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In the US, we have chosen a system where the strong get stronger, and corruptly use that strength to crush rivals. Paying off legislators, dumping product below cost, price-fixing, cannabalizing, all have the effect of destroying competition and limiting choice for you and I. Make no mistake, this is why M$ is so strong. They have destroyed countless businesses and lives by bulldozing competitive balance, with their radical self-interest.

About half the population instinctively hews to the strongest --in any struggle-- simply because they look like they're going to win. This is anti-progress and anti-intellectual, but has been the case since the beginning of time.

So, let's do the math and see what happens: M$ continues to grow and destroy competitors (Real, Oracle, Ericsson, Nintendo), until M$ is our only source for software, computers, phones, gameboxen, internet, news, etc. One provider for everything. Do you think they'll care about you, then? What if you object to their billing? They cut you off and you're dead. Now we are actually patenting nature's genes, and patenting general business processes?! Mathematically, the only environment that can result from our current business climate, is a single provider for everything, and only two classes: royalty and peasant, the complete opposite of what The Party would have us believe. Which class will you be in? If your house is not presently in the top 5% of your city, guess what? Do you think that they're going to make you rich, if you support them? Has your position actually improved in the past three years, or did they screw you?

So tell me now: how can monopolies possibly be a good thing? What's wrong with treating Winduhs like a utility, which must be overseen in the public interest, given that it is unbiquitous? Some act like there'll be a giant bureaucracy to do this, but have a look at the first chart in this article.

No, look at it carefully. ZERO private-sector jobs in February, and 21,000 government jobs, after three years of Bush "economics"!! And as a bonus, we slingshot from a $350bb surplus, to an historic $550bb deficit in just three years!! This is the opposite of what you promised us!! We've been not only robbed & raped by these dirty-tricksters, but insulted as well. We know where the money really goes.

Until these conservatives can actually run an economy without stealing our Treasury, they should shutTF up. I call on all Party members to exercise some of that 'personal responsibility', and write a nice fat check today to the U.S. Treasury, to help cover our childrens' new debt.

And from now on, insults, smears, and ridicule, will be met with the same. We're learning your nasty tricks.

The US Patent and Trademark Office has invalidated Eolas' patent covering plug-ins! Back to your regularly scheduled discussion.

Look, Microsoft causes cancer!

Wrong, it's IBM that causes cancer.

SCOX share prices are taking a hit today, down almost 12% as of twenty minutes ago. It's a good thing the SCO executives have been bailing out when they have. They really could have taken a hit today.

You'd think they planned that or something!

I love the headline of the Reuters article. It keys in on SCO strategy: no business plan, no propsects, no problem! We'll steal from, er, sue somebody!

Where are the defenders of all Haitians now?

A little busy at the moment.....

"In other news, the rovers are beginning to experience power supply problems due to the accumulation of dust on their solar panels"

This makes things sound worse than they actually are. They are not beginning to experience power supply problems -- they are simply getting less power than they were when it first landed, and they are taking some steps to operate more efficiently.

From SpaceFlightNow, in the report for THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 26, 2004 2215 GMT (5:15 p.m. EST):

"The amount of power Opportunity is able to generate continues to dwindle due to the decreasing amount of sunlight (energy) reaching the solar panels during the Martian seasonal transition to winter."

From the Reuters report:

"NASA's two robotic rovers on Mars have begun scaling back their working hours as the approach of autumn on the Red Planet and dust on their solar panels slowly chokes off their power supplies, a NASA official said on Friday."

What the NASA official (Richard Cook) actually said was: "The vehicle is continuing to perform fine but we are starting to modify our daily process to respond to the decreasing power."

Both the dust accumulation and the decrease of sunlight were anticipated. The lifetime (designed to be 90 days) of each Rover is determined when the batteries can no longer be charged enough to survive the cold nights. Spirit is already 54 days into its 90-day "death sentence".

I guess the implication is that the proper thing Intel should have done is develop its own set of 64-bit extensions, making it absolutely incompatible with AMD's offering.

The Area 51 talk is ok as long as it doesn't get too heavy into the black choppers that don't go whup, whup whup... in the night.

First, since he US Government controls vast areas of Nevada's innards, attributing any Sci/Tech weirdness in Nevada directly to Area 51 adds fuel to the disingenuousness which obfuscates rational UFO discussions.

As a near lifer Vegas resident who has been on extensive adventures in Nevada, I've seen many an unusual light in the sky which defied easy explanation, and several contrails in the air that were extraordinary, but it is wise to allow Occam's Razor to rule the day. Simply, the government tests new and secret projects extensively out in dem dere hills pardner. Get used to it, don't go overboard with alien absurdities.

from the RJ Article (hyperlinks added):

Friday's cloudy weather made Bill O'Donnell (M.S., UNLV, 1995. Electrical Engineering Electrical gizmo builder for the Physics Dept) doubt the theory of static interference...

"Solar flares can produce and eject large numbers of charge particles, and usually the Earth's magnetic field deflects them before they enter the atmosphere," said chemistry and physics Professor Malcolm Nicol (Visiting Professor of Physics and Chemistry, Executive Director, UNLV High Pressure Sciences and Engineering Center )..."But if they are very large, they have been known to destroy the electronics systems in satellites and cause other problems down here."

This sort of rules out known natural causes, but the dense cloud cover may have been reflecting electronic game playing up and over the intervening mountains and down into the Las Vegas valley.

from the RJ Article (hyperlinks added):

Paul Oei, an electronics engineer with the Los Angeles office of the FCC, said keyless entry systems operate on unlicensed frequencies. The devices can fail when they are near an antenna emitting high radio frequency energy...

he recalled hearing about an incident years ago in which garage-door openers stopped working in an area when Air Force One was nearby.

"Who knows what the military could be using at any given time?" he said.

Yes, who knows...but Mr. Bush's millstone in the War on Terrorism's hypocrisy as he stumbles into complexity, Pervez Musharraf, may have stymied an assasination attempt with a device similar to this.

from the RJ Article (hyperlinks added):

John Pike, director of globalsecurity.org ...said military technology could easily be responsible for Friday's phenomenon. One such operation is jamming, which involves the release of electromagnetic energy to interfere with an enemy's radar detection capability...

Pike noted that particularly in Nevada, the military has a number of unacknowledged programs in jamming and radar and high-powered microwave weapons...

"The military is certainly capable of fibbing about these things," Pike said. "But, for the military to have done it, they would have to have seriously miscalculated the effects of some test."

Pike makes it sound like the chances of the government seriousl

I thought it was more like seven trillion.

That's not the way things work in the US, nor are they likely to either even if the real-life Islamist fanatics succeed in killing more of Congress with a plane, or maybe nuke Washinton. There is a line of succession for the Presidency that makes it difficult at best to take out everyone. The Governors can typically appoint temporary representatives to Congress. The Army doesn't have any large force near Washington DC. The major military unit that could control Washington DC is the National Guard, which is very much comprised of citizen soldiers and under civilian control. The entire armed forces of the United States are too small by far to enact martial law even if they wanted to do so. More than half of the total armed forces are controlled by the governors of the states in the form of the National Guard. A large portion of the regular armed forces is out of the country at any given time making the National Guard the most powerful combat force on the continent. The Governors would raise hell if the Army tried to tell them what to do. Congress is working on legislation for emergency, speedy elections in the event of mass casualties in Congress. The scenario suggested is nonsense.

Although The Handmaid's Tale is often called Science Fiction, I think it is closer to the truth to refer to it as fantasy. More specifically it is a wacko leftist fantasy regarding a bogeyman version of a "Christian right" that doesn't exist in any meaningful way. (There might be a handful of people out there whose beliefs are so far removed from orthodox Christian belief that they could want a society like that, but good grief, even the Libertarians have to outnumber them by at least 200:1. Is anyone worried about a Libertarian takeover? How about Muppet fascism? )

Or, "I like speed!"

So let me get this right: Some guys in BFE clone human stem cells. Ok, fine. Gotcha. Meanwhile, the head of the IAEA is warning that the "World May Be Headed for Nuclear Destruction" because of the proliferation of nukes by Pakistan and North Korea.

Someone remind me please why it is that I should give a rat's ass about cloning, whether it's Joe Blow's stem cells or Adolf Hitler's own gametes? Cuz I just fail to see the significane of this at all, really.

I heard yesterday on NPR that in Iraq, the only jobs are as policemen. That all the fertilizer factories and other businesses are closed. This is a reality, that cannot be appreciated in the Corporate Bubble. Now, if Rummy really had the best interests of Iraq in mind, they'd concentrate on finding those former business owners, and get them set back up! You cannot have a country, without an economy; but that's exactly what we've given them. Iraqi business owners are not the idea though. Nope, the plan has always been:
- Invade Iraq to assuage Bush Sr's embarrassment for not taking Bagdad in the first Gulf War;
- Taxpayers foot the massive war costs ('they can afford it...');
- U.S. companies directly connected with the Party, get no-bid contracts and reap the revenue from rebuilding Iraq, with oil paying for it (hopefully);
- Taxpayers, unfortunately, not reimbursed.

Trouble is, Shi'ites are in the majority, and any election would stupidly create another Iran. Foolish. Clearly, none of this was thought out by the Bush Admin II. It's a quagmire... a tarbaby. And today we discover that Afganistan has been greatly increasing its opium poppy regions. Well, that's just great... is there anything else Bush can do to destroy civilization as we know it? Oh yeah, deforestation, park drilling, drift-netting, Kyoto-bashing, etc.

Lately you may have noticed that the White House is 'in disarray'. In the past few weeks Bush has proposed hydrogen cars, men-to-Mars, Segways-for-the poor, etc, all costing masses of money. (NASA says they weren't consulted -um-, and that it's far cheaper and safer to just go straight to Mars, without stopping at the Moon)
Dubya asks for more money for defense, oil, and others who do not need it comparatively, while 'phasing out senior citizens' with the recent Medicare overhaul, and cutting thousands out of education programs.

The objective fact is, the Bush Admin II has managed to ruin our country's economy with their radical self-interest, in three short years. We have slingshotted from a $350bb surplus, to a $550bb deficit, solely due to the Party's spending and spending and spending. An historic budget deficit, and we know that another Iraq request for $45bb is waiting for elections to be over, in addition to the astounding, unprecedented Defense budget. 9/11? We're told that cost only $79bb. So, where's the other TRILLION or so, Dick? (And WTF are you blasting under your house, Dick? Who's paying for your new underground office, in your real house, Dick?)

Can anyone tell me why we still have a Navy? To "project power"? When missiles, long-range bombers, C5's, and in-flight fueling exist? Which are far faster? Aircraft carriers were proven obsolete in Pearl Harbor. (indeed any large, slow, expensive weapon is obsolete) We have a whole service branch that's not needed... and ties men up in isolated, cramped quarters for months. (These ideas proposed here for the first time) But the real problem that needs to be addressed is inertia. Gore started this with his Streamlining Govt initiative.

Repubs seem to cronically do the complete opposite of what they say they will: they spend money profligately; restrict civil freedoms; and dampen competition! No reasonable person could look at this chart and fail to see a pattern of thieving, over the past 30 years. We would be so much better off without this hidden corruption, being able to afford universal healthcare and Euro-style free university, were it not for special interests emptying our Treasury with Dubya's $1.3 TRILLION tax cut. Reagan's tax cuts didn't work to "stimulate the economy" (in fact caused a major oil and real estate crash, which average taxpayers had to pay for... opposed to beneficiaries of the tax cuts), and there

I heard yesterday on NPR that in Iraq, the only jobs are as policemen. That all the fertilizer factories and other businesses are closed. This is a reality, that cannot be appreciated in the Corporate Bubble. Now, if Rummy really had the best interests of Iraq in mind, they'd concentrate on finding those former business owners, and get them set back up! You cannot have a country, without an economy; but that's exactly what we've given them. Iraqi business owners are not the idea though. Nope, the plan has always been:
- Invade Iraq to assuage Bush Sr's embarrassment for not taking Bagdad in the first Gulf War;
- Taxpayers foot the massive war costs ('they can afford it...');
- U.S. companies directly connected with the Party, get no-bid contracts and reap the revenue from rebuilding Iraq, with oil paying for it (hopefully);
- Taxpayers, unfortunately, not reimbursed.

Trouble is, Shi'ites are in the majority, and any election would stupidly create another Iran. Foolish. Clearly, none of this was thought out by the Bush Admin II. It's a quagmire... a tarbaby. And today we discover that Afganistan has been greatly increasing its opium poppy regions. Well, that's just great... is there anything else Bush can do to destroy civilization as we know it? Oh yeah, deforestation, park drilling, drift-netting, Kyoto-bashing, etc.

Lately you may have noticed that the White House is 'in disarray'. In the past few weeks Bush has proposed hydrogen cars, men-to-Mars, Segways-for-the poor, etc, all costing masses of money. (NASA says they weren't consulted -um-, and that it's far cheaper and safer to just go straight to Mars, without stopping at the Moon)
Dubya asks for more money for defense, oil, and others who do not need it comparatively, while 'phasing out senior citizens' with the recent Medicare overhaul, and cutting thousands out of education programs.

The objective fact is, the Bush Admin II has managed to ruin our country's economy with their radical self-interest, in three short years. We have slingshotted from a $350bb surplus, to a $550bb deficit, solely due to the Party's spending and spending and spending. An historic budget deficit, and we know that another Iraq request for $45bb is waiting for elections to be over, in addition to the astounding, unprecedented Defense budget. 9/11? We're told that cost only $79bb. So, where's the other TRILLION or so, Dick? (And WTF are you blasting under your house, Dick? Who's paying for your new underground office, in your real house, Dick?)

Can anyone tell me why we still have a Navy? To "project power"? When missiles, long-range bombers, C5's, and in-flight fueling exist? Which are far faster? Aircraft carriers were proven obsolete in Pearl Harbor. (indeed any large, slow, expensive weapon is obsolete) We have a whole service branch that's not needed... and ties men up in isolated, cramped quarters for months. (These ideas proposed here for the first time) But the real problem that needs to be addressed is inertia. Gore started this with his Streamlining Govt initiative.

Repubs seem to cronically do the complete opposite of what they say they will: they spend money profligately; restrict civil freedoms; and dampen competition! No reasonable person could look at this chart and fail to see a pattern of thieving, over the past 30 years. We would be so much better off without this hidden corruption, being able to afford universal healthcare and Euro-style free university, were it not for special interests emptying our Treasury with Dubya's $1.3 TRILLION tax cut. Reagan's tax cuts didn't work to "stimulate the economy" (in fact caused a major oil and real estate crash, which average taxpayers had to pay for... opposed to beneficiaries of the tax cuts), and there

a new system for tracking individuals based on their electronic presence.

My god. Not only do they tip up the U.S. Treasury and shake it empty, but they also want to track everyone as we try find a job? Double-plus ungood.

Any remaining Party members should have a look at this. We have been raped and robbed, repeatedly, and we should start publicizing it, and see to ars publicum, as they have seen to their radical self-interest, for so long.

{foil hat}
This in mind, I offer a deeply cynical view of this Senate ricin episode:
- In 2001 several middle-left congressmen and newspeople were targeted with anthrax, which was truly deadly because it was extremely fine and it had a special exotic treatment on each particle to cause it to fly airborne. It could even pass through the pores in an envelope.
- Now "gray granules" of ricin are found in envelopes to conservatives.
- Only an idiot would think granules would be a real threat. The kind of idiot who would leave fingerprints on the envelope and DNA in the glue, which is not the case here.
- U.S. Gen Tommy Franks recently said that the Constitution "may have to be suspended if there's another major terrorist attack".
- Some are concerned that the 2008 elections may be suspended on grounds of national security; but hopefully it won't be the 2004 elections instead? If Kerry or Edwards is too strong?
- With the blame made this time on 'linux hippies?
{/foil hat}

a new system for tracking individuals based on their electronic presence.

My god. Not only do they tip up the U.S. Treasury and shake it empty, but they also want to track everyone as we try find a job? Double-plus ungood.

Any remaining Party members should have a look at this. We have been raped and robbed, repeatedly, and we should start publicizing it, and see to ars publicum, as they have seen to their radical self-interest, for so long.

{foil hat}
This in mind, I offer a deeply cynical view of this Senate ricin episode:
- In 2001 several middle-left congressmen and newspeople were targeted with anthrax, which was truly deadly because it was extremely fine and it had a special exotic treatment on each particle to cause it to fly airborne. It could even pass through the pores in an envelope.
- Now "gray granules" of ricin are found in envelopes to conservatives.
- Only an idiot would think granules would be a real threat. The kind of idiot who would leave fingerprints on the envelope and DNA in the glue, which is not the case here.
- U.S. Gen Tommy Franks recently said that the Constitution "may have to be suspended if there's another major terrorist attack".
- Some are concerned that the 2008 elections may be suspended on grounds of national security; but hopefully it won't be the 2004 elections instead? If Kerry or Edwards is too strong?
- With the blame made this time on 'linux hippies?
{/foil hat}

At what point do we decide that we've done our best to look for it, but that life just never existed on Mars?

Probably whenever we decide that we've done our best to look for it, but that life just never existed on Mars.

Seriously, what did you think the point of the article was? They looked at what they'd done so far, decided that they hadn't done their best yet, decided what else they needed to do to have done their best, and then made a pretty little graphic to illustrate it for us.

Reuters' visual description of MyDoom has some things wrong...

According to the Reuter's graphic attached to the article, it's actually SGO not SCO. Did the poster even read _all_ the article? :p

So. Maybe the DDoS is the primary purpose of this? MyDoom.B is ready to hit microsoft.com on Tuesday.

While this could concievably just be a negotiating tactic by Pixar, it's more likely to be a simple case of Disney needing Pixar more than Pixar needed Disney.

Meep

Imagine the fun you could have adding these marks to documents that are typically scanned.

...pictures two students taking SAT's. First student goes to the restroom, second student adds circular marks to first students SAT paper.

Really though, the ability to create anti-copy documents would be kind of interesting. I wonder is someone like Reuters or Associated Press has considered using this to control distribution of their photos. They can give out a copy with the marks, but in order to use it, they need one without the marks.

Jim

From what I can tell, it's just a rebranded version of MSN Messenger. Same shit, different wrapping.

Reuters Messaging. Specifically designed for the corporate user, with encryption, logging, resilience, etc etc.

I remember a little bit ago when microsoft reported that xbox sales where greater then gamecube sales for the last two weeks in december. I find it amusing that in the IGN interview Perrin seems to agree with this statement, it's because a lot of the retailers didn't have any more left!

So congress doesn't have to worry about deficit spending as much... Do away with funding complete crap like that.

"You always want the (strategic) high ground," U.S. Republican Sen. Sam Brownback of Kansas, chairman of the Senate commerce subcommittee on science, technology and space, told Reuters. Such thinking echoed a key aim of the 1960s U.S. space race against the Soviet Union.

[snip]

U.S. security officials have said military dominance in space was essential, especially following China's first manned space flight last year. NASA's 2003 strategic plan says the agency's mission was widened to include the Pentagon's space effort.

I wouldn't put it past this administration to develop some sort of "Homeworld Security Agency".

...rather strange all that is happening!

IBM Sells Computer Using AMD Chip to Bristol-Myers
Wed January 14, 2004 01:02 AM ET

Cheers!

12 year-old named Lim's "love affair with the fantasy game [Lineage] saw him fall foul of the law after he stole $16,000 from his father and ran away to feed a passion for online gaming

In another news, South Korea's credit card crisis worsens. But these maybe unrelated...

It matters because it's a question of degrees.

It used to cost more in time and money to go to FISA, so marginal cases were discouraged. But no need to bother with that anymore -- with the (blanket, mass-produced) National Security Letter (implemented December, 03), they've endowed law enforcement with all the powers of the Stazi. These are historic, unprecedented, regressive, repressive, changes to our government. Congratulations, to The Party and our corrupt Congress.

To those who would depend on encryption, yes I use it as a matter of course as well, but if outlawed (the very next step), no dice.

I'm surprised that the twenty-somethings here just do not think you can effect any change whatsoever, and adopt a defensive posture. Concentrating on avoidance, rather than repair. That just does not work; if you run, it activates a pursuit reflex (as in wolves), and things get exponentially worse for you. It's the world that you're inheriting, you know. Maybe you just don't appreciate what regimes of the past were like... it's the only answer I can think of for this cultural apathy.

You have to speak out, rationally and clearly, especially when you're in a crowd hostile to your ideas. That's when you have the most effect, because at least half the people in that crowd are uncertain. Yeah, it's harder, but just bitching among friends does absolutely fscking nothing.

The corollary to this, as Noam Chomsky says, is that free speech means allowing precisely that speech which you abhor, at the time you abhor it.

Understand that ALL messages of importance are directed to the 20% of the population which is politically participating. EVERYthing else (sitcoms, sports, shopping hysteria, etc) are just to keep that other 80% from thinking about important matters... to keep them busy. (mooo)

Will the 2004 elections be suspended? I doubt it, but I also doubt that we'll see 2008 elections since Gen. Tommy Franks feels that another major terrorist attack would require suspension of the Constitution. (Why hasn't this guy been arrested for treason?!)

It looks to me like everybody is pretty much blissfully happy with the general state of affairs, and that the people in the military rank and file are just about as loyal and satisfied as any military organization has ever been in history.

Really? Is that what you think? Do a search on suicides by US soldiers in this Iraq conflict, and get a shock.

[FatBastard temporarily removes tinfoil hat...]

1.
a) Jose Padilla still being held. This was the first one that came up with a Google of "Padilla held". Then there are the US, British and Australian citizens still being held at Guantanamo Bay.

b) State department death: John Kokal
There was also one about a state deparment intelligence agent found shot, that looked like a suicide, but I have not been able to relocate it, sorry. I think it was on cursor.org.

2. The vote recount was stopped by the Supreme Court. I just find that astonishing.

3. The context of the thread got lost. I was using European units because a European commented about the price of petrol there already being $5/gal. I was trying to illustrate why $5/gal gasoline here in the states would be devastating to the economy. I also consider myself a Libertarian but, at the moment, there is no Libertarian party, so I'll vote for the lesser of the two evils.

4. I have been paying attention. Coal plants today can be very clean, but they still spew thousands of tons of CO2 into the atmosphere. And Bush just repealed parts of the clean air act so they don't even have to scrub for mercury.
Nuclear is very clean, and I'd be happy to have far more Nuclear plants then we currently do. But this just supports my contention that the Oil Patch Gang would much rather keep making loads of money on oil and using oil as a pretext for empire building.
Case in point: a Sea Wolf class submarine has a 50 Megawatt nuclear power plant (enough to power 25,000 homes) and doesn't need to be refueled for the life of the vessel (20-30 years depending on who you believe).
A renewable-energy/hydrogen transport economy can provide us with all the energy we need.
Being less idealistic and more pragmatic - The United States could provide all it's energy needs domestically - if it really WANTED to - build more nuclear, build/retrofit more clean burning coal, build a few Boeing solar power towers in Nevada, Arizona, and Texas. Migrate transportation to hybrid gas/electri, turbo diesel/electric and then to hydrogen over the next 15 years.
That's my point. That's what we should be doing now. The Clinton administration at least left us more or less pointing in the direction.

This just in: U.S. Oil Imports Set Record in 2003: 63%, Trend Seen Up

5. The American system of government is one of the best, if not the best in the world. At least it was four years ago. Again, just because we lean Libertarian doesn't mean we should sit on our colective thumbs waiting for the Libertarian party to spring out of the Ether or Dark Matter or whatever we're calling it today. :-)
This administration is the absolute _worst_ administration the United States has ever had. Period. We need somebody else, anybody else, come November. If things remain the same after that, well then I may seriously begin to despair and have to move to Costa Rica.

Regards,
johnny selfish-meme seed

Perhaps it's a sign of the times, but the first thing I thought of while seeing the presentation of Sonys' new humanoid robot, is seeing them swarming a city, armed with miniguns. They are nimble and fast, and could probably be trained to leech off the enemy's power grid while overrunning the place.

Anyhow, robotic dog? Stupid, absolutely stupid. Legs are the most unstable mode of transportation. Give it some wheels or treads, then it won't cost millions in R&D to just get the thing working.

"Keep your crappy beaver pelts, shells, pine cones, or whatever the fuck you use for currency."

Oh that's rich. How much less is the dollar worth today?

from here:

"The dollar fell broadly on Tuesday to a new record low against the euro and to multiyear lows against other currencies while stabilizing against the yen, aided by suspected yen-selling intervention.

The dollar plummeted to a fresh 11-year low against the British pound and fell to its lowest level in nearly eight years against a basket of currencies under the weight of persistent concerns about the U.S. current account deficit and expectations of continued low U.S. interest rates."

I've toyed with the idea of getting a mac until I read this. Why would I want one of these? And what's with the ipod battery thing?

Looks like michael achieved the very difficult simultaneous posted/rejected duo.

Here's the rejected post which amounts to a mixed report on the success of the mission, courtesy of Reuters, Space.com and the BBC:

Reuters and the BBC report that the first U.S. Mars Rover - the Spirit - has landed and radioed a confirmation signal, but has since gone silent. NASA/JPL are waiting to learn if it survived. Space.com reports that the Spirit has indeed landed safely.

FedEx is mentioned in the original question. I thought it was interesting that they just bought Kinkos (the copy company, not the clown) for 2.4 gigabucks.

It would be easy for FedEx to sit on its laurels and continue to scrape more bucks out of the traditional shipping market. This purchase, while risky, shows that they've got management that can think outside the box. Granted, UPS is a step ahead with their UPS Store locations (formerly Mail Boxes Etc.). But as several articles have already pointed out (see Google News), FedEx may now be positioned to remain relevant even if the traditional "send a document for $10 bucks" business model goes away.

Back to the poster's original question, "which internet business models they believe are going to succeed?" If I knew, I would be rich, but it's clear that the winners will be those with the smarts to extend their "business models" like the FedEx example -- as opposed to either too-slow companies like Commodore (Atari, too), or all-you-can-eat monsters like Tyco.

Who is responsible for Libya opening? The US!

I do believe the Brits had something to do with that endeavour.

Yeah, the Taliban is still in power, right? Wrong. Osama may not be captured, but for all we know he could already be dead. Either way, we took away from al Qaida a large source of security and funding - the Afghan government.

we went to war for the oil

Really? My gas prices haven't improved. Iraqi oil being sold on the open market isn't going into a US account - it's being used to improve the Iraqi infrastructure. And US taxpayer money is being used to get refineries updated and back online.

we went to war because the current administration has been unable to resolve domestic issues such as increasing poverty, decreasing employment, and corporations that have destroyed the economy to enrich a few people.

Have you even seen the news lately?

Stocks End First Positive Year Since 1999

New Jobless Claims Lowest of Bush Tenure

You might want to find a new source for the conspiracy theories.

In other news today...
Anti-Spam Suit Dismissed; AOL May Re-File

However, "firm commitments" by donor countries meeting in London this week was only in the range of US$700 million, said Nigel Roberts, World Bank's representative to the West Bank and Gaza.

He said US$1.1 billion would "maintain the very basic level of equilibrium in the economy."

Donors disbursed US$930 million in 2001, and just over a billion dollars in 2002, Roberts said. "Given the trends, this very high level of foreign assistance is roughly US$300 per capita, which on a sustained basis is the highest in any country in the world, in a developing country situation," he told a news conference.

"what's a NORAD to do?"

Considering their apparent excess in personnel, budget, and equipment, I'd say their talents could be put to better use elsewhere.

In another news to retailiate against the outsourcing backlash from US India has decided to ban US companies from selling cellphone equipment/chips/software in their market, which is expected to reach 100 million in next two years (another url says The user base is growing at about two million a month and is expected to cross 100 million by 2005.)(US market is about 110 million for comparison) and 500 million by the end of the decade. . Similar huge numbers are expected for PC and car markets. Also, they have decided to ban the cars companies like GM, ford and other US companies like Mcdonalds, Pepsi,coke and Hoolywod movies etc. from selling in India. The govt. of India said that the local people are losing jobs because of this trade.
P.S. in case you are clueless this story is made up. I just wanted to make a point that trade is benefitial to both US and India. So, it is stupid to put barriers against outsourcing/trade etc.

According to the linked BBC article, everyone except the EU is backing Japan.

On the other hand, Reuters says that China and Russia are backing France.

Anybody know which is accurate?

European sources close to the talks said the United States and South Korea were in favor of Rokkasho, a remote fishing village in northern Japan.

Russia and China were said to back the European Union's site in Cadarache, near the Mediterranean port city of Marseille.

Reuters coverage of this story is here

Sig
-- Compare war time president's military record (www.awolbush.com) with Wesley Clark's (Wesley Clark's Army Career)

Oh, you're all going to love this!

Free Willy died -- now if you trolls don't come up with some VERY clever trolls in the next FreeBSD post, I'll be sorely disappointed.

Remember: we're all counting on you!!

Gee, thanks, U.N.! Tomorrow they'll tell us "Oh, we figured it out! Let's just wait for low-tech countries to use the web, since when they need web pages in their language, they'll create them!"

This ought to rankle you more: "Sara Kyofuna, a spokeswoman for the group that is looking for a donation of a million PCs for the continent's classrooms, said open source software is too complicated for some schools to run, and, if something goes wrong, there are no support staff."

Of course, Slashdot noted all kinds of support systems, including the technology community, that top the centralized, paid-only tech support that boys like Ballmer provide.

Link