Slashdot Mirror
"Time-Traveler" Busted For Insider Trading
Chester sent in a story that has been making the rounds for a bit, but if you haven't bumped into it, "Yahoo! TV came up with this weird story about a guy who caught police's attention by gaining $350 million from mere $800 in two weeks. The twisted part is that he justifies his knowledge about stocks by saying he is a time-traveler from year 2256!"
This is an interesting story, and there are several things we
should note about it. First of all, it's posted in the
"Entertainment News & Gossip" section of Yahoo! TV. That should
be a fairly big give away. Second this guy allegedly got
arrested January 28th, yet no major news outlet has picked the
story up.
With those pieces of information let's look at the story. The
story claims this guy made $350 million dollars in two weeks
with only an $800 dollar investment by making 126 high-risk
trades. It also alleges that he came out a winner every time.
The article then leads you to believe the SEC thinks it's
insider trading and that his story about being from the future
is obviously false. Yet any person with reasonable intelligence
will realize that even with insider information, there is no way
someone could make 126 "high-risk" trades and come out on top
every time. To have a record that perfect someone would need
foreknowledge.
The article appears to be trying to persuade us that the man had
insider knowledge, yet when you evaluate the story at face
value you walk away thinking "no way, insider information isn't
*that* good. He *must* be from the future".
The major problems with this story though lie in the basic
facts:
1. There is no Andrew Carlssin being investigated by the SEC
2. The SEC does not have police powers and cannot arrest people
3. The alleged high risk trades didn't take place
4. There is in fact no record of *any* of the events mentioned
I could go on and on, however there is absolutely no solid
factual information to back this story up. I saw this article a
few days before April 1st, so I thought it was some type of
elaborate April fools day joke, but I wanted to put it to rest
once and for all, so I called the SEC Public Relations office.
They said the article is completely made up and has no basis in
fact. It's not even based on an actual investigation.
Of course we knew all this because this story is posted in the
"Gossip" section though.
Doug Tolton
"The destruction of a value which is, will not bring value to that which isn't." -John Galt
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,630-627115 ,00.html
"The SEC has never heard of Carlssin, and several "facts" are plainly untrue. "
...I thought it was a funny story ... damn there is a lot of lag on slashdot lately...
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
or is slashdot getting really slow at the news these days? Lockergnome had this bit last month
Newsie, Moderator, www.tauniverse.com
It seems you'd need multiple sources to make $800 in $350M in that short of a time...
Sometimes, schizophrenic paranoid mania might actually be useful.
I prefer becoming filthy rich through more conventional means... like "accidents" involving rich relatives and innocuous-looking poisonous mushrooms... mmm... MONEY...
The Weekly World News will continue to follow this story as it unfolds. Keep watching for further developments.
This time traveller story was originally written by a satirical news site. If I remember correctly, yahoo news mistook it as factual... As did slashdot!
- A real programmer uses $ cat > a.out
Weekley World News is a tabloid.. like those who say Elvis is alive and working at Microsoft!
-- Note: These Comments are Generated by ME! Not You! ME!
...and it was rejected. Good thing too. It's a bogus story.
He's stuck here unless he can generate 1.21 jigawatts of electricity.
This is a "news" article from the , a US Supermarket tabloid. Its also several weeks old.
As I've not seen this story carried by any other media outlet, I find the accuracy a little suspect.
This is a hoax made up by the Weekly World News, an Internet-based newspaper that's only slightly less factual and sleazier than the National Enquirer. Please see the
Today must have been a really slow newsday for Slashdot.
"We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars." - Oscar Wilde
I can't believe that Slashdot fell for this old tabloid rag story. Oh wait, yes I can. This is perfect Slashdot material.
First came the twinkie defense, then the PMS defense, now the time traveler defense. If he is really from the future at least he knows his hare-brained excuse will wirk, or else he really wants to investigate the inner workings of out current penal and judicial systems.
...because I could swear today is April 17th, not April 1st.
Ask him to return the money and send him on his way.
Page 5 is the only place to get the really important Weekly World News
You shank my Jengaship!
i haven't figured out how anyone could have even thought of this as being true since it says 'thanks to the weekly world news' at the bottom of the article...
must be a sloooowww news day
Hey wait a minute... It's April 17, not April 1. HUH!?!?!?
While very high in entertainment value, if you start posting stories from Weekly World News we're in for a ride. These are the people that are also reporting that Saddam made a gay porn film in 1968 in which his "acting" almost moved the reviewer to tears.
My favorite was the sex, liquor and drugs diet I saw about this time last year in WWN.
The best way to do is to be.
slashdot has become a tabloid. I heard about this 3 weeks ago, and after researching it, it came from a skeezy tabloid. I guess it is news for nerds though. would be afully cool to time travel and take advantage of that.
Theonlyuse of monkeys is to testthings onthem.Some peoplemay say"Hey That'scruel!"and myresponse is"I don't like monkeys
I want to mail this guy and find out which horse comes in first this Tuesday in the 8th at Churchill Downs.
Trolling is a art,
Check your sources people.. This one comes from the Weekly World News. Surely the same credible news source that gave us Batboy and the visage of Satan over the New Mexico desert.
/. news today:
In other
Bill Gates takes over kernel 2.5 maintenance: said to have 'Great Plans' for Linux
The Detroit Big 3 pull their SUV line and produce feul-efficient cars
and George Bush admits he cannot read on a fourth-grade level
Perhaps we can get slashboxes for the Weekly World News, and the Enquirer!
Maybe Taco can call them a 'Plum' too!
I can't think of anything that typifies Slashdot better than posting a four-week old article from the Weekly World News.
If it ain't broke, you need more software.
This is a story from a tabloid. They also have stories about the Bat kid, etc. I mean ... gosh ... chester and cmdr taco need to get a life.
Even if he wasn't lying, even if this wasn't the Weekly World News...
He should still be busted. Stock gains through timetravel would be unethical for the same reason insider trading is illegal.
From the Weekly World News. Surprised it wasn't Batboy making all this money.
comical ali told me that he travelled from the future with this man. the plan was to create enough wealth to defeat the american infidels, but dubya started the war too soon. hence the plan failed.
you too can send ridiculous lies to your friends with comical ali's help at http://www.yourcomicalali.com/
A) This is old news.
B) It's a Weekly World News story.
C) You missed April Fool's by over two weeks.
D) You're stupid.
This is a hoax. It is "making-the-rounds" as fact, but it is, as anyone that reads the article and isn't stupid immediately realizes, fake. It's from the Weekly World News. It even says it's from the Weekly World News right there at the bottom!
/. story about Bat Boy fighting in Iraq?
What's next, a front page
It's cute, and would have been a great story, oh, say, 16 days ago. What the hell is it doing on the front page today? Did Taco strike an advertising deal with the Weekly World News?
-Ryan, with the unoriginal sig
At least they posted this as a Humor post.
Must be a very slow news day indeed.
The story is obviously bogus, and it's painfully clear to anyone just based on the "$800 -> $350,000,000". Doubling your money in two weeks is hard enough (even with insider information), but 437,500x...uh huh. There is no amount of information that could allow someone to work $800 to that amount so quickly.
How this got posted on Slashdot, even if the story weren't so obviously a fraud, is the real mystery. Someone must have gone back in time and...bah, I can't even think up a time travel scenario that would justify this being posted.
Anyone knows that *true* time travellers use Sports Alamanacs to make bets!
What proof do they have that this guy is using "insider training information"?
This seems like complete bullshit that they can arrest him just because of his winning streak.
WTF has our legal system come to?
They can watch him like a hawk, investigate it with a fine tooth comb, but unless they have some shred of evidence, they should free him ASAP. I hope some shrewd lawyer takes up this case.
My time has been wasted with being shown this link for the 3rd time now. Please read the last sentence!!
"Weekly World News will continue to follow this story as it unfolds. Keep watching for further developments."
uh... yeah...
that was weak
Alright, this is obviously a hoax, because he would have *known* that he was going to get caught! Not only that, if we've learned anything about time travel from hitchiker's guide to the galaxy, we've learned that you don't need to make high-risk trades...just put a couple of pennies in your favorite bank back in 1860 and then live off the interest in 2356 or whatever year. Sheesh...this guy had no class whatsoever. He has *no* clue where his towel is.
The anti-salmon
sigh
At any rate, here you go. No truth - just cuz it's on Yahoo, don't ignore that fact that it was written by the GODDAM WORLD WEEKLY NEWS. Christ on a crutch...
and, as a media outlet, about as reputable as the Scientologist door-to-door guys roaming in my neighborhood.
Yahoo! just archives these reports.
I knew this was fictional before all of you, because, I am in fact, from next Wednesday! I traveled back in time several days just to get the first post here telling you all it's false.
But alas, my internet connection was too slow and I couldn't get FP!
If you read carefully you see that the source is the "Weekly World News." You know that trashy tabloid newspaper at the grocery store right next to the National Enquirer? If you saw this story on the front cover of the tabloid while picking up some Doritos, you would chuckle and move on. But in the world of the Internet, it's posted on Yahoo and looks just like every other Yahoo news article, except for the fact that it's on tv.yahoo.com instead of news.yahoo.com. Even Slashdot picks it up (in jest, right guys?) and it looks even more legit.
So it just goes to show you that on the Internet, you need to check the source of news a little more carefully since tabloid news can have the same exact "look" as the real news.
This article is from the Weekly World News. You know, "Bat Boy Fights in Iraq", "Baby Gives Birth To Own Monther."
Slashdot has truly sunk to a new low.
Note that the article ends by saying that the Weekly World News will follow the story as it unfolds. This should have been enough of a hint that this is a prank to anyone who ever stood in line for the cash register at the supermarket.
For those who don't know, the Weekly World News is similar to the National Enquirer (ie a hoax news magazine), except that WWN goes a bit further and usually features on its cover a picture of some cat with an alien growing on the side of its head or of the virgin Mary doin' the streets of Vegas..
Iraqi Information Minister Mohammed Saeed al-Sahhaf (aka Baghdad Bob) was arested for telling the Truth???
More at 11.
Karma: The shiznight, mostly because I am the Drizzle.
Hello, If you are a reliable supplier of the below equipment I am going to need the following: 1. A mind warper generation 4 Dimensional Warp Generator # 52 4350a series wrist watch with memory adapter. 2. The special 23200 series time transducing capacitor with built in temporal displacement. While these time pieces normally go between $5,000-$7,000 a piece, I am having a hard time finding a reliable supplier. Teleport to me within the next 48 earth hours and I will pay $40,000 2002 US cash. Please only reply if you are reliable. Send a (SEPARATE) email to me at: Tomnwrr@aol.com zMMH
"Trusting every aspect of our lives to a giant computer was the smartest thing we ever did.." Homer Simpson
It clearly says at the bottom:
This is OLD news. But I for one believe this guy. All they have to do is go with him to see if him time machine is real. If it is, ask him a few questions and let him go, if not, then take his ass back go jail. Simple as that.
Or, we could just confiscate his time machine, see how it works and make profit.
1) Find time machine.
2) See how it works
3) ???
4) Profit !!!
I'll have you know that it's the best investigative reporting on the planet!
(j/k)
What's this Submit thingy do?
In other news..
There's a new drug craze sweeping the nation... SNIFFING MONEY!
Smoking boosts your memory!
And most importantly..
Saddam Starred in Gay Porn Films!
This sounded like a legitimate news story, too: near New York, a man was cutting fish and one of them began to speak in Hebrew about apocolyptic things.
www.truthorfiction.com is your friend.
this article is syndicated from the weekly world news... take a look at the menu to the left.
i cant believe this actually made it on slashdot.
This has to be a hoax for no other reason than it would be pretty much impossible to turn $800 into $350 million in a short period of time, no matter what you knew. Even Hillary Clinton only turned $1000 into $100,000 and that took a year.
Maybe's he actually a time-zone traveller who travelled 2256 miles (and 4 time zones) from the west coast. The whole thing sures smells of the wacky tobacy....
Why do I h8 apple?
Let's face it. The Weekly World News just hacked Slashdot.
Yahoo killed the sniffing money link. So instead, here's another fascinating article about talking fish and the end of the world.
I don't see what the big deal is... I bet I could go from $800 to $350 in less time. Heck, I bet I could go from $800,000,000 to $350 in just a little bit longer. Especially with the current market conditions.
Norris/Palin 2012
Fact: We deserve leaders who can kick your ass and field dress your carcass.
What are you gonna do? Prove that he's not from the future?
Anyone can be from the future. Muhahahahahaha.
The rest of the Yahoo web site is also funny, though. I did not know about it.
Time travel into the future of programming: http://mozart-dev.sf.net
-- Did you try Tao3D? http://tao3d.sourceforge.net
Can we *please* have an interview with this guy ? Since he seems to have a clue we could once and for all settle the question whether Linux succeeds on th e desktop or not.
Snopes debunk this story here
;-)
Its always worth checking with Snopes. That and checking for dupes I guess
wot no sig
Here we go again. Slashdot editors should look into the submitted stories before posting them. Next time it'll be something like "Man born in Australia with the head of dog!"
Why doesn't slashdot do some sort of distributed posting system similar to the random moderator access. People who feel the story is legitimate will mod it up, etc. Once it reaches a certain level it gets posted to the site. Seems to make sense to me. That way CmdrTaco can have his job entirely reduced to moot.
EAT MORE FAJITAS!
Relative to him the knowledge of the stock's going through the roof is common knowledge so is it still insider trading? Did he break any laws in obtaining the knowledge? NO! I say let the man have is 350 million dollars :) Food for thought....
Thanks to who ever submitted this story cause it made me laugh right before I left work. It's a funny piece.
"I believe in everything in moderation. Including moderation." -Dean DeLeo, Stone Temple Pilots
Weekly World News is the source of this story. ;)
Take a look at their other headlines and see if they seem reliable.
But think about it for a minute... IF it were real, and the guy was going to be charged, wouldn't the whole time-travel component of his defense be a great lead-in to an insanity plea?
I had a sucky sig.
If your own brain and the "Weekly World News" origination weren't enough...
Do a search on news.google.com for "Andrew Carlssin" to see if it's "legit news" and you'll get 4 hits, one of which is this rebuttal from the Times Online, a UK paper.
Snopes also looked into this and explains it's false here. When something is too much to believe, wouldn't you check there first?
--LP
Charlie's Mom: Charlie, hand me the paper.
Charlie: Mom, I find it interesting that you call The Weekly World News "the paper." A newspaper contains facts.
Charlie's Mom:This paper contains facts! 'Pregnant man gives birth.' That's a fact!
"My fingers Emit sparks of fire in Expectation of my future labours." William Blake
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/2854189.stm
Yeah I was pretty excited about this too until I remember, that day, that it was April 1. ha ha...
Not only does it say Weekly World News on the left column (which I don't know what it is) but it's under the subtitle "Supermarket Tabloids".
"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere." - Martin Luther King, Jr.
This clown is messing with the very fabric of space and time! Thanks a lot for ruining the universal, asshole!
Also important today is support for easy autoprobe detection based methods of setting up your GUI environment. Now you will not be punished for not knowing the exact details of every single device, much less the parameters of the drivers (and which drivers and X servers) to use. You can of course tweak to your hearts content but now you can get a box up and running if you really just want to get some work done.
I ran into a guy yesterday who said he was from 2264.
... "something something copied the code from the rich guy something something something " ...
Guess Microsoft will-have-had 'embraced-and-extended' it into their OS by then, or well he mumbled something to that effect
He said that we should be expecting 90% of the worlds population to be paying us all a visit, but then he turned this weird blue color and disappeared, mid-sentence.
; -- the corruption of government starts with its secrets. a truly free people keep no secrets. --
Everyone knows the world will end Dec. 18th 2062 when Halley's Comet strikes into the earth... people are so easily manipulated
The mandatory "I thought this was a dupe but then I remembered I travelled back from next week" post.
You know, I thought at first that this story was a dupe, but then I remembered that I travelled back in time from next week...
graspee
This story comes from Weekly World News. So file it next to stories from National Enquirer and all the other fictional tabloids.
What next on Slashdot: "Bat boy h4xOr5 FCC!"
Regardless of the fictional aspect of this story, it made me think of an interesting question:
If a person devises a time machine, how can they both (1) travel back in time and (2) account for the displacement of the Solar System and its planets in that time?
For example, if he traveled back 200 years but remained in the same position, he would have appeared not in Wall Street but in space to quickly die in a vaccuum. The comfort of Earth would literally be billions of miles away.
Healthcare article at Kuro5hin
He must have left his copy of Securities Law: Insider Trading in the glovebox of his DeLorean.
You forgot about that 'Evil Bit' they're adding to TCP/IP
"Draco dormiens nunquam titillandus."
I bet I end up seeing this on the sci-fi channel. People believe in aliens with no more proof. Next we'll have an "eye witness" ex-SCC guy come forward and tell us all about whats going on. You know, the "cover up." Am I the only one that rolls my eyes when I see things like this?
Take a look at:
The Osama Bin Laden Suicide Bomber Dating Service
Terry Brooks to rewrite The Lord of the Rings
Baen Books Announces Product Placement Deal with Microsoft
Each and every one of these stories is as true as the parent, and most are funnier...
Lawrence Person (lawrencepersonh@gmailh.com (remove all "h"s to mail)
http://www.lawrenceperson.com/
Jeffrey Goines, did he?
Nuke Gay Whales for Jesus.
...but it has a "Monty Python" foot next to the article, a general indication that the story is FUNNY more than anything else and NOT to be taken seriously. Personally I thought it was funny and I laugh even more that others would take it seriously.
I am psychic. I remember when I first found out I had these magical powers... It was next Tuesday.....
The fact that its from the Weekly World news should have been a dead giveaway.
Isn't this about the time the events in the StarTrek universe takes place?
GrimReality
2003-04-17 19:06:47 UTC (2003-04-17 15:06:47-0400)
... most especially since it's *gigawatt*....
"Times have not become more violent. They have just become more televised."
-Marilyn Manson
To find out if he is really from the future, simply ask him how many times this story will be reposted on Slashdot.
Slashdot: Because who says the bs has to stop on April 1st?
Hubbah
Let him out of that jail cell you morons. He's too nice of a lad to be locked in such a horrible place. And I can prove he's my great great grandson. I'll submit my DNA for analysis.
I know an opportunity when I see one.
Really though, this guy did not likely have insider trading the likes of which the SEC is accustomed to dealing with. I wouldn't be surprised if he's using some data mining software like KnowledgeMiner for Macintosh (http://www.knowledgeminer.net/) and actually has the software set up RIGHT with the right kind of data being fed to it. The economy is just one VERY large system of linear and non-linear equations in a huge matrix. Stumbling upon the right information for even a partial solution for maximizing returns in the stock market would indeed be quite profitable. I wish I could turn $800 into $350 million in two weeks.
Of course it's a hoax.
"Andrew Carlssin" is an anagram for " I AM BILL GATES "
I knew when we came in 2002, Andrew would be the one to screw it up.
Why can this not be true? It is very possible that we know very little about what we know ... may be in a few hundred years we will know more .. and then this would appear to be a "no-big-deal"! Are we skeptical about this because we don't want to believe what we don't know?
Just a thought.
this is a true story.. but since the guy is from the future.. he just fixes the problem by returning to the past from a different time in the future.. he fixed it by making it look like a hoax.. when actually it's TRUE!!!!!
Stories from tabloids don't count as hoaxes, because everyone but Taco realizes they're fiction.
... really this guy should have gone back to 1986 and invest in a little upstart called
Gullibility of
Fark
"Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away." - Philip K. Dick
When does the CEO of RIAA become a crack addict, lives on the streets and becomes the ho that she is. Yeah, it's a hoax.
Puh-leease....
As a current tourist in your quaint era, I can assure you that time-able persons such as myself amuse ourselves by participating in Slashdot forums, downloading p0rn, and watching that gem of two-dimensional entertainment - Saved By The Bell. We do NOT participate in "insider trading" since your credit cards are paltry to imitate using some peanut brittle, gum, and the inner workings of a common saucer part.
Lando, Andrew? Duh!
love is just extroverted narcissism
I didn't realize that stuff from the World Weekly News was /. worthy...
A new feature is just a bug waiting to happen. And vice versa.
This has got to be the worst example of a story the editors threw up without doing some basic snooping.
Trolls lurk everywhere. Mod them down.
Look again - this was posted in Slashdot's humor section. See the foot icon.
The PROOF it's a hoax.. lies into 2 details:
1st, it's not Bin Laden that did the 9-11, it was the MOSSAD
2nd, history has PROVEN no power lasts for more than 100 years at this time of history and the time-span shrinkens through time.
therefore, a) he'd say "I'd tell you who REALLY did the 9-11" and b) he'd probable not let so "conveniently" assumed US would be "as-is" "with just some more stability in the stockmarket"
Other than that, it's an OBVIOUS HOAX, no "time traveller" would let someone cought him since he'd know in advance the exact history of him
"Mom, I'm concerned when you refer to the Weekly World News as "the paper" " ... that's a fact." ... the only movie I've ever seen with reference to the Weekly World News)
"But it is. It has the 5th highest circulation in the world I'll have you know. See here: Man gives birth
(So I Married an Axe Murderer
I'm surprised you haven't featured this story on how Congressmen are losing their jobs to technical inovation.
The super lame thing is that I had been sent this article over a week ago.
everyone knows that time machines do not use gigawatts, they use jigawatts. Geez it doesn't take a rocket surgeon to understand the technology involved.
Who could travel much faster than light.
He went out one day,
in a relative way,
and came back the previous night!
-- Fuck Beta
eom
.. on April 1st.
"Derp de derp."
Strange things are afoot at the Circle K.
I knew about this story way back in 2008.
it is Lt. Jack Reisner of the 3rd Infantry.
anybody know what tips off the SEC? I suppose they just review transaction sizes and timings - are there any references that quantify these? We should figure this out just in case we stumble across a time machine, or simply get lucky in the market.............
You do know this was posted under the HUMOR section, right?
/course/ it's fake. We all know that. But it's still damn funny!
Of
Some people take life too seriously.
Colin
Colin Davis
Although this comes from the WWN, it was also noted that in the year 2256 the Chicago Cubs still haven't won a World Series and Dick Clark is still alive.
Those two items give the story some credence.
...because I didn't feel like making an account, but
SLASHDOT SUCKS...BALLS
... are simply a twisted genius :-)
Infuriate left and right
I'd travel ahead in time two weeks and THEN Slashdot's news stories would be current.
I don't know the meaning of the word 'don't' - J
If someone was *really* from 250 years in the future, would it be obvious just by talking to them? Would it be easy to distinguish between a real time traveller and some delusional person who thinks they are from the future or a deliberate fake?
On one hand they probably speak very strangely, using words, grammar and ideas that have not been developed yet but are consistent. They would also have a very detailed and consistent knowledge of a future world way past the ability of the average person to make up. They probably would also have knowledge of future technologies and so forth and be able to describe them in the detail. But none of this would be verifiable, and most of it would probably sound outlandish. If you were zapped back to 1750 you'd probably be able to tell people about aeroplanes, tungsten light bulbs, telephones, computers etc. but you would be hard to build any of them from scratch. Would anyone believe you?
in the year 2235 100 million will only get you a loaf of bread and some penguin mints.
Won't you be my my neighbor?
11:15, restate my assumptions: 1. Mathematics is the language of nature. 2. Everything around us can be represented and understood through numbers. 3. If you graph these numbers, patterns emerge. Therefore: There are patterns everywhere in nature.
Heute die Welt, morgen das Sonnensystem!
The skit was on snl after the 80s stock market crash. Future man with his perfect stock picking record refuses to tell if or when a recovery happens despite the pleas of analysts.
When one of the analyst does himself in, they ask future man if they knew that would happen.
"yes"
" then why didn't you stop him"
"I never liked him"
(Note: this is a completely sarcastic remark (I'm not that gullible)) But if they are Time travelers from the future they can say that they are because no one will believe them. Even if the bring a person back and forward threw time they wont believe them either. Traveling back in time is great because you get to do a bunch of cool stuff make investments. Get your bills payed on time and still no one is the wiser! Um yes I would like to pay my bills for my 2010 Toyota! (he he he reverse interests)
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
You know, sometimes they actually print things that are true. When I was in high school in the 80's, someone at my school got really drunk at a party and was dropped off at 2 a.m. by his "friends" in a snowbank near his house. He nearly froze to death - his body temperature got well below the level where normally you would die. His feet and hands were ice chunks, but he miraculously survived. The Weekly World News picked up the story, and reported it very accurately.
All is Number -Pythagoras.
Cmder Taco got taken by a false story once again..
Could someone please excersie some reading ability please?
or better lets send Cmder Taco over to MS campus..
I am KIDDING!
Don't Tread on OpenSource
Applying Occam's razor to the known facts, I'd say the simplest, most likely explanation is that he is indeed a time traveler.
what is interesting in time travel from the future is implications. i mean, for us we live in the present and the future does not exists, yet. but for someone in the future, if he/she could come back to the past, that would mean that now, in our present, the future already exists "somewhere" so the future would be already "written" for us. interesting.
--
gilbou
that all the time travelers who made money on the stock market left over a year ago!
Just who do you think is responsible for the tech boom and
Please people... this all happened 255 years ago!
- Preferences: Solaris 10 (servers), Ubuntu (desktops), Solaris 11 (personal servers) -
But how does Bat Boy tie into this?
When punk rock is outlawed, only outlaws will have punk rock.
Man, when Fark makes fun of you for being gullible, that's bottom of the barrel.
Hell, that's about as embarrasing as appointing someone from DoubleClick as head of your national privacy adminis....D'oh!
What were you expecting?
Wasn't this up for April Fools' Day?
This sig no verb.
Two out of three are correct, so that's the same SN ration on /. what gives?
You don't need anything more than common sense to tell you this story is fabricated.
It says he chose to come back when the economy was bad because if you knew which few stocks were going to do good you could clean up.
Well why the hell would anyone do that when they could make tons more money coming back before the internet boom...you could make more money than all of those fishy investments in a bad economy and no one would have said a thing.
This is typical urban legend and it's easy to spot.
He is his own grandpa
1. How much hemp is required to travel from 2256 to 2003?
2. How are stcok prices stored on dates aprroximately 253 years previous?
3. How much hemp is reuqired to send you back to the year 2256(withing a few months of your time travel originating date)?
4. What other moneymaking schemes do you have but won't be able to employ in jail?
Support Israeli punk bands. Man Alive.
Somewhere a timelord's TARDIS has gone missing...
(Some nerds you lot are... 300+ postings and no TARDIS references)
Dear Friends,
My name is Andrew Carlssin. In September 2256 my car was reposessed and the bill collectors were hounding me like you wouldn't believe. I was
laid off and my unemployment checks had run out. The only escape I had from the pressure of failure was my time machine and some stock ymbols. I longed to turn my advocation into my vocation. This December 2002 I went on a four month time-jump. I bought and sold a couple of stocks for BIG MONEY in April 2003.
I'm currently under investigation by the SEC for insider trading, but all I need to do is get back to my time machine and return to 2256. I will never have to work again.
Today I am rich! I have earned over $350,000,000.00 (Three Hundred and Fifty Million Dollars)) to date and will become a billionaire within 4 or 5 months. Anyone can do the same. This money making program works perfectly every time, 100% of the time. I have NEVER failed to earn $50,000.00 or more whenever I wanted. Best of all you never have to leave home except to go to your mailbox or post office.
In October 2255, I received a letter in the mail telling me how I could earn $50,000 dollars or more whenever I wanted. I was naturally very skeptical and threw the letter on the console of my time machine. It's funny though, when you are desperate, backed into a corner, your mind does crazy things. I spent a frustating day looking through the want ads for a job with a future. The pickings were sparse at best. That night I tried to unwind by getting into my time machine and going back to hang out with Jesus. I proofread a rough draft of what would become the Bible and than glanced at the letter on the console. All at once it came to me, I now had the key to my dreams. I realized that with the power of the time machine I could expand and enhance this money making formula into the most unbelievable cash flow generator that has ever been created. Most of the hard work is speedily done via self-serve online brokerage houses throughout the world. If you believe that someday you deserve that lucky break that you have waited for all your life, simply follow the easy instructions below. Your dreams will come true.
Sincerely yours,
Andrew Carlssin
INSTRUCTIONS
1) Buy a time machine.
2) Capture all of the open and close prices with the largest up or down changes for the past couple of months. Double-check all the numbers; you wouldn't want to lose all your money on a typo.
3) Go back in time to the start of the prices that you've recorded.
4) Start trading like nobody's business. Try to make some intentional mistakes to try and cover up your tracks -- don't be like me and lead the SEC auditors straight to your portfolio!
Dossy's Blog
The Vulcan Science Directorate has determined that time travel is impossible...
I submitted a PCWorld story on the 10th and 11th about AOL applying to the FCC for release from the requirement to make AOL Instant Messener interoperable with other provider's services.
t k,dn040703X,00.asp
The story that was posted on the 12th was about tests of Video Messaging.
http://www.pcworld.com/news/article/0,aid,110158,
ok this is the [n]th time this has been posted on slashdot! good grief!
Now THERE'S a funny statement...
All of you saying this isn't real notice it was posted with the laughs icon at the right?
I guess his story makes sense. I *lost* my ass in the stock market being a time traveler from the *past*.
maybe it's just me but this sound like the same thing that happened in the Outer Limits episode "The Inheritors" starring Nick Lea (That Alex Krychek guy from the X-Files)
Turns out he gets a meteorite in the head, becomes a stock genious and raises millions of dollars from nothing in order to buy metal to make a giant machine to fry old people... Weekly World over Outer Limits... I'm taking the Outer Limits version, at least the chick that plays his fiance was hot.
-JBenini
"Best Weekly World News Story"
1. Bat Boy!
2. JFK Assasination - UFO Conspiracy!
3. Elvis is Alive
4. Bigfoot's Love Slave
5. Cowboy Neal is really Ed Anger
Everyone will start to cheer when you put on your sailin' shoes.
He also has a pipeline under construction to transport the money directly from Wall Street to Israel.
Strange things are afoot at the Circle-K.
Found it buried in a story on the 5th, though that article seemed to indicate it was purely about the Video Messaging, whereas the PC World article implies it's all interoperability requirements.
Humans still exist in 2256. This is conforting.
If it is true we should take the deal he offered, Give us Osama, Cure AIDS, and let him walk.
Now if it is really true the guy would be an idiotic PHB. After all, He could claim the $25 million reward from the FBI, use the money to develop a cure for AIDS and make billions selling the drugs he developed. No one would ever know he is from the future or arrest him for insider trading.
Looking for a job?
Want your resume written professionally?
DON'T USE TUNAREZ!!!
Looks like WOKR out of Rochester has picked up on this as a real story
I wonder if they're a fox station.
That's so not true, if you play the options market. Buying an underwater option (an option to buy at a price greater than the current price) close to the expiration date can be very cheap. Yet it's a derivative stock, so if the price were to go above the strike price even a smidgen, it might increase your option value from, say, $.25 to $1 in the span of a day, quadrupling your money and requiring only a modest increase in the price of the stock (for instance, this underwater option might be for $70 on a $69.50 option, near the expiration date.. if the stock climbed to $71, the option is going to worth at least $1).
Hoax aside, with 126 correct tips and an options account, you could probably pull this off. 350000000/800 = 437500 in 126 transactions. My handy dandy caluclator ("bc") tells me that only needs a modest return of 11% per transaction, assuming you dumped all your money into each. Hell, not even sure you need the options to pull that off if your tips are good enough. Even if you only had tips that were so so (or you didn't know how the market would take them), you could spread your money out, get some massive returns with options on the ones you know will pan out and try to hedge your bets on the other tips.
Note that I don't advise trading in options without experience. They can rise quickly in price, but they can also lose value just as quickly.
Hi Andrew Carlssin, While we are stuck in jail together you think you can give me a winning lotto number I can call my wife with. Thanks buddy and if you see my future great great children tell them I was never in jail.
If time travel does become possible in the future, how come no one has made it back in time to inform us yet? Wouldn't you think that as soon as it becomes possible, the inventor would travel back in time to inform a distant relative how he did it. Could you imagine a world where people are free to live in whatever time and place they want. When would you live?
Don't forget that due to inflation in the year 2256, $350 million is probably minimum wage.
Crap. I need to make sure I don't get caught next go around.
God spoke to me
Way to go, Slashdot - reposting a Weekly World News story.
Slashdot Question and Answer session: Elvis. We'll send 10 or 12 of the highest-moderated questions to the King tomorrow, and run his answers as soon as he has time to reply.
I wish bloggers would get over it.
Isn't there some dupes to post?
Journalistic credibility issues asside, Im so damn embarrassed that I believed the "Saddam in gay porno" story that I cant bring myself to use anything Yahoo related.
But everyone knows April 17th is "Eastern Orthodox April Fools Day."
My user name was a mistake. Input wasn't restricted, my bad.
It's Weekly World News, PEOPLE!
If he's from the future, why didn't he write himself a letter telling himself that he's gonna get busted? Shouldn't a time traveler know the outcome of his trip to the past before he leaves? And if so, wouldn't the fact that he knows his plan is going to fail prevent him from going thereby preventing the letter from ever being written and thereby preventing him from knowning his plan is going to fail... oh no I've gone cross eyed.
---- "Excuse me. Where's the children's gun section?"
... posting false stories.
Dick Clark is alive ... they just keep his head in a jar. They're waiting for the year 3000 celebration mainly.
...if I go from $350m to $800 in two weeks?
Okay, I'm all for a little piece of fluff to break up the day, but when I'm in that mood, I head to sources other than slashdot. C'mon, guys, cross-posts of the Weekly World News ?
What's next? Summaries of Penthouse Forum ??
The older I get, the less I like everyone else.
If I were coming back from the future in a time machine to score a little cash off of the stock market, 2003 is not the time I'd come back. I'd come back in 1998 or so, start buying like crazy on the leading edge of the bubble, then dump everything in March 2000. And follow it up by a bunch of short trades. Or, without enough appropriately dated seed money, just skip the bubble's rise and go straight for the short trades.
--
"Open source is good." - Steve Jobs
"Open source is evil." - Microsoft
If he picked Syracuse to win the tournament...then we know he's from the future.
-516
Well.. he coulda just created these falacies to throw you off his track using this time travel technology...
Coulda happened.
The best I could come up with is: RASCAL NERD WINS
(Courtesy of: http://www.wordsmith.org/anagram/advanced.html)
-jc
So it's 2256 and you have diligently combed through old data looking for stock performance from 2003. But you forget to look for news stories about you getting arrested, killed, maimed, etc. in 2003? What a loser. What a nonexistent loser.
"I'm so moist I'm sticking to the leather." -Kermit the Frog on The Late Late Show
Anyone else see that ANDREW CARLSSIN is an anagram for LIARS CAN DR NEWS - NCDave
My personal favorite WWN story: Farmer shoots ten pound grasshopper. There was a picture of the farmer holding his trophy on the cover. This was back in the 80s, and I just happened to glance over at it in the checkout stand. At a time when the Enquirer was considered over-the-top, this obvious hyperbole was refreshing. People would bring WWN to school and we'd bust a gut reading it at lunch. It's been a long time since I've payed any attention to it... maybe I'll grab one next time I'm in the drugstore... for old times' sake.
In retrospect, perhaps widespread dissemination of WWN was the beginning of the "golden age" of tabloids in America. I mean, where do you go from there? OTOH, you could look at it as a precursor to the Onion.
For all intensive purposes, "whom" is no longer a word. That begs the question, "who cares"?
...we'd probably find the whole GMontag Slashdot ID to have been created for the same sinister purpose.
...ARGH!
Of course, now that means my ID was too....
--- I wish I could hear the soundtrack to my life. That way I'd know when to duck.
And to think that over the last few weeks I've complained about the quality of Slashdot post selection these days (really terrible) and been modded down. Do you see now people? Do you see? HELLO-OOOOOO!
The legal standard is: "trading on material non-public information".
Trading: yup, he traded.
On: yup, he based his decision on the knowledge. He admitted that. (There is a legal point here. Suppose I am a director of IBM and I want to sell some IBM stock to finance my child's college education. I can't just sell the stock because I'm in possession of IBM information about Linux sales. So I tell my broker, in writing: "on 2005-01-03, sell 1000 shares of IBM at 10:30 am at the market price, no matter what. This order is irrevocable." Then the broker will execute the trade in 2005, and it's legal, because nothing I know today in 2003 will still be material *and* non-public in 2005, so my 2005 trade will not be *based on* material non-public knowledge).
Material: yup, the future stock price is as material as it gets.
Non-public: that's the interesting point for a time traveller. The information is not known to the people around Andrew, and Andrew damn well knows that (he admitted as much).
So if I were a judge interpreting the law, I would convict him under the Securities Act of 1934.
Here's a more interesting question: what would the stock market look like if there were lots of investors with access to future information? Well, businesses that actually succeeded would get funded, and businesss that failed would not get funded. So it would be a boring market, where the only stocks that actually traded would all make about 5% to 15% per year -- just like the high quality bond market, but more efficient.
Most people would actually be better off, because money wouldn't get wasted on failed ventures. The market would fund only the companies that actually cure cancer, not all the dead ends.
Or put it this way: if you had a crystal ball and you knew which open source projects were going to succeed (gcc, linux, perl, x) and which were going to fail (hurd, berlin, cml2), you could spend your hacking hours on the projects that are going to succeed (whatever success means to *you*), so there would be less hours wasted on projects that go nowhere and die.
This hurts me to see /. posting this type of crap. After hearing this stupid story a few weeks ago, I've decided to completely disregard Yahoo! as a news source of any kind. That type of crap shouldn't be posted on a trusted news service, such as Yahoo! They didn't really post anything that says that the story is just that, a story. They barely said the WWN was following it.
Another note: Many people have no idea what the WWN is; and given its name alone, it sounds like a somewhat trustable source. Bad bad bad Yahoo! and bad Taco!
[sig]www.masterslate.org[/sig]
You don't understand this guy us the
GREAT-GREAT-GREAT-GREAT-GREAT-GREAT-Grandson of BATBOY
moo.
The WWN leads the world in stories about WWII German astronauts returning to Earth.
the Weekly World News is the only media that citizens are allowed to read. And it's referred to as... "the paper"!
You also can accelerate the process greatly by making use of leverage (i.e. buying on margin). Of course, a true time traveller might have trouble providing the necessary credit history to setup a margin account...
For those of you who haven't bothered to read the article, (or those of you who took it seriously) I just have to point out the funniest line in the whole thing has to be where the arrested time traveller claims that, "...I just got caught in the moment."
Did Taco put this up as like some sort of mega-master-super-gigantic troll to see people over and over sputter angrily about how this was a WWN article? Or does it go deeper? Maybe he lost a bet? Perhaps Slashdot is taking part in a government conspiracy to spread disinformation and take the eyes of the people off of their dereliction s of duties?
Nah, prolly just something to give us a chuckle.
"Boys have a Penis, Girls have a Vagina", kids say the darndest things!
Sure, but 126 trades in 10 days would mean that he would have to get into and out of each trade before moving to the next one (in order to fully leverage the money made on each transaction). That's in and out in less than an hour all day every day for ten days. With future information there are a lot of easier ways to capitalize on that $800.00 initial investment.
--
As a matter of fact, I am a lawyer. But I play an actor on TV.
It appears that this man has also travelled almost a month forward in time to republish his news story on /.
-George Q Bush XXIII will anounce winning the 25th Gulf War, a family tradition honoured -Al-Sharaf I, minister of information, will deny it as usual -AdmiralTaco V, will dupe this story upon the return of Andrew Carlssin, not a single /. reader will notice
He is most likely an extra terrestrial.
I will consider the possibility that it was fraudulent if you will consider the possibility that
he is a time traveller.
It's the lawyers... in the future, the ABILITY exists to travel back in time, but the LIABILITY isn't covered. In order for you to be contacted, or to interact with these humans from the future, you'll need to sign the release forms in the present. You will also have to hope that your disclaimer and the cost of the trip will survive until such time (in the form of a funded provision in a will perhaps, al la Ben Franklin's gift to Philadelphia?)
Due to the total control/destruction of information in 2112 (caused in part by current RIAA policies and the DMCA) almost none of these release forms survived - hence there are no time travelers contact you or anyone you know.
(This post covered under temporal release #852387522178-A)
"Whoever would overthrow the liberty of a nation must begin by subduing the freeness of speech."--Benjamin Franklin
*_s_l_a_s_d_o_t_s_u_c_k_s_*_s_l_a_s_h_d_o_t_s_u_x_ _
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Important Stuff: Please try to keep posts on topic. Try to reply to other people's comments instead of starting new threads. Read other people's messages before posting your own to avoid simply duplicating what has already been said. Use a clear subject that describes what your message is about. Offtopic, Inflammatory, Inappropriate, Illegal, or Offensive comments might be moderated. (You can read everything, even moderated posts, by adjusting your threshold on the User Preferences Page) Important Stuff: Please try to keep posts on topic. Try to reply to other people's comments instead of starting new threads. Read other people's messages before posting your own to avoid simply duplicating what has already been said. Use a clear subject that describes what your message is about. Offtopic, Inflammatory, Inappropriate, Illegal, or Offensive comments might be moderated. (You can read everything, even moderated posts, by adjusting your threshold on the User Preferences Page)
If I were zapped back to 1750, I'd be telling people to wash their hands with hot water and soap between taking a dump and eating their dinner!
And they'd probably lock me up when I got to the part about invisible creatures that are too small to see and cause sickness.
Seriously, if I had prior notice, I wouldn't try to take any 2001 technology to 1750. I'd study up on technology from the era 1771-1791. Forget about computers and telephones. I'd be all about soap, improvements in printing presses, the periodic table (okay that is a bit later), maybe some morphine. And steam engines. Definitely steam engines.
This must be true, he article is attributed to the Weekly World News. Everyone knows they are a pillar of integrity in journalism....
...they could get this guy together with that spammer who needed to contact someone with a time machine.
Editor Emeritus and Senior Writer, TeleRead.org
This story is from the Weekly World News. You know the reputable news magazine that sits beside the National Enquirer in supermarket isles. Don't get me wrong, I love the WWN, in fact, I have a subscription. However, I don't beleive everything I read.
PS. Their story on Pope John Paul II becoming an official member of the Harlem Globetrotters, that's actually true. I swear. Google it! You know you want to...just look it up.
-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Lost Sheep to Shepard, you got your ears on?
Let's think about this as realistically as possible. If you could travel from 2256 to 2003 and wanted to make money, you wouldn't attempt to make $350 million over the course of a few days in 2003. Instead, you'd go back, place buy orders on stocks that will increase in value slowly over time. Then you'd go back to 2256. Your stocks would then be worth a fortune.
I just heard some sad news on talk radio - Communist Tyrant Fidel Castro was found dead in his Havana home this morning. There weren't any more details. I'm sure everyone in the Slashdot community will miss him - even if you didn't enjoy his work, there's no denying his contributions to popular oppression. Truly an Cuban icon.
Must... travel back to when Slashdot had REAL stories... And back when Kuro5hin wasn't a socialist hole. The fate of the future rests on me.
...$350 million dollars aren't worth shit. Unless they have a serious shortage of toilet paper.
Stupid flawed fake story.
It's true that he needs only 10.8% per transaction. But he needs to make 270% per day. And there is only one option expiration day per month!
Also consider: it would be hard to find an American broker that would let a new, unknown customer with only $800 trade options at all.
The story would be a lot more plausible if it said "six months" rather than "two weeks".
It's from the Weekly World News. The publication that brings us such news as, "Bat Boy Fights In Iraq!" And, "Satan Escapes From Hell!" Come on, people.
$1,000 into $100,000 in less than months...
p ec ial/whitewater/stories/wwtr940527.htm
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/politics/s
so, why should this man be so persecuted?
guns kill people like spoons make Rosie O'Donnell fat.
"Weekly World News will continue to follow this story as it unfolds. Keep watching for further developments. "
CAMON! It's the Weekly World News! The same people who published "Crack addicted squirrel gnaws off man's leg in Central Park" and "Satan escapes from Hell. Photos show proof."
Shame on you Yahoo. Check your sources.
- Zav - Imagine a Beowulf cluster of insensitive clods...
Even if travelling through time WAS possible, such a feat would NOT be.
First it would require a massive trade to transform $800 to $350,000,000 in just three weeks. Such a trade volume would inevitably "Change the past".
Effectively, trading based on information for day 1 would change market conditions from day 2. Effectively, using historical data as a strategic advantage would change subsequent history rendering similar knowledge useless.
Remember "Back to the Future 2". They got it wrong there as well. Future Bif stole a Sports Almanac from Marty (who was trying to do the same thing) and travels back to 1950 to give it to his witless teenage self.
The problem is that as young Bif started making big money, his large gains WOULD be noticed. Especially by bookies and associated people who were already actively trying to beat odds by fixing matches in various ways.
My guess is the boxing scores would be useless after he made ANY significant amount of money wagering on them. Other sports would most assuredly ripple with changes made as Bif's new found wealth rippled through the gambling community. Most certainly, he would quickly be blacklisted from making bets for being "right" too often and visited by some paid goons (the fate of anyone who wins TOO often in Vegas). Bif's use of the Almanac would quickly render it inaccurate and obsolete.
A much more useful plot "trick" would be the "Early Edition" scenario. You know, the guy who gets tommorow's Chicago Tribune every morning. The Sport's pages and Stock pages would show large motions in the market that COULD potentially be exploited provided that the subscriber didn't put TOO MUCH money into those "futureoids" that could potentially change them. One could get very rich over a LONG period of time if one could peek "just one day" forward every day.
Long Term info would be too succeptable to the "Butterfly Effect" which can wraught huge changes from very small inputs. The best Sci-Fi example of this is Star Trek's "Journey to the Edge of Forever" where McCoy inadvertantly thwarts the WW2 allies during by travelling back to depression era US and kindly soup kitchen matron.
In Soviet Russia, the future is NOW
The time-traveller is really CmdrTaco... The dupes are just a side effect of him being in multiple times at the same place...
Dupe posts are
I heard that it is impossible to travel back in time before the time machine was made. He must be one of those worm hole guys. They are everywhere.
---
Stupidity must be wiped from the face of this planet -- and we should start with the clod who posted this story, no?
Didn't think for a minute that this was a sham, did you?
Slashdot falls for the "Time Traveler Insider Trading" story. Weekly World News laughs evilly in its beer
"Whoever would overthrow the liberty of a nation must begin by subduing the freeness of speech."--Benjamin Franklin
Now we can /. tabloids
See this if you read Dutch for details.
Point of this story in relation to the slashdot post: A missed opportunity for the defense who didn't claim he was from the future....
Maybe this guy is truly from the future, or a parallel universe. In 250 years, I suppose our science has evolved enough to create a time machine, and all the mathematical corrections to make the machine always end up on Earth.
But, if time machines do exist, how come I don't see future great-great-grand kids come and visit me and tell me the numbers to the next lottery, or even the schematics to the time machine so I can start playing with it now? Shouldn't there be time-cops that monitor the fabric of space-time to make sure that no one travels to the past and attempts to alter history? But if they do exist, how come he can come back? Hmm....
But as smart as he may be, this guy is a complete idiot with his investment. He should have known that making 126 high-risk trade within 2 weeks and able to pocket $350 million in profits will definitely draw attention of the SEC. Why didn't he invest slowly? Or simply bring all the future newspapers back to his ancestors so they can make the investments for him? That would be a better approach to making his fortune. The fact that he got caught while traveling back in time shows that people in the future aren't that smart after all.
At least, I'm happy to know that mankind still exists in 250 years.
Am I the only person who noticed this story was republished from Weekly World News?? Yeesh!
Big Daddy, Johnny, Burp, Aunt Zelda, Scott, Slurp, Big Momma
Look Ron Jeremy has been getting laid and masterminding acts of global terror and no one is saying a word!
Comparing it to Windows will be a moot point, since El Dorado is going to have a 40% larger code base than XP.
Wow. Methinks CmdrTaco is just trolling /.
Must be a slow day in Ann Arbor
OFN.
Comment removed based on user account deletion
If I were going to go back through time, I would at least do some sanity checking.
do
{
come_up_with_crafty_plan_to_r00l_the_past();
}
while (history_shows_me_getting_caught());
Then once I exit that loop, I would go back in time and implement the plan where I don't get caught.=D
Best. Comment. Ever. Enjoy!
Well it was supposed to be a joke, but for the short article it was convincing. I really liked the part about no history of the guy before Dec 2002. The give away was the number of trades and how much he made. I don't see how he could have made hundreds of millions after only 126 trades. Did anyone caculate what kind of trades had to be made for that to happen. Also why trade long? If the market is doing so poorly, then he should have done better picking shorts and make it on the losses of others.
"Your having a bad day when the voices in your head put you on hold"
but this story came from the WEEKLY WORLD NEWS initially. /.?
How did this make it on
We KNOW that it's false. I guess that's why it was posted with the humour icon. I could be wrong, but I'm not.
I think the gov't helped create this story in order to make people think the stock market can make you money. The people that actually believe this story might believe this paragraph too which would make them invest now:
Carlssin declared that he had traveled back in time from over 200 years in the future, when it is common knowledge that our era experienced one of the worst stock plunges in history. Yet anyone armed with knowledge of the handful of stocks destined to go through the roof could make a fortune.
Anybody see Trading Places? Watch the ending, and you'll learn something. They SELL OJ at a high price, then the buy it back at a low price to cover the ones they sold. As long as your buy price sell price, you make money...
That's also what the asshat did that put the cyanide in the tylenol capsules so many years ago...
Trust me.
BTW, do you know where I can find a Sarah Connor?
the urban legend pages posted this story a few weeks ago.
If he's from the 23rd century and he's this stupid then he must be a dropout from Star Fleet Academy.
Eternity: will that be smoking, or non-smoking? I Corinthians 6:9-10
"D'you think maybe we should start checking Urban Legends before approving stories?"
Big Daddy, Johnny, Burp, Aunt Zelda, Scott, Slurp, Big Momma
Pregnant man gives birth....That's a fact!
They don't usually run true stories at all.
You may not realize it, but you just participated in an opinion poll.
Fake news outlets are actually government-backed. They guage public reaction to phony stories without alarming everyone (had it actually been true). If the reaction is good, then the public is ready for it. For what? Today, Time travel.
One popular rebuttal to the possibility of time travel is always, "If it's possible, why don't we encounter time travelers?"
:)
But, what if we just never believe them when they tell us.
Ansi's and stupid tricks!
is that someone was stupid enough to take a Weekly World News story at face value. I didn't know that people came that clueless, even on /.
If the WWN said that the sun was expected to continue burning at least through the end of the week, then I'd start worrying. I think they have a policy against publishing anything that is actually true, no matter how outlandish.
Im sorry but did nobody notice the Monty Pythonesque foot indicating HUMOR before burninating everything? I read this story elsewhere (guess where) a few days ago and I thought it was sort of funny.
Then again stuff that matters it aint.
If this has been said before im sorry but I just had to say it so please mod kindly.
What post? The one you're carrying inside your rusty innards!
> "D'you think maybe we should start checking Urban Legends before approving stories?"
Nah, actually reading the articles takes too much time, just like spellchecking. For maximum story throughput, we can't afford to not post them as soon as we get them.
I thought this might be a new excuse for some scam, but it's apparently totally bogus.
> Weekly World News will continue to follow this
:)
> story as it unfolds. Keep watching for further
> developments.
Ugh! They missed their chance. Should have read...
Weekly World News will continue to follow this
story as it unfolds. Keep watching for *future*
developments.
Please don't mix presentation style with semantic markup. Your sentence is not the content of an accent, but should simply be presented on aural browsers using a particular accent. A simplistic example of the correct way to mark up your data would be:
<span style="accent: scottish">I'll have you know it's the eigthth most widely circulated paper.</span>
However following the standards set by the working drafts for XHTML2 you should instead give the span entity a unique id and set its style using an ID-selector in a page-wide stylesheet. You also may wish to provide alternative accents if the "scottish" one is not available on the user's system.
Step 1: Build a time machine
Step 2: ?
Step 3: Profit
A time machine? Imagine a beowulf cluster of those.
... Like the fact that cheap nuclear fusion is just ten more years away and Duke Nukem Forever will be out any day now.
Karma: Frotzed (mostly due to the Frobozz Magic Karma Company)
How about people who not only read such articles but post about how much the article and Slashdot sucks?
It's funny, laugh.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
You mean, the one true ping?
"Three Pings for the Admins under the sky, Seven for the Techs in their halls of stone, Nine for lUsers doomed to die, One for the Dark Lord on his dark throne In the Land of Redmond where the Shadows lie. One Ping to rule them all, One Ping to find them, One Ping to bring them all and in the darkness bind them In the Land of Redmond where the Shadows lie."
Much apologies to userfriendly and tolkien.
The key to the enjoyment of pop music is to replace any instance of "love" with "C.H.U.D."
My favorite Weekly World News Headline ever was:
Scientists Plan to Blow Up the Moon
"we'd be better off without it anyway," says one top reasearcher
Jeez, how much can a 'science news' source suck before it's out of business.
Are you guys trying to fail?
This explains it.
Four weeks ago, he called. He could not believe he got ahold of me. He just about passed out when I said hello. I asked him why he was treating me like a god. He replied that my contributions to the world had many great effects on civilization. He only wondered what I could have done if I wasn't so poor while I was young. Unfortunately, the SEC locked his accounts before he could give me the money.
If this guy travelled back in time to invest in the stock market why would he choose a time when the economy is so bad? Where was he in 1999?
The time cops saw it comming or there is no such law. Then again, the time traveler should also have been able to research his own arrest. If he knew he was going to be arrested, he would not have been. If he was not arrested he would not have been able to research it. The rooster came before the hen and I make no sense.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
...first, according to Einstein you cannot travel backwards thru time, only forwards (i.e. accelerate craft to near speed of light and time slows for you, so when you arrive back at your starting place, a lot of time will have elapsed for everything but you and your craft.
;-)
Secondly, there's the International Date Line, which is like a longitude line, so just go to the North Pole where you can run around the pole in a circle, many many times crossing the Date Line over and over again and again, and go back/forward as many days as you like
How is it even possible that someone smart enought to:
1. Travel back in time from the year 2256
2. Make like a quarter of a billion dollars from a meager $800 investment
Can at the same time not be smart enough to:
1. Check up on his criminal record and see if he ever got busted for insider trading.
Besides, you mean to tell me that this is the best way for someone from 2256 that has access to a time machine to make a measly quarter of a billion dollars?
So that's where my time machine went! I knew i shouldn't have trusted him...
Can anyone explain to me how this story got so big? I've had a few people send me links, and I've seen it on a few sites... Now slashdot even has it! I mean, WHAT THE FUCK?
It's the WEEKLY WORLD NEWS, people!
(Yes, the tabliod refered to as "The Paper" in So I Married An Axe Murderer)
Now that yahoo is syndicating them, there are lots of bullshit stories filled into the yahoo news templates. What makes this one so special that it gets on slashdot? And how many people forwarding it don't actually realize it's from the WWN? I mean, this is the publication that brought us Bat Boy , and the Clinton's Alien Baby stories. And now some crap about a time traveler makes slashdot?
It makes no sense.
__
Choose mnemonic identifiers. If you can't remember what mnemonic means, you've got a problem. - Larry Wall
What happened to M$ and how many Billion will I have by the time I am 30.
No, that wouldn't work. In most countries there has to be some movement on the account in 20 years, or it becomes property of the bank.
Believe me, I tried!
I thought everything posted on Slashdot was true, you mean it isn't?
OMG! What's the world coming to?
or something that skaggs dude was published
do a google.com search for Andrew Carlssin and look for anything other than the same news artical.
It comes back to the New York Post. The same fine publication that brought you "bat-boy"
I can't believe this got this far.
I'm outta here folks. Sorry to sound like a humourless git but Slashdot is becoming a supreme waste of time.
OK, I'm going to try and steer away from the obvious /.-bashing and BTTF-inspired jokes at this point, and take a moment to look at it from a slightly different angle. Fact of the matter is yes, I heard about this a number of weeks ago, and did a quick browse to find other WWN stories such as "Fish as Human Face!", but for me, the really stunning bit was just how quickly it spread. Despite the local pier burning down at the time, I still received a link to this story about half a dozen times within the space of a working day. Some people *seemed* to believe it, whilst others apparently realised its jocular potential, and added a smiley or two. Which raises two points.
1. The speed at which it spread. Netmemes have been pretty established in the mainstream ever since hamsterdance, at least, but I'm always amazed at the number and diversity of people by which this kind of thing, a random link (i.e. no different to other WWN headlines) that catches the attention of the foward button, propagates. Not just that, but the implications this holds in a connected society. In fact, a surprising amount of local news is disseminated to me in this fashion. In a relatively small town such as here, degrees of separation are only one or two on average, and major local news spreads through email and SMS networks way faster than newspapers or websites.
2. The other thing I find interesting, slightly related to 1), is the "gullibility" of people that forward such things. The tiniest amount of research (i.e. click a link), beyond the nature of the subject itself, proves this to be of instantly dubious nature, and yet I think (perhaps just pessimistically) that many of the people that received it in their mailbox didn't necessarily *believe* it, per se, but didn't instantly discard it as pure hoax, simply because it was forwarded to them by someone they knew. Alongside some other true, but fantastic, stories and URLs that get circulated these days, if a linnk gets presented as "news", then I think a lot of people just go "uh?" and forward it on, without really considering the origins. This isn't so important in this case but, tying it back to the first point, what implications does this have on more "serious" news distributed through more "informal" networks? Would I have really believed that the local pier was on fire if I hadn't had access to webcams trained on it?
I'd like to see news become more independent, more distributed, and I think cases such as this highlight both the advantages and cautions that need to be considered in such a process.
http://www.ufodigest.com/aprilfool.html
... this is the same rag that brought you "Bat Boy" and "The Amazing 10,000 lbs Lady".
Not only that, the source is quoted as the "Weekly World News"
Yet another dupe on ./ was originally posted in the yes 2128. Sorry I don't have a link at this time.
The trouble is, in his time, bread is $500 million a loaf and Microsoft Office 2245 is $1 trillion.
If Slashdot were chemistry it would look like this:Cadaverine
Hey Taco! Who is this "radical rad" character? He doesn't show up in the user search and the only reference I can find to him is this one post. What gives?
this story is obviously fake... ...not even time travelers can come out on top in today's market...
I hope he doesn't find his grandfather....
If you bothered to check the source of things before posting them you would have found already that the story originated from the Weekly World News.
I certainly don't consider them to be very reliable and if you do then please forward all your cash to me for safe keeping.
In other news, the SEC has expelled embedded journalists from Wall Street for reporting new that has endagered the jobs of Wall Street insiders. bbspot.com
Anyone with any intelligence would have picked a better time than now to involve oneself in the stock market. If $800 could do that now, think what it could have done in 1999 or 1928.
If there was enough intelligence to execute such a plan, shouldn't there have been enough intelligence to do a good job of it?
oh yeah..and that whole wwn thing...
Brian
that was all
Jesus H. Christ, has Taco lost it, or what? All the dupes, and this... a tabloid story. He's obviously resting on his laurels, making just token efforts to keep up with Slashdot, bareley even reading it, just logging on to show his lately very lame face.
Get a grip, man. Stop drinking and drugging and screwing and get with the program or retire. You're a mess and an embarassment.
Stephen Hawkins (super genius physicist) says that time travel is theoretically possible and may come to pass in the not too distance future so why couldn't this guy be from the future? I have news for you. If any of the governments of the world (especially those of the more technologically advanced countries) had some kind of proof to them that there was a "time traveler" amongst us they would snap them up for that secret and do their best to erase any public knowledge of it real fast. Think about the huge military power of controlling some type of time travel. Don't be so fast to dismiss what you don't understand or think is not possible. Just a few hundred years ago we all thought the world was flat and the earth was the center of the universe. In the 30's space travel was something of comic books and make believe but now we know it's very possible. Could he be a very lucky quack on the other hand...sure but we will probably never know if he really exist at all now. Just a little something to think about....
Howz this for a conspiracy theorist twist:
This story was purposefully released by a clandestine office of the U.S. Government at the urging of the Fed and Treasury.
Why?
To break the negative psychological feedback loop that is keeping our markets and economy in check.
Bear with me on this and pardon a little economic theory.
The stock market is now in its third year of decline; John Q. Public, whose 401K is now a 101K, is convinced the market is stacked against him, is full of crooks and questionable accounting, and is nothing more than a way to lose money. Clearly he has empirical basis for his opinion.
As risk aversion increases among public investors like John Q. and they withdraw from the markets, demand for stocks declines, which brings down prices: it's the law of supply and demand. Fewer buyers=lower prices. The supply of stock doesn't change much, so if demand falls, price falls.
Now, lower stock prices prevents many companies from doing merger and acquisition deals they need to do to increase efficiency and maintain growth; when was the last time Cisco bought another company? And lower stock prices also causes corporate debt rating agencies to lower their credit ratings on companies, since credit worthiness is coupled with companies market capitalization, among other things. Companies' reduced borrowing power that results from debt downgrades prevents them from upgrading plants and equipment or advertising as heavily as they should. Revenues fall further, dragging down share prices more. IPOs can't get done, so new companies can't get new products and ideas to market. Innovation suffers.
Some companies go bankrupt, which causes John Q. Public to be even more wary of the market; and as unemployment rises and John Q. Public gets laid off, clearly he isn't putting anything into his 401K (or 101K?)
So a vicious cycle begins. Vast economic wealth is destroyed.
Problem is, the stock market *can* be an enormous wealth creation machine, as we saw in the 95-2000 period: the wealth effect, whereby investors increase their real and perceived wealth by stock market gains, leads to greater consumption, which leads to greater production, which leads to full employment, which leads to increased 401K and retirement plan contributions, which leads to stronger investment, which leads to more economic strength. Its a 'virtuous cycle'. But the Fed has now shot all of its interest rate cutting bullets, which is the way it has prodded new virtuous cycles in the past, so its power to initiate another virtuous cycle this way has been weakened.
Hence the conspiracy theory.
What if the Fed released this story to get John Q. Public thinking: "Hey! I got $800 back in taxes this year--what if *I* could make $350M in two weeks like that crazy guy!" The Fed figures this is a nifty way to break the negative risk-aversion feedback in the mind of John Q. Public, and it uses this story as 'financial Psy-Ops' as a way to jumpstart the virtuous cycle. $800 bucks into $350M in two weeks? Better than lottery tickets.
What's special about the original release date of this article? It came out close to the day the market bottomed in March. And just a month before the tax filing deadline, when most folks who are expecting refunds are probably filing. And by the way, the market has been rising again since April 15th, when lots of folks have refund checks in hand. Coincidence? Maybe.
"They" make the story just implausible enough to avoid suspicion, and just silly enough to be off the radar screen of intelligent investors; but they also throw in just enough to get people to start trusting the SEC again: after all, the SEC caught this guy for "insider trading", it must be doing something right again, that's got to be good, huh?
"They" release this story on an Opinions and Gossip venue, to get it circulating and get people talking about it. The ultimate 'viral marketing' effect ta
Look, I just wanted you all to know that I loaned him the $800 in vintage cash, before he went to traveling and he has yet to pay me back.
I wouldnt believe a thing he says.
I think you underestimate just how much I just dont care.
After reading this in this time period, I jumped back to 2257, and looked up a paper in 2004, he goes to jail after a very short (but entertaining) court hearing... where the judge was reported to have asked the defendant...
"So, if you are from the future, who is the president?"
The defendant replied, "Ronald Reagan!"
To which the Judge replied "Ha! The actor?"
The truth comes out...
THE GOOD HUMOR MAN CAN ONLY BE PUSHED SO FAR
Bart Simpson on chalkboard in episode 2F18
Why is this story not in YRO? I cannot believe that no one else has complained about the obvious repression of this man's rights. We must be becoming very apathetic. People from the future have rights too!
Is the story true or not? Who cares? Such details have never stopped real civil rights leaders like Jesse Jackson!
Yes, the same discriminative news agency which has brought us unequivocal proof of the existence of Bat Boy. "Bay Boy Was Here!" Once you sift through the artistic renderings in the Weekly World News you will find it is a very factual and informative paper.
I don't care what any of you think, I think this guy's legit. Hey Taco, could /. interview this guy?
My first question is "Mr. Carlssin, what Linux distro will be the one to finally achieve world domination?"
"Oh, and another question. When will Microsoft go bankrupt?"
"Oh wait! Just one more...
Ruby on Rails Screencast
and all the latest goings-on with aliens. Maybe this isn't so far fetched afterall. I wonder if it would really take another 250 years to figure out how to time-travel. I thought it would be doable sooner than that. Although maybe with the shortage of students studying the hard sciences and the popularity of Fox this is about right. But on the other hand it's all just reverse engineering if you believe in a supreme being. And we all know reverse engineering is not real science or is it? Wait is real science reverse engineering...?
It's all becoming blurry....
http://tinyurl.com/3t236
What's interesting about this story is the amount of attention it appears to be getting. With the volume of quirky, fabricated B.S. on the Net, why does this rise to the top?
I too feel a bit of a 'tug' when reading this. I think it's due to its correlates with American terror insecurity - something odd out of nowhere in New York - and the empathy with which it compels us to look at the current state of history - "one of the worst stock plunges in history". People want a validation of their take on their collective state of affairs. In fact, in the story's future, what is going on now with the stock market, and by implication, with terrorism, is "common knowledge". Hey, it really is bad, and the people of the future haven't forgotten - but it's going to get better: apparently we find out "the whereabouts of Osama Bin Laden and a cure for AIDS".
Think about it. He's a time traveler. Now that a news source has picked up on it, it goes down in the public record. Why would someone go back in time to an era where they are sure to be captured? Clearly this proves he gets away with it, because if he were to not get away with it, it would have been written down somewhere and he would have fair warning.
how else could an idiot story like this get in here - not even as comedy yet...
This is on a par with a hypothetical story about a SQL database company harassing Mozilla because of a name similarity...
Oh, wait...
Richard Steven Hack - This sig is TOO GODDAMN SHORT TO DO ANYTHING USEFUL WITH! MORONS!
I have actually known quite a few junkies with drinking problems, but most of them hadn't had sex in years outside of the services they provide (usually clothed) for free drugs.
The diet story consisted of an interview with some truly skankish woman who claimed that every time she got hungry she had sex instead and then otherwise kept herself too drunk and high to go out to eat or visit a grocery store.
She claimed to have dropped 30 pounds in six weeks this way and went on to further cast doubt on the diet-industry's emphasis on exercise and nutritionally-dense food choices.
I cut out the story and took it to a hot friend of mine who had offered to help me any way she could with my dieting struggles.
You have to love the WWN...
The best way to do is to be.
All Weekly World News Storiest and.cfm
http://www.weeklyworldnews.com/wwn/newss
Consider the source of the article.....
It's humorous none the less.
"Weekly World News will continue to follow this story as it unfolds. Keep watching for further developments."
Any updates on this story?
Although entertaining, I am disturbed by this statement: "The only way he could pull it off is with illegal inside information. He's going to sit in a jail cell on Rikers Island until he agrees to give up his sources." That is not the ONLY way. Although statistically improbable, he could theoretically be that lucky. And what ever happened to actual evidence??? If they think he is lying about time travel, then they have no HARD evidence to hold him more than 72 hours... Sounds like an April fool's joke.
It's already been established that this was a weekly world news article in disguise. Why the hell is it being reposted?
no one from the future would be caught dressed like that!