Slashdot Mirror


The Social Structure of Open Source Development

HulkProtector1 writes "NewsForge has published an interview Tom Chance conducted with Andreas Brand, a sociologist who is studying the free software world. Read the full interview to learn more about Andreas' views on KDE's development model, volunteer recruitment and retention, motivation, work distribution and more. "

391 comments

  1. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot by timecop · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me a

  2. Work Model by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic



    The Michael Sims Work Model
    1- Get job at slashdot.
    2- Abuse unlimited mod capability.
    3- Freak out on peers.
    4- ???
    5- Unemployment!

    53760f2155e96ee7da920ca06dba0e4c

  3. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  4. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  5. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  6. The social structure of open source development by Freexe · · Score: 0

    Both Interesting and Informative

    --
    "In a time of universal deceit - telling the truth is a revolutionary act." - George Orwell
    1. Re:The social structure of open source development by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

      Just wait until open source development projects get slapped with a patent lawsuit from MS, we'll see who's laughing then.

      Does ECMA allow patenting of standards? I know IETF does. If so, then MS has a huge advantage. It can use its corporate presence to stamp out this open-source rubbish, together with its ridiculous notions of so-called 'freedom', and let the silent majority of developers get on with making money from software.

      The GPL and other open source licenses are anticompetitive. Imagine a proprietary product has to compete against a open-source one which (heaven forfend) happened to be better and with greater market share. How on earth is the proprietary one meant to compete and provide compatibility/better features, when it has to use open standards?

      Software has zero replication cost, but the cost of building it is huge. We can't all live on customisation, consultancy and support contracts. This is especially true given the problems of outsourcing, etc. The American software economy depends on widespread GPL-incompatibility. I look to Microsoft, Adobe and others for decisive leadership.

      Let the patent wars begin.

    2. Re:The social structure of open source development by MightyMartian · · Score: 1

      > The GPL and other open source licenses are
      > anticompetitive. Imagine a proprietary product has
      > to compete against a open-source one which (heaven
      > forfend) happened to be better and with greater
      > market share. How on earth is the proprietary one
      > meant to compete and provide compatibility/better
      > features, when it has to use open standards?

      Imagine a product that's $200 cheaper than said product. How dare it sell for less?

      If a proprietary product is truly greatly better than an GPL equivalent, then there's no reason it shouldn't sell. If it's not any better, but merely costs $$$, then tough. That's the way the cookie crumbles.

      If the value is actually there, then the pricing can be justified. If the value isn't, then I'm afraid the marketplace is going to be cruel to it.

      Unless you would like to force all products of a specific genre or function to the same price. But then, that would be rather anticompetitive, now wouldn't it.

      --
      The world's burning. Moped Jesus spotted on I50. Details at 11.
  7. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  8. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  9. Insightful comment by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    Just wait until Mono and dotGNU get slapped with a patent lawsuit from MS, we'll see who's laughing then.

    Does ECMA allow patenting of standards? I know IETF does. If so, then MS has a huge advantage. It can use its corporate presence to stamp out this open-source rubbish, together with its ridiculous notions of so-called 'freedom', and let the silent majority of developers get on with making money from software.

    The GPL and other open source licenses are anticompetitive. Imagine a proprietary product has to compete against a open-source one which (heaven forfend) happened to be better and with greater market share. How on earth is the proprietary one meant to compete and provide compatibility/better features, when it has to use open standards?

    Software has zero replication cost, but the cost of building it is huge. We can't all live on customisation, consultancy and support contracts. This is especially true given the problems of outsourcing, etc. The American software economy depends on widespread GPL-incompatibility. I look to Microsoft, Adobe and others for decisive leadership.

    Let the patent wars begin.

  10. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  11. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  12. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  13. Re:Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdo by stanjef1 · · Score: -1

    Thank you so much. We could not have lived had you not posted this multiple times.

  14. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  15. Details. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Introduction

    DSPAM (as in De-Spam) is an extremely scalable, open-source statistical-algorithmic hybrid anti-spam filter. A majority of users running v2.10+ achieve filtering rates ranging from 99.92% - 99.98+%, DSPAM is currently effective as both a server-side agent for UNIX email servers and a developer's library for mail clients, other anti-spam tools, and similar projects requiring drop-in spam filtering. DSPAM has been implemented on many large and small scale systems with the largest systems being reported at about 125,000 mailboxes.

    What is a Statistical-Algorithmic Hybrid Filter?
    Present-day language classifiers bear the responsibility of maintaining accuracy in the midst of ever-increasing sample complexity. In the setting of spam filtering, many types of intentional attacks have been introduced such as obfuscation, word list injection, sample flooding, and etcetera. As the complexity of classification text continues to multiply rapidly, many filter developers today are left with conflicted feelings between increasing the complexity of their filter and wise teachings from CS class reminding them that computer science is about controlling complexity, not creating it. At the rate complexity is rising, filters will (and have already begun to) become so resource-intensive that they lose scalability, eventually leading to a second conflict of interests: where fighting spam becomes more expensive than managing it.

    DSPAM is the first Statistical-Algorithmic Hybrid filter and in being such boldly suggests that there is a better alternative to increasing the feature set of filters to match the spams they are trying to fight. By employing algorithms designed to increase the quality of existing data rather than the quantity of data with the goal of reducing the feature set rather than increasing it, DSPAM has managed to achieve nearly equal levels of accuracy with present-day Markovian-based filters and other types of filters that employ large feature sets with the added benefit of using a significantly fewer amount of resources. DSPAM presently peaks at 99.984% accuracy, which is ten times more accurate than a human being [1] and is presently being used on implementations as large as 125,000+ mailboxes.

    DSPAM's Focus
    The DSPAM project attempts to go beyond "just another statistical filter" by focusing on the following areas:

    * DSPAM has a strong focus on providing better data to already existing algorithms (Bayesian, Chi-Square, etcetera) Combination algorithms work inherently well, but depend on the quality of data. Some of the approaches deployed in DSPAM towards this goal include Chained Tokens, Inoculation Groups, Classification Groups, advanced de-obfuscation techniques, and a new noise reduction algorithm called Bayesian Noise Reduction. The goal is to incorporate processing algorithms that can withstand the long haul of ever increasing message complexity. So far we're doing a great job.
    * A strong focus on large-scale implementation support. The largest implementation of DSPAM we've heard about to-date involves 125,000 users. DSPAM has been designed to experience a very short execution time (0.03s - 0.10s on average hardware), and has been equipped with a storage driver API allowing several different storage mechanisms to be used. Depending on disk space constraints, accuracy can be traded off for additional disk space or vice-versa.
    * Empty Corpus Support and Global Dictionary Support. It is very important in a large-scale environment to allow users to build their own dictionaries starting from scratch. Why? Because system administrators haven't got the time to create 20,000 seeded dictionaries. On top of this, ISPs require out-of-the-box filtering, which DSPAM's global dictionary feature provides for end-users, with minimal centralized learning. DSPAM provides support for building corpuses from scratch without suffering many fatal training errors (false positives). When these two

    Read the rest of this comment... jad

    1. Re:Details. by Nimrangul · · Score: 1

      I think you may have messed up your copy and paste, seems you were on the DSPAM site, what you wanted was just a few posts up.

      --
      I'm sick of following my dreams - I'm just going to ask them where they're going and hook up with them later.
  16. Could be a cool hosting facility! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic


    In the UK The Bunker is an old nuclear shelter turned into a secure webhosting facility.

    The guy who owns it wrote 'Stay Another Day' performed by East 17 and was a UK Christmas #1.

    Fact.

    No. This isn't about football.;-) qfp

  17. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  18. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  19. Open letter to the GNAA by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    Dear GNAA,

    I hope this letter finds you well. I have been doing alright, after getting that job at Wal-Mart. It's great because now I have benefits and the pay is better than the lumber yard.
    Grandpa is doing better, his hacking cough is almost gone, although Nelly down at the corner store says that it may come back. I'm not sure, what do you think?

    I hope you have been finding productive ways of spending your time since your talents should be used for the improvement of humanity. You seemed like such a promising organization, and I'm sure you'll go far. Mom thinks the same.

    I do find that sometimes my feelings towards you confuse me. I excited by your dialogue, but also perturbed by the dark demons that float inside my soul. What should I do?

    All the best,
    Frankie Sausage pzp

  20. Extradition from Australia by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    Most of the "Prisioners" as you call them, were tax evaders. People who could not grow enough crop for their landowner. "Real" criminals were executed.

    And yes, Australia does have extradition arrangements with the U.S. But was he in the U.S. when he did the crime? And if not, is that a valid defense? If he hacked into a bank, we would want him sent to face the charges. But, not all of us have hacked into banks, but all of us have pirated software or music, therefore we want to be leanient with his sentence. cy

  21. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  22. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  23. wrong! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    It's known for that Torvalds kid that worked there ny

    1. Re:wrong! by WoodenRobot · · Score: -1, Offtopic

      What's with all these AC posts that are clearly just reposts of other postings from other threads? They all have a couple of random letters at the end too. It's seems to be some new and bizarre troll...

      --
      ---
      "I did nothing. I did absolutely nothing and it was everything that I thought it could be."
  24. same as capitalism by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The open source movement works the same way as capitalism, grab the source code and run.

  25. Somewhat offtopic... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Does anyone know much about Apache James? Apache's new Java-based mail server? I've been playing around with it and it seems pretty smooth. But how does it compare to, for example, postfix?

    One nice feature is that you can extend James using "Mailets" (like applets/servlets but for mail) written in java, which would be great for a java-head like myself :).

    Anyway, I was just wondering if anyone knew much about it/actually used it for anything. It would be nice to have a single mail server who's configuration could be used on any platform. uo

  26. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  27. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  28. Thanks, Microsoft! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    That downtime really blew. I couldn't read my spam.

    Don't let it happen again, Microsoft. llp

  29. I don't get Congress. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Offtopic
    There's an important difference you're overlooking: Nobody's getting shut out of the DVD player business.

    Seriously, how many legal car repair shops do you think there are? A million is most likely a conservative figure. The car computer legislation is happening because there are a lot of people in the car repair business, and have been in the car repair business for generations. But, suddenly (last few years) they've been unable to fix cars because they don't know the secret codes for the cars' computers.

    This isn't "I want everything, like MP3s and DVDs, for free". This is "I want to fsck-ing survive here. ius

  30. Interoperability more important by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    I don't understand why antitrust sanctions always focus on the application-bundling issue. I would find it much more useful if MS was forced to play nicely with respect to interoperability. (Yes, it's mentioned in TFA, but only in very specific cases.)

    If I were the dictator, MS would be forced to document the file formats it is using (including all WMV formats, of course), all network protocols, and to provide sufficient NTFS documentation so that I can finally can mount/dev/hda2 with read-write soonish. yyo

  31. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  32. Simple Answer = Patch-Day at Hotmail by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    Even MS has to patch their own servers.

    TechAdmin: We have to install the latest Mediaplayer updates on the Hotmail servers.

    Executive Manager: Why, that means downtime - for every minute downtime of hotmail.com I get less bonus! The servers stay up!

    TA: But we have to install these updates because without them we can not patch the servers.

    EM: Why do we need to patch the servers?

    TA: To make them more secure.

    EM: But we use our own MS Products...

    TA: That's we need to patch so often!

    EM: But the latest patches were not labeled even 'critical'

    TA: That's because of Steve and Bill and the guys from marketing, so they can tell everyone that our products are secure.

    [May someother continue...] ah

  33. Dammit by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    You think that's bad? Try working at an isp and have people yelling at you and blaming you for breaking hotmail ;).

    ahh the joys of the internet. ww

  34. I don't get Congress. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    When the MPAA comes a callin' with their CSS encryption, the answer is the DMCA.

    But when it comes to open-standards for automobiles, they're all for it.

    Why won't they make up their minds? bcq

  35. While we're talking about the social structure... by GillBates0 · · Score: 3, Interesting
    Why do most Open Source developers, hackers and software hobbyists appear to be male? The bias is easily visible on most open source websites, discussion boards (/.), and even in the Credits/Contributors list of Linux and other projects.

    Not intended to be flamebait, and from a quick readthrough, the article did not seem to address this inequality. We do hear a bevy of jokes about no females reading /....but what really is the reason?

    --
    An Indian-American Hindu committed to non-violent thought/speech/action alarmed by the global explosion of radical Islam
  36. Date in the story? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Perhaps a date in the story would have been more useful, since "As of 8:15 PM EST" is now just highly misleading. That 8:15PM EST was on Friday, March 12. This story is making it sound like it's been down for days, but in reality it was just a few short hours.

    This story isn't even relevant at this point. ax

  37. Sounds like good way to do some serious damage by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    on a loosely configured network, not saying this tool doesn't seem interesting, but it seems prone for use in DOS attacks... ixq

  38. Cool but... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    What i want is something where i can copy in a sheet of music or a few bars and hear what it would sound like. if you really want someting to teach music students with this would be it because you coul experiment and verifiy ideas or intent. na

  39. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  40. Celeron comparison by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Whoops, I mean the Centrino chip. nmr

  41. yoU Fail It by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Troll

    eyes on the real Usenet is roughly it a break, if grandstanders, the luck I'll find AMERICA) might be A NNED TO PLAY reaper Nor do the the last night of = 1400 NetBSD

  42. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Funny
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  43. Well isn't it obvious? by caston · · Score: -1
    They're in it for the chicks...

    --
    Beings aspergers AND pulling chicks... I enjoy the challenge!
  44. In Australia they also rise by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Of course it depends which way your head is up, or down - sometimes they go sideways in both directions.

    mdy

  45. Solution by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1
    Just tell them you need a quote... that you need to ensure that you have the money right now to be able to repair it.

    It's perfectly reasonable to, once they've given you the quote, to also tell you what all is wrong with your car. Tell them you'd need to think about it, as if this is going to put a bit of crimp in your budget for this month, and say you'll get back to them as soon as you've worked out the details.

    Trot down to your favorite small shop mechanic and ask him how much he'd charge to do exactly the job that the other guys said needed to get done. You tell him that the dealership has already given you a quote for $X, and the problem has been diagnosed by them. Odds are he'll undercut them. If not, just go back to the dealership... you're SOL.

    If your mechanic guy has offered to do the repairs, then you go back to the dealership and tell them that you just can't swing that kind of money this month. Then you take your car to little guy's shop and have it repaired there.

    Funny thing is, if enough people did this, the little guys would learn what the diagnosis codes meant because they'd get customers coming in telling them what was already wrong, and the mechanics could start matching up codes to real problems.

    Now the question is, is the above method, using strictly social engineering, still considered a violation of the DMCA? qdq

  46. Zaurus connectivity ? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    I first expected it to be some kind of super Zaurus but no...
    it just seems to be some bigger Vaio C1xx.
    Now, I do not see who they want to sell this to if this at least present no consistency with the rest of their offer. xgy

  47. So by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    when you're high, can dogs really fly or is it just the weed? lsm

  48. WTF!?!? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    What information is being withheld that makes non-dealer repair impossible?

    The issue is that ODBII is a pathetic subset of the real information avaible. In some cases it's useless (diagnosing climate controls, etc), in other cases it just a LOT less information than the dealer-specfic compter would provide.

    Obviously not having it doesn't make non-dealer repair impossible, but it does make it a lot harder. If you knew nothing about cars you could just replace parts until you find the right thing but it this the right way to do it?

    The point here is that independent shops are being put at a severe disadvantage by being provided only a minimal subset of the availible data. pdg

  49. No fucking chance by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    obtain criminals that seek refuge in a country

    (A) He's not a criminal and
    (B) he's not "seeking refuge". He's remaining at home where he's been the whole time.

    The US is getting uppity at Autralia because Australia is not prosecuting him. And the REASON Autralia is not prosecuting him is because HE DID NOT BREAK THE LAW.

    The US wants to extradite him so they can persecute him for "breaking codes", NOT for copyright infringment. "Breaking codes" is nothing but working out mathematics. And guess what? It's not a crime to do math in Australia! He's not a criminal.

    It's my dip-shit home country of America that came up with the numbskull idea of criminalizing math.

    P.S.
    The Chinese people should have a revolution and overthrow their government. OOPS! I JUST VIOLATED CHINESE LAW! I guess I'm a criminal too! Quick, someone extradite me to China!

    - psi

    1. Re:No fucking chance by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      WTF are you talking about? What does this have to do with KDE?

    2. Re:No fucking chance by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Uhmmm, Huh?

      Austrailian code breaking criminals? What article are you reading, 'cause it seems a tad more interesting that the article that I'm reading....

  50. Cars, DVDs, what's the difference? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1
    "A calibration code is what makes that part work, and that's the part that's proprietary," Territo said. "It's like the difference between an Apple microprocessor and an IBM microprocessor.


    Someone needs to let them in on a little IBM/Apple secret:)

    wl
  51. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Obviously, boys are smarter than girls.
    (This *is* meant to be flamebait -- and posted anonymously, so I don't ruin my chances with the girl who reads /. ... I know you're out there baby, and I love you!)

  52. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  53. It's an interesting article by digitalgimpus · · Score: 3, Insightful

    But I'd personally like to see a reflection on more open source projects than just 1 or 2.

    There are a million+1 projects now. Some with only 2 people, some with hundreds. I'd like to see what the research shows in a larger sampling.

    I'm guessing some of the smaller projects (1-10 people) will have different motivational and organizational factors than a larger project. Simply because of the group dynamics.

    1. Re:It's an interesting article by thpr · · Score: 1
      I'd personally like to see a reflection on more open source projects than just 1 or 2

      Ditto. And correllate to some other factors as well. A Linux has a huge potential installed base, because it is a general-use application. But what about something like PCGen, which is very focused, yet still has a pretty large development group (from what I can tell). Then projects with only a few maintainers. There is also the dynamic of rewriting an existing application to a new language that may alter results (like jarsync).

      Do turnover rates vary between these types of projects? What about potential for actually releasing code? (since so many projects on SourceForge don't have any code at all) What about forking? What about documentation? What about the ability to transition to a new lead maintainer? There is an entire dymanic of management systems here which is different from anything for which we have a lot of data.

      I truly hope this inspires someone to do some in-depth research on this. I should write some of my former business professors and see what they think :)

    2. Re:It's an interesting article by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      IAASS (I Am A Sociology Student).

      Any Sociologist around can feel free to correct me. ; )

      The first thing I thought when I saw the scale of this research was "Whoa! Huge!". Sociology works hard to find scientific data, but in the process of doing so it has to give up many things.

      Note that I'm not trying to talk down the natural sciences, or just "science" as I believe it's called over there, but they have the luxury of not having to deal with people. People are damn tricky.

      Especially since around 1980 when sociology started seeing the deficiencies of doing huge surveys and putting the entire society in a table and started relying more on the interviews and language the research has had to be "limited" to a narrow part of something to achieve anything worthwhile.

      I have a dream of some day doing sociological research like they did in Asimov's Foundation trilogy: everything was calculated very precisely, and the main sociologist character could cast oracle-like predictions. In the meantime, interviews with 10 people can fill a whole doctor's dissertation.

      -Vilgot, Finland

  54. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  55. How about compiling natively for the Efficieon? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1
    Wow, it's been quite a while since a Transmeta/Crusoe/Efficieon article was posted. Since nobody else seems to be up to it, it looks like I'll have to ask the standard question. Here goes:

    I understand that the Transmeta family of CPUs use 'code morphing' to translate x86 code into an internal execution format. But wouldn't it be better to write code which targets the true 'native' instruction set of the Crusoe/Efficieon? I mean, wouldn't this help solve the fucking awful performance problems of the chip?

    OK, now that's out of the way, I would also like to ask one more question. Here goes:

    Will Transmeta sell more Efficieons in the chip's whole life span than Intel will sell Pentium Ms in one day?

    I look forward to the community's response!! tr

  56. mmmhmmm by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Have you ever been in some sort of establishment and said to yourself. You know? This tune is quite catchy (pinky to mouth). It would be quite excellent if I could burn this piece of innovative harmony to CD. Wouldn't it Chompsky.. hUhUhU.

    Certainly sir. Would you have me ask the young lady what specific tune?

    Sure, be on with it.. CHOP CHOP Chompsky. Put them on my ipod.. (pinky to mouth). gvk

  57. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  58. I wonder what is so important.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    "I wonder what is so important that NASA is going to wait until Monday. Maybe they will be unveiling something else at the same time?"

    It's the monthly bug-report announcement. "A local root vulnerability has been found in the astrology community. NASA rates it as non-critical"
    ob

  59. Not a problem yet by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    It won't be an issue until they find a Kuiper object that is bigger than Pluto. Then they'll have an awkward situation. Making Pluto a planet when this bigger object isn't one doesn't make sense; nobody wants to add a new planet, because in retrospect it was a mistake to make Pluto a planet, and adding another Kuiper object would just compound it; and removing Pluto from the list of planets offends tradition.

    Everyone wants to push this off as long as possible, so if the new object is really smaller than Pluto, they'll breathe a sigh of relief and go on with things as they are. zg

  60. Divide and conquer by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Yeah yeah forking is always sweet and this sure sounds like a lot of fun already, but what I'm really waiting for is for someone to put together a BSD-from-scratch distribution! I mean, I know I could just build one with GNAA/Linux.. BUT only having a single kernel to choose means my grimy little subculture won't be as obscure as it could be. Just think how exclusive I'd be if I could pick one of the NetBSD, OpenBSD, either of the active branches of FreeBSD, and PicoBSD, Dragonfly BSD or Darwin kernels.. clp

  61. "keeps getting delayed" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Why do I keep seeing this false meme repeated and repeated and repeated?

    Longhorn never got "delayed" because it never had a release date. They were targetting late 2005. Then they came out and said late 2005 is possible, but they're targetting early 2006. They haven't changed a thing since.

    So where did this "Longhorn is vaporware, it keeps getting delayed" idea start? ho

  62. A bit OTT indeed :-) by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1
    ... a fiend of a friend offered them to us for a quid each.


    Man, you're hard on your friends!

    Simon.
    ctm
  63. But who wins in the end? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Does nobody RTFA?!!

    The aim is to free computer makers to sell Windows bundled with rival audiovisual software such as RealNetworks RealPlayer or Apple's Quicktime, the sources said. sq

  64. Re:Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdo by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1


    You're new here, aren't you?

  65. I smell trouble. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1
    I can only envision one of two possibilities for how this is going to turn out: (1) The most amazing thing ever, or (2) The biggest flop in the history of the musical theatre.

    The problem is that, for the most part, really epic stories are simply not endemic to the musical theatre art form. How many have there been? And, of those, how many have truly been successful? Even theatre epics, like Show Boat or Les Miserables are still pretty small in scope when compared to something The Lord of the Rings because they focus pretty pointedly on people, whereas LOTR is about big events, big stakes, and even larger plot points.

    Shrinking the story down to where it would it would on the musical stage, and still leave room for the things every play needs (exposition, characterization, and, probably most importantly, songs) would be almost impossible under the best circumstances, and most of the people involved simply aren't of the proven calibre necessary to pull all this off. Sure, A.R. Rahman had some kind of a success with Bombay Dreams, but what in Matthew Warchus's resume suggests he's even remotely qualified to handle something on this scale? He's talented, yes, but not with material of this size. His solution to staging one of Broadway's most traditionally opulent musicals--Follies--on Broadway in 2001 was to strip away everything that made it so oversized and, in its original production, so thrilling. If you do that with The Lord of the Rings, what's left?

    So, while I wish them the best of luck, they're really facing a difficult struggle, and I'm not sure they will be able to pull it off. Under most circumstances, I would suggest that they rework the idea as an opera, or perhaps a series of operas, but of course, Richard Wagner already did that with Der Ring des Nibeluengen, and the less comparison The Lord of the Rings has with that, the better, I think. It will be unavoidable in any case, but critics (and audiences) will have their knives sharpened going into this, and it will have to be even that much better to win them over. I wouldn't wish on my worst enemy the challenges facing the creators of this musical. rh

  66. As I watcch this video... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    I am reminded I am only 20 (and in the US), but that Guinness looks so good. I'm also in Massachusetts which appears to have the worst alcohol laws of any state I've been in.
    People here are shocked when I talk about liquor sold in gas stations! (I'm from Maine, founder of prohibition in the US) bq

  67. Meanwhile, MySQL does transactions by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    What is it that makes MySQL so much more popular than Postgres?

    Lower barrier to entry.

    Since the vast majority of toy applications don't
    need anything more than a hashed flat file (like gdbm), people find it easy
    to get things working with MySQL (MySQL abstracts a flat file quite easily)
    and suddenly think they're Database GODS. Then, when they attempt a new
    db project, they either force MySQL into it because it's what they know, or
    they look at a more powerful DB package, realize they're in over their head,
    and decide that the DB package is to blame for their inability to use it, thus
    reinforcing their idea that MySQL is a better tool.

    Now I realize that there are lots of applications where MySQL is perfectly
    adequate, but the ease of using MySQL for toy applications has fooled lots
    of people who have limited db skills at best into thinking that they're
    experts. cu

  68. Yes but... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Which is why it will work. Know your demographic. If you're silly enough to pay too much for bad coffee, you'll more than likely pay too much for bad music.... cvg

  69. Speed is by no means by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    what these processors are known for. Benchmarks show that. That's not to say it's a bad processor, and maybe the Efficeon will turn out a little sweeter. Meanwhile, there isn't a whole lot about Transmeta's stuff that stands out. Except the wacky design. tcy

  70. TomPlay by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    Take a look at www.tomplay.com. xb

  71. Here we go again by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    heh, you might want to take a look at this joke. ;-) kei

  72. OK, wise guys... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1
    I'm working with Grid and ftsh as we speak. I'm a physicist, not a professional coder. I write reasonable code, but I'm no purist. With that said...

    ftsh has great utility in the realm it's written for. Obviously, it's not a basis for installing kernels or doing password authentication. In a Grid (not just distributed) environment, things break for all sorts of reasons all the time. You're dealing with a Friendly Admin on another system, one who may well be unaffiliated with your institution, project or field of study. He doesn't have any particular reason to consult with you about system changes.

    Now you find yourself writing a grid diagnostic or submitter or job manager. One does not need strongly typed compiled languages for this. Shell scripts are almost always more efficient to write, and the speed difference is unimportant. Right now, most Grid submitters are being written in bash or Python or some such. Bash sucks for exception handling of the sort we're talking about. Python does better with its try: statements, but there's room for improvement. ftsh is a good choice for a sublayer to these scripts. One writes some of the machinery that actually interacts with the Grid nodes and supervisors in this easy, clear and flexible form.

    Now there are a lot of specific points to answer:

    One needs a Windows port to be able to make the Grid software we write in GNAA/Linux available to the poor drones who are stuck with Win boxes.

    This is not a code spellchecker or coding environment. At all.

    This is not a crutch for inadequate programmers. This is a collection of methods to deal with a specific set of recalcitrant problems.

    As I was pointing out before, this is, after all, an unstable system. One is using diverse resources on diverse platforms in many countries at many institutions. I appreciate the comment made by unixbob about operating in heterogeneous environments.

    This isn't a substitute for wget. One uses wget as an example because it's clear.

    The "pull" model breaks down immediately when there is no unified environment, as is described on infrastructures.org. When you're not the admin, and your software has to be wiped out the minute your job is done, "push" is the only way to do it. This is the case with most Grid computing right now (that I know about)

    All the woe and doom about the sloppy coding and letting the environment correct your deficiencies is... ill-thought-out. That's what a compiler is, folks. Should we all be coding in machine language?:) Use the right tool for the job and save time.

    I do agree, however, that one should indeed hone one's craft. Sloppy coding in projects of importance is inexcusable (M$). There is no reason to stick to strict exception handling, however, in the applications being discussed by ftsh's developers (the same folks who brought you Condor). When code becomes 3/4 exception handling, even when the specific exceptions don't matter, there's a problem, IMHO.:) hot

  73. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  74. Ceren Schmeren by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    Here's Cinder oj

  75. What?? Reviews are rigged? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    The manufacturers are dictating what is revealed so they don't look bad?? Who would have ever thought.. I'm shocked. wks

  76. Back to grade school for retraining... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Actually, they switched back in 1999; Pluto is again further away than Neptune. la

  77. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  78. Very cool, but.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Something to consider about Japan and their rise in technology, is that since the end of WWII, they haven't had a military to take up financing, (or resources, or R&D, etc..) thus leaving the government, and the culture as a whole, to focus on something else...like business and technology. jk

  79. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  80. So by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    If dogs are flying, then that is not weed you are smoking... Tread carefully, but enjoy. md

  81. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Funny

    Maybe it's safe to draw an analogy to Family Guy:

    Lois: I guarantee you a man made that commercial.
    Peter: Of course a man made it. It's a commercial Lois, not a delicious thanksgiving dinner.

  82. "set -e" will go a long way to helping you by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1
    The article says:

    #!/bin/sh

    cd/work/foo
    rm -rf bar
    cp -r/fresh/data .

    Suppose that the/work filesystem is temporarily unavailable, perhaps due to an NFS failure. The cd command will fail and print a message on the console. The shell will ignore this error result -- it is primarily designed as a user interface tool -- and proceed to execute the rm and cp in the directory it happened to be before.

    That shell script can be improved a lot by using " set -e " to exit on failure, as follows:
    #!/bin/sh

    set -e # exit on failure

    cd/work/foo
    rm -rf bar
    cp -r/fresh/data .


    This means that, if any command in the script fails, the script will exit immediately, instead of carrying on blindly.

    The script's exit status will be non-zero, indicating failure. If it was called by another script, and that had "set -e", then that too will exit immediately. This is a little bit like exceptions in some other languages.


    xwu
  83. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  84. Sounds like good way to do some serious damage by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    on a loosely configured network, not saying this tool doesn't seem interesting, but it seems prone for use in DOS attacks... qh

  85. except... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Many business customers have recently been coerced into signing ongoing contracts where they receive any upgrades in a particular year in exchange for a yearly fee.

    These companies are going to be extremely p155ed off when they realise that all they are going to get for their money is (maybe) XP Reloaded (think ME).

    Companies cannot afford to throw money down the microsoft toilet for much longer... especially when all they get is extra bugs that they didnt need in the first place, coupled with a healthy dose of lock-in and increased support costs. ahe

  86. Wrong price point by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    As far as I'm concerned (and lots of people I know as well), the magic price point for notebooks financed from personal funds has become $1000 or less. After all, these are machines that are often "refreshed" every two years or less, I definitely don't want to spend much more than $500/year on notebooks. This Sharp is only giving me a slow processor, XGA and 20GB for $1500? Heck, I can get the ultra-slim Averatec 3150 for $900 (often for $700 refurbished), and it's got twice the HD and a faster mobile AMD to boot. Given that the backlight eats most of the power anyway, I doubt this Sharp will run all that much longer on a charge than the Averatec, Transmeta or no Transmeta. au

  87. I know you need to be paid for your time, but.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    If they had chosen to replace rather than repair, they would be out more then just $800 dollars for the new computer. Since the Judge family needs outside assistance to fix a computer, they would most likely needs outside help to reinstall all their original applications, transfer all their important files to the new machine (without also copying the viruses), etc. $300 to repair -vs- ($800 + $300) to replace? I think they made the right choice. rox

  88. Getting errors from site - here's the full text by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Sharp Shows Slim, Trim Notebook

    New Actius MM20 is first to feature Transmeta's new Efficeon chip.

    Tom Krazit, IDG News Service
    Monday, March 15, 2004

    The first notebook available in the United States with Transmeta's new Efficeon processor will be announced by Sharp Systems of America on Monday.

    The new Actius MM20 is an improved version of the MM10, says Terry Hanly, product marketing manager for Sharp Systems, a division of Sharp Electronics.

    Advertisement

    The MM10 used Transmeta's older Crusoe processor, which was praised for its miserly power consumption but panned for its performance.

    The new Efficeon TM8600 is designed to improve performance while maintaining the low power consumption required by ultraportable notebooks--such as the 2-pound MM20. Sharp's tests showed that Efficeon delivers about 1.4 times the performance of Crusoe, Hanly says.

    Sharp also improved performance in the MM20 by adding PC2100 (266-MHz) DDR SDRAM. The notebook now comes with 512MB of memory, up from 256MB in the older MM10.

    The notebook's standard battery will last three hours under normal conditions. An extended battery will add six more hours of computing time and 0.6 pounds, Hanly says.

    Portable PC

    A base configuration of the notebook includes the 1-GHz Efficeon processor, 512MB of memory, a 20GB hard drive, and a 10.4-inch display for an estimated starting price of $1499. Sharp will take preorders for the notebook as of Monday, and it will ship in April.

    The MM20 is designed as a second notebook for corporate executives or frequent business travelers that prefer something lightweight when traveling, Hanly says.

    Sharp will include a base station and cable with the MM20 that allows users to connect the notebook to their regular PC through a USB port and use the notebook as an external hard drive.

    Specially configured software from Iomega allows users to make changes to documents on their regular PC that will be automatically synchronized with the MM20. Conversely, if a user makes changes to a document on the road, the updated version of that document will automatically replace the older version on the regular PC when the units are connected, Hanly says.

    A version of this notebook has been available in Japan, Hanly says. She does not know if a version will ship in Europe. lnw

  89. Geo (or larger) Politics and the human condition by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1


    Back in April 2002, the UK government started to fund a centre studying both the near-earth-orbit rocks we know about, and ways of increasing awareness and detection rates, as well as investigating possible protection strategies.

    Personally I think it's just playing at people-politics, at least in the form the UK has done it $600k isn't going to go very far, but it's a relatively cheap purchase of public goodwill... On the other hand, at the moment I'll take what we can get.

    There's a tiny chance of life as we know it being destroyed. A really tiny chance, and one thing humans aren't good at is disaster-planning - even when the potential result is extinction, the "gut-feeling" is to say "it'll never happen", because none of us have any experience of it happening. This is short-sighted, we should be doing something.

    Although I don't think there's any reason to panic about it, the last great ecosystem was destroyed by (perhaps two, perhaps 1) asteroid, as far as we know. Researching, thinking, creating plans would probably be a good idea, at least IMHO.

    Simon ao

  90. Hmmm, flexible humanoid lips? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    I for one can see several applications that might directly appeal to this crowd.

    hx

  91. What's in a word ? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    It seems to me that they're trying to redefine "score editor" and yet generally, that's what it seems to be, more or less.
    While the printed output is asthetically pleasing, it strikes me as an odd technology to persue, because I wonder how many musicians today can actually read music. I'd wager the vast majority of rock musicians can't, and that roughly half of pop musicans can't. I can't, and I've written "plenty" of material and play several instruments. It's not truly a necessity anymore, with a good ear and modern equipment, ideas can quickly be stored for future embellishment or shown to others in the absence of an actual instrument. It's not even necessary for registering with the library of congress, an audio tape will suffice. yp

  92. Please called it MICROSOFT SQL server by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Just calling "SQL server" suggests its the only
    program that serves SQL. uss

    1. Re:Please called it MICROSOFT SQL server by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Don't be stupid. SQL Server is a product name, much as the same as "Internet Explorer". Every time someone omits the Microsoft from the beginning of that, do you cry about the fact that the name implies it is the only program that explores the internet?

      Idiot.

  93. Saving ourselves from famine, disease, war by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    why should we realistically expect an end to famine, disease, war? They've been with us throughout history. Man has always wished to eliminate these woes -- yes they keep getting worse and worse.

    This is an idiotic, self-perpetuating argument. Just because something is, and has been for a long time, does not mean it is an unchangeable truth.

    In this particular instance, consider this: the world is rapidly changing and is not the same as, say, during the Roman Empire, yet there is a lot of residual ideologies and beliefs left over from those times. They are not set in stone, however...do not mistake them for "human nature." There have been a lot of improvements to the world that should not be overlooked (civil rights movement, etc).

    There are some people who are interested in actualizing change in the world. Some have even written down their thoughts about it. qr

  94. A distributed shell ... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    ... was mentioned a few months back in one of the magazines I pick up almost monthly (forget which one out of the several it was).

    I think the shell was called dsh. I believe this is the project site: http://dsh.sourceforge.net/

    Are the aims of this fault tolerant shell and dsh the same? I'm not a programmer, but I'm trying to teach myself *nix system administration.

    Eventually I'm hoping to cluster some older x86 systems I'm going to get at auction together for a Beowulf cluster. It sounds to me like one if not both of these two shells might come in handy! ql

  95. "If he committed no crime in his home country" by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    You're in Minnesota. That's instant punishment. If it weren't for their hockey team, it would have been labelled 'Hell' a long time ago. lr

  96. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  97. MS slips makes more opportunities? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    I hate to disagree with that, but we recently had a project and had the choice of which SQL to use. Customer pushed back and simply said MS.

    Just because the product isn't there doesn't mean they will automatically go to another 'free' alternative- instead it means they'll simply use the older version until it wears out. oql

  98. Quite the fix up by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    According to the 1999 article, the original asking price was $300,000. The guy who bought it is asking $3,500,000. That's a bit of a markup, there.

    It makes sense if he put a lot of money and time into renovating it; that's probably the case if there's someone currently occupying the property. (Which the auction hints at.) as

  99. The real problem by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    The real problem is people who actually buy this stuff. If no one was buying things from spam, no one would send spam. We all know this.

    I propose we start spamming. Anyone who responds gets a nice l'il pistol whipping and is returned to their comptuer. After the first news report, people will be afraid to respond to spam. ykt

  100. Oooh! An idea whose time has come! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1
    More ideas whose time has come, including:
    • DRM Helmets
    • Jack Kemp
    • Yankee Go Home
    • Collaborative Dispute Resolution
    • Microchips for Your Pet Parrot! (see page 2 of Google results)
    oed
  101. Intellectual Property... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    I've heard from time to time (albeit prety sparsely) of companies threatening legal action for using their images on a website/forum/etc.

    Is there any written law that backs it up, or is it just baseless threats? cv

  102. That explains it... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    I was getting a "Service Unavailable" but couldn't figure out if it was my flaky connection or Microsoft's flaky software. Guess now I know. oir

  103. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  104. %(plus on3 Informative) by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    trouble. It Lite is straining var7 for diiferent dey

  105. Change two words... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    If you take this quote from the article:

    "You don't want technology to destroy competitiveness," said Sen. Lindsay Graham, R-S.C., who offered one of the bills. "There's no reason... you shouldn't be able to take your car to anyone you want rather than there being only one option."

    and change two words, you get:

    "You don't want technology to destroy competitiveness," said Sen. Lindsay Graham, R-S.C., who offered one of the bills. "There's no reason... you shouldn't be able to take your music to any player you want rather than there being only one option."

    I wonder how Sen. Graham voted on some other issue?
    fz

  106. Gravitational perpetuum mobile by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Just examine the effect and move it to macro scale, i.e. you drag lighter-than-air baloons down, pick them and release them up in normal conditions, creating energy (i.e. lifting small amounts of water up and releasing it onto a turbine). Free Energy! Of course there ain't no free lunch, but in this case it comes at cost of earth's rotation momentum, after several megawatts of energy produced our day will be some fraction of second longer. gqc

  107. Stop the presses! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Seriously slashdot, your GNAA/Linux loving policy is blinding you as to what is relevant and what isn't.

    And your ignorance of news is blinding you to the fact that all the other major news sites reported hotmail and msns outages as well.

    Even CNN had it as a top story in the technology section. cqs

  108. Low priority? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    But how important will famine, disease, and war be when 90% of the population has been wiped out by a massive asteroid and the effects after the collision?

    So an asteroid could actually be the solution to these serious problems! I like your thinking. vtd

  109. AMERICANS! Get your act together! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    The article states that the Australian authorities are unable to charge him, indicating that he has done nothing illegal in his country of residence and the country where the act was carried out (Australian server,.au domain). Many Americans have "broken Norwegian law", by allowing Norwegians to download hardcore porn from American servers. Should they all be extradited? Your country and laws are not above anybody elses. The fact that some of you clearly think so sickens and frightens me. If we are to go by the logic put forth by some of you, we should all be extradited to China (if not North Korea)... Sure you want that? nop

  110. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  111. Everything but the kitchen sink by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Can it make tea too? qc

  112. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  113. Wow... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    I'm feeling like I could be the 6 trillion dollar man any year now... between this, powered exoskeletal legs, I'll be a super sapper in no time. I wonder how much of this my beloved US Army has actually looked into. ax

  114. marketing survey by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    About 6 months ago I was on the phone to some marketing company who were doing a survey on Yukon and whether or not I was contemplating deploying it.

    I said no because:

    1) it was too tighly integrated into AD/ windows server and we didn't any of that.
    2) I didn't trust it, and wouldn't till it had been in the field for at least a year.

    I think they got alot of responses like 2) (going by the marketers comments) and they prob decided to wait till the new windows server is out (2006??) and deploy on the new Trusted Computing Base thing they are wittering on about.

    pg

  115. Could be a cool hosting facility! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1


    In the UK The Bunker is an old nuclear shelter turned into a secure webhosting facility.

    The guy who owns it wrote 'Stay Another Day' performed by East 17 and was a UK Christmas #1.

    Fact.

    No. This isn't about football.;-) pj

  116. I know you need to be paid for your time, but.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    If they had chosen to replace rather than repair, they would be out more then just $800 dollars for the new computer. Since the Judge family needs outside assistance to fix a computer, they would most likely needs outside help to reinstall all their original applications, transfer all their important files to the new machine (without also copying the viruses), etc. $300 to repair -vs- ($800 + $300) to replace? I think they made the right choice. yhl

  117. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  118. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  119. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  120. Easily satisfied. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Sure, they'll make big bucks with just Britney, Justin and Limp Bizkit available. Cause everyone knows people who drink coffee at Starbucks don't have taste. xgv

  121. Divide and conquer by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1
    From that interview, it sounds like DragonFly is going to have a different package management system in the future. Which means either the base is going to change,

    The BSD base isn't packaged. BSD types like having a source tree for their entire base system and being able to do "make buildworld" and "make installworld" to upgrade it. The package management system is entirely for third party applications. This is not Debian or Gentoo who have no code maintained by themselves other than installation and package management stuff. The BSDs maintain the kernel, the libc, other key libraries, and all the base utilities like ls, cp, mount, etc. And there's also a lot of "contrib" software in the base system -- some of it necessary to build the system (gcc and binutils), some of it just there out of tradition or regarded as "too useful to be moved to ports" (bind, sendmail). lx

  122. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  123. Celeron comparison by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Whoops, I mean the Centrino chip. bil

  124. A different kind a fault tolerance by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    I've always wanted a shell that deletes into a 'garbage' folder, but in a native way so programs calling a delete function would also. I've also wanted a 'file versions' feature to bring safety to accidently overwriting. Then it would really be tolerant of user faults.

    While we're at it: a config file library so every config file is the same format; exportable functions so gimp can export gmp.imageResize fileName 800 600 to the shell; and a codecs folder with libraries for image, video, document, and data compression.

    Not every might see that last one's benefit, but I think if every app exported its format there (quicktime, realmedia) and let it be universally called, apps would be judged by interface, not filetype support.

    Another idea: make every shortcut in X the config file. That way, a simple copy+edit makes two easily created+accessed differently configed programs. (I don't know about network-wide configs, though.) fu

  125. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  126. Still Wanted: by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Open form-factor laptop specification.

    I *can't* believe that companies like Viewsonic and Asus have not gotten together to create a chassis and DC power spec so that we can all build/repair our own laptops. Things like LCD panels could be purchased affordably at Best Buy or Circuit Shitty if this was the case. esl

  127. Mmmm...bubbles going down in beer. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    -Homer bz

  128. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  129. No reason to force them by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    It is a good idea. It happened with IE and should happen with any other Windows endorsed products. There is no reason to ship them pre-installed. The argument that GNAA/Linux do that is false because XMMS and The Gimp are seperate entities from the distribtuion. pkt

  130. Dammit by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Why do people despise the Mac platform so much?

    perceived levels of freedom

    Back in the day, both IBM PCs and Apple Macs were closed systems, their internel workings were undocumented to the outside world. There was, however, one crucial difference. PCs set up the hardware with the BIOS and then went to disk for the OS whereas MACs booted from an internal ROM. Compaq succeeded in cloning the IBM BIOS which meant you could put an IBM floppy in a Compaq machine and it would boot. Some companies tried to clone the Mac but were slapped with lawsuits because you couldn't copy the Apple ROM. The company that supplied IBM with the stuff on their floppies was a Washington startup called Microsoft who had cunningly retained the right to ship MS-DOS seperate from a computer.

    Consequently the PC Clone market flourished and IBM lost their control over the PC Platform driving down price while driving up incompatibility. Meanwhile Apple continued to develop their platform. It was a technically superior platform with a unified graphical user interface, used Postscript for printing and SCSI for devices. This made MACs expensive when you did CPU Cycles / $. You could walk into an Apple dealer, choose the bits, go home, plug it all together and it worked whereas you would go to a PC dealer tell him what you want and he's spend a few days building it and battling to get the bits talking to each other but when you got it home it worked.

    Because it was difficult to build and maintain PCs, their builders and maintainers looked down on the MAC, it wasn't as fast for the same $, was too easy to use, you didn't have to take the case to pieces to add a peripheral and the only people you knew who had them were too rich to deserve them.

    As the builders and maintainers of the PCs of everyone in their social circle, the non-techies trusted the techies opinion, parroting the same lame arguments in PCs vs MACs arguments the world over.

    oy

  131. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by garcia · · Score: 2, Funny

    Obviously you're just the president of Harvard.

  132. Article Repost by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    One of the best-known and most ambitious music programs for GNAA/Linux is the LilyPond score engraving system. Unlike other typesetting software like Finale or Sibelius, LilyPond is not a score editor, and it has no GUI -- instead it aims to start from a simple textual description of the music and turn it into the highest possible quality output, automatically.

    LilyPond is the result of several years of work by Han-Wen Nienhuys and Jan Nieuwenhuizen. In this extensive interview, GNAA/Linux Musician's Chris Cannam talks to them about recent and future directions for the project.

    Chris: I recently found a file of music examples I had printed out from LilyPond, probably in 1998. The LilyPond printouts looked less professional than they would be today, but many of the capabilities of today's software were in place. What have you been doing for the last six years?

    Han-Wen: About five years ago we were working up to release 1.0. Our target was to have a usable program that could produce basic music notation, where we defined "basic" as "whatever is in our set of simple test pieces", and usable was "will not dump core, mostly."

    We succeeded, but of course it didn't work very well for things that weren't in our test-pieces. By that time, we were also reaching the bounds of what was possible in our model of notation, an object-oriented model, hard-coded in C++. So we decided to integrate the GNU's GUILE library, a Scheme interpreter which was specifically designed to extend programs. We spent the next two to three years refactoring our C++ code into Scheme functions. This resulted in a more flexible, more efficient and better maintainable program.

    "We knew what 'publication quality' engraving meant, and were determined to perfect Lily into producing that."

    The second big change was catalyzed by an invitation to join a workshop in Firenze, Italy, organized by Nicola Bernardini of AGNULA fame, then director of Centro Tempo Reale. At the workshop we met Nicola, a few top-notch engravers, and an editor for Universal Edition, an Austrian publisher that does a lot of contemporary music. We had the chance to discuss LilyPond with several experts. On the one hand, we were thrilled that they took us seriously, but on the other hand they pointed to several inadequacies in our output. We arrived back home a great deal wiser.

    We knew what "publication quality" engraving meant, and were determined to perfect Lily into producing that. Since we like hand-engraved music, we started reproducing simple pieces in LilyPond and comparing the output side-by-side. By doing close comparisons, we learned how music should really look, and we fixed all the deficiencies that we found.

    In anything that you write, there will always be a neat, simple, small idea that is obscured by crufty implementation, bad design or suboptimal algorithms. According to me, the real art of programming is recognizing the neat idea, and being ruthless enough to redo all the other bad bits. Since we're writing new code all the time, we also have continue to refactoring everything, and this how we have spent the last few years: coding new stuff, and refactoring old stuff.

    We also did a lot with the documentation. Some of our users complain about the current documentation, and they're probably right, but what we have now is light-years ahead of the manual a few years ago.

    Your website features an essay on music typesetting that is quite critical of other software, with an entertaining piece of bad typesetting from Finale. You make an effort to explain that it isn't just an exceptional example -- but surely if programs like Finale and Sibelius are so widely used by good musicians, they can't really be that bad?

    The default output of Finale is indeed shockingly bad, which is why almost all other vendors routinely compare their packages to Finale. Of course, that's why we use it too. The default layout of Sibelius is not very elegant, but at least it's usable. A Sibelius sampl

  133. MS helping OSS - Indirectly by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Firebird

    They all beat MS-SQL consistantly, and postgresql is coming close to toppling oracle!

    Mysql isn't the only open source database in the world. It is popular because 90% of users DON'T need all the flashy features. xw

  134. "Appear to be male"? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny


    Why do most Open Source developers, hackers and software hobbyists appear to be male?

    Dunno - perhaps it has something to do with a generally barrel-like physique and likelihood of facial hair. Careful, though - appearances can be deceiving.

    1. Re:"Appear to be male"? by mattyrobinson69 · · Score: 1

      i have a barrel-like physique (im on a diet) and im growing my beard back, but i cant code in anything but VB5 yet.

      Two out of three aint bad?

    2. Re:"Appear to be male"? by mattyrobinson69 · · Score: 1

      sorry - i completely misread your comment. ignore me.

    3. Re:"Appear to be male"? by poopdeville · · Score: 1

      ignore me.

      Indeed!

      --
      After all, I am strangely colored.
  135. Pack the bags! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Honey, we're moving to Washington!!!

    Imagine mapping this (your HOUSE) for a Quake / Unreal map!!
    ngp

  136. that isn't how it works by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    are they going to coat them in extensible insulator, too?

    and every crush-injury will destroy them

    these guys need ome more requirements analysis nbp

  137. That's okay by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    SQL Server 2005? is going to be great. However, if I had to choose the *best* database I would go with Oracle without a doubt. Every tool other database manufacturers are trying to mirror generally come from Oracle. Plus they support GNAA/Linux which makes buying very expensive hardware a problem of the past. Hell you can get a license for standard for $799.

    Unfortunately my job runs SQL Server 2000. Having cut my teeth on PL/SQL, Transact is a nightmare because it is so limiting.

    I'm actually looking forward to Yukon because the marketing ad sheet shows some really cool features. The only question is will they deliver and when will it be? hn

  138. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  139. Pre-emptive anti-slashdotting by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    The one from the logged in poster is a faithful reproduction of the article. The anonymous coward one mentions cowboyneal and male body parts.

    That probably explains why the moderation was done the way it was far more the the stated author of the article. iy

  140. linuxmusician.com -- no content.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    I love the idea, but looking throughthe site even a seasoned GNAA/Linux vtran CAN NOT get a linux pc doing his music work.

    there is lots of words and ideas on the site but absolutely ZERO content.

    the tutorial on rosegarden is 100% worthless, they dont even cover how the hell you get it set up so you can actually input/output anything.

    Nothing about JACK nothing about the wild fight to get MIDI working reliabily under ALSA and JACK.

    no real reccomendations as to what hardware to buy because it does work, just a wishy-washy "most soundcards come with a midi port on the joystick..

    how about the fact that most soundcards absolutely SUCK at midi/audio recording? why not a list of "
    these fricking work good"

    linuxmusician.com is a worthless website for a bunch of fanboys, and i constantly reccomend to people that are interested in linux and music to AVOID it.

    let us all know wher there is a REAL website devoted to getting linux and musicians working together...
    nxy

  141. what make's the net so special? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Why is it that there "have to be" laws specific to the internet? If a spammer sends an e-mail using forged headers, why doesn't the law go after him (or her) with good old-fashioned anti-fraud laws? Does the main failing of these kinds of old laws lie in ingorance that makes law enforcement unable or unwilling to enforce the laws without further clarification, or is something else going on here? yvy

  142. Horrible Name by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    I really do wish mickysoft would rename their flagship database something else. Are they that arrogant that they feel the need for such a generic name? That's about like naming your product "Web Server" or "Network File Server". When someone mentions SQL server, I always have them clarify whether or not they are talking in general terms for some sort of relational backend, or are they referring to microsoft's product. Sometimes they don't even know the difference, but perhaps that is microsoft's end goal. gv

  143. Somebody Didn't Read GNAA/Linux Toys by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    It doesn't cost 400 quid to put together an LCD picture frame. PopSci is taking a different route from GNAA/Linux Toys to make sure it'll work. cg

  144. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  145. Dammit by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    I hope she's good in bed cause I'd never date someone that clueless unless she could make my
    toes curl, my eyes roll into the back of my head, and jets of steam shoot out of both ears.

    You want her to put you in a microwave?

    That is Kinky! qg

  146. It's a religion. by theGreater · · Score: 4, Insightful

    No really, think about it. You have a core set of guys who are -really- in touch with the new movement (RMS and ESR come to mind), but who tend to upset a lot of "normal" people. Following in their footsteps, you have a slightly larger, more polished set of people; religions call these "disciples" but we tend to call them "maintainers." They decide where the needs of the real world intersect with the tenets of the ideology.

    Then there's you and me. Honestly, most of us have no idea about the gory details of the whole thing. We gladly use free and libre and EULA'd software to get along in our daily lives. Some of us are more dedicated than others, and we only run Debian. Or Catholix. Or whatever. No matter which one we choose, it's "The Best One" and all others are inferior in some way.

    LUG's as churches, LiveCD's as evangelism... the list goes on and on and on of why Libre and Open Source software are more like a social / religious organization, and less like a goods and services production group.

    -theGreater Zealot.

    1. Re:It's a religion. by latroM · · Score: 1

      We gladly use free and libre and EULA'd software to get along in our daily lives.

      I haven't seen any free software EULA, have you? The GPL is a distribution license, so are the BSD licenses. You don't have to accept those to use the software.

    2. Re:It's a religion. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
      All apologies for not being clearer. I was attempting to differentiate between three different classes of software:
      1. software that costs nothing monetary to obtain
      2. software that is free as in air, and free as in liberty
      3. software that has a restrictive license or other objectionable attachment
      My point was that many of us, while paying lip service to the FOSS movement, happily use horribly restricted and invasive software on a regular basis.

      I was making an analogy between religion and FOSS; this would fall under hypocrisy in religion, and is often justified for the sake of convenience.

      -theGreater.
    3. Re:It's a religion. by vyrus128 · · Score: 1
      I have to strongly disagree with you. Yes, the superficial structure may be similar; but the difference is in the _memes_. The memes associated with/spread by FLOSS are things like sharing your efforts; in contrast religious memes are, almost by definition, of the form "If you don't join us you are going to Hell. If you do x, y, or z you are going to Hell."

      The only meme I can really find in common is respecting the leadership; but forks of religions only happen by people so up in the hierarchy as to be disillusioned with the leaders, whereas anyone can fork a FLOSS project (not that it happens often, but it does occasionally.)

    4. Re:It's a religion. by Verteiron · · Score: 1

      An interesting concept. Most people only have "room" in their minds for 1 religion. It would be curious to tally up the religious beliefs of really "devout" OSS supporters and see how many are atheists. Perhaps OSS is being dropped into people's "worship" slot.

      --
      End of lesson. You may press the button.
    5. Re:It's a religion. by theGreater · · Score: 1

      I've seen this statement made several times in many forms: "If you're not US, you're THEM and our ENEMY."

      In religion it takes the form of "Follow these teachings or you're not 'saved'." In FOSS it takes the form of "Use this license or you're not 'free'.".

      And, of course, as in all other worlds, you have two endpoints for people to lie between.

      -theGreater.

    6. Re:It's a religion. by vyrus128 · · Score: 1

      I would be willing to entertain the idea that RMS' "Free Software" ideology is like a religion. But the point of differentiating "Open Source" from "Free Software" is to get away from that zealotry. Besides which, there are very many projects that simply don't care about such issues, preferring to focus on the software itself (as it should be.)

    7. Re:It's a religion. by Brandybuck · · Score: 1

      It's not all about hell. Sometimes it's about heaven. Destroy the World Trade Center and get laid by seventy seven babes for all of eternity. Free your mind to get out of the karmic rat race. Etc, etc.

      --
      Don't blame me, I didn't vote for either of them!
    8. Re:It's a religion. by Brandybuck · · Score: 1

      I've thought about this before. I think there is an innate need in human beings for religion. Atheists fill this need with non-theistic things. When you get groups of atheists together, they tend to product their own non-theist religion, complete with ethos, priesthoods, sacred texts, rituals, etc.

      The prime example is communism (as opposed to socialism). The state is revered as holy, the works or Marx are sacred, party leaders are priests, etc.

      Many geeks are agnostics or atheists, and I think there is a similar psychology at work here. It's not just licensing, but also covers programming languages, Linux distributions, and other things. Anything which can be a "one true way" can become a substitute religion for some geeks.

      How do you know if a geed has gone beyond mere preference (good) and into religious worship (bad)? Look for the priesthood. Are there people whose primary task it is to promote the "one true way"? Look for the proselytization. Is your current distro not good enough for them, and are they following you around urging you to try theirs? Look for the preaching. How many times have you been told that a certain license will save your soul^H^H^H^Hfreedom? Look for the taboos. Have your ever seriously offended a geek by using the word "Linux" without the prefix of "GNU/"?

      Not all geeks are this way. But a significant number of them are. This charge of "religion" didn't come out of nowhere. There are so many more things to be properly religious about, that to waste your spirituality on software is sad.

      --
      Don't blame me, I didn't vote for either of them!
    9. Re:It's a religion. by An+Onerous+Coward · · Score: 1

      No, it's not a religion. The parallels you point out work pretty well, because religion and open source movements both fall under the category of "social movements", and most social movements have those sorts of things in common.

      The religious comparison may be a sore spot for those of us who see religious belief as usually irrational or anti-rational. But many social movements contain elements of anti-rationalism. For example, Communism isn't a religion, but its statements about the workings of history are anti-rational in the extreme.

      So the question isn't, "Is Open Source a religion?", but, "Do its proponents base their claims on demonstrable facts, and engage their critics in a constructive way?" Our record may be a bit spotty in that regard. Some of the statements made about software quality and security sound more like received truths than empirically derived fact. But I don't think anti-rationalism is endemic to the cause, which for me is a necessary criterion for participation.

      --

      You want the truthiness? You can't handle the truthiness!

  147. music/audio on linux: by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    While I know that this is more of a compositing program--at least from what I read so far...as I have shamefully not RTFA--I'm going to take this opportunity to bitch about the one thing that has been keeping me from making the switch to GNAA/Linux for all these years:

    Audio Apps


    I'm no industry elitist that demands ProTools. in fact, I hate protools. The interface leaves much to be desires...granted, i'll buffer that (admittedly harsh) opinion: I'm a huge fan of CoolEditPro.....("eww, PC audio"...I can hear it already),

    The underlying audio subsystems are a far cry from what windows offers. And what I experienced with in my limiting dealings with aRTS leaves much to be desired. (Think: latency) And I'm sure that has a lot to do with it....(why hasn't ASIO or an equiv been implemented yet?)

    Aside from that all I ask for is a simple audio production suite where i can record something, and then playback and record something else. Simple full-duplex operation. I've been doing it in Windows for over 7 years now.....hell, I did it in DOS with my GUS 11 years ago.

    Toss in a little simple single-track editing, some simple effects (Chorus/Flange, Dynamics processing, simple verb and delay, etc) and maintain development of the project and you've won yourself a full-fledged permenent windows convert.....and i'm willing to bet I'm not the only one.

    Am I just out of touch? Is there already software out there that does this?

    ~Dan suo

  148. Like 'His Dark Materials' by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    Rather surprisingly, they managed to turn the almost-as-complex His Dark Materials trilogy into what is, by all accounts, a fantastic stage show... I'll certainly be getting tickets to see this... hp

  149. Contradiction? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    In my opinion, any file format that claims to be universal should have two properties: it should have an expressive structure, so other formats can be expressed in it, and it should be as lean as possible, so that converting from other formats amounts to removing information. I think that MusicXML fits neither.

    Am I missing something or are those two properties mutually contradictory? If converting means removing stuff, then the format would have to be a subset of the original, but if it's expressive enough to express other formats, then would it not also have to be a superset?

    I basically read that as "It must be both more and less than what we have, and MusicXML is neither of those things" jw

  150. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  151. I don't get Congress. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    When the MPAA comes a callin' with their CSS encryption, the answer is the DMCA.

    But when it comes to open-standards for automobiles, they're all for it.

    Why won't they make up their minds? mi

  152. woohoo by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1
    there's only one thing better than DSPAM v2.10 begin released.

    Getting laid. exa

  153. I guess that'll show em. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    This is Slashdot, where any sufficiently advanced opinion is indistinguishable from fact. ic

  154. Simple Answer = Patch-Day at Hotmail by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Even MS has to patch their own servers.

    TechAdmin: We have to install the latest Mediaplayer updates on the Hotmail servers.

    Executive Manager: Why, that means downtime - for every minute downtime of hotmail.com I get less bonus! The servers stay up!

    TA: But we have to install these updates because without them we can not patch the servers.

    EM: Why do we need to patch the servers?

    TA: To make them more secure.

    EM: But we use our own MS Products...

    TA: That's we need to patch so often!

    EM: But the latest patches were not labeled even 'critical'

    TA: That's because of Steve and Bill and the guys from marketing, so they can tell everyone that our products are secure.

    [May someother continue...] pzt

  155. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  156. Not what it is all about by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1
    Do you really need much compute power in a walk-about machine to do email, web browsing, word smithing ? In a trade off give me battery time over machine horsepower every time.

    Common sense would say so, but unfortunately, newer browsers, widget libraries, and window managers use a lot of resources. I used to use Redhat 7.1 with FVWM and Opera 6. Blazingly fast on my P3/450. Then, because of frustration with incompatible libraries for newer RPMs, I upgraded to Fedora/Opera 7. I still run Fvwm, but this new Opera version (with a newer Qt library, I presume) needs about 2 seconds of CPU time just for getting in and out of focus. If I look carefully, I can see that the borders of the windows inside the Opera window change a little bit depending on the focus. Emacs and xterm still run fine, but everything that has Gtk or Qt is slow as hell. zfy

  157. Everything but the kitchen sink by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Can it make tea too? nkm

  158. Very cool, but.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    It pisses me off that no American company today would ever do something like this.

    That is because Wall Street is so concerned with short-term profits. Gasoline is at an all-time high while Toyota/Honda are the only companies that had the patience to develop a profitable solution.

    Now, Ford isn't buying Toyota technology because it makes environmental sense. Rather, they are doing it because it makes sense for short-term profits - the same mindset that got them into this situation in the first place. This mentality will catch up to the US sooner or later. And where is solar energy? nkc

  159. Preach on, by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    had to take my car to the dealership this weekend because the shop down the block didn't know what the codes meant. Turns out it was a misaligned break caliper, cost me $225 at the dealership, would have been about $130 down the street. eii

  160. Dupe by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1
  161. Trolls R' Us by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    Yow. I've never seen so many obvious MS posts on any story here before. They must have been rousing people from bed in Redmond today to get the word out.

    How are these obvious trolls and flamebait getting modded up? Every single MS monopoly story has some bonehead saying "how come Apple doesn't get in trouble for bundling iTunes..." This has been definitively answered dozens of times, but here it is again, and modded up too. Likewise, every story has someone saying "what's wrong with bundling things people find useful..."(apart from anti-trust law, nothing) or "who gets hurt by forcing MS to stop breaking the law? Joe Sixpack, that's who..." (I agree, let's ignore laws that restrain Microsft's freedom to innovate) Both are here as well, and modded up.

    What's going on? The low number of comments on the story seem to have revealed a distinct pattern that would normally go unnoticed. prz

  162. I wish NASA was better at PR.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    First off, I was really pissed off at NASA and the media outlets for the scant coverage of the mission results concerning water on mars. All we got was a 4 minute introduction and one panelist into the release and it was back to the CNN/FOX 30 minute cycle of endless Pro-Bush news bits and Iraq coverage. Luckily, I have the NASA TV channel on satellite, so I was able to flip over -- but for the >95% of americans without NASA tv, they missed out on an hour's worth of enlightening details of Mars, straight from scientists and not tabloid writers with no understanding of science.

    Now, this release isn't even going to be televised. The only initial outlet is a conference call for reporters only.

    I'm ashamed of NASA and I am ashamed of our media coverage of science. When I was a kid, every space shuttle launch was televised. Taking 10-30 minutes of time out of my day to watch the occasional launch helped inspire me to think above the quagmire I was born into, to know there was something greater. Kids today get MTV and 24 hour news spin channels in 30 minute loops.

    But hey, at least they get a nice, fast Internet and ~225 national channels of garbage via satellite. wax

  163. What is to come by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    I see alot of fellow slashdot posters slamming on "Why only WMP?". Well, the outcome of this sanction is wider than WMP alone, much wider. It will leverage future sanctions on other software bundled with Windows in speed and decision power. By taking this case as an example, it will become much easier to make sanctions against other monopoly misuse. That is what the real power of this decision is all about. thy

  164. Um... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    We've had them for many years. It's called NiTiNOL. Nitinol is a metal alloy that, when used in wires, constricts when current is passed through it (heating phase) and stretches when it is idle (cooling phase). This is also the same material that those bend-proof wire glasses frames are made of. See http://www.dynalloy.com/AboutNitinol.html for just one manufacturer's info page. mr

  165. That's a new one by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    The GPL and other open source licenses are anticompetitive.

    OK, so "viral" is no longer effective - we all saw how MS can happily thrieve among viruses. Let's bring anticompetitive on, maybe we can then "persuade" the DoJ to ... ummm ... "look" into in?

    Expect this new GPL opinion to make it into MS's unofficial arguments soon.

    1. Re:That's a new one by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

      Anticompetitive? Then why is Microsoft's biggest worry that its OS and products are losing market to open-source ones? This is called competition where I'm from.

      One also has to remember that the only reason we promote competition is because we don't know how to force people to produce good products otherwise. Here, we've found a way. The only competition lost is that between companies creating the same thing in parallel because they don't share with each other, which has nothing to do with these issues - in fact companies would have more time to work on new products if they didn't have to waste time reinventing the wheel.

  166. Precedent? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    I can't really say I care for the precedent being set here.

    How are you supposed to get anything done on the internet if you have to worry about not only the laws in your country, but those all over the world?

    (Realistically, the laws in your country plus those in the US) psy

  167. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by Aadain2001 · · Score: 1

    Well, I can speak from experience that myself and my other male engineer peers do not do anything to make women avoid engineering or computers in general. Maybe it's time we stop looking for some outside source or plan to keep women out of engineering roles and first look to your own for an answer. The women I know in engineering are intelligent, driven, and very much my peers in all respects. There just aren't many of them. Get women more interested in engineering first, then check to see if programs/professors are intentially driving women away. If you want so see more women's name in the credits for Linux, submit a few patches yourself and get some of your female computer friends to do the same. There's no reason they can't get in, they just aren't trying.

    --
    Space for rent, inquire within
  168. Somewhat offtopic... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Does anyone know much about Apache James? Apache's new Java-based mail server? I've been playing around with it and it seems pretty smooth. But how does it compare to, for example, postfix?

    One nice feature is that you can extend James using "Mailets" (like applets/servlets but for mail) written in java, which would be great for a java-head like myself :).

    Anyway, I was just wondering if anyone knew much about it/actually used it for anything. It would be nice to have a single mail server who's configuration could be used on any platform. lq

  169. what did you expect by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    The computer is nothing special -- just another thing. You have plumbers and electicians, etc. Computer service is really just another semi-skilled trade that anyone could do if they wanted to invest a little time to learn, but they prefer to use their time in other pursuits.

    I often pick up painting jobs for a few extra bucks (and because I like doing some manual labor from time to time). I don't think it's any different than doing basic computer service.

    Isn't a goal of the computer field to have pooters so easy to use that anyone can do it? If I was feeling grumpy I would happily argue that most trades which the typical geek might describe as "lowly" or "pathetic" are actually more challenging than 90% of computer related tasks performed by conceited pricks in the IT field. And the most conceited of the bunch never touch the 10% of work which required any degree of intelligence, but they are simply insecure fems who think that somehow working on a computer makes them better than others.

    li
  170. SSI? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    If you read the article, Matt says (about SSI): "It is something that no non-commercial system today can do"... zau

  171. Okay by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    I have a friend who went around charging 50 dollars to take the MS.Blaster worm off people's computers. This amateur computer repair field has great potential, as computers penetrate further and further into most bussinesses. Time is money, and paying some kid 50 bucks to fix a computer is often cheaper in the long run then spending 2 days doing it yourself. I plan to do the very same thing with a local company over the summer break from school.
    I want to be a Digitician when I grow up. qmn

  172. SQL Server 2005, Visual Studio 2005 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    CNET News reported five days ago on the 10th that both Yukon and Whidbey would be delayed and their final names. They need that time if they are going to clean up the shit HTML and JS outputed by VS. Not that they will, that would allow people to use Firefox.

    The company said Wednesday that it has decided to push out to the first half of 2005 the delivery of the next major edition of SQL Server, code-named Yukon, and a closely related update to Visual Studio.Net, called Whidbey. Until recently, the company had said that both products would ship by the end of this year.

    The final product names for Yukon and Whidbey will be SQL Server 2005 and Visual Studio 2005, said Tom Rizzo, director of product management for SQL Server.

    Microsoft delays database, tools delivery yb
  173. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by wackywendell · · Score: 1

    It is especially interesting, considering that you can't blame the men for not hiring the women...because there's no real hiring involved. Although I guess the feminist argument there would be that women were prevented from the education necessary to begin with; however, from my limited perspective, that's not the case. I wouldn't say that its because women are less capable than men at developing software, but I would say that women are less interested in doing so...just as I would say men are not less capable as nurses, just less interested. The question then becomes...is this nature or nurture? I tend towards saying a combination of both...a natural tendency for men and a natural disinterest for women reinforced by the already uneven ratio...but I don't really have any idea.

  174. I guess that'll show em. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1
    Um, linux is a kernel, not a distro.

    Which is unfortunate in many ways. For example, Matt has introduced variant symlinks into DragonFly, and has major plans involving vfs namespaces etc which will really solve a lot of problems in package management, like allowing two different conflicting versions of a package to exist at the same time. He can do all this because he's looking at the whole picture, and so are the others: the entire source tree for the base system is there on my machine, in one nicely-arranged subdirectory. I don't foresee major changes happening in the linux kernel driven by distributors. To this day, breakages with binary-incompatible glibc etc are constant annoyances with linux unless you choose a stable distributed version from a branded linux distro and stick to it. the linux kernel is what "linux is supposed to look like" to linus.

    What is "the linux kernel"? There's a Red Hat kernel, a Mandrake kernel, a SuSE kernel, and you can't really drop a generic Linus kernel into any of the commercial distros and expect it to work properly. (Debian and Gentoo are better.)

    I'm not dissing linux, it's better than the mainstream alternatives and has far better hardware support and graphical system administration tools than the BSDs. In fact after 2 years with FreeBSD I myself had switched to GNAA/Linux on my new machine because of hardware issues (I've now mostly switched to DragonFly and the hardware issues are mostly gone). And I use GNAA/Linux at work and have no desire to change that. But there are reasons why a lot of technically aware people find the BSDs nicer systems to play with. bj

  175. Why is it by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    What's the point of a screenshot of a commandline text processor like lilypond?

    I'd have thought the scans of the printed output on the site would be more than enough.

    What next. Do you want a screenshot of the scrolling messages at boot of the next linux kernel? om

  176. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  177. What about linux distributions?? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Many distributions ship with software such as XMMS, mplayer and the gimp. Should Mandrake, SuSE, Debian and the like be fined for carrying this software? cro

  178. How good is "Global Filtering" compared to SA? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    This looks interesting - for me especially how they've already got a system in place to automatically learn ham/spam by simply forwarding a message to a predefined email address (which apparently uses some sort of embedded "bug" to track it so it doesn't matter if the user's MUA forwards headers correctly).

    But my main concern is how well the described "Global Filtering" works with users who have no ham/spam corpuses built up yet. SpamAssassin still works reasonably well (eg, catches roughly 60-70% of spam) with no Bayesian stuff going on (just evaluating email on rules alone). Can DSPAM work equally as well? mq

  179. This seems like a good idea... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    ...a laptop with a dedicated "portable" architecture. I can definately see Intel saying "More transistors, more power, more clock, and it'll be okay" - which is questionable on the desktop but not at all adequate with laptops. Transmeta's departure from this is an interesting turn of events - Will we see two separate processor lines, one for the laptop, and one for the desktop? And I don't mean the M-series, which just added variable clock and PM, but something like two different design philosophies.

    And damn, that's a sexy laptop...:)
    axa

  180. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  181. Owners reputation. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    If you look closely on EBay, 19 people have voted him up. 19 people are satisfied with his previous auction, which leads to this conclution: The person selling it may not be faking it, but how the hell did he get it in the first place? cuo

  182. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  183. Let's draw a line in the sand... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1


    All the programmers who need the environment to compensate for their inadequacies, step on one side. All the programmers who want to learn from their mistakes and become better at their craft, get on the other side.

    Most of us know where this line is located.
    nx

  184. Recruitment by IceFox · · Score: 4, Interesting

    The article touches on recruitment and how in open source developers come and go. So might as well ask /.

    If you are working on an open source project, what has caused you to join an open source project?

    -Benjamin Meyer

    --
    Do you changes clothes while making the "chee-chee-cha-cha-choh" transformation sound?
    1. Re:Recruitment by PhilRod · · Score: 4, Interesting
      I'd like to widen the question that icefox put, to
      As a member of an open source team, what attitude and methods do you use towards recruitment?

      I think this touches on a wider issue relating to open source (free software, peer-directed projects, whatever you want to call it), namely how we deal with the less strictly technical aspects of the software itself. Most of the discussion on, say, OSS mailing lists is directed towards coding, as of course it should be, since it's the software itself that is the object of the exercise. But there are plenty of other important and useful ways of improving software and people's experience of it: documentation, usability considerations, promotion, and so on.

      Improving these aspects of software in an open-source model seems to be a very different task to writing code. It requires 'soft' skills - the ability to attract people, help them learn the ropes, and then retain them as contributors. In a business model, of course, you can pay people to do the marketing and the usability testing (say), but in an open project, you can't force people to do what they don't want to.

      As a contributor to KDE for a few years now, I think we as a project have perhaps thought too little about these wider things, but what have other projects done about them? Do you rely on companies to sponsor developers (not necessarily coders!) who can work on these less popular areas, or do you require coders to provide, say, documentation or usability testing for their apps?

      --
      KDE Documentation Team: http://i18n.kde.org/doc
    2. Re:Recruitment by Zurk · · Score: 1

      have a need. solved it.

    3. Re:Recruitment by Zphbeeblbrox · · Score: 1

      It's fun, Gives me an output for my creativity. I think of coding as art in some ways. And OSS gives me the oppotunity get my "art" viewed and appreciated by others. It's as simple as that really.

      --
      If you see spelling or grammatical errors don't blame me. I tried to preview but IE here at work borked the CSS
    4. Re:Recruitment by vdboor · · Score: 1
      If you are working on an open source project, what has caused you to join an open source project?

      Most of the time people slowly get involved with the project. Enter the forums/mailing lists, post suggestions, perhaps start fixing a few bugs or help other people out, slowly start to implement bigger features.. And before you realize it, people will be asking you for comments about their idea's. That's how it kind-of happened to me, but I also had an itch to scratch and the developers appeared to be busy with their personal lives.

      Nevertheless, I agree more Open Source projects should advertise you can help/contribute as well. A lot of users don't realize they might be able to help. Unfortunately, most projects don't have a clear view about different tasks people can do. It's always the usual "you can write it yourself, period" response.

      Mailing lists are not the most friendly place if you haven't used one before, CVS is new for most people too. A good guide on this would certainly help. But attracting artists and translators is a different story.

      It's interesting to read that some idea's are emerging on this point. I found that blog at planetkde.org, it's about the new artwork contests of kde-look.org, they seam to attract a lot of artists who didn't knew how to contribute before. :-)

      --
      The best way to accelerate a windows server is by 9.81 m/s2 ;-)
  185. Just Because of Linus Torvalds by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    I very much doubt your Pentium M numbers. Why else would e.g. Samsung need to permanently activate the cooling fan on its Pentium M notebooks when running without battery, whereas the Efficeon doesn't even need a fan.
    And saying just because the TM5600 (oldest Crusoe) was slow the Efficeon is also slow, is like saying just because the K-6 was slow the Athlon64 is also slow. awo

  186. Can I sue? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Can I sue for damages incurred because I couldn't order my penis enlargement pills before my porn audition? Damn you microsoft, you kept me from making millions! Now just give me some money and we'll call it even. sbd

  187. that isn't how it works by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    are they going to coat them in extensible insulator, too?

    and every crush-injury will destroy them

    these guys need ome more requirements analysis kvi

  188. Not what it is all about by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1
    Do you really need much compute power in a walk-about machine to do email, web browsing, word smithing ? In a trade off give me battery time over machine horsepower every time.

    Common sense would say so, but unfortunately, newer browsers, widget libraries, and window managers use a lot of resources. I used to use Redhat 7.1 with FVWM and Opera 6. Blazingly fast on my P3/450. Then, because of frustration with incompatible libraries for newer RPMs, I upgraded to Fedora/Opera 7. I still run Fvwm, but this new Opera version (with a newer Qt library, I presume) needs about 2 seconds of CPU time just for getting in and out of focus. If I look carefully, I can see that the borders of the windows inside the Opera window change a little bit depending on the focus. Emacs and xterm still run fine, but everything that has Gtk or Qt is slow as hell. xzu

  189. Wouldn't be much work in Tcl by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    ... or probably Perl or Python, either.

    It doesn't actually seem to grok the commands that are being run, so something like

    proc try {times script} {
    if { [catch [uplevel $script] err] } { cleanup ; retry }
    }

    is all that's needed (of course to do it right you'd need a bit more, but still...).

    try {5 times} {
    commands...
    }

    Although Tcl is a bit lower level, and would require you to do exec ls, you could of course wrap that too so that all commands in the $script block would just be 'exec'ed by default.

    In any case, better to use a flexible tool that can be tweaked to do what you need then write highly specialized tools. gq

  190. Control set = training set? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    The filter was tested on 6597 messages. So how many messages was it trained on? I sure hope it's not the same 6597 messages, because in that case any accuracy number is meaningless.

    /A

    eea
  191. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Why do most Open Source developers, hackers and software hobbyists appear to be male?

    Most developers, hackers, and software hobbyists are male, Open Source or not. Historically this has been the case, but also I think the "community" is fairly hostile to women. Hostile meaning both the obvious and also "too welcoming" -- as a woman on Slashdot, I find that I *ALWAYS* get modded up when I mention that I'm a woman, even in my sig, and even when the comment isn't very mod-worthy. When I don't mention it, I seem to be modded just the same.

    I've also had people email (at an adress I only use for slashdot) me for asking for naked pictures, dates, sex advice, incredibly personal details, and a lot of other unwanted attention.

  192. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  193. Some have the wrong idea by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1
    This is not meant to replace a score editor!!!

    Analogous to the world of word processing, this software is more in the category of software like TeX, LaTeX, or even Postscript and PDF, to a lesser extent. This is software made for pretty printing music. It is meant to do this job, and this job alone very, very well. While one could edit it directly (it's not that difficult to work with), that would be something like using a flathead screwdriver on a screw that is clearly a Philips.

    What people should do is look for a score editor that can export LilyPond documents. I'll help start you off:

    I'm sure there are others out there. ikx
  194. The Inevitable Silmarillion Comment by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    I think Mel Gibson ought to direct a musical of "The Silmarillion" done entirely in Elvish. Estimated running time: 13 hours!

    That ought to cure the general public of their love for Tolkien's material in a big hurry! pf

  195. Slow Computers by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    I've found that provided the system have a good amount of memory, a pentium 2 is good enough to run most applications.

    I've been tweaking an older PII laptop (400MhZ, 192M) over the past few months. The idea was not to lose any functionality or "new" features (i.e., dropping a 2.2 based distro, the PII's contemporary OS, would be cheating). So far I'm extremely pleased. The machine is very functional, even faster in some respects than a newer Thinkpad T22 (800MhZ, 256M) because the video support is better.

    The main changes:
    * 2.6 kernel -- huge difference
    * Fluxbox instead of KDE/Gnome
    * NPTL
    * Rebuilt some apps with i686 optimizations
    * Config tweaks (default services, buffer sizes, etc)
    * Application substitutions (Firefox vs Mozilla, etc)

    I've been testing other things including:
    * Default fs (reiserfs vs ext3)
    * sshd default configs (blowfish vs des, etc)
    * MP3 vs OGG (about the same CPU, but I hear MP3 is nicer)
    * Adjusting timer resolution in kernel
    * Replacement syslog that batches writes

    own

  196. Fair Use by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    How long do you predict it will be before all rights to fair use are vanquished from the Internet? xe

  197. Horizontal Business Model by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    I've always believed that GNAA/Linux/FOSS distributions would be a fantastic model for this sort of thin horizontal distributed economy. You have thousands, if not millions of GNAA/Linux savvy people out there who can make money on those around them who just want their computer to work for a specific purpose.

    This beats the hell out of the centralized monopoly model. Who better to support your computer than someone who understands it intimately? If they cannot fix it, they can go to the author and ask them to fix it - an unlikely happenstance for the average user, but not so much for a "digitician". rq

  198. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  199. Bad Idea by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    I agree. Web browsers were designed to be fault tolerant, and just look at all the horrendously broken crap that passes for HTML out there. Dangerous stuff. bkt

  200. A decision based on Science, or Politics? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1
    Is this a decision based on Science? Or is it based on Politics and emotion?

    Did you know that in 1998 Senator Patrick Leahy, of Vermont, got his State's largest Lake, Lake Champlain, to be reclassified as the 6th Great Lake? At least as far as the awarding of researh grants. Being considered a "Great Lake" made the academic institutions in his constituency eligible to apply for certain research grants.

    There is talk of sending a probe to Pluto. Is it possible that it is easier to sell a probe to "planet Pluto" than to send one to Kuiper-belt object Pluto?

    I remember, back in the days when I tuned in to debates as to which newsgroups should be created, the big debate as to whether a new group should be talk.acquaria, rec.acquaria or sci.acquaria.

    In Leahy's defence, these were environmental research grants, and I should probably assume he added this line to the bill to protect his constituent's natural environment -- not for the petty partisan purposes. bkx

  201. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by Mant · · Score: 1

    Because most developers are male, nothing special about the open source ones (in this regard)

  202. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  203. Who broke Slashdot? by BenjyD · · Score: 3, Insightful

    OK, who broke slashdot? The comments are messed up big time for me: all AC and from random stories. It's even weirder than Slashdot normally, which is pretty scary.

    1. Re:Who broke Slashdot? by tcopeland · · Score: 4, Informative

      I've seen this happen before; I think it's just a bot posting old comments to this store as an AC. And I bet his IP address will get blocked soon...

    2. Re:Who broke Slashdot? by LEgregius · · Score: 1

      I'm not sure. I have hit the reply button on a comment and the comment ended up in a different story. I've seen it happen to other people as well.

  204. digital certs by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Even if only for servers to keep open relays out of the loop, it may be time to mandate third-party trusted ID certs (ala SSL) for mail servers. It's proven too difficult to get most people to digitally sign their mail, but admins should be clueful enough to generate certs and have them validated externally... eax

  205. Neat. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Now I have a new chat up line to use: hey babe, ever stop and think about bubbles moving down? Hello? You didn't finish your drink! sf

  206. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by shyampandit · · Score: 1

    Because no work would get done if females came in!

  207. TomPlay by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Take a look at www.tomplay.com. nct

  208. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  209. Infinium a hardware vendor? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    I can't think of a more unfortunate name than the "phantom console" other than the "vaporware console"... seriously who comes up with this stuff.

    If they tried to sue me I'd call their bluff (the "phantom lawsuit") and just put quotation marks around all my stuff to humiliate them:

    The ceo of the company making the *yet to be released* "phantom" console has asked us to take down our review of their business. We suggest the best thing they could do would be to give us a "phantom" console to review, but something is really haunting their company - because the "phantom console" has yet to be released to the public. Finding their "phantom offices" is also a difficult task. But perhaps we shouldn't be so hard on the CEO, he could be a visionary - this "phantom of his imagination" could bring the gaming world to it's knees. All they need to do is set a new "phantom release date" and stick to it like the slime the ghosts leave when the pass through walls in Ghost Busters. Then we will all be able to enjoy the phantoms

    humiliation complete, lawsuit aborted, insert credit for more life. kzd

  210. Precedent? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1
    I'm not sure, but I don't think the US extradites US citizens to other countries.
    Well, that's what we have the Internet for, isn't it?

    Extracted from the US to:
    Ireland

    Hong Kong

    Yugoslavia

    I am by no means an expert on this, these are just some google results. zu

  211. The trouble with per-user filtering by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1
    Spam filtering needs to be applied to multiple E-mail accounts to work really well. The fundamental characteristic of spam that can't be avoided is that large numbers of similar messages are sent to different people. That's recognizable.

    Looking for spam by content analysis for a single user only works for some people. If, for example, your legitimate E-mail contains many messages about investments, mortgages, and similar financial subjects, it's going to be hard to separate out financial spam by word analysis.

    Spamcop does multiple-user analysis. It works better than most of the single-user systems. bo

  212. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  213. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  214. A lot of astronomers don't want to count Pluto by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    IMO, Pluto should [shouldn't?] be labeled an asteroid since it's smaller than even our own moon.

    An interesting point, though to be fair, its an arbitrary cutoff. There are moons elswhere in our solar system larger than Mercury, which is indisputably a planet, for example. Also its worth pointing out that our moon is large enough that it and Earth are sometimes called a double planet. Consider this, Luna does not orbit Earth as near the equator as is usual among most other moons. Also, peculiar to all 138 known moons with the exception of Charon, it possesses an orbit where the effect of the Sun's gravity is greater than that of Earth's. Without their host planets, they would float off, wheareas the moon would continue orbiting the sun quite contently. pr
  215. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  216. Slashdot has 76,000 female users! by BigDogCH · · Score: 2, Interesting

    I don't know, but when I was going through CS classes we started with about a 50:50 ratio of boys to girls. Okay, maybe 60:40. I only know of 3 girls out of maybe 30 that finished.

    Just guessing, I would guess 30 boys finished. So 30:3? Seeing as how my /. number is 760290, does that mean /. has 76,290 female users? Wow!

    1. Re:Slashdot has 76,000 female users! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Interesting

      here's one?

      dude, we're out there. you boys are so thick-skulled, you don't see that we don't preface every comment we make with "hey, i'm a girl!"

      because that would be stupid.

      anyway, i agree with the CS class ratio, but more interesting to me was the stratification. there were sort of three 'levels' of CS-type degrees at my UG. businessy computer stuff, regular CS, and engineering. in the beginning, when we all shared classes, there were lots of girls, but they almost all ended up in the businessy, less hard-core degree. i was in regular CS - would have done engineering if i hadn't spent half my college career being a music major - and the ratio was as described above. i'm not sure if there were any girls in the engineering - maybe one or two.

      it's not that we're not taught to believe we can do science. we're just taught to believe we can't/shouldn't do the REALLY hard science. and/or our older brothers hogged the PC Jr when we were kids.

    2. Re:Slashdot has 76,000 female users! by BigDogCH · · Score: 1

      Music to CS? Holy cow what a change! I crossed education and CS, but man, music might be an even greater change.

    3. Re:Slashdot has 76,000 female users! by calvus · · Score: 1

      I went from majoring Hotel and Restaraunt management to CS. So I figure I'm uniquely positioned for a career after outsourcing.

    4. Re:Slashdot has 76,000 female users! by Jedi+Alec · · Score: 1

      you'd be amazed at the similarities between playing/writing music and working as a programmer for example. listing a musical instrument is a big plus here to get a job in IT.

      --

      People replying to my sig annoy me. That's why I change it all the time.
    5. Re:Slashdot has 76,000 female users! by BigDogCH · · Score: 1

      After I posted, I was also thinking about how almost every application (games especially) have music or sounds incorporated into them. Maybe it would be a very handy combination.

  217. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  218. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  219. Fear Uncle Sam by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    I am usually don't condone the strong arm techniques of the US government. And I do support open source. But Warez is a crime. And it should be punished.

    Bullshit. Warez is a crime IN THE US, but not in Australia.

    In Germany it's illegal to say ANYTHING that is pro-nazi. Do you think that the US would even consider extraditing one of its citizens who posted something pro-nazi on a website? Of course not.

    This is lunacy, pure and simple.

    LK slv

  220. Missing the point by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    So what you are saying is that programming should be hard, and people should be expected to do it right, or it promotes bad practices.

    Yet we are expected to excuse your grammatical and typos. Doesn't that just promote bad practices? Shouldn't we whack you over the head with a baseball bat just to make sure you won't post when you're not prepared to write flawless posts?

    The more work you have to do to check errors, the more likely it is that however vigilant you might be, errors slip past. If you have to check the return values of a 100 commands, that is a 100 chances for forgetting to do the check or for doing the check the wrong way, or for handling the error incorrectly.

    In this case, the shell offers a function that provides a more sensible default handling of errors: If you don't handle them, the shell won't continue executing by "accident" because you didn't catch an error, but will terminate. It also provides an optional feature that let you easily retry commands that are likely to fail sometimes and where the likely error handling would be to stop processing and retry without having to write the logic yourself.

    Each time you have to write logic to handle exponential backoff and to retry according to specific patterns is one more chance of introducing errors.

    No offense, but I would rather trust a SINGLE implementation that I can hammer the hell out of until I trust it and reuse again and again than trust you (or anyone else) to check the return code of every command and every function they call.

    This shell does not remove the responsibility to for handling errors. It a) chooses a default behaviour that reduces the chance of catastrophic errors when an unhandled error occurs, and b) provides a mechanism for automatic recovery from a class of errors that occur frequently in a particular type of systems (distributed systems where network problems DO happen on a regular basis), and by that leave developers free to spend their time on more sensible things (I'd rather have my team doing testing than writing more code than they need to) dc

  221. Once again, Babbage was thinking ahead... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    "On two occasions I have been asked [by members of Parliament!], 'Pray, Mr.
    Babbage, if you put into the machine wrong figures, will the right answers
    come out?' I am not able rightly to apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas
    that could provoke such a question."
    -- Charles Babbage
    nj

  222. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by Frymaster · · Score: 4, Interesting
    Obviously, boys are smarter than girls.

    maybe attitudes like this are the reason there aren't that many women in programming.

    my girlfriend spent four years at school and three years in the industry going from one software shop before she finally quit the whole biz because of attitudes like that. she works at a homeless shelter now and says that her mentally ill and drug addicted clients are easier to work with than the average alpha geek.

  223. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  224. Worst idea since spell checkers by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    just need to learn to spell and to ytype accuratly. -- QED - Quite Easily Done

    <Teal'c> Indeed </Teal'c> cv

  225. Very cool, but.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    AFAIK, they are semi-autonomous in that they can navigate over and around obstacles from point A to point B without being explicitly told to do so. qs

  226. sometimes by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    I just really hate academics. bs

  227. Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot F by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    Michael Sims Fired, Joins GNAA to Troll Slashdot Full Time

    FREMONT, CA (TECHNEWS) - After a heated debate at Slashdot executive offices, editor Michael Sims was locked out of the building and departed in a tirade of lisping insults, vowing revenge immediately. This morning, industry sources revealed that Sims has joined the infamous trolling organization Gay Nigger Association of America with the intent of trolling Slashdot fulltime.

    In a short phone interview with Technews, Sims asserted that he was calm but resolved on his course of action. "The Slashdot editors and I had a disagreement," he explained. "I did it all for the users, but they..." he drew the syllable out painfully, resting on a case full of Little League trophies and certificates of participation from transgendered dating services, "They just couldn't take my truth. They were -- babies, just babies, oh, the horror, the abomination," he said, before being led away by three white-clad male nurses.

    According to Harvard Psychology Professor Arnold Rothstahlberg, "trolling" is an internet phenomenon where dissenting users disrupt a site by flooding it with absurd or paradoxical information. "It satisfies the primal id," he said, chewing on a large, bulbous, phallic black cigar. "To justify themselves by forcing their enemies into hysterics. It's a compensatory mechanism much like getting back at the kids who beat you up in high school by installing Linux and using it to pingflood their XP boxes and Macs."

    Slashdot editor CmdrTaco was reticent to comment. At an interview conducted in the crap-filled Ann Arbor bungalow he shares with his wife, to whom he proposed over Slashdot, he said, "Well, you know, Slashdot is just a web site. Michael should calm down about this. But if he doesn't, our corporate sponsors will sue him until he's giving $4 blowjobs on Haight Street."

    From the GNAA corporate headquarters, a mysterious floating island off the coast of Newfoundland that few reporters have seen and even fewer have returned from with their sexual identities intact, GNAA "Head Programmer" timecop said he was glad to have Sims on hand. "From what I've seen of his postings on Slashdot," said timecop, "he's a total fag. Which is convenient as all our halfops need anal, and I can't handle the drama. That's what's worst about the net: the drama."

    Sims has been involved in previous internet firefights, most notably the controversy over the censorware.org website in 2001. While Sims alleges that the site was his creation that was sabotaged by others, his coworkers disagree. Bennett Haselton, security consultant for the "Anarchy Anal" and "Chaos Cumshot" websites, said of Sims, "We set up this website, and left him the password. We have a disagreement, bam, the website goes down and someone raped my two-week-old Labrador puppy with an iPod."

    Slashdot Editor CowboyNeal, who was entangled in a whale net after attempting to swim the English channel, spoke fondly of his former coworker. "Michael always brought a certain passion to the work, a passion that was easily ignited and led to many sweaty sessions in the corporate washroom," he said. "I'm not at all surprised he joined an organization of gay niggers. He always like something different and unique in his pasta salads."

    Programmer Seth Finkelstein alleges that Sims is "totally unstable" and agreed readily to this interview. "Of course, I'm a disinterested observer," he said. "But anytime I see that closet psychopath and monkey nut-muncher stealing the spotlight from hardworking programmers like myself, I have to speak up, for the benefit of the people, of course," he said. Technews reporters were permitted to leave the premises only after making a PayPal donation to Finkelstein.

    Mike Godwin of the EFF, who balances a career as privacy advocate with his hobby of making videos of teen swingers blowing goats, agreed. "I've never met another editor like Michael," he said. "And, since my regimen of retrovirals is already costing me an arm and

  228. Not ready for the real world by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    From the article:

    "the researchers estimate that the wires should be able to withstand several thousand cycles of extension and contraction."

    That's no where NEAR what would be needed for any of the applications they mention. For example, at 70 beats per minute your heart beats 100,800 times per day. Assuming each step a runner takes covers 3 feet (very approximate here), then a "cycle" (back to starting configuration) is 6 ft. That's 880 "cycles" per mile. A single 6 mile run is therefore over 5000 cycles.

    Several thousand "cycles of extension and contraction" is not even close to enough for any real world app. Who wants to have that internal heart monitor replaced several times each day? How about that high-tech single use "smart" sweatshirt?

    These will need to be in the 100's of thousands to millions of cycles for their lifespan before they have any real utility.
    ir

  229. Must Be Told by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Yes, it does.
    Now go back to cowering you insensitive clod! oa

  230. It wasn't... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    slated to be released until the last quarter this year. 2005 "sounds bad", but it's only a few months. ogt

  231. A solution in search of a problem? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Hey, there's nothing like converting a low-res display and computer hardware to make a high-tech $300+ version of a $10 picture frame. ben

  232. Pictureframe PC by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    This is very similar to a Mini-ITX project I saw a while ago.

    The main difference is, the Mini-ITX page shows you how everything is layed out inside the picture frame. cu

  233. What's DSPAM? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    Okay, I figure it has to do with spam... but what exactly? Server? Client? GNAA/Linux? Windows? Don't make me click links, this is Slashdot and I'm lazy. tl

  234. very good coffee? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    At long last the secret of Starbucks' "very good coffee" is revealed: burn the holy living shit out of your beans!

    Now you, too, can have that wonderful taste of charred coffee in your very own home!

    iys

  235. we'll send for one when it comes with linux by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    & wi-fi vdo conferencing, etc.... qkb

  236. OK, wise guys... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1
    I'm working with Grid and ftsh as we speak. I'm a physicist, not a professional coder. I write reasonable code, but I'm no purist. With that said...

    ftsh has great utility in the realm it's written for. Obviously, it's not a basis for installing kernels or doing password authentication. In a Grid (not just distributed) environment, things break for all sorts of reasons all the time. You're dealing with a Friendly Admin on another system, one who may well be unaffiliated with your institution, project or field of study. He doesn't have any particular reason to consult with you about system changes.

    Now you find yourself writing a grid diagnostic or submitter or job manager. One does not need strongly typed compiled languages for this. Shell scripts are almost always more efficient to write, and the speed difference is unimportant. Right now, most Grid submitters are being written in bash or Python or some such. Bash sucks for exception handling of the sort we're talking about. Python does better with its try: statements, but there's room for improvement. ftsh is a good choice for a sublayer to these scripts. One writes some of the machinery that actually interacts with the Grid nodes and supervisors in this easy, clear and flexible form.

    Now there are a lot of specific points to answer:

    One needs a Windows port to be able to make the Grid software we write in GNAA/Linux available to the poor drones who are stuck with Win boxes.

    This is not a code spellchecker or coding environment. At all.

    This is not a crutch for inadequate programmers. This is a collection of methods to deal with a specific set of recalcitrant problems.

    As I was pointing out before, this is, after all, an unstable system. One is using diverse resources on diverse platforms in many countries at many institutions. I appreciate the comment made by unixbob about operating in heterogeneous environments.

    This isn't a substitute for wget. One uses wget as an example because it's clear.

    The "pull" model breaks down immediately when there is no unified environment, as is described on infrastructures.org. When you're not the admin, and your software has to be wiped out the minute your job is done, "push" is the only way to do it. This is the case with most Grid computing right now (that I know about)

    All the woe and doom about the sloppy coding and letting the environment correct your deficiencies is... ill-thought-out. That's what a compiler is, folks. Should we all be coding in machine language?:) Use the right tool for the job and save time.

    I do agree, however, that one should indeed hone one's craft. Sloppy coding in projects of importance is inexcusable (M$). There is no reason to stick to strict exception handling, however, in the applications being discussed by ftsh's developers (the same folks who brought you Condor). When code becomes 3/4 exception handling, even when the specific exceptions don't matter, there's a problem, IMHO.:) xp

  237. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by theGreater · · Score: 2, Informative

    Did anyone here actually listen to or personally hear that speech or some of the followup interviews? The president of Harvard said something to the effect of, "There's different numbers of men and women in the sciences, and research should be done to see why: is it nature or nurture?"

    Now, I don't know about you, but that sounds like a relatively innocent thing to say to me. I could see where you could misinterpret it... but it has sunk into the world's consciousness as a proven fact that the president of Harvard is a bigoted sexist jerk. This one incident simply doesn't seem to support that fact.

    -theGreater Anti-PC.

    Yale Daily News

  238. Great by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    How long till I have to upgrade/patch the OS on my underwear? df

  239. First Real Post by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Um... no, that doesn't do the same thing. The whole point of ftsh is that the 'try' block encloses a set of statements which must all be executed or it fails. If the 'cd/tmp' fails, bash will blindly run the 'rm -f data' anyway, whereas ftsh will stop and jump to the start of the try block to have another go. gju

  240. Why wouldn't I want windows to play back videos by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Want Microsoft DRM, non-compliance to standards, and who-knows-what in the future too? It's to avoid this that these sanctions are being applied.

    Sounds sensible to me xaq

  241. Bad Idea by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    I agree. Web browsers were designed to be fault tolerant, and just look at all the horrendously broken crap that passes for HTML out there. Dangerous stuff. ywb

  242. The real problem by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    The real problem is not so much that the Yukon date has slipped, it's that Whidbey (The next version of Visual Studio.NET and the.NET framework) is slipping with it. For who knows what reason, Microsoft decided that these products must be released together. While Yukon promises some very nice features, most people would much rather have Whidbey released now and live with SQL 2000 for awhile longer.

    To top it off, MS is not even going to be releasing any service packs for Visual Studio in the meantime. There are some rather serious issues with the current version of Visual Studio that can only be fixed by calling MS for specific hotfixes. Needless to say, much of the MS developer community is up in arms. qmb

  243. Let's draw a line in the sand... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1


    java, c++, c#

    -------------

    asm, c ?
    ont

  244. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by BigDogCH · · Score: 1

    "mentally ill and drug addicted clients"
    vs.
    "average alpha geek"
    How many average alpha geeks land up as a mentally ill and drug addicted client? Does she server food to any of her former coworkers? A female friend of mine left CS for a similar reason.

  245. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by FreeUser · · Score: 1

    maybe attitudes like this are the reason there aren't that many women in programming.

    Maybe humor is a difficult concept. :-)

    Seriously, I'm about as ardently anti-sexist as they come, and even I understood the humor (that BTW was clearly intended as much as a tongue-in-cheek criticism of sexism in the technical fields as anything else)

    So chill.

    --
    The Future of Human Evolution: Autonomy
  246. I don't get Congress. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Govt. is typically illogical.... IMHO, let them pass this one as law, and THEN hit them with the questioning about their logic on cars vs. DVD's.

    It's more leverage for us if it's already written into law.
    suy

  247. Would it work? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Yes. Would the prices be reasonable? Doubtful. vwg

  248. Standard oil by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Looking back at history I'm thinking about Rockefeller and Standard oil. How is that situation any different from Gates and Microsoft? Standard oil was broken up by the government why shouldn't we do the same now to Microsoft? Its irrefutable that Microsoft controls software for the personal computer from the operating system, office applications to now digital media/rights. Even before the SCO/Microsoft fiasco it was obvious that Microsoft devoured its competitors to preserve its stranglehold on the industry. uby

  249. Whoa... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    "The wires can stretch to over half their original length."

    Is it me, or does this violate some law of grammar, physics, or both? jm

  250. Is there any hope? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    By the time your daughter grows up, do you think there will be any of our cherished freedoms on the Internet left, or will everything be wrapped in legalese and DRM? With the passage of laws from the DMCA to the PATRIOT act, I've been increasingly pessimistic about the US's ability to pass any sane legislation that interfaces with the Internet... id

  251. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by Dayflowers · · Score: 1

    Damn... life as a female slashdot-reader sure sounds alot more interesting than the male counterpart. Jugding from your post, and my own short slashdot experience, that is.

    Heh...

    --
    I am a speak english. Do you not? - Saroto
  252. 3rd party connections by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    I thought they had blocked other programs again. Trillian and Gaim couldn't connect, but I installed MSN 6.1 and got right back on. tnz

  253. Gold hmm.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1
    Of course they couldn't be made out of anything else than Gold could they?

    I do realise Gold has special properties such as conductivity and hypoallergenic properties, but come on! lh

  254. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by BigDogCH · · Score: 1

    On a serious note, I don't think the president of Harvard said anything wrong. Observing trends and tencencies backed up by actual numbers isn't sexism, it is reality. Men and women are different, especially women. I don't fricken understand them, and am insulted when people say we are equal! I am married, and she doesn't understand me either. We just look at the world quite differently.

  255. Inuit Contributions by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Hockey was invented somewhere in Europe or European North America in the 19th century. Lacrosse was invented by Indians near the St. Lawrence and is played on grass rather than snow, so I doubt the Inuit were involved.

    Inuit inventions include snowshoes, toboggans, dogsleds, kayaks, toggle harpoons, and various other tools for hunting and travelling in the North as well as snow and ice civil engineering techniques. Pretty impressive, I'd say, for a culture with almost no wood, rock, or metal. They've probably contributed as much as any other non-Eurasian colonialised culture, and they make some really cool art. fr

  256. Yukon's promised features by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Yukon is finally going to deliver online restoration, database mirroring with automatic failover, and support for mirrored backup sets.

    Let's face it, these features isn't something most users need. If Microsoft sees real trouble, they will simply slash the per-processor license cost by a factor of 50 or 100, and switching suddenly becomes a non-issue for most users.

    Per-client licenses and awfully high per-processor licensing costs are the most important factor which motivates most users to attempt other solutions. Of course, the proprietary databases have important features which look very good on paper, but I've seen quite a few installations which use a multi-thousand dollar database as if it were MySQL (not even using online backup). You can get away with that if you only need a workgroup server license, but if you need 20,000 client access licenses (or multiple per-processor licenses), licensing becomes a problem and you'll certainly consider other options. opk

  257. If my Slinky taught me anything . . . by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    One kink and it's trash can city. iq

  258. Cars, DVDs, what's the difference? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1
    The difference lies in the fact that with codes to your car, it can be serviced independently.

    With the codes to your DVD, you can make unlimited copies, and do anything and everything with them.

    Not correct. I can make unlimited copies of DVDs without any access to codes - just as I can make copies of a text written in German without being able to read that language. Mass bootlegging of DVDs happens this way already.

    CSS is all about controlling who gets to make DVD players. It does nothing to prevent copying. ra

  259. MS helping OSS - Indirectly by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    If I had any doubts that MS is helping OSS and slowly erasing itself, it is now clearing:-) Jokes aside, this will seriously affect businesses that have paid for their upgrade licenses, as the licenses will expire before the sql server is released. This will make decision makers view Open Source in a new light. Atleast, in Open Source you don't pay for future vaporware in the present. vvb

  260. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by essreenim · · Score: 1
    easier to work with than the average alpha geek.

    What about theta g33k5?

  261. OOohhh... give it a rest... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    How long before people start having a backlash against LOTRs?

    4000 recent awards, the actors are plastered on every talk show, multiple console games, 3 recent highly pushed movies --shouldn't they just take a breather?

    Wouldn't waiting a few years and then bringing the story back in a different format be refreshing for the story?

    Davak
    isd

  262. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by Otter · · Score: 4, Interesting
    That was an interesting incident, wasn't it? At the very epicenter of academia, Summers says something controversial and the response isn't "I disagree!", it isn't "You're wrong!", it's "You must never say such a thing! It is forbidden! Now grovel for forgiveness!".

    If this is the way professors treat the freaking President of Harvard freaking University, is it a surprise that undergrads feel inhibited from speaking freely in class?

  263. Another idea for a fun project by dkleinsc · · Score: 3, Funny

    Determine the person at the center of the open source society, using a Erdos-style numbering scheme. e.g. Joe Blow worked on sendmail with Jane Smith who worked on zlib with RMS gives Joe Blow a RMS Number of 2.

    Then just find the lowest average number, and that person is the center of the open source social structure.

    --
    I am officially gone from /. Long live http://www.soylentnews.com/
    1. Re:Another idea for a fun project by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      As someone who just finished reading Linked: How Everything Is Connected to Everything Else and What It Means by Albert-Laszlo Barabasi, for a systems engineering class I'm in, I must say I'd definitely give you some MOD points if I had any!

      Before people mod me offtopic, at least check out the book I mentioned, it details the whole "six degrees of separation" effect... I'm guessing that RMS would be a "hub" ;)

    2. Re:Another idea for a fun project by messiertom · · Score: 1

      ....RMS gives Joe Blow I had to do a double-take when I saw that.

      Whaaaaaaaaaa? No way, he couldn't have... oh, he didn't. Thank God.

  264. About clothing with this by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    To all of those who responded with something about putting this technology in clothes: What is to stop this from happening now? for the most part clothing doesn't stretch as much as these wires do. The technology is here today for wiring up your clothes, just not for processing it in the fabric. Maybe before you think of wild uses for new technology, you should think about current ways that it could already be done. mpv

  265. LilyPond is aimed at a small target market by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    I'm a pretty serious amateur jazz musician, and I do a fair amount of composing and arranging for jazz ensembles of about 8-16 musicians.

    LilyPond is not intended for people like me. If you're less serious than I am, LilyPond is definitely not intended for you.

    The most popular music notation software is Finale. Finale is buggier than Windows ME and twice as bloated, but once you learn how to use it, it gets the job done. You can enter your notes relatively quickly, tweak them a little, print, and go. While it has some very non-intuitive options, it's straightforward enough that most amateur musicians are able to sit down and click around until they get it to do what they want.

    How's the output? Pretty crappy if you don't spend any time playing with it. But if you spend a little bit of time fixing the glaring errors, the result is readable by most musicians.

    LilyPond, on the other hand, reads a description of the music in a text-based format, and formats it automatically - using much nicer algorithms than Finale apparently uses. It might take quite a bit longer to get your music input, but the end result will look nice - and will not require nearly as much tweaking.

    LilyPond, by itself, is only of use to professional engravers, and only those who are willing to learn how to use it. If somebody ever develops a front-end to LilyPond that's actually integrated (as opposed to something like Rosegarden that can just export to LilyPond's format), then it might be more accessible to the average musician.

    Don't get me wrong - I think that LilyPond is great. I just think that a lot of the complaints I'm seeing in this forum are because people don't understand what problem LilyPond is trying to solve and who will benefit.

    No, LilyPond is not ready to replace all of the other music notation software out there. But it's one of the best tools for professional music engraving already, and maybe someday it can also be an appropriate tool for the casual user, too. qd

  266. A heckler from the 18th Century by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    seriously MOD PARENT UP!, that guy made a flute playing "automaton" that had about 12 songs back in 1737 dz

  267. Making DVD Copies by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1


    Is it legal to make and edit copies of commercial DVDs for personal use? What about loaning out the edited copies to friends?
    sx

  268. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by TOWebstress · · Score: 1

    Maybe there are a few more women among you than you realize. This is the first time I've posted, but a read quite a bit. But we're out here...I'm just not a contributor to open source development. HI GUYS!!! *waving*

    --
    You see the look on my face, and yet you keep talking.
  269. Let's draw a line in the sand... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1


    All the programmers who need the environment to compensate for their inadequacies, step on one side. All the programmers who want to learn from their mistakes and become better at their craft, get on the other side.

    Most of us know where this line is located.
    xn

  270. A bit OTT by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    That is so over the top. Creating an entire PC just to show a picture? That's 200 for the screen and another 200 for the computer. On top of that they are recommending a hard disk?
    My version uses a 5 quid FPGA and some junk thrown away equipment. The LCD was a 12" 9bit colour from some factory and a fiend of a friend offered them to us for a quid each. And the RAM is an old 1Mb 30simm (I have about 3kg of these). There you go. A picture displaying system with no need for a huge/noisy PC power supply (runs from one of those 12v ac/dc plug converters). The images can be sent to it via a serial cable (two wires internally so it can be passed over any old cable you have lying around).
    kq

  271. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by jemfinch · · Score: 1
    Why do most Open Source developers, hackers and software hobbyists appear to be male?


    Uh, because most computer geeks are male.

    Next!
  272. Fear Uncle Sam by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1
    I totally disagree with you, even though you seem to love promoting my site.

    It is a crime to eat chewinggum in Singapore. Does that mean Singapore can extradite and incarcerate every American who eats chewinggum in US soil? rjn

  273. Burnt Starbucks coffee by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    I think the reason for the music tie-in is that there's more and more competition for the coffee-drinker's dollar and they need to come up with new ways to stand out. Within two blocks of my apartment, there's a Starbucks, a Seattle's best, and two local coffee houses. 10 minute's walk up the street, there a cluster of about 6 more coffee places, including 2 Starbucks at the same intersection.

    But between the insane cost and the burnt flavour of their coffee, I never go to Starbucks and the ability to put together a CD isn't going to entice me.
    nj

  274. Cars, DVDs, what's the difference? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    This is not exactly true... modern cars have a "closed loop" system where various sensors feed data into the computer which it uses to tune engine parameters. Thus, the computer is "self learning"... about a decade ago, Ford recalled a number of Tempo's. They replaced the injector and downloaded the engine calibration data -- they used a federally mandated recall to collect this "millions of dollars" worth of data.

    In fact, it actually takes a mere afternoon to build the calibration data. It takes a fair bit of equipment (diag station, dynamo, etc.), but the process is rather simple. (that is, for those that know how to do it.)

    Ironic side discussion... the only real difference between the VW 1.8T engines (150hp and 180hp anyway) is the ECU programming. I can "upgrade" my engine with a serial cable:-) nwk

  275. I still prefer tougher email security by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    This may work for a little while, but the creative peeps will find a way around it.

    I say forget the filtering shit and force email to evolve. Part of the reason that spam happens is that there is no real authentication going on. No requesting permission to be on your white list. No real strong way to block anybody you don't want to hear from. No real way to verify the sender is legit. etc.

    I don't claim to have all the answers, but I do know that I've been using ICQ for years and haven't seen a Spam from there since I turned on the 'require authorization' feature. uy

  276. US Army Needs This Robot by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    As I recall, the US Army was suffering from a shortage of bugle players to play taps for the passing generation of soldiers. They developed a digital bugle that can play taps even if the bugler is incompetent, drunk, or both.

    Since Toyota has now developed a vastly more complicated technology that can be used to solve the same problem as the slightly complicated one above, I look forward to future Pentagon procurement hearings.

    Note to self: Sarcasm in this post often results in massive retribution.
    df

  277. "Social" Structure? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0, Insightful

    Ha!

  278. This seems like a good idea... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    ...a laptop with a dedicated "portable" architecture. I can definately see Intel saying "More transistors, more power, more clock, and it'll be okay" - which is questionable on the desktop but not at all adequate with laptops. Transmeta's departure from this is an interesting turn of events - Will we see two separate processor lines, one for the laptop, and one for the desktop? And I don't mean the M-series, which just added variable clock and PM, but something like two different design philosophies.

    And damn, that's a sexy laptop...:)
    xg

  279. visit to the bank by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    We could recreate scene's from Half-Life within the silo complex. I want to be Gordon!

    I can see it know...(cheesy guy looking up as the camera blurs/wave effect)

    "Nothing you need to worry about, Gordon. Go ahead."

    "I have just been informed that the sample is ready, Gordon. It should be coming up to you any moment now. Look to the delivery system for your specimen."

    "Standard insertion for a nonstandard specimen. Go ahead, Gordon. Slot the carrier into the analysis port."

    "Gordon! Get away from the beams!"

    Oh the fun we could have....:-)

    zem

  280. Dammit by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Jeez.

    Building a computer from parts might be easy for you, but that does not make it "easy". Most people can't handle it. They want to buy a computer and take it out of the box and plug it in and turn it on. This goes for PCs or Macs.

    Have you used a Mac that was manufactured in the past half decade? You can use any USB mouse with them, including your seven-buttons-with-scroll-wheel optical mouse. They use PCI, AGP, ATA, and USB for expansion. They have a "taskbar", it's called the Dock.

    Windows's popularity is entirely attributable to Worse is Better. rup

  281. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by pavon · · Score: 1

    From all that I can tell females are less interested in engineering then men. Concider the situation at the science/engineering college I went to. There were more males then females, but that could be caused by all sorts of things, and is not the point I want to make. Instead look at what majors the females who were there chose. From my observation the departments with the highest percentage of females were biology, chemistry, psycology, then physics, geology, with the fewest in CS, EE, and mechanical. Now (nearly) all of those girls were very smart, and most were capable of getting any of the majors offered at the school. But they chose the majors the did because they found them more interesting, because it fit their mindset better. So statistically speaking far more females enjoy and life sciences / pure sciences than engineering.

    Now why is this the case? Maybe we are just wired differently. Concider what happens when people encounter a problem. The stereotypical guys just wants to do something to fix it and get it over with. The girl wants to talk about it, to understand it better, and to them comming to an understanding is often the solution in and of itself. Of course this is talking in generalitys. There are definately girls with engineering mindsets, as there are guys with more diplomatic mindsets, but there does seem to be a very real tendancy behind that stereotype.

  282. Best number in the show is.... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    ...when the Fellowship sings "The Hills are Alive..." on the slopes of Carhadras? buh

  283. Oh, it's MICROSOFT! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    You know, I read the headline, and I honestly could not figure out WHO'S sql server was being delayed. So I said to myself while opening it; why diden't the author of this specify which SQL server is being affected?

    On a slightly more seious tone (though I did honestly not know who's server was being delayed; I thought it was some no named server that I'd never heard of!), do not allow microsoft to pull another 'we own the word windows'; never shortern Microsoft SQL server, into SQL server- at the absolute least call it MS SQL, so that this way in 5 years they can't turn around and sue everyone who has SQL in there name!

    Don't believe me; look at lindows. ke

  284. What's in a word ? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    While the printed output is asthetically pleasing, it strikes me as an odd technology to persue, because I wonder how many musicians today can actually read music. I'd wager the vast majority of rock musicians can't, and that roughly half of pop musicans can't. I can't, and I've written "plenty" of material and play several instruments.

    Thanks to strong middle and high school music programs, more people can read music today than ever before.

    Reading music is still simply the fastest way for an experienced musician to learn a new piece of music. Many jazz and classical musicians (including myself) can sightread (play it while reading it for the first time) quite complicated pieces of music, up to tempo, which is an extremely valuable skill.

    Of course there are a small minority of successful recording artists who can't read music, but the vast majority of successful musicians do read music, and most of them read music well. I don't see this changing anytime soon.
    pl

  285. Ozzy Osbourne says by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    All aboard the crazy train. lf

  286. Filter at sender? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Okay, so filtering on the receive end is fairly commonplace - but what about filtering close to the sender?

    (1) Force all ISP customers to use their own SMTP server (block all port 25 access to external addresses).

    (2) Set up an outbound SMTP server for all ISP customers to use - but include a spam filter that rejects sending the message if it considers it to be spam? It would also give instant feedback to the user - the mail client would immediately report the error.

    Then the spam wouldn't even be transported over the net, saving vast amounts of traffic on the internet backbones. This action could also potentially kill spam overnight. nd

  287. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by garcia · · Score: 1

    It was just a joke and because someone else modded me up incorrectly as "Insightful" it is supposed to be something other than was originally intended?

    Lighten up.

  288. Is the FTSH acronym pronounced... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    As a side-bar, is the FTSH acronym pronounced... fetish?

    All kidding aside, this sounds like a great idea.

    As for the comments about encouraging sloppy code, it is clear those posters have never worked in demanding moving-target environments. The kinds of errors encountered cannot be solved easily in code - this extension would help.

    As for the comments on "you can do this in Perl, Python, and ", this is true, but if I know Bash and want tolerance, why should I have to learn a new language to get it? Likely all I'm doing is copying files, forking off subprocesses, and the like.

    For the comments on "why another shell," I would tend to agree that it would be best integrated into Bash - but then, you change the implementation of Bash, create incompatible situations, and have to retest volumes of existing scripts. It's best to have this as a separate shell with close look/feel semantics to Bash (or Csh).

    nc

  289. Meanwhile, MySQL does transactions by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Meanwhile, MySQL is now doing transactions, and VIEWs are on their way in 5.1. It's GPL, so it's free (as in speech).

    Why not use Postgres? That way, you don't have to wait for features that all the other RDBMS products have had for years. What is it that makes MySQL so much more popular than Postgres? It sure isn't features. pbf

  290. The real problem by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    All these suggestions make the naive assumption that people in general learn from past mistakes. lqz

  291. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by Ohreally_factor · · Score: 1

    Sure, it was humorous. But it's because it reflects actual attitudes that makes it funny. So what's wrong with debating the issues that a joke brings up?

    A joke can do two things when dealing with serious issues. It can be used to smooth over the issue and allows us to dismiss the issue. Or it can highlight the issue, and open it up for debate.

    --
    It's not offtopic, dumbass. It's orthogonal.
  292. LOTR: Riverdance by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    After all, Legolas's antics were not far off....

    qgj

  293. Different threading model by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    It looks like the gist of the threading model for Dragonfly is that threads all stay on one processor. I assume this is for user processes only, and that this isn't pervasive through the kernel? div

  294. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Chick programmer speaking from experience... all through college I was discouraged from pursuing my career as opposed to encouraged by approximately a 2:1 ratio, by parents, peers, friends, mentors, etc. The concern was that I would find the work too "difficult" (even though I won math awards in high school) and time consuming and the social environment creatively stifling and possibly annoying due to a perceived lack of social skills among the sort of people who typically work in technology. Most of the people who said discouraging things had little or no direct experience to draw on and had no idea what they were talking about. I make it a point to tell people how interesting, challenging, and stimulating my work is to try and reverse this stereotype. Just my 2 cents.

  295. Speed is by no means by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    what these processors are known for. Benchmarks show that. That's not to say it's a bad processor, and maybe the Efficeon will turn out a little sweeter. Meanwhile, there isn't a whole lot about Transmeta's stuff that stands out. Except the wacky design. ob

  296. A bit OTT indeed :-) by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1
    ... a fiend of a friend offered them to us for a quid each.


    Man, you're hard on your friends!

    Simon.
    iqh
  297. A new book: Opensource Society And Its Enemies. by _Nag_gaN_ · · Score: 1

    The title suggests the possibility of this new book: Opensource Society And Its Enemies. Instead of Plato, Hegel and Marx, who will be criticized in this new book?

    --
    We do this for fun.
  298. ABC Notation by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic
    The ABC Notation is very popular amongst tradtional music enthusiasts. It's the format of choice for emailing and exchanging tunes on tradional music mailing lists and newsgroups. ABC is in widespread use.

    Here's the introduction:

    abc is a language designed to notate tunes in an ascii format. It was designed primarily for folk and traditional tunes of Western European origin (such as English, Irish and Scottish) which can be written on one stave in standard classical notation. However, it is extendible to many other types of music and recently Steve Allen has coded Beethoven's Symphony No. 7, Movement 2 in abc! Since its introduction at the end of 1991 it has become very popular and there now exist several Windows, Mac, Palmtop and UNIX based tools which can read abc notation and either process it into staff notation or play it through the speakers of a computer.

    One of the most important aims of abc notation, and perhaps one that distinguishes it from most, if not all, computer-readable musical languages is that it can be easily read by humans. In other words, with a little practice, it is possible to play a tune directly from the abc notation without having to process and print it out. Even if this isn't of interest, the resulting clarity of the notation makes it fairly easy to notate tunes. In addition, the ability to write music in abc notation means that it can be easily and portably stored or transported electronically hence enabling the discussion and dissemination of music via email.

    (Emphasis mine.)

    ABC is an extremely popular format for collecting and exchanging tunes. There are Large Tune Repositories using ABC. nr

  299. Could be a cool hosting facility! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1, Offtopic

    On and I forgot.

    They love open source.

    So they could be reading! *waves* hl

  300. but by Anonymous Coward · · Score: -1

    Get off your high horses people (not just you, all the posters along this vein).

    Look, what are you waiting for in the next release of SQLServer? Anything? Nope...didn't think so.
    You HAVE a rock-solid DB solution from MS right now, so who cares if the next release from MS is late, especially when it represents a fundamental change, and thus nothing you're doing _right now_ will suffer if it's not out next week will it?

    Damned, the only thing I know of that's being worked on that requires this to be released is WinFS, which will be released in Longhorn when? A couple more years you say?

    Besides, when was the last time your OSS project of choice went gold on time? And no, not having release deadlines doesn't count.
    fkp

  301. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by noisymime · · Score: 1

    Does she server food to any of her former coworkers?

    Oh if I could only remember how many times I've made that typo :D

  302. Re:Why are most FOSS developers male? by softcoder · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Perhaps you should ask the project lead for Mozilla, who is I believe, female. At the 2004 OsCON they had a panel about FOSS volunteers. The Apache lead mentioned that there were two groups of people who tended to drop out early: women, and Japanese. In his opinion, they were driven away by the flame wars on the mailing lists. Women, and Japanese, were just not comfortable with the level of 'discussion'. The Apache head was not happy about this, but there doesn't seem much he can do.

  303. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by hellgate · · Score: 2, Informative
    Links to follow-ups by Garry Becker (nobel prize in economics) and Richard Posner (judge on a United States Court of Appeals).

    Obviously, they are not neurologists, but each has an interesting take.

  304. C++ and reuse by leandrod · · Score: 1

    I know the guy's role is sociological, not technical, but I get worried about how much confusion reigns in free software.

    One can reuse code in any language. It is source code availability that enables that, not C++; even OO in general seems to conduce to reuse but frequently leads to problems such as the weak base objects.

    C++, with its huge complexity, is a handicap -- Java and C# are still complex but at least they try to be a little bit simpler, not to mention definetly better things such as functional programming.

    Now if KDE wants to keep using an arcane language, it is their choice, just as they insisted for how long in a confusing licensing and now keep insisting in a confusing interface. But don't spread technical misinformation, please.

    --
    Leandro Guimarães Faria Corcete DUTRA
    DA, DBA, SysAdmin, Data Modeller
    GNU Project, Debian GNU/Lin
    1. Re:C++ and reuse by 10Ghz · · Score: 1

      I really fail to see how C++ is an "arcane" language. And I really fail to see what was so "confusing" about KDE's license. It was mostly GPL and LGPL, with Qt being licensed first under the QPL and commercial-licence and a bit later under QPL, GPL and commercial license. Seriously, how is that "confusing"?

      --
      Lesbian Nazi Hookers Abducted by UFOs and Forced Into Weight Loss Programs - -all next week on Town Talk.
    2. Re:C++ and reuse by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If C++ is too complex for you, then you need to get out of programing. C# and Java are simpler only for simple programs. As things get more complex they ALL have disadvantages. Programing a complex system is hard not matter what system you use.

      Now if you were programing a simple project, yes C++ is too complex. C# and Java are not either though, you should be looking more at python.

      I have no idea what you mean by calling C++ arcane. C++ was designed for real world use, and many large systems are written with it. Come to think of it, C# and Java are really only tweaks to make some things in C++ look a little nicer. The improvement is arguable. (in the case of garbage collection, it is done at the expense of RAII so it can be a disadvantage in some situations! Not to imply that garbage collection is useless)

    3. Re:C++ and reuse by leandrod · · Score: 1
      > I really fail to see how C++ is an "arcane" language

      Perhaps not being a native English speaker I misused the word -- I meant a language you need to be a language lawyer to be effective in.

      > I really fail to see what was so "confusing" about KDE's license

      See why Debian was unable to distribute KDE...

      --
      Leandro Guimarães Faria Corcete DUTRA
      DA, DBA, SysAdmin, Data Modeller
      GNU Project, Debian GNU/Lin
    4. Re:C++ and reuse by nutshell42 · · Score: 1
      Hey, a troll on /. I can't believe it!

      The kernel is written in C, Gnome in Objective C, KDE in C++; there's a reason all large-scale projects (correct me if I'm wrong but atm I can't think of any well known 2-3 million lines+ project in Java/C#) use "arcane" languages

      And KDE is (L)GPL, Qt is GPL (among others) and it's been that way for years now I really don't see what you're talking about

      --
      Don't think of it as a flame---it's more like an argument that does 3d6 fire damage
    5. Re:C++ and reuse by 10Ghz · · Score: 1
      See why Debian was unable to distribute KDE...


      If Debian had problems with KDE, it really is Debian's problem. I don't think that KDE's licensing has ever been "confusing". Don't try to blame Debian's problems on KDE.
      --
      Lesbian Nazi Hookers Abducted by UFOs and Forced Into Weight Loss Programs - -all next week on Town Talk.
    6. Re:C++ and reuse by leandrod · · Score: 1
      > If Debian had problems with KDE, it really is Debian's problem.

      No, Trolltech Qt's license wasn't compatible with the GNU GPL. Go inform yourself before replying.

      --
      Leandro Guimarães Faria Corcete DUTRA
      DA, DBA, SysAdmin, Data Modeller
      GNU Project, Debian GNU/Lin
    7. Re:C++ and reuse by leandrod · · Score: 1
      > The kernel is written in C

      And suffering, see how progress slowed down and Linus found himself unable to produce stable kernels in 2.6.

      But yes, C is a lot less arcane than C++

      > Gnome in Objective C

      Gnome is plain C. And yes, Objective C is quite less arcane than C++

      --
      Leandro Guimarães Faria Corcete DUTRA
      DA, DBA, SysAdmin, Data Modeller
      GNU Project, Debian GNU/Lin
    8. Re:C++ and reuse by 10Ghz · · Score: 1

      Funny, KDE used it, and they were using the (L)GPL. How could KDE use Qt (with TT's endorsement in fact) if Qt was not compatible with KDE's license? And numerous other distros shipped KDE without any problems. And how was _KDE's_ licensing consfuisng? It was (L)GPL. What's so confusing about that?

      Like I said: Debian's problems are Debian's problems.

      --
      Lesbian Nazi Hookers Abducted by UFOs and Forced Into Weight Loss Programs - -all next week on Town Talk.
    9. Re:C++ and reuse by leandrod · · Score: 1
      > How could KDE use Qt (with TT's endorsement in fact) if Qt was not compatible with KDE's license?

      That is it, they couldn't. It took years to make Trolltech change Qt's license to something GNU GPL-compatible.

      --
      Leandro Guimarães Faria Corcete DUTRA
      DA, DBA, SysAdmin, Data Modeller
      GNU Project, Debian GNU/Lin
    10. Re:C++ and reuse by 10Ghz · · Score: 1
      That is it, they couldn't.


      Yes they could. Or as the original KDE-announcement (from 1996) says: "Since a few weeks a really great new widget library is available free in source and price for free software development.".

      Obviously Qt could be freely used for free software even back then. And KDE did just that, and TT had ZERO problems with it. Hell, they endorsed it! TT changed their license because some people started whining about it. But KDE (which was GPL-licensed) had been using it for quite some time already, and TT had zero problems with that fact, quite the contrary!

      So do tell me: how is it that KDE "couldn't" use Qt, when in fact they used it, and TT supported them in doing so?
      --
      Lesbian Nazi Hookers Abducted by UFOs and Forced Into Weight Loss Programs - -all next week on Town Talk.
    11. Re:C++ and reuse by nutshell42 · · Score: 1
      Gnome is plain C

      Not really, they wrote their own Objective C look-alike.

      C++ is one of the most popular languages out there; to call it arcane just because you don't like it is unfair. Yes C++ offers lots of possibilities to screw things up but it's also one of the most powerful languages. If you do a C++ project it may be more important to think about the structure of the program before you start hacking and to be more careful about the details than with Java but KDE got that right (And a good IDE can help you immensely).

      All I see when I read your posts is a disgruntled Debian zealot too lazy to come up with a better argument. We can argue about features, usability, speed, integration, clean design of the different code elements etc. but restarting flame wars about programming language and license that were settled years ago because both sides realized that they were stupid is a bit weak.

      --
      Don't think of it as a flame---it's more like an argument that does 3d6 fire damage
    12. Re:C++ and reuse by leandrod · · Score: 1
      > they wrote their own Objective C look-alike.

      You don't know what you're talking about. They didn't. It is just OO-like functions you access in plain C.

      > C++ is one of the most popular languages out there

      So popular everyone spends loads of time trying to fix it, and it grows and grows...

      > restarting flame wars about programming language and license that were settled years ago because both sides realized that they were stupid is a bit weak.

      I criticised the claim you need C++ to reuse code, and that's clearly stupid. I called it arcane, and it is. And Debian never settled the KDE issue, it is just that Trolltech recanted and relicensed Qt under the GNU GPL.

      --
      Leandro Guimarães Faria Corcete DUTRA
      DA, DBA, SysAdmin, Data Modeller
      GNU Project, Debian GNU/Lin
  305. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Sorry, the vagueness of plain text and all... but I stand by my assertion that this one-liner should be retired as it is both factually and functionally incorrect.

    -theGreater.

  306. religions are magic by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Insightful

    religion - a strong belief in a supernatural power or powers that control human destiny;
    open source - A method and philosophy for software licensing
    philosophy - any personal belief about how to live or how to deal with a situation

    You seem to have religion and philosophy confused. Unfortunately this isnt unusual because for most people religion has hijacked their philosophy and ethics.

    (source = hyperdictionary.com)

    1. Re:religions are magic by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      I think philosophers would call it an ideology or a tradition.

    2. Re:religions are magic by theGreater · · Score: 1

      You seem to be confusing religion and superstition. You are certainly entitled to that belief, but one is a fear-based avoidance of certain unreasonable things, the other is typically a system of maxims for living one's life; they are not mutually exclusive.

      Also, you may have noticed that many of the great philosophers spend a lot of time ruminating about god, existence, and other domains of religion. Why shouldn't religion be allowed to return the favor?

      I certainly do wish everything was as clear cut as you would suggest, however. Then we could just all discount the value of all religions (this is VERY popular on /.) and get on with our lives.

      -theGreater.

  307. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    From what I hear from girls who know computer-type people, we are the reason they're are not many girls in computing.

  308. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by MikeBabcock · · Score: 1

    Maybe the many scientific studies that show that men and women are not the same help too.

    You know, that the average woman and the average man think differently? There's a reason my wife who got into Computer Engineering at 16 yrs old and studied VAX assembly language still asks me to change the settings on our home machine -- she couldn't be bothered to do it herself. She's more than capable, but the itch isn't there.

    I meet guy after guy doing OSS work and they're "scratching an itch", and when we discuss our work with the ladies we know, often very bright and computer-minded, they don't have those itches. Theirs are different (on *AVERAGE*).

    Good for us, good for them, I don't care -- its not sexual discrimination or something, its called natural bias. Get over it.

    --
    - Michael T. Babcock (Yes, I blog)
  309. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by Money+for+Nothin' · · Score: 4, Interesting

    We do hear a bevy of jokes about no females reading /....but what really is the reason?

    Women tend to be more social than men? Men have a greater enjoyment of technical problems than women? Boys play with dump trucks and military characters and Legos and Erector sets (more individual, technically-creative toys), while girls play with Barbies and lipstick and new clothes (more social, more fashionably-creative items)?

    Some would say it's because men ostracize women in the workplace, but that ignores the fact that men go into Computer Science schools in a ratio of about 20:1, and engineering schools (what I've seen of them, anyway) in ratio of like 10:1 or 5:1. Perhaps this stems from earlier-childhood ostracization from letting girls play with dump trucks and BB guns and Legos and other activities which might turn them into a "tomboy"?

    Or perhaps it's simply a product of genetic evolution which tells men to take technical problems in greater proportion than women (evolutionary history summed up as follows -- man: hunt for food and fend off predators and other men using innovative killing tools; woman: cook food, wash clothes, take care of kids)?

    We may all be equal under the law (as we should be), but let's not kid ourselves - men and women *are* different, and that fact is as bluntly-obvious as the fact that we have different sex organs. And the difference, IMO, probably manifests itself in other factors of "manhood" or "womanhood" as well.

    (Disclaimer: these are all vague sociological generalizations which will not apply in specific scenarios. But isn't that what sociology is about - vague over-generalization? :P )

  310. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by mangu · · Score: 0, Flamebait
    her mentally ill and drug addicted clients are easier to work with than the average alpha geek


    What a surprise. Losers who totally fucked up in everything they tried are less arrogant than people who stand at the top of a successful, well paid, career?


    Your girlfriend seems to be have a rather intolerant personality. She needs to work with people that are clearly inferior to her, because she can't stand the sugestion that anyone could be superior to herself. If she can't stand the occasional banter from colleagues with good humor she surely isn't fit to work with geeks. Or do you think it's easy, from a human point of view, to be called a "geek" or a "nerd", both pejorative terms, just because you can understand the finer concepts in computer science that eludes the majority of humans?

  311. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by iabervon · · Score: 1

    I suspect that the current state has a lot to do with the image of computers in the 80s, which is when a lot of the current developers got interested. Back then, computers in general were viewed as somewhat obscure and especially difficult to program, and they would only be given to kids who were expected to be interested in science and technology. At the time, girls were not commonly seen as potentially interested in technology, so they were unlikely to have computers to be interested by. Women have become more involved since, but people coming to computers later in life, I think, are less likely to write code as a hobby, and more likely to only write code for work.

    So I think the 20-year time delay between when people start forming their life-long interests and when they tend to feel fully prepared to begin working on major public projects means that we're now seeing, in the OSS community, the results of Reagan-era attitudes towards gender and towards computers.

    Beyond that, girls are still discouraged from getting involved in computers and scientific and technical fields in general, primarily, at this point, by their peers who aren't interested in there fields. While it is generally considered uncouth for people in technical fields to discourage girls from joining them, it is still acceptable for people in non-technical fields to encourage girls to join them (in preference to technical fields).

  312. Re:Slashdot has 76,000 female users! -- like me? by mgoss · · Score: 4, Funny

    In my CS classes, it's more like a 10:1 ration of guys to gals, but that's a fairly small private university.

    So, I'm female. I love computers, programming, linux, gentoo... hopefully in the future there will be more and more people like me.

    I mean, there's got to be some females to help pass on geekiness to their kids. But I just don't think my mom would understand an e-mail that said something to the effect of "emerging package baby, nine month compilation time!"

    By the way, geeky pick-up lines are the best. And I find all you guys very amusing.

    PS, no you can't have my e-mail address. :)

  313. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by Frymaster · · Score: 1
    What a surprise. Losers who totally fucked up in everything they tried are less arrogant than people who stand at the top of a successful, well paid, career?

    are you implying that people who are mentally ill are to blame for their condition?

    Your girlfriend seems to be have a rather intolerant personality. She needs to work with people that are clearly inferior to her, because she can't stand the sugestion that anyone could be superior to herself.

    very insightful! by this "logic" we can assume that programmers have an even bigger inferiority complex because they work with computers: machines that can't do anything without being told to do so.

    If she can't stand the occasional banter from colleagues with good humor she surely isn't fit to work with geeks

    uh, no: sexist, misogynist and emotionally stunted trolls aren't fit to work with her.

    Or do you think it's easy, from a human point of view, to be called a "geek" or a "nerd"

    er, don't you know when people call you those "pejorative" terms they're just engaging in "occasional banter from colleagues with good humour"? nice double standard, bud. thanks for helping make my point!

  314. Confused by webhat · · Score: 3, Interesting

    It seems like everytime I read an article it's another social comentary on the structure of F/OSS, what's up with that?

    It's strange how at one time the F/OSS community is a marginalized group under attack from every large company who thinks it's destroying their market share and now it's so important that everybody and their dog is writing about how wonderful the development structure is.

    I'm not saying it's not wonderful, but I'm not saying it is either. Then again it seems that everybody and their dog is saying that too.

    Oh, and on the comment: "I think that a democratic election is better than a dictatorship."

    Is that a dig at Bush or a dig at Linus? Personally, and some research back me up on this, I think that dictatorships are sometimes needed to get the ball rolling. Then once the dictator gets too big for their boots and there's a revolt. In the case of Linus he elected deputies to help him with the leadership role.

    Here's a quote I borrowed under the GFDL, from Wikipedia:

    Edmund Burke:

    "I cannot help concurring [e.g., with Aristotle, inter alios] that an absolute democracy, no more than an absolute monarchy, is not to be reckoned among the legitimate forms of government. They think it rather the corruption and degeneracy than the sound constitution of a republic."

    See now I'm a F/OSS social commentary writer too... ;)

    BTW, the original confusion, see subject, came from the fact that I didn't see the obligatory OSTG warning in the message, it's almost as important and as much a part of /. as the jibes about Will Wheaton in the story above.

    --
    'I am become Shiva, destroyer of worlds'
  315. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    "There's different numbers of negroes and whites in the sciences and in prison, and research should be done to see why: is it nature or nurture?"

    Does that sound lika a valid question to you?

  316. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by TOWebstress · · Score: 1
    Or do you think it's easy, from a human point of view, to be called a "geek" or a "nerd", both pejorative terms...

    If you really have issues with being referred to as a "geek" or a "nerd," why do you read Slashdot: News for Nerds?

    --
    You see the look on my face, and yet you keep talking.
  317. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by RealAlaskan · · Score: 1
    Boys play with dump trucks and military characters and Legos and Erector sets (more individual, technically-creative toys), while girls play with Barbies and lipstick and new clothes (more social, more fashionably-creative items)?

    When my son plays with dolls, they [the dolls, under his control] fight and build things. When my daughter plays with trucks, the mommy truck takes care of the baby trucks. The boy builds guns and forts with legos, the girl builds houses for the mommy truck and the baby trucks.

    In our family, at least, different play styles lead to different choices in toys. It's not different toys leading to different play styles!

    One fact that no liberal and no feminist seems to want to accept is that boys and girls are different.

  318. MOD PARENT DOWN by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    PS, no you can't have my e-mail address. :)

    MOD PARENT DOWN!

  319. Playing together by Nurgled · · Score: 1

    I enjoy programming. It's more fun and rewarding when you do it with other people.

    Simple as that.

  320. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by KludgeGrrl · · Score: 2, Insightful

    One fact that no liberal and no feminist seems to want to accept is that boys and girls are different

    As a liberal (well actually NDP, but that's even further left) feminist I have to butt in.

    I accept that men and women are different, not merely in their reproductive capabilities. Yes, males tend to dominate mathematical fields, Females language-based fields. I would argue that this is in part due to innate predispositions and in part due to societal reinforcement. Exactly how much of which is open for debate, but there do seem to be differences.

    Yet even if we accept that men *tend* to be better at some skills and women at others it is pretty clear that individuals regularly rise above these tendancies. There are several very good male writers, although writing relies upon language skills, traditionally associated with women. (People always remark on the women who succeed in male-dominated fields, but what about the inverse? No one considers Tolstoy to have been overcoming the burden of his sex when he set pen to paper.)

    Moreover, it is strange to assume that far more men are involved in open source developments because they are "better at math" given that the open source community is not just people sitting in cubicles doing math. It is, first, a *community* ergo a social network -- which is one of those things women are alleged to be so interested in. And does software not rely upon language? Should it not have a good user interface? If we accept that men and women tend to be interested in different intellectual challenges, why assume that there is only one kind of challenge in a given problem? Surely the strength open source is that different people are free to tackle the problems they see, the problems that interest them, and that by having a wide variety of people contributing the final product benefits from the variety of the people who worked on it. No?

    Surely in open source development, variety and difference in the developers is a good thing, no? So it is worth asking why more women aren't involved, not because of a desire to be pc but because their involvement might produce a more robust product. And isn't that the whole point?

    People get all tied up thinking that gender difference is oppressive and bad. I think gender difference is often exaggerated, but that any difference, gender or otherwise, is a survival trait for society. It's no good having everyone think the same way all the time. We need variety, in life as well as software development.

    Just my 2 cents.

  321. An opinion from a woman. by bigdreamer · · Score: 1

    Well, this is an interesting question, and I can only speak from my own experience, but I personally feel it's more nurture than nature.

    Next time you go shopping, go to the toy section of the store and look how boys' toys and girls' toys treat the subject of electricity. Last time I went, the boy's section had a toy that showed boys how to make a circuit, and the only toy in the girls' section that had anything to do with electricity was a magic genie lamp that required batteries to "magically" glow. And this was a Wal-Mart in a major American city. I also saw a lot of cool boys' toys that showed how to build complex structures. There was no equivalent in the girls' section. So, here we have boys' toys that encourage logic and engineering, while girls' toys equate science to "magic." Interesting.

    Another problem is schools and school teachers. I remember in elementary and middle school when I expressed an interest in science and math, while my teachers would say, "But you're such a good writer." So, I was receiving explicit messages that writing was my strength and I should put those other things aside.

    Then, there was college. I tried to major in computer science for a while, and then I realized that I had never taken the classes required for me to think logically. That was partially my fault. And while the computer science professors were helpful, the young men in the department who were my peers brushed me aside and treated me like I didn't exist. Eventually I started to wonder if I had the wrong genitalia to major in computer science. This attitude of mine led me to eventually switch to a major my high school teachers had prepared me for: English.

    Now, I'm in the process of getting my Master's of Library Science. I'm taking a course required for my Master's degree, a class in basic computer applications (the Microsoft Office 2003 suite, basically). The class is a breeze, and it's being taught by a woman who knows how to program in various languages, including COBOL. She is encouraging me to go back to school to get a BS in some sort of science like I originally wanted. I'm thinking of majoring in physics with a minor in computer science. Maybe, I could get a Master's degree in Physics and be qualified to be a science librarian and help with research. I feel that if I had met my teacher earlier, I would have graduated with a computer science degree instead of an English degree. So, having strong role models for women in the sciences (real live ones, not just Ana Lovelace and Dr. Grace Hopper) is another major step for more women to be in the sciences.

    The geek culture is one that I feel that women can adapt to, because I am a member of a Slackware online group that is mostly male, but I can flame and write jokes like the best of them. They treat me differently, it's true, but they treat me with a lot of respect because I am a woman that can hold on her own. So, IMHO, I do not feel that geek culture is a major impediment to women working on or with OSS, it's more of the major culture that discourages women from even being in OSS in the first place.

  322. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    are you implying that people who are mentally ill are to blame for their condition?

    I would blame drug addicts for their condition. Drug addiction can cause mental illness, so in that case I would blame them for their condition. (There are many causes of mental illness, drug addiction a rare one, and also the only one I can blame on the sufferer)

  323. Wrong, it is more like public interest association by mikelang · · Score: 1

    Public interest groups have all these traits also, but feed a more "material" needs.

    Religions tend to have mutually-exclusive licenses whereas interest groups do not.

  324. Men use grey matter, women use white matter by garyebickford · · Score: 2, Informative

    According to this Press Release from University of California Irvine (also covered by many news media), men's and women's brains are more different than almost anybody thought. The difference may explain why women are generally better at tasks requiring so-called "relational intelligence" and men are generally better at tasks requiring single topic focus (math, engineering, etc.) Computer programming in general falls into the topical domain.

    From the press release:

    "In general, men have approximately 6.5 times the amount of gray matter related to general intelligence than women, and women have nearly 10 times the amount of white matter related to intelligence than men. Gray matter represents information processing centers in the brain, and white matter represents the networking of - or connections between - these processing centers.

    This, according to Rex Jung, a UNM neuropsychologist and co-author of the study, may help to explain why men tend to excel in tasks requiring more local processing (like mathematics), while women tend to excel at integrating and assimilating information from distributed gray-matter regions in the brain, such as required for language facility. These two very different neurological pathways and activity centers, however, result in equivalent overall performance on broad measures of cognitive ability, such as those found on intelligence tests."

    The press release also notes that these two processing models have similar intellectual performance. This is very interesting to me:

    "These two very different neurological pathways and activity centers, however, result in equivalent overall performance on broad measures of cognitive ability, such as those found on intelligence tests."

    --
    It's easier to be a result of the past, but more fun to be a cause of the future! http://www.spacefinancegroup.com/
  325. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by jac1962 · · Score: 1

    Ask Harvard University President Lawrence Summers

    Then again, maybe you better not
    --
    "I worked hard for it. I deserve it. And I have it," Campbell said. "It's all mine."
  326. Re:Slashdot has 76,000 female users! -- like me? by BigDogCH · · Score: 2, Funny

    "PS, no you can't have my e-mail address. :)"

    Street address would be fine.

    In all seriousness though, while your parents don't understand your field of choice, they surely call you every time they need help. I hate getting calls that start with "Hi, you don't know me, but I am your moms friends hamsters former-owners uncles sons 2nd best friend, would you fix my computer? It doesn't work good."

  327. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0
    maybe attitudes like this are the reason there aren't that many women in programming.


    And maybe you're full of shit.

    While working for a DoD contractor we had many bright, smart, female software engineers at the start of the project. Most of them didn't have CS/CE degrees, but did have degrees in applied math, physics, and electrical engineering. The fact of the matter is that over the year I was there most of them VOLUNTARILY migrated to testing or technical writing. Guess what? They didn't change cubicles, teams, or coworkers. They simply started filling a job position which appealed to them more.

    my girlfriend spent four years at school and three years in the industry going from one software shop before she finally quit the whole biz because of attitudes like that. she works at a homeless shelter now and says that her mentally ill and drug addicted clients are easier to work with than the average alpha geek.


    And my wife, who is ex-military AND a masters degreed engineer would tell her to cowboy the hell up and deal with it. She's a senior systems engineer on a team with seventeen men and has no problem coping.. nor has she at the three previous engineering positions she's held over the last eleven years.

    Both in the computing field and in the military I've encountered a FEW female employees who seem to think that us geeky engineers should bend over backwards to be "sociable" and "include them in the group". They believe that lack of doing so is a knock against them.

    Well tough shit. I will give them all of the support a professional engineer of their position should need. I will expect from them the code as specced so that I may interface my code to it. In the event of a problem I will efficiently and amicably as possible work to resolve the issue. BUT.. I don't have to like her.. and for that matter I don't even have to be particularly nice.

    Meet engineer Joe Friday.. just the facts ma'am.
  328. Re:Why are most FOSS developers male? by misuba · · Score: 2, Insightful

    The Apache head was not happy about this, but there doesn't seem much he can do.

    This is a complete copout. Here's a story.

    I had two professors in college. One of them would lead class discussions, in which the sizable number of female students would tend to be quieter, and at some quiet point, he would kind of chuckle embarrasedly and say, "you know, it would be great if we heard some more from the women." And right afterwards, maybe a woman would say something out of obligation, but then things would pretty much go the way they were going before.

    The other one led a discussion on the very first meeting of the class, and at the end of class, he stood in front of his desk and said this: "Okay, this public service message is for the women in the class. The message is: this was done to you. You were not born like this. When you were little babies in the nursery, you were blabbering and yelling just as much as the little boy babies were. But somewhere in between, something happened. What happened, or why, is not my department exactly. I'm just saying this because, the next time we talk over something in class, I want you to remember it. That's all." Then he gave us our reading assignments.

    The moral of the story is: there is something you can do. The thing to do is: something. Something other than a shrug. Talk about the problem, from the beginning, and make it known how you feel and what you expect. Do not be rolled over by the freight train of social convention.

    --

    If you don't pretend to be anyone, are you?

  329. Alpha geeks are annoying - what's new? by Just+Some+Guy · · Score: 1
    Men are often abrasive to each other without any malice and are pretty used to bluntness. However, women tend to be more tactful in person. Neither way is inherently "better" than the other; they're just the recognized and documented differences in the way the genders interact.

    So how does this affect women in the technical workplace? A lot of your "alpha geeks" are snotty, condescending jerks. Men brush it off as a personality annoyance and accept it as part of the cost of interacting with those people. Some women would perceive the same behavior as a stream constant personal attacks.

    Put another way, through an average guy into a situation with a bunch of arrogant geeks and he'll likely respond in kind without ever thinking a thing of it, while the average woman will wonder why everyone hates her and her work.

    That doesn't make it right. That doesn't make it OK. That does, however, make it understandable that a lot of women hate working around technical men.

    --
    Dewey, what part of this looks like authorities should be involved?
  330. volunteers/contributors ratio? by Dulimano · · Score: 1

    He didn't talk about a very interesting question: How many of the KDE contibutors work on KDE as their day job? Or more importantly: how much of the KDE codebase is a work of people as their day job?

    In the case of Linux, I think currently all of the most important contributors (who, on the whole, are responsible for almost all of the incoming core code) are now getting paid for their work on Linux (at OSDL, Red Hat, SUSE, IBM etc.). The same is true for Mozilla (Mozilla Foundation, Oracle, IBM, and now, famously, Google). Of course, this wasn't always so. Anyway, what's the case with KDE?

    1. Re:volunteers/contributors ratio? by Otter · · Score: 1
      He didn't talk about a very interesting question: How many of the KDE contibutors work on KDE as their day job? Or more importantly: how much of the KDE codebase is a work of people as their day job?

      It's a vanishingly small number. It gets larger if you include KDE work done in spare time by Troll Tech developers paid to work on Qt, but even so it's overwhelmingly a volunteer effort.

  331. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by x40sw0n · · Score: 1
    Most programmers, coders and engineers are male; IMHO this is due to the largely redundant and linear thinking process that is required. For a good coder or engineer, you have to be able to consistently trace a single logic path, and find it's breakdown or completion. Women think differently than men, in a more 'explosive' pattern really, giving them distinct advantages in group management, project leadership, etc. men tend to think in this sequence A goes to B goes to C goes to D (etc.) and women tend to try to approach things like this: A,B,C are all reachable from D, so where do I need to go first? Both styles have perfectly viable reasoning, but some are better suited for certain roles than others. I think women should be more involved in computer sciences, and I do think that current attitudes derail that frequently. However I think that a womans perspectives would be best utilized from operational aspects, and usability. Most software could certainly use a woman's touch, especially in the UI department. I wouldn't subject a woman to coding, (it would drive her nuts) but QC would be great. Her attention to detail (men are generally bad at this, I know I am, with the exception of grammar) and ability to check interellation would be invaluable in this kind of position. Hell it might reduce bad coding (thanks to all those dyslexic coders) to an absolute minimum...

    In Absentia

  332. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by bastardsquadmuzz · · Score: 1

    I wonder if this can be linked to speech as well? Men talk to solve problems, women talk to share them. Could explain why more men are technically minded (mechanics, computers, etc) and more women are in caring professions (nurses, teachers, etc).

    Just a thought.

    --
    --Muzz
  333. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by J.R.+Random · · Score: 1

    Most programmers are male, whether doing open source work or otherwise. Most engineers are male. Most mechanics are male. So are most carpenters. Guys like to make stuff. The sexes are different. Get over it.

  334. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by 'The+'.$L3mm1ng · · Score: 1

    There's a difference in being called a geek by a geek (that's a compliment) and being called a nerd by a "normal" guy anytime it show's you're a bit different (that's an insult - at least to me).

  335. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by poopdeville · · Score: 1

    Maybe you're just passing the buck onto genetics when in fact there's a sociological phenomenon occurring. Of course, you couldn't know that, since your genetics prevented you from studying sociology.

    Who the hell is a stereotypical guy? We're all just people with unique perspectives. Thinking about "stereotypical people" is the sort of mindset that allows you to apply vague, ill-defined, and yet negative stereotypes to individuals.

    I'm a mathematician -- geeky to the point of chic -- but I understand people well enough to know you're full of shit.

    --
    After all, I am strangely colored.
  336. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    yes. Absolutely.

  337. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    and the response isn't "I disagree!", it isn't "You're wrong!", it's "You must never say such a thing! It is forbidden! Now grovel for forgiveness!".

    Wow, it's amazing how much more sense things make when you exaggerate.

    Did anyone really say "You must never say such a thing! It is forbidden! Now grovel for forgiveness!"..?

    No, that's something that you made up. Keep trying.

  338. Starting Open Source Software Projects For Dummies by tlambert · · Score: 1

    Everyone wants to know how to mass produce Open Source Software projects, but they all want it in an "Starting Open Source Software Projects For Dummies" book.

    No one's writing one of those, because understanding social organizations is something that's not best left to "social scientists. There's no mention in the article of mathematical modelling, or anything else that would mark him as a serious student, it's just an opinion puff-piece that happens to mention KDE.

    There's a lot of work out there that's applicable to formal study, which can be leveraged for understanding how to create a maintainable Open Source Project, but it requires a formal understanding of constraint-based systems and games theory.

    Recommended reading for social scientists who actually want the gig of studying OSS, rather than the gig of being trade journal pundits:

    Nonlinear Dynamics, Mathematical Biology and Social Science (Santa Fe Institute Studies in the Sciences of Complexity Lecture Notes)
    Joshua M. Epstein
    ISBN: 0201419882

    The Evolution of Cooperation
    Robert Axelrod
    ISBN: 0465021212

    The Economy As an Evolving Complex System (Sante Fe Institute Studies in the Sciences of Complexity, Vol 5)
    Philip W. Anderson
    ISBN: 0201156857

    Can we maybe see something about a study of OSS projects that isn't just another puff-piece?

    -- Terry

  339. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The interesting thing that all you "alpha geeks are mean" girls should notice is that the parent poster's attitude, despite the fact that he's a troll, is rather common among boardroom executives. It's always the squeaky wheel's fault. Alpha anythings are hard to get along with, because they became alpha by fighting to destroy the competition.

    No matter what business you're in, you'll only avoid coworkers who are out to get you if you're in a non-threatening, "helper" position rather than a promotion track "producer" position. Guys are used to this because we get called "pussies" if we don't compete like a bunch of deranged sociopaths at everything. The only difference between women in business in general and women in CS is that CS's historical male dominance makes you stand out as an exception, and slapping down the exceptions is easier than competing on merit, if your goal is winning at office politics.

  340. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by lachlan76 · · Score: 1

    maybe attitudes like this are the reason there aren't that many women in programming.

    Did you read the second line? It was meant as a joke...

    (This *is* meant to be flamebait -- and posted anonymously, so I don't ruin my chances with the girl who reads /. ... I know you're out there baby, and I love you!)

    Why must everything be taken as an insult?

  341. Re:While we're talking about the social structure. by burdalane · · Score: 1

    Not all girls are like that! When I was little, I played with construction tools and toy swords, and I never had any interest at all in taking care of babies, dolls, trucks, or anything else, and I still don't. I'm also more antisocial than most guys I know.