Slashdot Mirror
Slashback: Blockage, Stripes, Upswings
Wait -- I thought we were already on the new, new, old, new, old new economy. davecb writes: "To compliment Jon's essay on the Myth of the Tech Slump, have a look at last month's cover article in The Atlantic, where computer technology is quietly changing the old-economy companies of the rust belt into something rather different: the new old economy.
The author asks (and answers) 'The great question about the surge in American productivity since 1996 is, Will it last, or is it simply a brief, blessed pop that will disappear forever when the next recession comes? That is essentially another way of asking whether the New Economy and the New Old Economy are real, or are just the Old Economy on adrenaline.'
He and I suspect it's the very opposite of a slump."
Mommy, where is my new baby brother's barcode? raincrow writes: "One of the only good things that came out of the CueCat fiasco (for me, anyway, besides the free barcode scanner and accompanying shiny coaster), was the discover of ReaderWare, which has made the management of my personal library so much better. The ReaderWare newsletter, in turn, has a lot of good tips on bar code scanners, and turned me on to Qode (http://www.qode.com/), which is a shopping system that uses a personal barcode scanner to let you set up your own shopping lists and other goodies (ReaderWare folks just like it because it can store barcodes untethered from the PC and therefore keeps you from having to lug all your books to the computer). What's interesting is that Qode.com makes a really big deal about being *anonymous*. Quoting from the site 'Note that we said anonymity, not privacy. Qode has been working to solve the problems of consumer privacy by designing a system that does not require any personal or identifying information. Qode matches promotions specifically to the products entered into the system by its anonymous users. It is impossible to connect this information to any individual. We then deliver the promotion to your private, custom web site ? not your e-mail.' Any experiences out there? I'm still looking for the holes, but that's a niftly little gadget for $50.00."
Lose mail free with Not-so-Hotmail! Just when you thought the confluence of spam (note to Hormel -- the bad kind, not your tasty meat product, which is uppercased) and email had exerted all the evil it could, the opposite proves true. Read this account on ZDnet about what happens when your mail doesn't get sent on hotmail due to hyperactive, automatic spam-prevention bots. (The "your" of course referring to people with Hotmail accounts.)
Don't they make video cards or something? Johnathon Walls writes "It seems that the sequels to The Matrix are in even more trouble as Carrie Moss ends up on crutches for six weeks due to a knee injury. This is added trouble to the previous holdups reported by Slashdot. Jet Li has also pulled out (though I'm uncertain how new this bit is)."
I was in the middle of a play-by-email game of Diplomacy when my e-mail hosting service decided to block any mail with 'diploma' in the subject. Of course they didn't notify users about the new spam filter, or the list of keywords, or provide any control over it, so it took me a while to realise. O how I laughed. My allies thought I had suddenly fallen cold with them and Turkey fell quicker than a really quick thing.
Hotmail addresses are recycled a short time after accounts are closed. Somebody else may have had the same account name before you and been less careful. Of course, it's also possible that one of your friends accidently put it on a web page somewhere, or mentioned it in a news posting, or half a dozen other things where address scrapers can pick it up.
Jet Li pulled out of the Matrix sequel a while ago. Michelle Yeoh was set to replace him, but now she has pulled out, too. Unlike Michelle Yeoh, Li's beef seems to have been the money. Yeun Woo Ping, the awesome Hong Kong kung fu choreographer who did the wire work for both the original Matrix, and Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon, also might not be back for The Matrix II. Rumor has it that the American stars are sucking up all the money from the production, leaving Woo Ping out in the cold with Jet Li. If they want to get world class Hong Kong people, they should pay them what they're worth. Hell, The Matrix was really just an appropriation of the Hong Kong action movie, with a bigger budget and better special effects. First they rip of the concept, then they won't pay the originators of the idea what they are worth.
Don't forget that Friday is Hawaiian shirt day.
Microsoft has turned into a bunch of politicians: How can you tell they're lying? Their spokesdroid's lips move.
question: is control controlled by its need to control?
answer: yes
This isn't as much "normalization" as it is "don't take so many drugs when you're designing tables."
"If Microsoft, one of the largest technology companies, can say who we send e-mail to, that really puts constraints on freedom of speech in the U.S.," said Johnson, an information technology worker at a major Illinois hospital.
It depresses me that
People this stupid exist
News services repeat such bone-headed opinions without labelling them as such
~Cederic
This is tangential, but maybe you'll find it interesting that the Feb Scientific American claims that 30% of the US GNP is based on products that make use of the principles of quantum mechanics.[1]
The high tech economy is here to stay; just don't confuse "high tech economy" with ill-conceived e-commerce scams^w schemes.
(I'm sure e-commerce is here to stay too, but most of what exists now is based on hype rather than utility, and will be eroded away before the real e-economy settles in. Not to imply that you didn't already know that.)
[1] Of course, all products use quantum mechanics at some level. The claim was refering to direct uses, such as lasers, transistors, superconduction, etc.
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Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade