I have resisted giving my SSN for decades now, way longer than identity theft has made such resistance fashionable enough that even "normal" people worry about it.
Since it was often a hassle, I tried many tactics to try and persuade merchants, etc., to do without.
The one that worked best for me was to claim that the SSN was the MARK OF THE BEAST in the Bible. And that if they insisted on it they were helping SATAN and standing against JESUS.
Believe me, NOBODY wanted to continue THAT conversation! NOBODY!
So if there was any way in their procedures that they could get by without the SSN, they'd do it.
Credit bureaus insist SSNs are not required to get a credit report -- anyone try this with SPRINT?
Well, if the Church of Scientology came out in strong support of ODF, Microsoft's paid Wikipedia FUD spreaders would certainly get a run for their money!
Video poker slot machines addict 5 times faster than other forms of gambling.
It takes about two years for those who become compulsive video poker machine players to become hooked. Other forms of compulsive gambling, including conventional slot machines, take about ten years.
According to various TV news investigations of legalized gambling over the years.
I'd guess that the increased amount of actual thinking involved in video poker playing creates a greater illusion of control of the outcome, or simply involves more actual neurons in the brain in the process of playing.
There's a useful clue here to what makes a game more addictive, since 5 times quicker is a very big difference. But I can't say what it is.
Well, as I understand from Swedish friends, here is how they censor violence on TV in Sweden.
If the violence is real -- such as war atrocity or actual crime -- it can be depicted since to prohibit it would be hiding the truth.
But if the violence is a work of fiction, it can't be depicted -- since that would be adding to the ugliness of the world, and has the effect of deadening natural human empathy.
I'm not signing up for that position, but at least it's one logical place to draw a line.
And while I've never even seen a Manga comic book, I am signing up for the position that the judge who said comic books have no artistic value is a "let's-put-drapes-on-the-naked-lady-statues" type of idiot.
| If you really think you can take on the pirates, good luck. | | If you figure out how, please don't tell the RIAA.
Here's a practical suggestion:
Enlist the assistance of an incredibly powerful lobbying group, whose identity may surprise you: The nation's librarians.
I can't say if they'll agree with you and I'm not one myself. But they were able to achieve a significant change to the Patriot Act even while Bush was still president. So if they do agree with you, you've got a pretty relentless, principled, respected group on your side. I think even Google-the-Almighty would listen to the librarians.
There's the side-benefit too that the MPAA and RIAA -- mass sewers, oops, I mean sue-ers, of totally innocent people demanding thousands of dollars apiece from them (like the mafia: hello RICO except with the Federal Judiciary acting as accessories) -- aren't likely to benefit in the slightest. But the little guy author I think would get a fair hearing.
Moderators -- please bother to check if a link is valid. That may change over time. That initial one has varied today from -1 troll to +5 , but all I see is a one-page pdf that says the doc is sealed. Which the summary already says. Maybe it used to contain the actual sealed document. But it doesn't now. All clicking on it will do is make people feel stupid. Not +5 material. BTW, I use foxit not adobe for pdf reading, in case that matters.
However, an actual copy of the petition appears on ilrweb:
The best reason I can see for the court sealing it is that it lays out the whole case for how the RIAA has been screwing innocent people out of thousands of dollars for years (we knew that), and that the federal courts have been stupid patsies in letting themselves totally be the tools by which this is accomplished (we knew that too). But maybe for the first time a courts sees it clearly enough to be as horribly embarassed as they should be.
No inside knowledge; just cynicism about our "check your conscience at the door, merciful judge just means activist judge, the prosecution can deliberately fake evidence without affecting a jury verdict so no retrial for you, Martha" federal judiciary. Covering its exposed, very ugly, ass.
Wouldn't it be great if the RICO statute allowed for damages against the stupid judges who helped make this "several thousand dollars per innocent person" shakedown possible?
Ah, the general, multifactorial, "let's look at our sins a little" explanation. It becomes more appealing when we're frustrated in finding a single specific cause. If the bee problem ever reaches the point where shrinking food supplies result in significant human starvation you can bet that form of explanation will gain favor. That's certainly how things were with HIV/AIDS before the discovery of the very specific HIV virus. Feeling one's misfortunes are a form of punishment (by who or whatever) is a symptom of depression. So I am skeptical of this category of explanation.
The refuting articles are a year and half old, not including publication lag. But I think the most important thing in the article is that a specific anti-biotic restored two collapsing hives. Every single theory of these Spanish scientists could be completely incorrect, at the same time that their solution is correct.
Best of all, however, that solution is perfectly testable.
In fact, one good approach to solving the problem would be to just try every antibiotic known and see what happens empirically. We can't do that ethically with human illness but we can with bee colonies.
I suppose the bee researchers aren't plugged into the antibiotic biz, and the antibiotic researchers aren't plugged into the bee, uh, biz. Infrequently, someone less educated than the pros -- and thus less constrained by interdisciplinary boundaries -- can come up with something the pros have so far missed.
At the very least, I'd like to see flumagillin tested.
If you google for "amazon banned" you'll find some pretty outrageous stories. Reading the original article and responses to it, this customer has been incredibly polite, even when asked rude, accusatory questions from other people posting. The latest info I've seen is that Amazon decided to grant him "a one time exception" and re-enable his account. An "exception" to exactly what rule they don't say.
I don't approve of DRM period, but if I were to make an exception it certainly wouldn't be for Amazon's kindle or Amazon's anything, especially considering that partial book-banning they pulled earlier this week.
Wake up Amazon, several things you're doing are turning customers to enemies needlessly. Synergy can bite you!
A vastly more logical conclusion would be that you are given to "hasty generalization".
There's a formal list of logical errors people are prone to, and that's one of them. Wikipedia can enlighten you further if you care to learn.
Upon second glance, I see you're also guilty of "argmentum ad hominem", or name-calling.
Making up lies about other people can get complicated, so to lessen the mental burden some liars simply tell complete truths about themselves, in the guise of an accusation of others.
I know this sounds like a trite oversimplification, but it is quite common. Recognizing it allows you to learn more about the false accuser than he has any idea he is revealing.
This may or may not apply to you; if the shoe fits, wear it.
Why is *anything* that is life & death sensitive to the masses put onto the internet in the first place? I understand things needing to be connected to *some* kind of network for remote monitoring and control, but why is that network the internet? So the operators can shop for shoes or surf for porn while they're bored?
Even if there were never any agreement on anything it would serve the incredibly valuable purpose of making diplomats from different countries available to each other on a casual basis. And it's a place where anger gets vented, allowing even the most laughable claims of "national wounded pride" to be avenged verbally, rather than militarily.
Recall that there are numerous countries in the world where insulting words are the moral equivalent of physical attack. Not every culture believes the remedy for words is words, and for actions is commensurate actions.
If you don't think that verbal ego-soothing has ever prevented a military attack you'd be overestimating the emotional maturity of many of the world's leaders.
Trouble is, such incidents aren't easy to document. If such numbers could be produced, IMHO they'd make the UN's value easy to see. But then producing them would embarass tempermental leaders, putting us back at square one.
| And don't they stop treating cancer patients in some European countries if they're too old?
Here in America you just have to run out of money for treatment to stop, or have your insurance company decide to retroactively cancel your policy as of the day you bought it ("Recision" happens all the time. Some companies pay bonuses to their employees who are their "top recinders".) [PBS]
So we stop treating people who have the most life to lose, and nationally insure those with less. Isn't it about 80% of hospital dollars are spent in the last 6 months of a person's life? (Often till their money for Medicare co-payments runs out.)
Not logical. Not merciful. Profitable for those in the know.
Come US national health, there will be a market for covering the things that the national program doesn't cover (like cancer therapies past certain ages, etc.) for those who want and can afford them. Some national health countries make this illegal, others allow this market to exist. I don't see us in America banning this private-sector-for-money option.
| Nowhere else in retail does the original maker get 70% of the price to himself. People count | themselves lucky to receive 10-20%
What about consignment stores, which is a fair analogy. They don't get a 30% commission do they?
And I don't think that giving software developers an incentive for vengeance is a particularly comforting plan from the customer's point of view.
Every once in a while Apple seems to do something that makes me imagine a picture of a roasted pig with an apple in its mouth, and makes me think how glad I am not to be trapped by them.
It's only once in a while, but nobody likes to feel stupid and victimized. Not that feeling vandalized by Wintel-specific spyware/viruses is any fun either.
The mothering test did indeed use actual mother lab rats whose own pups were placed in the next compartment, a few inches away down the footshock hallway.
Once fertilization takes place, few species involve fathers at all, tho humans are among the exceptions. Hence the use of the gender-specific term mothering rather than, say, nurturing or parenting.
Surely tho, you've felt the simultaneous urges to at once ravish and protect the 20th century's film goddess Marilyn Monroe? If you've never seen any of her films you've got something to look forward to. (If watching with a girlfriend, I recommend "The Misfits", unless you and she are really not suited to each other, in which case I'd stay away from that one, lest she break up with you before the evening is over.) It features a lot of horses.
| The sex drive is second only the hunger drive so if the teen has a full stomach then what | do you think the next priority is?
It doesn't invalidate your point, but sex comes in at a distant fifth. Top five needs are: Breathing, thirst, hunger, mothering and sex in that order, as determined by the amount of voltage a lab rat will withstand in order to meet each of these needs.
Reference: __How to Get Whatever You Want Out of Life__ by Dr. Joyce Brothers, my second favorite book title ever. Amazingly, it's full of practical suggestions, rather than vague platitudes.
You certainly have a point, but you're overstating it.
Perfect objectivity may be imposssible for us as human beings, but that does not lead to the logical conclusion that we should not even try.
Some of us are really pretty good at it, and some of us are atrocious. There really is a vast, vast difference between the most and least objective among us. And that's before considering those who willing lie thru their teeth in support of one or another bias.
Then there is the case of Fox News, most (but not all) of whose broadcasters make no attempt at objectivity, but repeatedly make the laughable "Fair and Balanced" claim.
One of my favorite Fox moments was a few years ago when the late Merv Griffin appeared on some opinion show. The exchange began something like this:
"Welcome to Fox news Mr. Griffin!"
"Glad to be here. Love Fox news, that's my politics."
"Yessiree, fair and balanced," said one of their many idiotic broadcasters.
"No you're not. Don't be ridiculous," said Merv, laughing.
The broadcaster quickly moved to the actual news topic at hand.
| Unfortunately, most news sources in the US are biased, and the number of mainstream media outlets | with liberal leanings appear to outnumber the conservative ones.
Uh, that may have been true during the Viet Nam war, but it certainly became completely false by the time of the Iraq war.
"The big lie", a propaganda method popularized by the Nazis, persuades people by claiming something rather outrageous, and then repeating it endlessly. The first time people hear the lie, they think any idiot can tell that's false, but when they hear it again they think "those people aren't idiots -- the outrageous thing must be true! How very interesting! I must tell so-and-so about it!" If you don't think hard and get real facts, you'll be fooled. If you do think hard and try to get facts, you're likely to be laughed at, ostracized or worse. But if you don't bother to think hard, you'll always wind up doing someone else's bidding, and not even realizing it.
You might want to change your single opinion about media bias into two or more different ones, depending on the decade in question.
Slashdot Mirror
Here's my free idea for GenCom:
Next time you bother to put together a web page for your convention, bother to include the location.
(It's Indiana, tho the art makes it look like Russia.)
Folks below who read the article say this headline is just not correct.
Let me take this opportunity to call the BING TV ad campaign the most repulsive since the one where Bill G wiggles his butt. (Ugh, shudder!)
The only thing they could have done to make it worse is have Billy Mays screeching the already irritating voice track.
(People who irritate millions for profit, like Mays and spammers, I exempt from the "Don't speak ill of the dead" social more.)
I have resisted giving my SSN for decades now, way longer than identity theft has made such resistance fashionable enough that even "normal" people worry about it.
Since it was often a hassle, I tried many tactics to try and persuade merchants, etc., to do without.
The one that worked best for me was to claim that the SSN was the MARK OF THE BEAST in the Bible. And that if they insisted on it they were helping SATAN and standing against JESUS.
Believe me, NOBODY wanted to continue THAT conversation! NOBODY!
So if there was any way in their procedures that they could get by without the SSN, they'd do it.
Credit bureaus insist SSNs are not required to get a credit report -- anyone try this with SPRINT?
What's his number? I'll put it into my "select call forwarding" so when a repeating scammer calls back, his office can handle it.
Just helping.
Well, if the Church of Scientology came out in strong support of ODF, Microsoft's paid Wikipedia FUD spreaders would certainly get a run for their money!
Video poker slot machines addict 5 times faster than other forms of gambling.
It takes about two years for those who become compulsive video poker machine players to
become hooked. Other forms of compulsive gambling, including conventional slot machines,
take about ten years.
According to various TV news investigations of legalized gambling over the years.
I'd guess that the increased amount of actual thinking involved in video poker playing
creates a greater illusion of control of the outcome, or simply involves more actual neurons
in the brain in the process of playing.
There's a useful clue here to what makes a game more addictive, since 5 times quicker is a very
big difference. But I can't say what it is.
Well, as I understand from Swedish friends, here is how they censor violence on TV in Sweden.
If the violence is real -- such as war atrocity or actual crime -- it can be depicted since to prohibit
it would be hiding the truth.
But if the violence is a work of fiction, it can't be depicted -- since that would be adding to the
ugliness of the world, and has the effect of deadening natural human empathy.
I'm not signing up for that position, but at least it's one logical place to draw a line.
And while I've never even seen a Manga comic book, I am signing up for the position that the judge who
said comic books have no artistic value is a "let's-put-drapes-on-the-naked-lady-statues" type of idiot.
The space station qualifies as "incredible"; this photo -- not so much.
The station was less than 1/16th of an inch on my 22 inch monitor where it was
barely distinguishable from a few droplets of dried diet coke shmutz.
| If you really think you can take on the pirates, good luck.
|
| If you figure out how, please don't tell the RIAA.
Here's a practical suggestion:
Enlist the assistance of an incredibly powerful lobbying group, whose identity may surprise you:
The nation's librarians.
I can't say if they'll agree with you and I'm not one myself. But they were able to achieve
a significant change to the Patriot Act even while Bush was still president. So if they do agree with you,
you've got a pretty relentless, principled, respected group on your side. I think even Google-the-Almighty
would listen to the librarians.
There's the side-benefit too that the MPAA and RIAA -- mass sewers, oops, I mean sue-ers, of totally innocent
people demanding thousands of dollars apiece from them (like the mafia: hello RICO except with the Federal Judiciary
acting as accessories) -- aren't likely to benefit in the slightest. But the little guy author I think would get
a fair hearing.
Moderators -- please bother to check if a link is valid. That may change over time. That initial one has varied today from -1 troll to +5 , but all I see is a one-page pdf that says the doc is sealed. Which the summary already says. Maybe it used to contain the actual sealed document. But it doesn't now. All clicking on it will do is make people feel stupid. Not +5 material. BTW, I use foxit not adobe for pdf reading, in case that matters.
However, an actual copy of the petition appears on ilrweb:
http://www.ilrweb.com/viewILRPDFfull.asp?filename=andersen_atlantic_080314SecondAmendedComplaint
The best reason I can see for the court sealing it is that it lays out the whole case for how the RIAA has been screwing innocent people out of thousands of dollars for years (we knew that), and that the federal courts have been stupid patsies in letting themselves totally be the tools by which this is accomplished (we knew that too). But maybe for the first time a courts sees it clearly enough to be as horribly embarassed as they should be.
No inside knowledge; just cynicism about our "check your conscience at the door, merciful judge just means activist judge, the prosecution can deliberately fake evidence without affecting a jury verdict so no retrial for you, Martha" federal judiciary. Covering its exposed, very ugly, ass.
Wouldn't it be great if the RICO statute allowed for damages against the stupid judges who helped make this "several thousand dollars per innocent person" shakedown possible?
Q.: How many Exxon Valdez captains does it take to ruin Prince William Sound in Alaska?
A.: Why, that'd be one and a fifth!
Not to mention the fact that aerodynamics researchers at MIT have SCIENTIICALLY PROVEN
that bumblebees cannot fly.
Ah, the general, multifactorial, "let's look at our sins a little" explanation. It becomes more appealing when we're frustrated in finding a single specific cause. If the bee problem ever reaches the point where shrinking food supplies result in significant human starvation you can bet that form of explanation will gain favor. That's certainly how things were with HIV/AIDS before the discovery of the very specific HIV virus. Feeling one's misfortunes are a form of punishment (by who or whatever) is a symptom of depression. So I am skeptical of this category of explanation.
The refuting articles are a year and half old, not including publication lag. But I think the most important thing in the article is that a specific anti-biotic restored two collapsing hives. Every single theory of these Spanish scientists could be completely incorrect, at the same time that their solution is correct.
Best of all, however, that solution is perfectly testable.
In fact, one good approach to solving the problem would be to just try every antibiotic known and see what happens empirically. We can't do that ethically with human illness but we can with bee colonies.
I suppose the bee researchers aren't plugged into the antibiotic biz, and the antibiotic researchers aren't plugged into the bee, uh, biz. Infrequently, someone less educated than the pros -- and thus less constrained by interdisciplinary boundaries -- can come up with something the pros have so far missed.
At the very least, I'd like to see flumagillin tested.
I'll consider myself lightened then!
So where might you hail from, flajann?
If you google for "amazon banned" you'll find some pretty outrageous stories. Reading the original
article and responses to it, this customer has been incredibly polite, even when asked rude, accusatory
questions from other people posting. The latest info I've seen is that Amazon decided to grant him
"a one time exception" and re-enable his account. An "exception" to exactly what rule they don't say.
I don't approve of DRM period, but if I were to make an exception it certainly wouldn't be for
Amazon's kindle or Amazon's anything, especially considering that partial book-banning they pulled
earlier this week.
Wake up Amazon, several things you're doing are turning customers to enemies needlessly. Synergy can
bite you!
A vastly more logical conclusion would be that you are given to "hasty generalization".
There's a formal list of logical errors people are prone to, and that's one of them. Wikipedia
can enlighten you further if you care to learn.
Upon second glance, I see you're also guilty of "argmentum ad hominem", or name-calling.
Making up lies about other people can get complicated, so to lessen the mental burden some
liars simply tell complete truths about themselves, in the guise of an accusation of others.
I know this sounds like a trite oversimplification, but it is quite common. Recognizing it
allows you to learn more about the false accuser than he has any idea he is revealing.
This may or may not apply to you; if the shoe fits, wear it.
Why is *anything* that is life & death sensitive to the masses put onto the internet
in the first place? I understand things needing to be connected to *some* kind of network
for remote monitoring and control, but why is that network the internet? So the operators
can shop for shoes or surf for porn while they're bored?
It makes no sense to me at all.
Even if there were never any agreement on anything it would serve the incredibly valuable purpose of
making diplomats from different countries available to each other on a casual basis. And it's a place
where anger gets vented, allowing even the most laughable claims of "national wounded pride" to be
avenged verbally, rather than militarily.
Recall that there are numerous countries in the world where insulting words are the moral equivalent of
physical attack. Not every culture believes the remedy for words is words, and for actions is commensurate
actions.
If you don't think that verbal ego-soothing has ever prevented a military attack you'd be overestimating
the emotional maturity of many of the world's leaders.
Trouble is, such incidents aren't easy to document. If such numbers could be produced, IMHO they'd make
the UN's value easy to see. But then producing them would embarass tempermental leaders, putting us back
at square one.
| And don't they stop treating cancer patients in some European countries if they're too old?
Here in America you just have to run out of money for treatment to stop, or have your insurance
company decide to retroactively cancel your policy as of the day you bought it ("Recision" happens
all the time. Some companies pay bonuses to their employees who are their "top recinders".) [PBS]
So we stop treating people who have the most life to lose, and nationally insure those with less.
Isn't it about 80% of hospital dollars are spent in the last 6 months of a person's life? (Often
till their money for Medicare co-payments runs out.)
Not logical. Not merciful. Profitable for those in the know.
Come US national health, there will be a market for covering the things that the national program
doesn't cover (like cancer therapies past certain ages, etc.) for those who want and can afford them.
Some national health countries make this illegal, others allow this market to exist. I don't see us
in America banning this private-sector-for-money option.
| Nowhere else in retail does the original maker get 70% of the price to himself. People count
| themselves lucky to receive 10-20%
What about consignment stores, which is a fair analogy. They don't get a 30% commission
do they?
And I don't think that giving software developers an incentive for vengeance is a particularly
comforting plan from the customer's point of view.
Every once in a while Apple seems to do something that makes me imagine a picture of a roasted
pig with an apple in its mouth, and makes me think how glad I am not to be trapped by them.
It's only once in a while, but nobody likes to feel stupid and victimized. Not that feeling
vandalized by Wintel-specific spyware/viruses is any fun either.
Clearly I'm talking myself into going Linux!
The mothering test did indeed use actual mother lab rats whose own pups were placed in the
next compartment, a few inches away down the footshock hallway.
Once fertilization takes place, few species involve fathers at all, tho humans are among
the exceptions. Hence the use of the gender-specific term mothering rather than, say, nurturing
or parenting.
Surely tho, you've felt the simultaneous urges to at once ravish and protect the 20th century's
film goddess Marilyn Monroe? If you've never seen any of her films you've got something to
look forward to. (If watching with a girlfriend, I recommend "The Misfits", unless you and
she are really not suited to each other, in which case I'd stay away from that one, lest she
break up with you before the evening is over.) It features a lot of horses.
| The sex drive is second only the hunger drive so if the teen has a full stomach then what
| do you think the next priority is?
It doesn't invalidate your point, but sex comes in at a distant fifth. Top five needs are:
Breathing, thirst, hunger, mothering and sex in that order, as determined by the amount
of voltage a lab rat will withstand in order to meet each of these needs.
Reference: __How to Get Whatever You Want Out of Life__ by Dr. Joyce Brothers, my second
favorite book title ever. Amazingly, it's full of practical suggestions, rather than
vague platitudes.
You certainly have a point, but you're overstating it.
Perfect objectivity may be imposssible for us as human beings, but that does not lead to
the logical conclusion that we should not even try.
Some of us are really pretty good at it, and some of us are atrocious. There really is a
vast, vast difference between the most and least objective among us. And that's before
considering those who willing lie thru their teeth in support of one or another bias.
Then there is the case of Fox News, most (but not all) of whose broadcasters make no
attempt at objectivity, but repeatedly make the laughable "Fair and Balanced" claim.
One of my favorite Fox moments was a few years ago when the late Merv Griffin appeared on some
opinion show. The exchange began something like this:
"Welcome to Fox news Mr. Griffin!"
"Glad to be here. Love Fox news, that's my politics."
"Yessiree, fair and balanced," said one of their many idiotic broadcasters.
"No you're not. Don't be ridiculous," said Merv, laughing.
The broadcaster quickly moved to the actual news topic at hand.
I'd love to see this snippet on youtube!
| Unfortunately, most news sources in the US are biased, and the number of mainstream media outlets
| with liberal leanings appear to outnumber the conservative ones.
Uh, that may have been true during the Viet Nam war, but it certainly became completely false
by the time of the Iraq war.
"The big lie", a propaganda method popularized by the Nazis, persuades people by claiming something
rather outrageous, and then repeating it endlessly. The first time people hear the lie, they think
any idiot can tell that's false, but when they hear it again they think "those people aren't idiots --
the outrageous thing must be true! How very interesting! I must tell so-and-so about it!" If you
don't think hard and get real facts, you'll be fooled. If you do think hard and try to get facts,
you're likely to be laughed at, ostracized or worse. But if you don't bother to think hard, you'll
always wind up doing someone else's bidding, and not even realizing it.
You might want to change your single opinion about media bias into two or more different ones, depending
on the decade in question.
| Here we have voted 4 times for a lotto ... more than 80% for ... So why don't we have a lotto?
That's wild! Which state?