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Many of you have probably seen this, but it's an interesting story about one guy who did a lot of card counting, and what he thinks about the gambling mentality and casinos in general.

Come on, this site is about "News for Nerds", not "Current Popular Views on American Politics". And no, this isn't YRO, either. If you want to discuss stuff like this, you might be more happy over at Kuro5hin with all of the other mature people. Heck, I might even answer a question like that there. Just leave us here on Slashdot to our kernel updates, SCO news, and gushings about how sexy Willow Rosenberg is as a vampire, the things that nerds all over the world value and understand.

The point is this

But this seems to be directed towards you.

This series of articles is a very interesting look at casinos, how they work, and the psychology of gamblers.

Mind if I ask who actually pays attention to advertising? Marketeers want to sell stuff, regardless. If a certain buzzword increases sales, its in there whether it holds true or not.
I used to do some marketing work, being the honest people-loving guy that I am I soon quit after leaving rather offensive words regarding their almost criminal practices.

You might want to check this article for some more info

That discussion has moved to K5:

http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2003/8/6/32819/51827

Enjoy.

was on K5 a while ago, it's basically a HOWTO.

Yeah, I noticed that too.

• articles by MichaelCrawford at Kuro5hin
• GoingWare's Bag of Programming Tips (note - they cover a lot more than programming by now)
• Articles at The Linux Quality Database
• Musings on Good C++ Style - published at K5 under my old username
• Links to Tens of Thousands of Legal Music Downloads
• Writing Cross-Platform Software - Getting Started
• Freeing the Developer from OS Vendor Shackles

I write about the importance of speaking your mind, and give some tips on how I am able to write so well on this page.

• articles by MichaelCrawford at Kuro5hin
• GoingWare's Bag of Programming Tips (note - they cover a lot more than programming by now)
• Articles at The Linux Quality Database
• Musings on Good C++ Style - published at K5 under my old username
• Links to Tens of Thousands of Legal Music Downloads
• Writing Cross-Platform Software - Getting Started
• Freeing the Developer from OS Vendor Shackles

I write about the importance of speaking your mind, and give some tips on how I am able to write so well on this page.

• articles by MichaelCrawford at Kuro5hin
• GoingWare's Bag of Programming Tips (note - they cover a lot more than programming by now)
• Articles at The Linux Quality Database
• Musings on Good C++ Style - published at K5 under my old username
• Links to Tens of Thousands of Legal Music Downloads
• Writing Cross-Platform Software - Getting Started
• Freeing the Developer from OS Vendor Shackles

I write about the importance of speaking your mind, and give some tips on how I am able to write so well on this page.

http://www.kuro5hin.org/comments/2003/7/29/17659/1 721/169#169

Nice little rant. Too bad you didn't do more than glance at the parent posters "comment" on your sig. It was pretty funny.

Not everyone is trying to start a fight. Get your hair trigger fixed, you will find life easier.

http://www.kuro5hin.org/comments/2003/7/29/17659/1 721/169#169

Ummm...Taiwan IS the ROC (Republic of China). Mainland China is the PRC (People's Republic of China). If you're referring to this story, then there's no int'l cooperation involved, it's purely an effort of Taiwan (aka the ROC) - the PRC has nothing to do with it.

We view IBM's counterclaim filing today as an effort to distract attention from its flawed Linux business model.

If IBM were serious about addressing the real problems with Linux, it would offer full customer indemnification and move away from the GPL license.

As the stakes continue to rise in the Linux battles, it becomes increasingly clear that the core issue is bigger than SCO (Nasdaq: SCOX - News), Red Hat, or even IBM

The core issue is about the value of intellectual property in an Internet age.

In a strange alliance, IBM and the Free Software Foundation have lined up on the same side of this argument in support of the GPL.

SCO has shipped these products for many years, in some cases for nearly two decades, and this is the first time that IBM has ever raised an issue about patent infringement in these products.

These guys have some serious nerve - I hope they get put behind bars for this crap.

some disagree...

Kuro5hin commentary on the below story

This story on Kuro5hin entered a living hell when the sites being discussed sent their members to go get accounts and start stuffing the ballots.

Even controlled moderation would fail simply because the signal/noise ratio at the bottom level becomes so out of whack that no one wants to dive in the sewer on the chance of finding a diamond.

Kuro5hin commentary on the below story

This story on Kuro5hin entered a living hell when the sites being discussed sent their members to go get accounts and start stuffing the ballots.

Even controlled moderation would fail simply because the signal/noise ratio at the bottom level becomes so out of whack that no one wants to dive in the sewer on the chance of finding a diamond.

There's no way they'd be able to organise a legally binding contract with you (such that they really could base a lawsuit on it in the case of you violating it) without revealing their identity - and they're anonymous specifically so they don't have to worry about time-wasting lawsuits against them.

Additionally, the effectiveness of SPEWS is limited, and even spam fighters will admit it. Many spammers have switched from sending out from their netblocks to open proxies and the like in order to send out their mass emails. It's my opinion that an alternative approach to fighting spam, through means such as baysian filtering, and improved firewall rules could perform just as good a job of preventing spam without a shadowy organization such as SPEWS.

I don't have a dog in this fight. I don't know anyone with connections to the SPEWS list, either as being listed, or as being a lister; I dislike spam, and would not purchase a product from a spammer. On the same token, I feel that some of SPEWS' tactics are overly broad and draconian.

On a tangental note, I'd like your opinion on a hypothetical situation involving spam. What would you do in such a situation? How would you fight the possibility of someone using the ill-will of spam against a company?

I used to work for a small software company where most of our sales were made through direct mail. I think our gross sales peaked at about $2 million one year while I was working there in the mid-90's.

Each direct mail piece sent to a prospect costs hard cash to send, for printing, postage, labor and mailing list rental. Yet it was our experience that a response rate of 0.5% was sufficient to yield a profit.

Once you have identified a profitable offer and a mailing list that's rich with customers who respond to direct mail, you have a license to print money. That's why you probably each of you reading this receive two or three pieces of direct mail every day.

The following two comments I posted at Kuro5hin discuss this in great detail:

• The Importance of Advertising to Business
• Direct mail is very scientifically targeted

Simply installing filters on your own machine won't help. The people who purchase sexual enhancement products over the Internet don't know from spam filters.

I think the end to spam will come only when every ISP and mail hosting service installs filters that are enabled by default. Only then will the response rate of spam be reduced to the point that it's no longer economical to send it.

I think it's likely the day will come when ISPs will be forced to install filters that cannot be disabled. Possibly this will be ordered by various national governments.

I used to work for a small software company where most of our sales were made through direct mail. I think our gross sales peaked at about $2 million one year while I was working there in the mid-90's.

Each direct mail piece sent to a prospect costs hard cash to send, for printing, postage, labor and mailing list rental. Yet it was our experience that a response rate of 0.5% was sufficient to yield a profit.

Once you have identified a profitable offer and a mailing list that's rich with customers who respond to direct mail, you have a license to print money. That's why you probably each of you reading this receive two or three pieces of direct mail every day.

The following two comments I posted at Kuro5hin discuss this in great detail:

• The Importance of Advertising to Business
• Direct mail is very scientifically targeted

Simply installing filters on your own machine won't help. The people who purchase sexual enhancement products over the Internet don't know from spam filters.

I think the end to spam will come only when every ISP and mail hosting service installs filters that are enabled by default. Only then will the response rate of spam be reduced to the point that it's no longer economical to send it.

I think it's likely the day will come when ISPs will be forced to install filters that cannot be disabled. Possibly this will be ordered by various national governments.

This front-page story at K5 is particularly relevant. I have no doubt that the bounty will be met very quickly.

Mr. Lynds might be benefitted by reading this article referred to yesterday on /. The part of particular interest being "Misconception #3: Comparing Infinite Quantities".

One article that I found interesting A Guide to Infinity

Rus

If you want GNU-Darwin background and a balanced view, ignore Pudge's "FUD" and try the following links.

http://www.kuro5hin.org/?op=displaystory;sid=2003/ 1/20/191655/929
http://www.gnu.org/brave-gnu-world/issue-25.en.htm l
http://www.newsforge.com/article.pl?sid=00/12/01/2 028254&mode=thread

Regards,
proclus
http://www.gnu-darwin.org/

Well, read about Extreme Body Modification. People who want to part with their healthy body parts do not meet much understanding and consideration. You say that a person with a better bionic arm will be treated just like a person with an inferiour prostetic arm and more or less like any other person. May be.

But what about a person who wants to replace a "perfectly" healthy natural arm with a bionic one? Judging from experience, he will have to resort to underground rogue doctors a la Blade Runner or Johnny Mnemonic. What if someone wants to trade his legs for a high-tech wheelchair?

So while stem cell research is all good and valuable, you shouldn't shun other potential problems.

You're thinking of kuro5hin. This is slashdot. Slaaaaash, dohhhhht.

here.

Why, if it weren't for Jack's timely reminders, I might have missed my son's baseball game!

Nice job on replying to yourself "Mr. Wagner". Too bad you're a troll. WagnerConsulting.com doesn't exist nor does the "special plutionium[sic] core" that you "recommended" to Kiro5hin.

What do you trolls get out of this stuff, anyway?

die... now
please... just stop breathing

you sound so much like this total dolt

There is an interesting article about LiquidDemocracy over at K5

Communists advocate the emergence of a "scientific state" in which all revenues and all functions of society are subsumed by government planning and execution. In updated terminology, Marx predicted that ultimately science would advance to the point that there would be no role for labor or enterprise -- only scientifically optimized systems of automated planning and production. In this situation, there would be no free market to sustain the masses since they would not own the automated means of production, and, labor being worthless, would, therefore, have no income. Although Marx predicted a "withering away of the state", the communist interpretation of Marx's dilemma was that the state should confiscate ownership of the automated means of production and distribute the products to the masses based on social need. Since science would have removed all uncertainty as to the most optimal way in which to plan and operate these facilities, there would be no need for the incentives of the market to optimally allocate assets.

Clearly, communism touched a chord with this vision of an automated future in which laborers could not feed themselves or their families while capitalists, who controlled vast production facilities, had no incentive to operate them. The communist movement dominated the politics of the 20th century. Adolf Hitler exploited a related idea when he attacked "international Jewish bankers" in his national socialist movement. When such profoundly destructive movements run their course, it behooves us to do more than merely condemn their evils in moral outrage. Analysis of this recurring political disease, why we are susceptible to it and what can be done to prevent it in the future is just as great a moral responsibility as is condemnation of its manifest evils.

The appeal of communism (and an appeal of fascism) is that it addresses a truth which capitalists exploit and typically resist acknowledging in a material way -- that nature and civilization provide common assets of knowledge, resources, infrastructure and defense of legal rights which enhance and secure the productive value of private assets. It is precisely this pervasive influence of common assets, attributable to natural and historical heritage rather than the merits of any living person or operating corporation, that provides the definition of government's proper function, and, therefore, its proper level and source of revenue.

I have moved beyond that view to a form of anarcho capitalism in which net assets are essentially taxed due to reinsurance premiums to indemnify against force or fraud, but the structural integrity of such a system is not far from that which I proposed in the 1992 white paper. A family's personal assets would be largely exempt due to the fact that they could afford to defend their own property -- so the "tax exemption" is still likely to exist even under anarcho capitalism.

Imagine that -- anarcho capitalism that "taxes" only asset concentration. Well, that's what you get when anarchy reigns and a few people own all the assets -- they need to start thinking about how to keep their lives and properties safe from assault.

You're basically describing the article-moderation system on K5, which allows site members to choose which articles make it to the homepage, and also divides comments into 'editorial' and 'topical'. It's also based on Apache/mod_perl/MySQL, and available at the scoop source website.

You're basically describing the article-moderation system on K5, which allows site members to choose which articles make it to the homepage, and also divides comments into 'editorial' and 'topical'. It's also based on Apache/mod_perl/MySQL, and available at the scoop source website.

i tried asking at k5, but no one seems to want to give me a straight answer. could anyone here tell me? tell me what SCO stands for?

When the crew of BioSphere II had found that they had less food than anticipated (1800 cal/day each), they lost 15% body weight over a period of six months, and their good to bad cholesterol ratio was up and blood pressure down.

Just be sure you still maintain adequate nutrients. Changing your diet to include less junk food (chips, fries, cookies, even some breads) is another plus. And do some research on healthful composition of diets, new evidence the last ten years is showing the United States Department of Agriculture's food pyramid is scientifically unsound and may even be contributing to the obesity problems.

That said, exercise is a definite plus to stay in shape and to lose weight. Your body was made for moving around. Walking even small distances is good, and running and sports are good as well, but you may have to ease into it. As another poster stated, any exercise over and above 20 minutes will result in calorie burn.

Personally, I maintain a regimen of calorie restriction, and walking anywhere from five to 40 miles a week, and I've lost a very nice 33 pounds since mid-April. But the best part is I feel a hell of a lot more healthy and alive.

Cheers.

The color is usually superior (at a given price point, it's almost always superior), and the price per print of a dye-sub is much better than an inkjet. The resolution is higher as well.

you're going to want to keep your inkjet printer for b&w document printing, because it'll be slightly faster, and much cheaper than than dye-sub for this purpose.

Wrote a story about it....

here: http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2003/7/20/192659/148 .

How funny! I just discovered and read a story on Kuro5hin about this, written by Mr. Green himself.

He posted the article to Kuro5hin too. You can find it here.

He posted the article to Kuro5hin too. You can find it here.

http://www.kuro5hin.org/story/2003/7/20/192659/148

Well well well, I was just reading kuro5hin earlier today, and this appears to be a classic adequacy-style troll.

Nice.

hmm. another network huh? you mean like 3ro5hun?

So you read localranger's article and decided to try things out?

"Remember, the packets are moving through the FCC's internet to begin with, and can be stopped."

Wow. I'm just speechless.

1) Posters to Slashdot don't give their name and address. Slashdot can purge IP addy logs, so *they don't know* user info and *can't tell* the RIAA.

2) Many Slashdot posters don't live in the US, so tough shit RIAA.

3) How is posting a *COMMENT* on a *WEBSITE* possibly illegal? The day they take someone to court for that is the day US citizens truly lose their right to free speech.

I was just trying to head over to www.kuro5hin.org after visiting slashdot and mistankenly typed www.kuri5hin.org.

Guess what? It takes me to this overture search page. Makes me wonder if they've patented the use of commonly misspelled domains. The odd thing is that the whois database says that kuri5hin.org is not registered. The IE status bar briefly showed contact with auto.search.msn.com before turning up the overture page, which is also bothersome. The most logical explanation is that overture is the default search engine for my IE install. But how did it get that way? Do they just hijack unsuspecting user's browsers?

[This is my own story. In case kuro5hin is 404, for convenience I am reposting it in reply to your reference.]

Exposing the Happy Birthday story:
An editorial by J. Byron, May 2003, rev. June 2003

In this article, I attempt to answer three questions: 1 - What is that song Good Morning to All, and how does it relate to Happy Birthday to You? 2 - Is the melody to Happy Birthday to You public domain? 3 - Are the lyrics to Happy Birthday to You also public domain? There are many references to Happy Birthday on the Web. Most warn you of the copyright claim on it, and that the current owners rabidly defend it. Many of these "editorials" do not tell you about the song Good Morning to All - and the few that do, don't tell you about its undeniable legal status. Is this deliberate, or just ignorance of the facts? I don't know. Two such examples are an article at Attaché Magazine and the commonly cited article at snopes.com. In addition, some articles may unintentionally present inaccurate information. An article posted at lawyers.com incorrectly states that Good Morning to All was written in 1895 but unpublished. That assertion is untrue, and makes an important legal difference.

There is a 1935 copyright registration for Happy Birthday, but the melody Good Morning to All was formally published in 1893 as part of a collection, registered in October 1893, and is public domain by U. S. statute. (you just can't use the "Happy Birthday" lyrics in public without paying) However, one site listed in this editorial claims possession of some early publications that nullify the copyright to even the lyrics.

Good Morning to All [a.k.a. the birthday melody] included in:
Song Stories for the Kindergarten, pub. 1893
Song Stories for the Kindergarten, revised ed., pub. 1896
[and apparently other pre-1923 editions]
Words: Patty Hill (-1946) Music: Mildred Hill (-1916)

Good morning to you,
Good morning to you,
Good morning, dear children,
Good morning to all.

The song Good Morning to All - from which Happy Birthday was allegedly derived - is free to use (words and music) by U. S. federal statute. (Published before 1923, and furthermore published before 1909) Take a look at Lolly Gasaway's PD chart, or Cornell University's expanded chart. That version of the birthday melody may suffice for some people - instrumentalists in particular. Also note that titles cannot be protected by copyright, and no unique or proper names are involved. Naming an instrumental CD track Good Morning to All a.k.a. Happy Birthday to You should be legal. (The law of other countries might affect the song's status outside the U. S.)

Allegedly, after the publication of Good Morning to All in the Hill's songbook Song Stories for the Kindergarten, Robert Coleman, and others, published the "birthday" lyrics with the Good Morning to All melody. In the 1930's, the "Happy Birthday" lyrics combined with the Hill's published melody showed up on stage and in singing telegrams. The Hill family allegedly won a 1934 lawsuit for infringement. In 1935 the Hill family registered the "Happy Birthday" copyright mentioned endlessly on the Web. (Which does not affect today's public domain status of Good Morning to All.) Two sources for Good Morning to All sheet music are PD Info (a small studio, that also sells sheet music reprints) and