Who would do your garbage service, run your networks, keep the gas stations filled with gas, fill the supermarkets with food, harvest the food, run the shops?

    The fact is that America was settled in a vaccuum of what once was... There were tribal conflicts and infighting and wars and such, but much of that was ongoing prior to the arrival of settlers--or were the results of disease over which none of the settlers understood or had control over...

    (Of course this has nothing to do with the topic of digital assets and whether such is a good means of longterm storage.

    Personally i think the strength of longterm digital storage comes in one's ability to copy and recopy it. If too many controls on copying are created then the ability to store one's digital "possessions" is lost. If it's a movie or song you're trying to preserve, then companies that sell this movie or song are more than happy about this little feature, cuz they might get repeat business. If it's a datacenter at your company, this is a huge inconvenience, and lots of people still use tape backup, though the content is recorded digitally, to preserve their archives.)

    --Ray

  31. I don't know by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0 · on The Future of Creative and the Sound Card Market

    How about Diamond which has been making sound cards about as long as Creative and how about the high end market with companies such as M-Audio?

  32. I don't know by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0 · on The Future of Creative and the Sound Card Market

    How about Diamond which has been making sound cards about as long as Creative and how about the high end market with companies such as M-Audio?

  33. Lady Liberty on Lake Mendota by dpbsmith · · Score: 1 · on University of Wisconsin-Madison Bucks RIAA

    See this image of the prank.

    For serious protest stuff, read the book Rads: The 1970 Bombing of the Army Math Research Center at the University of Wisconsin and Its Aftermath, by Tom Bates, for a detailed and evocative picture of the Vietnam protest era.

    There's also a wonderful documentary about it called "The War At Home," but I'm not sure where to track it down these days.

  34. facts... by way2trivial · · Score: 1 · on University of Wisconsin-Madison Bucks RIAA

    http://amazon.com/s/ref=nb_ss_/104-4934940-1178315 ?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=spies+like+ us
    dvd 9.49, used and new from $3.00
    combo, two movies, one case SLU & nothing but trouble $8.47 used from 5.72
    AUDIO CD available used only, who? 2 available starting at 69.95
    repro 11X17 poster, 9.99
    vhs, not available new, available starting at 40 cents...

    Sorry to drag messy facts into light....

  35. Re:What gives? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0 · on IT Manager's Handbook

    Our management relies real heavily on this
    here

  36. Re:What gives? by drinkypoo · · Score: 4, Funny · on IT Manager's Handbook

    Where's the chapter called "Dealing with uninformed upper management"?

    You'll find that chapter here.

  37. Re:No, they were not. by linzeal · · Score: 1 · on P2P File Sharing Ruining Physical Piracy Business
    Fry's Electronics in Sunnyvale was selling them for 10-12 dollars from day one. Not much has changed besides the cost of the DVD player themselves and 5-6 dollar bargain DVDs.

    What I see killing the DVD market in the future if they do not keep up is 40-50 dollar DivX DVD players.

  38. Re:$5 for a hard copy current movie= good model by Technician · · Score: 1 · on P2P File Sharing Ruining Physical Piracy Business

    Or at least, if you don't agree with the word "value", then it's certainly "what do we need to earn to produce this".

    In the 1970's when LP's were king and singles were popular, the average record purchases per capatita in the USA was about 2 LP's per year. If MacDonalds followed the same roadmap, they would not be closing all over the place like Tower Records.

    Would you reather sell 2 copies of a hit album at $18 each or sell 20 copies at $5 each? I get a daily newspaper even though I don't always read it. I don't pick up CD's (AOL CD's don't count) very often because they are expensive. I also ignore overpriced new releases of DVD's. I typicaly pick up movies used at 2 or 3 for $20. It's the same movies, but at 1/2 to 1/3 the price. There is no CD rental outlets where I can buy previewed CD's. Most old catalog stuff is listed as remastered and at the same prices as new releases with only a few notable exceptions.

    The 30 year old Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon on the 30th Anniversary Edition (Copy Protected SACD) is still over $10. I can buy DVD's of movies of the same age for less.
    The WAll, is over $15. I can buy 2 year old films at Blockbuster 2 for $20. The industry then wonders why I don't buy CD's anymore.
    http://www.amazon.com/Dark-Side-Moon-30th-Annivers ary/dp/B00008CLOA
    http://www.amazon.com/Wall-Deluxe-Packaging-Digita lly-Remastered/dp/B000006TRV/ref=pd_sim_m_2/002-54 12195-6336807
    How many people would pick up these in regular CD's (Not copy protected and not compressed. The original dynamic range was outstanding.) for $5 each. Trying to make money and setting prices where I don't bother are a balance where they have not attempted to increase their sales.

  39. Re:$5 for a hard copy current movie= good model by Technician · · Score: 1 · on P2P File Sharing Ruining Physical Piracy Business

    Or at least, if you don't agree with the word "value", then it's certainly "what do we need to earn to produce this".

    In the 1970's when LP's were king and singles were popular, the average record purchases per capatita in the USA was about 2 LP's per year. If MacDonalds followed the same roadmap, they would not be closing all over the place like Tower Records.

    Would you reather sell 2 copies of a hit album at $18 each or sell 20 copies at $5 each? I get a daily newspaper even though I don't always read it. I don't pick up CD's (AOL CD's don't count) very often because they are expensive. I also ignore overpriced new releases of DVD's. I typicaly pick up movies used at 2 or 3 for $20. It's the same movies, but at 1/2 to 1/3 the price. There is no CD rental outlets where I can buy previewed CD's. Most old catalog stuff is listed as remastered and at the same prices as new releases with only a few notable exceptions.

    The 30 year old Pink Floyd's Dark Side of the Moon on the 30th Anniversary Edition (Copy Protected SACD) is still over $10. I can buy DVD's of movies of the same age for less.
    The WAll, is over $15. I can buy 2 year old films at Blockbuster 2 for $20. The industry then wonders why I don't buy CD's anymore.
    http://www.amazon.com/Dark-Side-Moon-30th-Annivers ary/dp/B00008CLOA
    http://www.amazon.com/Wall-Deluxe-Packaging-Digita lly-Remastered/dp/B000006TRV/ref=pd_sim_m_2/002-54 12195-6336807
    How many people would pick up these in regular CD's (Not copy protected and not compressed. The original dynamic range was outstanding.) for $5 each. Trying to make money and setting prices where I don't bother are a balance where they have not attempted to increase their sales.

  40. Like "Diamond age" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0 · on More Videogames, Fewer Books at Some Schools?

    In Diamond Age (by Neal Stephenson) the main character was teached with the equivalent to videogames.
    Read it if you like sci-fi, computers and nanomachines.

  41. No practical applications? by PIPBoy3000 · · Score: 1 · on E8 Structure Decoded

    Obviously they didn't read this book

    It does remind me of string theory a bit, though. Heavy on cool math. Light on any practical application.

  42. Re:Imperialism by westlake · · Score: 1 · on Russia's War on Piracy/Malicious Software
    Certainly not the amount of time that currently is set in the copyright laws. It's just too long. A lot of great content is locked up by this law, no one in this generation will ever learn of them if this law will still stand.

    There are over 1,000 titles in print in the Penguin Classics series alone. 750 pounds of books. 80 linear feet. The Penguin Classics Complete

    The Movies Unlimited catalog runs to 800 pages.

    Conservation costs money. Restoration costs money. That is why your $2 commercial DVD rip of a movie from a public domain source and not a studio master looks and sounds like crap.

    There is nothing significant missing from the Disney studio achieves. Its archieves are self-financing.

    That can be said of almost no other film and television studio in the world.

  43. Re:absurd by misanthrope101 · · Score: 5, Insightful · on The Coming Fight Over TV Violence
    If you read a bit about how the interrogation has been happening, you might not be so optimistic. Seymore Hersch's book Chain of Command details it quite nicely. Also, the central defense of the GIs accused/convicted in these cases is that they weren't properly trained, ergo their bosses weren't responsible, and so on. Also, the Taguba report explicitly mentions that torture was taking place.

    Reports of torture have come from all the US-run "terrorist" prisons, so we are talking about a universal pattern, not a couple of bad apples. Overall, I think you're being too optimistic about the US government.

    Depending on which version you believe, you get to choose between different kinds of bad. Either senior people authorized torture, or junior, untrained people were encouraged to "get results" and a blind eye was turned as to methods.

    So, rather than the parent being "absurd" (which means "logically impossible", rather than "factually untrue", by the way) it seems that you are either naive or uninformed. It really is bad. Governments do torture. People don't handle power well, and if you hide them away in a secret place, remove oversight, and pat them on the back for being a bit rough, they will in short order torture people to death. It's not about being American, Iraqi, or any indictment of the Bush Doctrine--it's just human nature. Read about the Zimbardo prison experiment, or Milgram's experiments, the book Ordinary Men, and so on. People can be savage if you put them in a situation where it's condoned and rewarded. That inner moral compass isn't as reliable as we like to think. If we had more cynics and less optimists when it comes to human nature, we would recognize that power corrupts and minimize the situations in which torture is likely to occur. Your optimism is exactly what we need less of.

  44. Dream Machine by Viking+Coder · · Score: 1 · on What Would Be Your Dream Machine?

    Well, just get the Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud out of Limited Beta, and they've pretty much already built my dream machine.

    The latency is a little lousy, but the horse power is awesome, the bandwidth is pretty good, and the storage space is effectively infinite.

    And then I guess I'll take a fully loaded Alienware Area-51 ALX as a front-end for it at about, what, $12,000? Sounds good to me.

  45. Dream Machine by Viking+Coder · · Score: 1 · on What Would Be Your Dream Machine?

    Well, just get the Amazon Elastic Compute Cloud out of Limited Beta, and they've pretty much already built my dream machine.

    The latency is a little lousy, but the horse power is awesome, the bandwidth is pretty good, and the storage space is effectively infinite.

    And then I guess I'll take a fully loaded Alienware Area-51 ALX as a front-end for it at about, what, $12,000? Sounds good to me.

  46. Good management and enviroment are essential. by jmnugent · · Score: 1 · on How to Stop the Dilbertization of IT?

    Alot can be said about the quality (or lack thereof) of people who enter the IT field and how that effects the industry. However.. after reading the book "Peopleware" , I have to agree with the view that the 2 biggest factors are bad management and bad enviroment. If the concerted combination of those two influences stifles creativity and creates and atmosphere that is dull and boring and full of "documentation" and "following the rules to a T"... you are going to get burnout, plain and simple. I worked the last 10 or so years for a company doing IT consulting and it resulted (last summer) in my wanting to put a gun barrel in my mouth. Now i'm on my own (barely making ends meet) but infinitely happier.

  47. Re:A few more ideas for NASA... by Adeptus_Luminati · · Score: 0 · on NASA Outlines Asteroid Deflection Program

    Book reference for idea #10:
    a) The Magus of Strovolos, ISBN#0-140-19034-1
    AMAZON REFERENCE: http://www.amazon.com/Magus-Strovolos-Extraordinar y-Spiritual-Healer/dp/0140190341/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/1 04-1078746-3613536?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1174147623& sr=8-1

    b) Reverse proof of concept experience visible today in India. By this I mean that you can see with your own eyes how material from the Astral plane can be materialized on Earth. The reverse is also possible, but due to the witnesses having to be in the Astral plane, it is harder for the average layman to conclude its reality, other than physical things just appearing to dissapear into thin air.
    URL: http://www.saibaba.ws/miracles/orphanagemysore.htm

    FYI, I've seen B) with my own eyes, and so can you - just travel to Mysore in India. It's no magic trick, it's a surreal reality. essentially a tiny metalic medal, barely bigger than a fingernail has been producing 2 Liters of rose scented honey (edible too) for the past ~25 years, 7 days a week! I know, it sounds whack, but its the only miracle left on Earth that you can witness with your own eyes, and if science can understand the physics behind that... hell, Armagedon doesn't stand a chance.

    Adeptus

  48. Doh! old news "Dogs & Demons" Alex Kerr 2001 by ponyslaystation · · Score: 1 · on Japanese Company Admits To Nuclear Cover Up

    And i thought /. kept up! *yawn* old, old news. http://www.amazon.com/Dogs-Demons-Tales-Modern-Jap an/dp/0809039435/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/002-9093765-89904 56?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1174134871&sr=8-1

  49. FDG by JAFSlashdotter · · Score: 1 · on C# Book Recommendations?

    Framework Design Guidelines

    It won't teach you to program in C#, but it will explain why things are the way they are, and give you a lot of good rules to keep you from making bad mistakes. Especially if you want to make reusable libraries, but even if not.

  50. Re:NASA is doomed by nacturation · · Score: 1 · on Enormous Amount of Frozen Water Found on Mars

    So far that's been my experience as well. I found this collection (no referral) to be very interesting as it exposed me to more authors that I'm not familiar with and the stories are quite enjoyable and very much within the hard sci-fi category.