Slashdot Mirror

Heh, I never realised that succotash was a real word, having only ever heard it in the context of a certain cartoon. OK, you can mod me down now.

That doesn't have much to do with capitalism. That's just a description of the market system we currently have. I don't see these actors using any captital. They are exploiting a monopoly which is not capitalism by definition.

Peon is actually the word I think you were looking for... while the phrase "pee on" would probably accurately reflect the way that some workers are treated, it summons to mind some things that many of us would rather not think about.

That's all fine and dandy that they make a lot of money but to demand the salary equivalent to a small country's GNP is absurd. It's one thing to negotiate a raise, it's another to extort it.

I may well be disappointed in my expectations. You, clearly, are and shall remain so, there being no actual grammatical restriction on spliting infinitives in the English language.

Perhaps you would care to boldly go to the provided link.

Cloven infinitives are not a sign of the Devil

KFG

Look it up.

It's "tone and meter", not "tone and pentameter", unless the spoken language is somehow broken up into groups of five. A lot of Shakespeare is written in iambic pentameter, for example.

My wife mainly uses the email address soubrette@our-domain-name, soubrette being the kind of role she likes to play in opera. Unfortunately, in French-speaking countries, the word now has pornographic connotations and she must use another address when writing to some friends there because mail from that address is silently filtered out.

(because they don't know what the word gender means)

You mean definition (3a) here?

Well obviously you must be below average, since you do not know what's the difference between an average. and a median.

Well obviously you must be below average, since you do not know what's the difference between an average. and a median.

April Fools: April 1; celebrated by playing of practical jokes
Practical Joke: A mischievous trick played on a person, especially one that causes the victim to experience embarrassment, indignity, or discomfort.
Slashdotting: the specific practical joke of removing a persons website from the internet.

April Fools: April 1; celebrated by playing of practical jokes
Practical Joke: A mischievous trick played on a person, especially one that causes the victim to experience embarrassment, indignity, or discomfort.
Slashdotting: the specific practical joke of removing a persons website from the internet.

I agree.

This infact is a kitsch smorgasbord of information that's quite off-putting.

I ask to be saved from the hordes of designers who monger (only) variable text sizes as epitomes of visualization. Visualization, by it's very nature, is defined as the process of formation of a mental image. It's what's inherent to photographs and pictures amongst other entities. Surely not much of a (memorable) image being formed here.

Personally, I much rather prefer the more subtle, appropriate and to the point layout practiced by news.google.com.

YMMV of course.

I can't believe all the people that don't catch april fools

Please enlighten us as to how this qualifies as an April Fools? I doubt that that's the intention, but even if it is, by definition it still is not an April Fools:
April Fools: April 1; celebrated by playing of practical jokes
Practical Joke: A mischievous trick played on a person, especially one that causes the victim to experience embarrassment, indignity, or discomfort.

And I second the parent post in that I certainly don't see why this is put on the front-page either. These are the type of things that you don't put on the front because it's stupid. It's stupid because there's many MANY more people that have stuff (laptops,cars,cell phones) stolen. Should they all get front-page attention? I don't think so.

What WOULD be front-page material is a link to a website where you can register stolen items, with information such as MAC addresses of the network interfaces. And the website has an 'API' so you can write software to automatically scan your network for those MACs, or a program that you can run before you buy it, to see if hardware is stolen.

That would be news for nerds.

But I'm sure Michael will soon enough find out about his mistake as the submission queue gets overladen with similar stories.

(don't get me wrong, I feel sorry for the person that got all that stuff stolen. But putting on the front page, [nl]daar kan je niet aan gaan beginnen...[/nl])

I can't believe all the people that don't catch april fools

Please enlighten us as to how this qualifies as an April Fools? I doubt that that's the intention, but even if it is, by definition it still is not an April Fools:
April Fools: April 1; celebrated by playing of practical jokes
Practical Joke: A mischievous trick played on a person, especially one that causes the victim to experience embarrassment, indignity, or discomfort.

And I second the parent post in that I certainly don't see why this is put on the front-page either. These are the type of things that you don't put on the front because it's stupid. It's stupid because there's many MANY more people that have stuff (laptops,cars,cell phones) stolen. Should they all get front-page attention? I don't think so.

What WOULD be front-page material is a link to a website where you can register stolen items, with information such as MAC addresses of the network interfaces. And the website has an 'API' so you can write software to automatically scan your network for those MACs, or a program that you can run before you buy it, to see if hardware is stolen.

That would be news for nerds.

But I'm sure Michael will soon enough find out about his mistake as the submission queue gets overladen with similar stories.

(don't get me wrong, I feel sorry for the person that got all that stuff stolen. But putting on the front page, [nl]daar kan je niet aan gaan beginnen...[/nl])

I think that you mean Preposterous

show me ;)

but let's not get carried away

show me ;)

but let's not get carried away

You lack words, pedantic grasshopper.

i know i'm going to regret this in the morning...

See dear AC, there's this little thing called sarcasm.. I'd look into getting your sarcasm detector fixed

The great-grandparent post is not (only?) an example of sarcasm, it's (mainly?) an example of irony. Irony means saying the opposite of what you mean, whereas sarcasm just means using a cutting tone designed to taunt or hurt. They very often go hand in hand: you'll utter an ironic statement in a sarcastic tone, but knowing and understanding the difference *absoluetely* guarantees you the distinction of most anal pedant in the room (prepending statements with "It's interesting to note that..." also helps).

Damn you Sound and Sense, damn you to hell!

i'll just get my coat now...

i know i'm going to regret this in the morning...

See dear AC, there's this little thing called sarcasm.. I'd look into getting your sarcasm detector fixed

The great-grandparent post is not (only?) an example of sarcasm, it's (mainly?) an example of irony. Irony means saying the opposite of what you mean, whereas sarcasm just means using a cutting tone designed to taunt or hurt. They very often go hand in hand: you'll utter an ironic statement in a sarcastic tone, but knowing and understanding the difference *absoluetely* guarantees you the distinction of most anal pedant in the room (prepending statements with "It's interesting to note that..." also helps).

Damn you Sound and Sense, damn you to hell!

i'll just get my coat now...

Vote for Martian succession this winter to keep the Martian surface clean!

I agree, it's time for the current Queen of Mars to step down, and make way for the next in line in the Martian royal court.

Oh, did you mean secession? My bad.

I'm referring to the majority mindset--the one reflected by the number of +4/+5 mods and the headlines that the editors post. You seriously disagree that it isn't the majority mindset?

A majority mindset? No. A collection of popular beliefs held by vary varying people? Yes. Slashdot is a large group. Contrary to popular opinion there is quite a bit of variance of opinion here. If one were to take the highly rated posts and and headlines as a whole, one must come to the conclusion that Slashdot both loves and hates both Gnome and KDE. The "majority mindset" of Slashdot, such that it exists is amazingly conflicted. I'm glad for it, it keeps the place more interesting.

As for the articles, well, the editors post what they get and what their audience wants. Their audiance submits and wants this strange mix of things, so they post it.

The fact that my post went from +5 to +1 in 10 minutes doesn't surprise me--clearly I ticked off the majority mindset who disagreed with me, and instead of replying as you did, modded me down. Which is, of course, fascism.

Fascism? "A system of government marked by centralization of authority under a dictator, stringent socioeconomic controls, suppression of the opposition through terror and censorship, and typically a policy of belligerent nationalism and racism." Heck, even the most appropriate definition, "Oppressive, dictatorial control," suggests a dictatorship that doesn't exist. I think the worst you can realistically charge is mob-rule and group-think, dangerous possibilities of democracy.

An equally valid possibility is that the moderators genuinely believed your post wasn't worth their time for any of a wide variety of reasons. Regretably, neither one of us can really support either theory. We don't have the data.

So disregard my opinion if it doesn't apply to you--nice and clear?

followed a bit later with...

It was an example of the double-standard that Slashdot holds due to its views on the RIAA.

You're not talking about some small subset of Slashdot. You repeatedly refer to Slashdot as a singular entity. As a member of that entity (as, indeed, are you), I felt it appropriate to refute what I see as incorrect views of Slashdot.

Slashdot editors will post pro-piracy articles and claim they increase sales, thereby supporting copyright infringement. In the next breath, they will post an article criticizing some inane violation of the GPL. How can one expect people to follow one copyright scheme if they profess not following another?

Okay, accepting that there are people who might hold both ideas in their head at the same time, just a few possibilities how one can do it:

"I should be free to redistribute any content I want, whenever I want." or it's cousin "All content should be free." Well, no problems here. The whole point of the GPL is to ensure that content can be redistributed. Someone violating the GPL is attempting to stop the redistribution of content. The two ideas certainly don't conflict.

"I'm against copyright on every level." This is seemingly at odds with the GPL. However, the GPL represents a compromise. Copyright exists today. If you release software for absolutely free into the public domain, someone else can take it and turn it into a proprietary, copyright protected program. So by using the GPL you ensure that at least some things remain (basically) free in a society in which copyright exists while you work to eliminate copyright.

Ultimately, the GPL is about giving people the right to share your work. Is it so surprising that someone who feels that their work should be shared (and remain free to be shared) should want the same thing of others?

Second, stupidity has nothing to do with me being able to decipher your incorrect grammatical writing style. I've been reading peoples minds for decades.

I'll allow that you simply missed putting in the letter 'u' in fourth. Also, mulitple uses of exclamation points is permissible when a distinct point is trying to be made. Were it not then the millions of comic books, certain magazines, books, etc would be in the wrong.

I'm an AC simply because I don't feel like registering here on Slashdot.

On a side note, my father uses the words 'stets' when speaking as opposed to the word 'instead'. My mother corrects him all the time. Even after 30+ years of marriage. He wasn't born in this country but with that one exception speaks the english language fluently. What's your excuse?

American children consistently rank lower than most other children in industrialized nations of the world when it comes to schooling. In fact, on this very board various people have remarked how woefully unprepared todays children are when it comes to math and sciences.

However, people such as yourself get bent out of shape when someone tries to correct them, to improve them. Apparently it's ok to not use correct english because 'people know what I mean'.

Guess what. It's not ok. If you can't use proper english to express yourself what else are you slacking off on?

From Top 100 April Fools pranks you may get some good ideas. For instance, #10 - Planetary Alignment Dcreases Gravity could well be worth recycling this year, due to the planet alignment of recent days. #15 might have possibilities for the more prurient among you.

Ideaflood, Inc. has more than 30 patents and patent applications,
many of which were filed before the US Patent and Trademark Office
began publishing patent applications, and cover many widely used and
easily recognizable technologies that make the internet possible and
profitable. Much of Ideaflood's intellectual property is just as
central to core internet functions, but operate behind-the-scenes on
network servers and other back-end hardware and software.

Organization Name: IdeaFlood, Inc
Name: DOMAIN FOR SALE
[snip]
Record Created on........ 1999-11-05

Phooey.

Un-anonymously...

I believe you mean "licensed."

Even better, who's to say libraries should provide internet access?

As long as you are going to argue the arbitrary content banning route, I'll argue the screw it all route. My local library doesn't provide TV access for anyone to come in and watch, why should it automatically provide the internet?

http://dictionary.reference.com/search?q=flee says:

1) To run away, as from trouble or danger: fled from the house into the night.
2) To pass swiftly away; vanish: "of time fleeing beneath him" (William Faulkner).

So you agree that many doctors should have to have malpractice insurance that runs $50,000 - $100,000 a year?

Despite the so-called "tort reform," medical liability insurance premiums have NOT decreased--in fact, they've gone up.

Why is that? Because the entities pushing for the cap on damages was in fact the insurance industry. Now they have the best of both worlds: less chance of payout and more money by soaking the doctors (with the costs passed on to you!).

The problem is not runaway lawsuits, but the lack of competition in the insurance industry. There are only a handful of providers (all operating under various sub-owned entities so it seems like there are more), so the prices are unnaturally high. Were there a true competitive market, prices would go lower without the lawsuit cap.

My father died because a doctor misdiagnosed a problem with his heart. I have failed to see how my mother or I would should be allowed to sue for $X million because of that.

Suppose that your dad was was the sole provider and earned $250k/year. Now he's dead and you have 6 years left of school, then off to college. Well, you're going to sue for at least 6 years of Dad's wages ($1.5mm) to keep you in the same lifestyle/opportunity (this will probably be reduced). Obviously, you're going to sue for the cost of the botched procedure (most likely get the few thousand, no reductions). Finally, you'll sue for punitive damages; and this is the one that will be "tsked" on /. because some punk guy got 5 million because of his dad dying, when the facts of the case were that the doctor was incompetent and the hospital knew he was---but let him stay on, anyway.

Terraforming other planets is fun, but first we really need to terraform Earth. Between desertification, global warming, overfishing, pollution, habitat destruction, slash&burn traditional farming, chemically-enhanced modern farming, genetic engineering of plants, moving species between ecological niches, sooting up the polar regions in ways that reduce the planet's albedo, and a lot of other things those pesky primates have been up to, this planet is becoming significantly less Earth-like.

Ah, but by definition, one can't terraform Earth.

terraform, tr.v.
To transform (a landscape) on another planet into one having the characteristics of landscapes on Earth.

Last time I checked, Earth wasn't "another planet." However, if you are meaning terraforming in the more general sense of "man-made changes in the landscape" then, yes, we are already terraforming Earth. We are changing the composition of its atmosphere, diverting its waterways, moving its stone, and (many contend) raising its temperature.

So many people in this board are talking about how we have messed up this planet, and can't be trusted with another one. At the risk of sounding industrialist (and therefore Republican, which seems to be a bad thing on /.), why is it that people think the planet is in trouble? This hunk of rock floating out in space is hardly dying. It has survived ice ages, tectonic plate movement, floods, fires, storms, droughts, floods, and even other relatively large hunks of rock slamming into it at millions of miles an hour. Yet, through all of this, it has managed to stay a planet. And it stayed teeming with life through all of it. Absolutely teeming. Microbes live 25 miles underground in solid rock, for crying out loud, and entire ecosystems live (and thrive) in the perpetual boiling dark of undersea volcanic vents, completely cut off from other ecosystems. These are hardly what we'd call hospitable environments.

No, my friends, the planet is not in danger. Nothing we could possibly do to it will ever even make it itch a little. What is truly in danger is our way of life. What we are destroying is the ecosystem we have become accustomed to. Species die out all the time. They get replaced with new ones. This has been going on for billions of years, long before we were even a spark of tool usage in some clever chimp's head. We don't strive to save species because they are critical to the survival of this and that. We save them because we like them. If every animal on the endangered species list went extinct, would the planet really notice? Not really. Life would go on. In a few millions years, other species would arrive. We'd be pretty bummed about it, though, 'cause those white tigers are adorable.

However, if there is life on Mars (and I'm an optimist about such things) then it has existed on Mars for millions, perhaps billions, of years, evolving quite independently of Earth's life. The amount we could learn from such life is immeasureable (even if it's only in fossil form). All of Earth's life is extremely similar, from a genetic point of view. Surely we all know the old adage, "one data point doth not a trend make"? Having a second data point (Mars) would really strengthen our own understanding of ourselves, and life in general. In that sense, I think terraforming would be a great loss to the scientific community, tantamount to outlawing microscopes, or something similarly absurd (and Gary Larson-esque: I can see the man in the trenchcoat in the dark alley.... "Wanna buy a microscope?").

But I digress. Here we are arguing about whether or not we should be terraforming another planet, and we can't even manage to get a computer and a robot arm on the planet's surface reliably. Crawl before you can walk, eh? Let's work on getting hardware in orbit cheaply and reliably, and *then* we can talk about massive public works projects on other planets.

>Think about it this way -- if one or two folks go into a store and shoplift, its a problem. BUT if they get caught, they get a light sentence. Now, what if hundreds went into stores and shoplifted as if it were institutional values?

They call it shoplifting when you physically remove an item without permission.

But when you walk into my shop, and then build one beside it that is identical in every way but the title, they say it's legal and that I have to tough it out.

If I were the RIAA, I'd be asking right now, what makes it legal to steal my ideas. But I'm not.

>Theft is theft.

It is. That's why when I download albums from Kazaa, I make sure I don't delete the uploader's copy. That way it isn't theft, in any sense whatsoever. (Legal, English, and common usage). In fact, in Canada, the right to download music freely is protected by law, that's how much it isn't theft.

For reference, "stealing" appears once in the US Copyright act, used to explain the act of removing a CD/phonograph/tape/whatever from your posession and use and making it my posession. Theft doesn't appear at all.

Also, the dictionary defines theft as:

\Theft\, n. [OE. thefte, AS. [thorn]i['e]f[eth]e, [thorn][=y]f[eth]e, [thorn]e['o]f[eth]e. See Thief.] 1. (Law) The act of stealing; specifically, the felonious taking and removing of personal property, with an intent to deprive the rightful owner of the same; larceny.

Note: To constitute theft there must be a taking without the owner's consent, and it must be unlawful or felonious; every part of the property stolen must be removed, however slightly, from its former position; and it must be, at least momentarily, in the complete possession of the thief. See Larceny, and the Note under Robbery

The other definitions say the same thing, but are less clear unless you look up the used words, such as "larceny".

• In India and Persia, thin loose trowsers or drawers; in Europe and America, drawers worn at night, or a kind of nightdress with legs. [Written also paijama.]

You can't rue the day if the day hasn't happened yet.

That's exactly what it is. By definition.

ep-ic
1. An extended narrative poem in elevated or dignified language, celebrating the feats of a legendary or traditional hero.
2. A literary or dramatic composition that resembles an extended narrative poem celebrating heroic feats.
3. A series of events considered appropriate to an epic: the epic of the Old West.

From dicitonary.reference.com.

Consider: This is a dramatic composition that resembles an epic poem in content.

2) Speed of change (not 'velocity') At least Linux patches improve the product. You have the choice of not applying them, where as, not applying windows patchs means opening yourself to zillions of worms.

Are you going to argue that Windows patches don't improve the product? I mean, really, they're not that bad. WinXP SP2 (which I'm running at work) adds some useful enhancements like pop-up blocking, a better firewall, and several other real, tangible improvements. Even though it's in beta it hasn't broken any of our apps, nor has it opened us to "zillions of worms." We've never had a worm invade our network due to good perimeter security and locked-down workstations and servers.

Not all laws have the same roots. The most fundamental ones are based on a single, self-interested (some would say "selfish") code that is the basis of civilization and the benign behavior associated with civilized society.

There are two types of laws, those that are meant to restrict your behavior because you would violate the rights of others follow the Golden Rule. And, those that restrict your behavior because you would violate the beliefs of others follow the Moral Majority Rule. The laws that protect against violating the rights of others are based on the idea that you wouldn't do anything to others that you wouldn't want done to yourself. Killing, maiming, theiving and so on. This is The Golden Rule.

The laws that force others to follow your belief system are based on the idea that a particular higher power has stated things are to be done in a certain manner. If others have the misfortune of not having association with this particular higher power they must be in the minority and of little consequence. Another way to look at these types of laws is that they protect you from the beliefs of others as long as you remain the majority. This is the Moral Majority Rule.

Being almost synonymous with common sense, the laws based on The Golden Rule are not often contested, unless there's an overlap with laws based on the Moral Majority Rule. Clearly, it is advantages to be part of the majority when passing laws based on the Moral Majority Rule. However, the disadvantage is that the continuation and enforcement of laws based on the Moral Majority Rule are often susceptible to review against documents such the U.S. Constitution. If the comparison leaves the law found wanting, it is often discarded.

= 9J =

Not all laws have the same roots. The most fundamental ones are based on a single, self-interested (some would say "selfish") code that is the basis of civilization and the benign behavior associated with civilized society.

There are two types of laws, those that are meant to restrict your behavior because you would violate the rights of others follow the Golden Rule. And, those that restrict your behavior because you would violate the beliefs of others follow the Moral Majority Rule. The laws that protect against violating the rights of others are based on the idea that you wouldn't do anything to others that you wouldn't want done to yourself. Killing, maiming, theiving and so on. This is The Golden Rule.

The laws that force others to follow your belief system are based on the idea that a particular higher power has stated things are to be done in a certain manner. If others have the misfortune of not having association with this particular higher power they must be in the minority and of little consequence. Another way to look at these types of laws is that they protect you from the beliefs of others as long as you remain the majority. This is the Moral Majority Rule.

Being almost synonymous with common sense, the laws based on The Golden Rule are not often contested, unless there's an overlap with laws based on the Moral Majority Rule. Clearly, it is advantages to be part of the majority when passing laws based on the Moral Majority Rule. However, the disadvantage is that the continuation and enforcement of laws based on the Moral Majority Rule are often susceptible to review against documents such the U.S. Constitution. If the comparison leaves the law found wanting, it is often discarded.

= 9J =

My objections to gambling websites are mathematical and ethical, not moral.

I'm just curious as to what your distinction is between ethical and moral

I'm not trolling, just wondering why you find them different.

My objections to gambling websites are mathematical and ethical, not moral.

I'm just curious as to what your distinction is between ethical and moral

I'm not trolling, just wondering why you find them different.

crystal

crystalline

"crystalline forms of carbon"

crystal

crystalline

"crystalline forms of carbon"

Not trying to be a grammar Nazi, but the words mean totally opposite things.

I disagree that a homogeneous environment is better, because it's not practical. Do you never exchange documents with other organizations? Unless you can force the whole world (or at least the bits you communicate with) to use the exact same versions, you need to be able to support diversity. If you want everyone in your organization to use the same version, you can't upgrade anyone until you can upgrade everyone. Upgrades will be few and far between; painful, feared and hated.

Not trying to be a grammar Nazi, but the words mean totally opposite things.

I disagree that a homogeneous environment is better, because it's not practical. Do you never exchange documents with other organizations? Unless you can force the whole world (or at least the bits you communicate with) to use the exact same versions, you need to be able to support diversity. If you want everyone in your organization to use the same version, you can't upgrade anyone until you can upgrade everyone. Upgrades will be few and far between; painful, feared and hated.

Was this case badly reported, or did the Supreme Court just ignore the plain english used in the law?

Errrr...?

What are you talking about?

Antipodal (adj) 1. Of, relating to, or situated on the opposite side or sides of the earth: Australia and Great Britain occupy antipodal regions. 2. Diametrically opposed; exactly opposite. (source).

Yes, Australia and Britain are certainly "antipodal" given that the word refers to places that are situated on opposite sides of the earth.

Learn to use a thesaurus so people can understand you.

Are you too elistist to use an understandable synonym such as dishonest or untruthful?

Learn to use a thesaurus so people can understand you.

Are you too elistist to use an understandable synonym such as dishonest or untruthful?

One OS can be based on another with out a single line of code being copied... lets take a look at the dictionary.com definition of based>.

I like #4, "The fundamental principle or underlying concept of a system or theory; a basis"

Linux is quite similar to Unix in terms of its higher level command set (ie what a user types in to a console to say... list the contents of a directory). By building a system which is functionally similar to an existing system, you help to ease the transition from one to the other, you base your new work on old.

Another example of this would be XPde, tell me it isn't in some way based on the Windows XP GUI, I highly doubt a single line of code was copied from Windows XP into XPde.