I have tattoos, and I used to have piercings. I'm also a damn good coder.
Anyone who refers to themselves as a "coder" is just a kid with delusions of grandeur.
Or a person who doesn't give a shit about title inflation. I've been a programmer, developer, lead developer, software engineer, data architect, and (most recently) a computer specialist. Under which of those titles do you think I did the most impressive work? Hint: it's not the one you think it is.
I disagree. If I write ugly code, it keeps me up at night. If the only way I can do something is with a hack, I get pissed off. My aesthetic concerns may not be predominantly visual, but they're there.
I'm often amazed at the level of hostility on/. to anyone who claims they are good at what they do. In comparison to the programmers/developers/software engineers/architects/whatever title inflation demands a coder be called, I'm pretty good. And I should be, since I've been coding for 15 years. Judging someone's coding ability based on their appearance is utterly retarded, as is believing in stupid rules like 'only people who suck at something will claim to be good at it'.
I think you missed the point. There's no way to determine if, for example, you experience the color red in the same way I do. It's an epistemoligical problem.
The point is, when we give editors power over the source, we end up with bias one way or the other. Rather than having people -tell- us about things, why not read them ourselves?
Imagine you're 5 years old, and you ask a professor and a redneck what causes rain. The professor spends hours telling you about weather patterns, condensation, etc., while the redneck tells you the rain is caused by God taking a piss.
Not really. It's going to move 20,000 or so Indians from East-Asia level poverty to US level poverty. An improvement? Maybe, but if India and China were able to get its quality and prices higher, it would benefit everyone. You might think you're winning now, but just wait 20 years when you're trying to prevent IBM from going to another country because it can get workers for a marginally cheaper rate.
The reality of the situation is that there's enough wealth in the world that everyone could have a decent standard of living, but corporatism forces all the money to the top, and then the rich hold onto the wealth, divvying out only enough to placate the masses. Communism may be flawed, but I can definately get on board with the sentiment behind it.
You think American conservatives love personal freedom? They're the ones who took most of our personal freedoms away. The only freedom they support is the freedom to own guns (I'm ambivilent on this issue). How easily GWB is forgotten, it seems..
And yet you still offer no solution. My approach would make them get real jobs, or at least make them start over from scratch, rather than just joining up with their old gang. I'm still waiting for your solution to the problem. And please, no more red herrings.
So then explain how you propose to prevent prisoners from perpetuating the culture of crime? saying 'focus on jobs' is just hand-waiving. It doesn't address the fact that a large portion have no interest in ever having a legitimate job. Isolation breaks the cycle. Perhaps it would be maddening, but I'm pretty sure it's no less humane than subjecting them to a constant threat of injury, murder, and ass rape.
Legalize drugs and everything else that there's no reason to make illegal (get rid of 90% of the prison population, keeping largely non-violent people away from real criminals)
Focus on rehabilitating prisoners rather than punishing. Also focus on getting criminals jobs. Right now it's really hard for people with a criminal background to get a job (meaning that their easiest source of income is... more crime!)
Probably more could be done, but it's a start, and definitely better than "send everyone to prison forever".
I see no reason that our solutions are mutually exclusive. I agree with what you say here, but I still feel we need to isolate criminals from each other while incarcerated so that they have less opportunity to share information and do not develop a sense of comradery. A big part of our violent crime problem is that prison gangs keep close ties to their outside counterparts. A gang-banger who gets out of prison after 10 years goes right back into his old gang, usually as a hero. Imagine how different it would be if he got out, and everyone he knew had moved on. Instead of going back to his old contacts, he'll have to find a real job.
That's where you're wrong.. It's not done because it's considered inhumane. If we eliminate outdoor time and reduce facilities to food, a bed, and a toilet, it could work. Youo don't even need to have walls between them. Just bars with screens between them and a noise cancelling system would work.
Better yet, how about solitary confinement for EVERY criminal, violent or otherwise. Isolation from all society, especially peers, gives them a good chance to think about what they did.
It's not the concept I have a problem understanding, it's the target. Compare this with, say, Nintendo DS, iPhone, or XBox hacking. Once you crack the security on these devices, you get access to:
DS - 3D accellerator hardware, cool touchscreen stuff, NES style controller,
iPhone - too much cool stuff to list (though not as appealing now that there's an officially supported SDK),
XBox - a powerful (at the time) console that can handle network functionality and play video, or
Calculator - a bunch of buttons and 100 or so monochrome pixels.
No doubt it was fun for the guy who cracked it to allow it to run custom code.. But I can't think of anything you could do with a handheld calculator that would really improve upon the capabilitie it had when it left the factory. So basically what I'm saying here is that it's cool someone cracked it, but I'm having a hard time understanding why there would actually be a home brew community rallying to this platform.
We have so many cool devices to program for these days.. And hacking a calculator is about as exciting as hacking a microwave (yeah yeah, particles are excited in a microwave, but you know what i meant).
Slashdot Mirror
I have tattoos, and I used to have piercings. I'm also a damn good coder.
Anyone who refers to themselves as a "coder" is just a kid with delusions of grandeur.
Or a person who doesn't give a shit about title inflation. I've been a programmer, developer, lead developer, software engineer, data architect, and (most recently) a computer specialist. Under which of those titles do you think I did the most impressive work? Hint: it's not the one you think it is.
I disagree. If I write ugly code, it keeps me up at night. If the only way I can do something is with a hack, I get pissed off. My aesthetic concerns may not be predominantly visual, but they're there.
I'm often amazed at the level of hostility on /. to anyone who claims they are good at what they do. In comparison to the programmers/developers/software engineers/architects/whatever title inflation demands a coder be called, I'm pretty good. And I should be, since I've been coding for 15 years. Judging someone's coding ability based on their appearance is utterly retarded, as is believing in stupid rules like 'only people who suck at something will claim to be good at it'.
I have tattoos, and I used to have piercings. I'm also a damn good coder. I seriously doubt the two are related.
Er, GGP. GGGP from current post
It's a problem if you're claiming that we all experience everything in the same way, as the GP poster claimed.
I think you missed the point. There's no way to determine if, for example, you experience the color red in the same way I do. It's an epistemoligical problem.
In the first column, Asia. In the second column, Europe.
How dost thee explain that?
I think you have way too much faith in humanity.
The point is, when we give editors power over the source, we end up with bias one way or the other. Rather than having people -tell- us about things, why not read them ourselves?
Imagine you're 5 years old, and you ask a professor and a redneck what causes rain. The professor spends hours telling you about weather patterns, condensation, etc., while the redneck tells you the rain is caused by God taking a piss.
Not really. It's going to move 20,000 or so Indians from East-Asia level poverty to US level poverty. An improvement? Maybe, but if India and China were able to get its quality and prices higher, it would benefit everyone. You might think you're winning now, but just wait 20 years when you're trying to prevent IBM from going to another country because it can get workers for a marginally cheaper rate.
The reality of the situation is that there's enough wealth in the world that everyone could have a decent standard of living, but corporatism forces all the money to the top, and then the rich hold onto the wealth, divvying out only enough to placate the masses. Communism may be flawed, but I can definately get on board with the sentiment behind it.
You think American conservatives love personal freedom? They're the ones who took most of our personal freedoms away. The only freedom they support is the freedom to own guns (I'm ambivilent on this issue). How easily GWB is forgotten, it seems..
don't be evil.. yet.
And here I thought the lack of interaction with people was a positive aspect of staying up late.
And yet you still offer no solution. My approach would make them get real jobs, or at least make them start over from scratch, rather than just joining up with their old gang. I'm still waiting for your solution to the problem. And please, no more red herrings.
So then explain how you propose to prevent prisoners from perpetuating the culture of crime? saying 'focus on jobs' is just hand-waiving. It doesn't address the fact that a large portion have no interest in ever having a legitimate job. Isolation breaks the cycle. Perhaps it would be maddening, but I'm pretty sure it's no less humane than subjecting them to a constant threat of injury, murder, and ass rape.
Probably more could be done, but it's a start, and definitely better than "send everyone to prison forever".
I see no reason that our solutions are mutually exclusive. I agree with what you say here, but I still feel we need to isolate criminals from each other while incarcerated so that they have less opportunity to share information and do not develop a sense of comradery. A big part of our violent crime problem is that prison gangs keep close ties to their outside counterparts. A gang-banger who gets out of prison after 10 years goes right back into his old gang, usually as a hero. Imagine how different it would be if he got out, and everyone he knew had moved on. Instead of going back to his old contacts, he'll have to find a real job.
Better than the criminal academy system we have now. What's your alternative?
That's where you're wrong.. It's not done because it's considered inhumane. If we eliminate outdoor time and reduce facilities to food, a bed, and a toilet, it could work. Youo don't even need to have walls between them. Just bars with screens between them and a noise cancelling system would work.
Better yet, how about solitary confinement for EVERY criminal, violent or otherwise. Isolation from all society, especially peers, gives them a good chance to think about what they did.
Citation please. And donating to get a new 120 foot projection screen for their mega-church doesn't count.
Eh, fair 'nuff. Personally, I'm more into the algorithm than the implementation. Then again, I'm not a "hacker", I'm a CS nerd.
It's not the concept I have a problem understanding, it's the target. Compare this with, say, Nintendo DS, iPhone, or XBox hacking. Once you crack the security on these devices, you get access to:
DS - 3D accellerator hardware, cool touchscreen stuff, NES style controller,
iPhone - too much cool stuff to list (though not as appealing now that there's an officially supported SDK),
XBox - a powerful (at the time) console that can handle network functionality and play video, or
Calculator - a bunch of buttons and 100 or so monochrome pixels.
No doubt it was fun for the guy who cracked it to allow it to run custom code.. But I can't think of anything you could do with a handheld calculator that would really improve upon the capabilitie it had when it left the factory. So basically what I'm saying here is that it's cool someone cracked it, but I'm having a hard time understanding why there would actually be a home brew community rallying to this platform.
We have so many cool devices to program for these days.. And hacking a calculator is about as exciting as hacking a microwave (yeah yeah, particles are excited in a microwave, but you know what i meant).