Skynet determined that you're going to father a child who will one day play an important part in the resistance: but as part of an experimental new program of time-travel meddling, rather than sending back a big, obvious threat like an assassination cyborg to kill you, they're trying to subliminally suggest that you use contraception.
But if people speak of a decade like "the twenties" or the "the thirties" they are talking about a different definition of "decade". "The twenties" spans 1920 to 1929, not 1921 to 1930.
Personally I'd have to say the seventies were my favorite decade. I mean, look at all the major events that happened in the seventies: The eruption of Mt. Vesuvius and the destruction of Pompeii, the construction of the Colosseum, Roman conquest of Wales, Syria, and Jerusalem, publication of Pliny's "Naturalis Historiae" - it was a busy time.
(This joke brought to you courtesy of an unhealthy preoccupation with MST3K)
You're right, he made a slight error there. Actually the first decade of 2010 ends tonight.
See, we're dealing with two conflicting ideas of when a {decade, century, millennium} begins and ends. Some say the new decade began at the beginning of 2010, some say the new decade begins at the beginning of 2011 (and, thus, the previous decade ends today, at the end of 2010.)
Therefore there are two (widely-recognized) decades to which 2010 belongs: 2001-2010 and 2010-2019. So the first decade of 2010 ends at the end of 2010, while the last decade of 2010 ends ten years after the start of 2010...
Didn't they launch chrome just a few years ago? I haven't read the summary yet, but this sure is a shame.
Yeah, I remember that...
But really, this was inevitable. As soon as that black Megadeus showed up and fired its chrome-buster - I mean, of course that's going to be the end of chrome.
Because of the vast changes in computers' capabilities since BYTE magazine ended its run, they've decided to change the name to "BYTE presents: Gibioctet"
They should have made Scrooge a Ferengi - and instead the three Klingon ghosts beat the crap out of him. Would be much more realistic.
I think a Ferengi Scrooge would be a lot of fun... I mean, all the things Scrooge would normally do would be considered good things... And then Jacob Marley and the other three ghosts would show up to encourage him to do it better...
Marley would show up and warn Scrooge that with his misdeeds he's forging a chain to burden him in the afterlife - and that it's important to accumulate enough wealth and manage it properly to be able to pay for the disposal of that chain after death. ("A man is only worth the sum of his possessions.") The two haggle over details of their partnership ("A contract is a contract is a contract - but only between Ferengi." "A Ferengi without profit is no Ferengi at all.") as Marley attempts to extract funds from Scrooge in exchange for a visit from the Ghosts of Business Consultation. ("Free Advice is Seldom Cheap" "Knowledge is Profit" "Never place friendship above profit.") Scrooge initially refuses to accept the reality of Marley's appearance, attributing it to hunger, and refuses to negotiate ("Never begin a negotiation on an empty stomach." "You can't make a deal if you're dead.") but Marley convinces him otherwise ("Greed is Eternal") and the two strike up a bargain wherein the Three Ghost Consultants will pay him a visit, and Marley will receive a percentage of the fee as well as a token payment in recognition of their old business partnership.
The Ghost of Performance Review would show Scrooge his early years, in which he developed his obsession with profit, his enterprising spirit of fiscal conquest and how he came to neglect his fiance Belle. Scrooge pines over his lost love for a moment ("Money is money, but females are better.") but the ghost praises his decision ("Females and finances don't mix.") The ghost would contrast Scrooge's youthful vigor for business with his present state, a decadent old man sitting on a pile of money... no longer striving for the next great conquest, instead just playing it safe and relishing the mistreatment of Cratchet. ("The riskier the road, the greater the profit." "Expand or die.")
The Ghost of Management Consulting would show Scrooge the clumsy entrepreneurial endeavours of his newphew Fred - and remind him that if one of these schemes someday achieves success, than it would be in Scrooge's best interest to be on Fred's good side when that happens - and to make himself a share-holder. ("Exploitation begins at home". "Treat people in your debt like family - exploit them.") Scrooge would come to recognize the potential to be gained from investing in Fred's ventures - and the potential of taking advantage of his relationships with family members as a means of networking and exploring new opportunities.
The Ghost of Forward-Looking Analysis would show Scrooge the cost/benefit projections of different potential changes to Cratchet's salary, and the expected drop in productivity if Tiny Tim were to die... State-mandated bereavement leave, loss of focus as a result of depression, etc. ("Employees are the rungs on the ladder of success. Don't hesitate to step on them." "After you've exploited someone, it never hurts to thank them. That way, it's easier to exploit them next time.") He would also show Scrooge the end result of his excessively conservative approach to business - failure to take risks and effectively leverage his accumulated wealth would lead to his ultimate decline as more ambitious competitors gradually overtaking his business. Scrooge is therefore convinced of the importance of small token gestures of appreciation to his employees, as well as the importance of remaining truly competitive.
In the end, Scrooge would be reminded that, even with his accumulated wealth there are always new business ventures to explore - that despite his advanced years, the remainder of his life still lies open like a blank accounting sheet - and that mistreating workers and exploiting family, while an enjoyable benefit of wealth, should not merely be something done for its own sake, but rather as a means to achieve greater financial success.
It's funny that our knee-jerk reaction is to ridicule interest in the Klingon language, but the fact remains that nerd-deity Tolkien also created his own languages for Middle Earth.
I think I'd be just as prone to ridicule people who wear pointy ears and study Elvish as people who wear prosthetic foreheads and study Klingon......Well, actually, that's not entirely true. I think either pursuit could be worthy of derision but if people are enjoying it I don't think there's anything wrong with that...
Reprap has a secondary project called Repstrap, which is pretty much a "good enough" design made from scrap parts and easily made on conventional tools. The idea is you build a temporary one that will last just long enough to help you make the more finished parts you need for the Reprap.
Repstrap refers to any means of building a Reprap-style device without the requirement of already having a working Reprap to print parts. "Reprap bootstrap"...
So it's not about a "good enough" design made from "scrap parts" necessarily - just any method that allows you to build a machine without paying someone $200 for a set of printed Reprap parts.
They probably just don't want to worry about getting sued.
I would expect most of these patents, and especially the ones that matter, will expire in the next couple years. Has Novell done anything worth a patent in the last 10 years? Patents only last 20 years.
Since when do you have to do anything (apart from file a patent, I mean) to have a patent?
I think he's trying to say that the patents must all be more than ten years old, since Novell hasn't done anything recently that was patent-worthy.
But that's exactly my point. You don't have to do anything patent-worthy to obtain a patent, you just have to come up with something someone else might want to do, and file a patent on it.
Good web sites cost $$$$. Crappy web sites made by code monkey sweatshops cost $$$. Bad websites the bookstore staff could put together cost $$ and most mom and pop bookstores have $ to spend thanks to everyone else standing in line ahead of them for customers.
Fortunately, it's very easy to get more $$$ - just hold down shift-4 on the keyboard.
They probably just don't want to worry about getting sued.
I would expect most of these patents, and especially the ones that matter, will expire in the next couple years. Has Novell done anything worth a patent in the last 10 years? Patents only last 20 years.
Since when do you have to do anything (apart from file a patent, I mean) to have a patent?
It's a recorded voice but they added audio processing and editing to make it sound artificial.
There was a piece of prop hardware that was supposed to be, I guess, an external text-to-speech module with its own speaker. David turns it on just before the remote machine gets chatty in this clip...
Of course I also like that "Would You Like to Play A Game?" movie so maybe my taste's just bad. (shrug) Reminds me of my youth.
I propose a new flame war: War Games vs. Hackers. I'm firmly in the War Games camp and find Hackers to be an unintentional comedy.
I just watched Hackers the other day, actually... It was hard to look past some of the more dated elements of the movie, along with the more retarded characterizations of the "hacker" cliche... But it was fun.
The description of Kate's computer is pure comedy these days, of course. Active matrix screen capable of a million colors, a 28.8 BPS modem (yes, not kbps, just "bps". I had to rewind to make sure I heard 'em right)... Oh, and she has the Pentium.
Of all the unrealistic things in that film, I think the most unrealistic is the fact that the protagonists are apparently in the clear at the end of the movie. They were hacking into some corporate server to steal data... And it did turn out that this data was crucially important in catching "the real bad guy" - but even so, Ellingson's not just going to let it go, right? Or what about the facilities Cereal used to broadcast that message? Or the traffic accidents caused by the traffic signal hack that they used to stay ahead of the cops? Even if they caught the bad guy and saved the environment, what they were doing was vigilantism, and since it was known they were mucking around in that server would also tend to call into question the validity of any data retrieved from the machine by forensics afterward... Just one more aspect of the film that doesn't stand up to any kind of scrutiny.:)
Wargames. I re watched it recently. It actually has some of the most realistic representations of hacking and hackers in any movie ever.
I've always considered Sneakers to be the gold standard of "real life hacking". (Once you get past the McGuffin, of course).
Really, I thought their McGuffin wasn't all that bad, either... They went a bit far in terms of what it was capable of, but I liked the basic idea of an algorithm+hardware system capable of cracking various current encryption systems.
It actually has some of the most realistic representations of hacking and hackers in any movie ever.
Cue the "It's not hacking, it's cracking" lunacy in 5...4... 3...
Well, admittedly that's a battle that was decisively lost decades ago - but I do think it's a legitimate complaint. A very good bit of terminology for describing what computer hobbyists do has been effectively redefined...
Slashdot Mirror
and why the hell is the captcha "condom" ?!?
Skynet determined that you're going to father a child who will one day play an important part in the resistance: but as part of an experimental new program of time-travel meddling, rather than sending back a big, obvious threat like an assassination cyborg to kill you, they're trying to subliminally suggest that you use contraception.
I wouldn't trade Photoshop (or even Gimp)
Processing of your comment will be suspended at this point, to be resumed once Gimp supports at least 16-bit color channels.
Or would you consider 1990 part of the 80s?
Judging from the clothes and music? Yeah. :)
But if people speak of a decade like "the twenties" or the "the thirties" they are talking about a different definition of "decade". "The twenties" spans 1920 to 1929, not 1921 to 1930.
Personally I'd have to say the seventies were my favorite decade. I mean, look at all the major events that happened in the seventies: The eruption of Mt. Vesuvius and the destruction of Pompeii, the construction of the Colosseum, Roman conquest of Wales, Syria, and Jerusalem, publication of Pliny's "Naturalis Historiae" - it was a busy time.
(This joke brought to you courtesy of an unhealthy preoccupation with MST3K)
The first decade of 2010 ended one year ago.
{ Face palm }
You're right, he made a slight error there. Actually the first decade of 2010 ends tonight.
See, we're dealing with two conflicting ideas of when a {decade, century, millennium} begins and ends. Some say the new decade began at the beginning of 2010, some say the new decade begins at the beginning of 2011 (and, thus, the previous decade ends today, at the end of 2010.)
Therefore there are two (widely-recognized) decades to which 2010 belongs: 2001-2010 and 2010-2019. So the first decade of 2010 ends at the end of 2010, while the last decade of 2010 ends ten years after the start of 2010...
Didn't they launch chrome just a few years ago? I haven't read the summary yet, but this sure is a shame.
Yeah, I remember that...
But really, this was inevitable. As soon as that black Megadeus showed up and fired its chrome-buster - I mean, of course that's going to be the end of chrome.
Because of the vast changes in computers' capabilities since BYTE magazine ended its run, they've decided to change the name to "BYTE presents: Gibioctet"
I thought the Computer Shopper was the most beloved computer magazine of all time.
I only read it for the ads, I swear!
They should have made Scrooge a Ferengi - and instead the three Klingon ghosts beat the crap out of him. Would be much more realistic.
I think a Ferengi Scrooge would be a lot of fun... I mean, all the things Scrooge would normally do would be considered good things... And then Jacob Marley and the other three ghosts would show up to encourage him to do it better...
Marley would show up and warn Scrooge that with his misdeeds he's forging a chain to burden him in the afterlife - and that it's important to accumulate enough wealth and manage it properly to be able to pay for the disposal of that chain after death. ("A man is only worth the sum of his possessions.") The two haggle over details of their partnership ("A contract is a contract is a contract - but only between Ferengi." "A Ferengi without profit is no Ferengi at all.") as Marley attempts to extract funds from Scrooge in exchange for a visit from the Ghosts of Business Consultation. ("Free Advice is Seldom Cheap" "Knowledge is Profit" "Never place friendship above profit.") Scrooge initially refuses to accept the reality of Marley's appearance, attributing it to hunger, and refuses to negotiate ("Never begin a negotiation on an empty stomach." "You can't make a deal if you're dead.") but Marley convinces him otherwise ("Greed is Eternal") and the two strike up a bargain wherein the Three Ghost Consultants will pay him a visit, and Marley will receive a percentage of the fee as well as a token payment in recognition of their old business partnership.
The Ghost of Performance Review would show Scrooge his early years, in which he developed his obsession with profit, his enterprising spirit of fiscal conquest and how he came to neglect his fiance Belle. Scrooge pines over his lost love for a moment ("Money is money, but females are better.") but the ghost praises his decision ("Females and finances don't mix.") The ghost would contrast Scrooge's youthful vigor for business with his present state, a decadent old man sitting on a pile of money... no longer striving for the next great conquest, instead just playing it safe and relishing the mistreatment of Cratchet. ("The riskier the road, the greater the profit." "Expand or die.")
The Ghost of Management Consulting would show Scrooge the clumsy entrepreneurial endeavours of his newphew Fred - and remind him that if one of these schemes someday achieves success, than it would be in Scrooge's best interest to be on Fred's good side when that happens - and to make himself a share-holder. ("Exploitation begins at home". "Treat people in your debt like family - exploit them.") Scrooge would come to recognize the potential to be gained from investing in Fred's ventures - and the potential of taking advantage of his relationships with family members as a means of networking and exploring new opportunities.
The Ghost of Forward-Looking Analysis would show Scrooge the cost/benefit projections of different potential changes to Cratchet's salary, and the expected drop in productivity if Tiny Tim were to die... State-mandated bereavement leave, loss of focus as a result of depression, etc. ("Employees are the rungs on the ladder of success. Don't hesitate to step on them." "After you've exploited someone, it never hurts to thank them. That way, it's easier to exploit them next time.") He would also show Scrooge the end result of his excessively conservative approach to business - failure to take risks and effectively leverage his accumulated wealth would lead to his ultimate decline as more ambitious competitors gradually overtaking his business. Scrooge is therefore convinced of the importance of small token gestures of appreciation to his employees, as well as the importance of remaining truly competitive.
In the end, Scrooge would be reminded that, even with his accumulated wealth there are always new business ventures to explore - that despite his advanced years, the remainder of his life still lies open like a blank accounting sheet - and that mistreating workers and exploiting family, while an enjoyable benefit of wealth, should not merely be something done for its own sake, but rather as a means to achieve greater financial success.
I would cordially like to invite you all to the World Horse Masturbation Championships, to be held at Decatur, Illinois, on January 14 - 17, 2011.
I thought about trying my hand at it (pun intended!) but, frankly, there's just no way I could compete with your mom...
It's funny that our knee-jerk reaction is to ridicule interest in the Klingon language, but the fact remains that nerd-deity Tolkien also created his own languages for Middle Earth.
I think I'd be just as prone to ridicule people who wear pointy ears and study Elvish as people who wear prosthetic foreheads and study Klingon... ...Well, actually, that's not entirely true. I think either pursuit could be worthy of derision but if people are enjoying it I don't think there's anything wrong with that...
Reprap has a secondary project called Repstrap, which is pretty much a "good enough" design made from scrap parts and easily made on conventional tools. The idea is you build a temporary one that will last just long enough to help you make the more finished parts you need for the Reprap.
Repstrap refers to any means of building a Reprap-style device without the requirement of already having a working Reprap to print parts. "Reprap bootstrap"...
So it's not about a "good enough" design made from "scrap parts" necessarily - just any method that allows you to build a machine without paying someone $200 for a set of printed Reprap parts.
Since when do you have to do anything (apart from file a patent, I mean) to have a patent?
I think he's trying to say that the patents must all be more than ten years old, since Novell hasn't done anything recently that was patent-worthy.
But that's exactly my point. You don't have to do anything patent-worthy to obtain a patent, you just have to come up with something someone else might want to do, and file a patent on it.
Good web sites cost $$$$. Crappy web sites made by code monkey sweatshops cost $$$. Bad websites the bookstore staff could put together cost $$ and most mom and pop bookstores have $ to spend thanks to everyone else standing in line ahead of them for customers.
Fortunately, it's very easy to get more $$$ - just hold down shift-4 on the keyboard.
Nope. I'm pretty sure Steam is a steaming pile of crap no matter what OS it's used on. DRM FTL.
Digital Rights Management Faster Than Light?
They all say "Arrrrr!", why do you ask?
'Cause the ninja infiltrator wants to know how to identify his targets...
So if Google is the 800 pound gorilla can 4 monkeys standing on each others shoulders take it on?
No, it takes 5 monkeys, and they have to combine to form Monkey Voltron ("gozaru" in the original Japanese...)
Have you just met the pope?
When I met the pope it was the "Terminator" theme song that got stuck in my head...
They probably just don't want to worry about getting sued.
I would expect most of these patents, and especially the ones that matter, will expire in the next couple years. Has Novell done anything worth a patent in the last 10 years? Patents only last 20 years.
Since when do you have to do anything (apart from file a patent, I mean) to have a patent?
Good point. But commodore64_love was talking in terms of (what sounded like) recorded, not synthetic speech.
He was talking about text-to-speech, which implies some kind of synth.
As for the voice in Wargames: It wasn't a synth, but it was meant to represent one. Check it:
Shall we play a game?
It seems the only winning move is not to play
It's a recorded voice but they added audio processing and editing to make it sound artificial.
There was a piece of prop hardware that was supposed to be, I guess, an external text-to-speech module with its own speaker. David turns it on just before the remote machine gets chatty in this clip...
Of course I also like that "Would You Like to Play A Game?" movie so maybe my taste's just bad. (shrug) Reminds me of my youth.
I propose a new flame war: War Games vs. Hackers. I'm firmly in the War Games camp and find Hackers to be an unintentional comedy.
I just watched Hackers the other day, actually... It was hard to look past some of the more dated elements of the movie, along with the more retarded characterizations of the "hacker" cliche... But it was fun.
The description of Kate's computer is pure comedy these days, of course. Active matrix screen capable of a million colors, a 28.8 BPS modem (yes, not kbps, just "bps". I had to rewind to make sure I heard 'em right)... Oh, and she has the Pentium.
Of all the unrealistic things in that film, I think the most unrealistic is the fact that the protagonists are apparently in the clear at the end of the movie. They were hacking into some corporate server to steal data... And it did turn out that this data was crucially important in catching "the real bad guy" - but even so, Ellingson's not just going to let it go, right? Or what about the facilities Cereal used to broadcast that message? Or the traffic accidents caused by the traffic signal hack that they used to stay ahead of the cops? Even if they caught the bad guy and saved the environment, what they were doing was vigilantism, and since it was known they were mucking around in that server would also tend to call into question the validity of any data retrieved from the machine by forensics afterward... Just one more aspect of the film that doesn't stand up to any kind of scrutiny. :)
Hackers had Angelina Jolie, that makes it completely unbelievable.
Maybe, maybe not. In any case she's nice to look at.
Wargames. I re watched it recently. It actually has some of the most realistic representations of hacking and hackers in any movie ever.
I've always considered Sneakers to be the gold standard of "real life hacking". (Once you get past the McGuffin, of course).
Really, I thought their McGuffin wasn't all that bad, either... They went a bit far in terms of what it was capable of, but I liked the basic idea of an algorithm+hardware system capable of cracking various current encryption systems.
Ghostbusters was the first well-known C64 game that did speech natively.
Not speech synthesis, though. It had a few pre-recorded bits of speech in it.
Speech synth was definitely on the home computer scene in the early 80s though... SAM is one a lot of kids from that era will probably remember.
Cue the "It's not hacking, it's cracking" lunacy in 5 ...4 ... 3 ...
Well, admittedly that's a battle that was decisively lost decades ago - but I do think it's a legitimate complaint. A very good bit of terminology for describing what computer hobbyists do has been effectively redefined...