It might be worth it to him, but this article is likely worthless to 99.9% of his readers, simply because they aren't going to do it.
Mmm... I would call it valuable for a couple of reasons. One, it's geeky, so it has some interest to me whether I'm going to do it now, some time in the future, or never. Two, it's a good indication of just how stable a processor is, and how close the manufacturer is setting the "recommended" clock speed to its "maximum" speed.
One other thing is, we're overclocking now by as many cycles as processors ran at full speed just a few years ago. Impressive or not, it's still interesting to watch people shrug at speed improvements they couldn't have imagined a decade ago.
I was programming for a long time before I went to university, mostly writing games.
I did very... average at university, mostly because I found the classes uninteresting (missing two midterms in the same term because I was hacking at home didn't help either...) I spent a lot of my time working on my own games at home instead of going to class. Maybe that's why I never got too discouraged.
As for finding silly bugs.... it gets better. The more experience you get, the fewer of those bugs you create, and when you do get them, you'll have seen them before and know what to look for first. It gets better - sometimes it just takes a while to realize you're not quite as hot as you think you are.:-)
I'm in the games industry now, and I'm enjoying it, and doing some really cool stuff. Going to university helped, more for the aspects of project management and software engineering than hacking. It added a level of maturity to my programming skills that was absent before, which helped prevent most of the things discouraging you.
Having the piece of paper saying I know something about computers doesn't hurt either.
So, take a week off... then just program something YOU'RE interested in for a week. Then do it again. If programming is in your blood, you won't be able to stay away for long, but as others have said, you're sounding pretty burned out. Take a break.
Ah, well, LLC actually stands for Limited Liability Company. As far as I have been able to determine, an LLC is somewhere between a partnership and a corporation. Since the goal of this particular LLC is not to make faceless stockholders very rich, but rather to make George Lucas very rich... well take that however you like.
Corporations aren't necessarily inherently evil anyway (although I'm not sure about their lawyers).
Using the brain to store digital information:
The problem is less one of interface than it is one of reprogramming neurons. While this might technically be possible, is there going to be any sort of information density advantage? Human memory has some really nice lossy compression, but that would make it a bad way to store digital data.
Computers "understanding" and "speaking" human language:
I think the only thing we've really learned in the last 30 years is that the problem is a lot harder than we thought it was 30 years ago. There are a multitude of problems, from simple parsing to having a large enough database to understand context. That, and we really don't know what problem we are solving. A speech interface to a database would seem to be to be a useful tool - "what is the weather going to be like today?" opens up the appropriate web page. "Find me a good price on a 1997 Honda Accord" hits the search engines, finds a few dealers in my area, and gets me some pages to view. We don't even have anything this sophisticated without the voice interface. (Speech-to-text + text-to-speech + Google) is not tons better than Google. Yet, we expect a program with the depth of knowledge and subtlety of reasoning that a human posesses. My own version of the Turing Test, "I'll believe it when I see it," suggests to me the system that can pass the Turing Test is a LONG way off.
Software as a weapon:
OK, ID was a poor example - I know I'm 1337 enough to reverse engineer alien technology in a matter of minutes and write a virus using a Mac, but that guy? But really, software as an weapon is only useful against those who use software, and only when that software is of critical importance. Even North Americans aren't THAT reliant on the 'net, although it might be wise to take precautions before we wire all of our brains together...
Well, when you put it that way, it's a little less terrifying...
Of course, the real questions are a) would this law have prevented terrorist activities and b) will it prevent future terroist activities?
I fail to see how stiff sentences are going to be a deterrent to the suicidal. Most of the commentary shortly after the WTC attack was to the effect that the U.S. had been focusing too much on high-tech terrorism, and that is why this attack slipped through. How does focusing even harder on technology help in this case?
I think this is a prime example of how legislation cannot solve every problem. Unfortunately, politicians need to make new laws to justify their existence, and the expectation of the population is that the politicians will make laws and then everything will be OK.
A lone voice cries out (OK, rants) too far down the thread to matter...
Oh well, it's not even my country, I'll survive for a while.:-)
I'm still boycotting both the RIAA and the MPAA. I still listen to the radio, but I usually don't buy types of products they advertise, or can try to choose a competitor's.:-)
Really, it hasn't been so hard. But then, I like classic rock and have never purchased a DVD in my life, so the tempatation to buy the "latest and greatest" is somewhat diminished.
You know, a fundamental component of capitalism is the right NOT to buy something. Until I can purchase their products with cash, instead of my freedom and soul, then I think I'll do without.
I would say that the requirement to immediately remove material immediately upon the accusation of infringement somewhat defeats the intention of "innocent until proven guilty" as well. It's more like "punished even if eventually found innocent."
Uh... because in this case, after I drive away in "your" Ford... your Ford is still in the driveway.
If I built a matter replicator and duplicated your Ford, then it would be a reasonable software analogy.
And under the DMCA, the replicator wouldn't be illegal, but I wouldn't be able to give you one or tell you how to build one. That would be a real shame.
Because it goes beyond mandating what I may do, it mandates what I may know, and limits what I may legitimately and peacefully tell others in words, pictures, symbols, or their digital (electical, magnetic, optical) equivalents.
Hmm, naughty, naughty.:-) I do have to agree though, assertions of "lost profits" due to piracy are a bit illogical (or, more precisely, stupid). If that were the case, technically a single person could cause them to "lose" more money than actually exists, much less what that single person has. You can't lose something you never had, doubly so with "intellectual property."
Still, I'd rather be taxed than have to put up with a DMCA-style law in Canada. I can't believe I just said that, but it's true!:-) The price of freedom isn't eternal vigilance, it's a few cents per CD-R?:-)
Let's see, what have I used the CD burner I have owned for about a year for:
-Buring the soundtrack to The Longest Journey, available free on their site
-Backups of various software that was purchased online
-Backups of my own work (my OWN music compositions and software)
-Red Hat 7.iso
I'm Canadian. I paid the tax on ALL of those CDs. I'm pretty sure the copyright holder (i.e. me, in several cases) was not compensated.
It's my laptop I'm not allowed to play CSS encrypted DVDs on.
Hmm... well, technically, you should still be allowed to PLAY them. You simply aren't allowed to GIVE DeCSS to anyone else. Actually obtaining it in the first place is a little bit of a grey area, since you would be one party in the trafficking of a banned item, but I suppose you could claim it just magically appeared on your hard drive.:-) I've never heard much discussion about the legality of obtaining DeCSS, merely about making it available for others.
Bastards.
OK, this part I can agree with.
Re:My Experience
on
Dorm Storm?
·
· Score: 2, Funny
All the students in my dorm were wired too, but I don't think it had anything to do with computers.
As far as I know, the licensing fees would apply to the use of the names/logos associated with being an official DVD title. It might have to be handled delicately, but it should be legal to implement the algorithm. Unless they have patented the algorithm, in which case it would be next to useless to them, since we wouldn't even have to reverse engineer it, the patent would state it clearly and publicly.
Would be interesting to test the reaction though.:-)
Slashdot Mirror
Uh...
If only it was easy to find any decimal of PI with a simple formula, [blah blah]
Well, it almost is. Not decimal, precisely, but any arbitrary hex digit...
It might be worth it to him, but this article is likely worthless to 99.9% of his readers, simply because they aren't going to do it.
Mmm... I would call it valuable for a couple of reasons. One, it's geeky, so it has some interest to me whether I'm going to do it now, some time in the future, or never. Two, it's a good indication of just how stable a processor is, and how close the manufacturer is setting the "recommended" clock speed to its "maximum" speed.
One other thing is, we're overclocking now by as many cycles as processors ran at full speed just a few years ago. Impressive or not, it's still interesting to watch people shrug at speed improvements they couldn't have imagined a decade ago.
it's "Die Fledermaus" ("The Bat" in German)
:-)
Would that translate more or less literally to "The Flying Mouse?" If so... that's very funny.
I was programming for a long time before I went to university, mostly writing games.
:-)
I did very... average at university, mostly because I found the classes uninteresting (missing two midterms in the same term because I was hacking at home didn't help either...) I spent a lot of my time working on my own games at home instead of going to class. Maybe that's why I never got too discouraged.
As for finding silly bugs.... it gets better. The more experience you get, the fewer of those bugs you create, and when you do get them, you'll have seen them before and know what to look for first. It gets better - sometimes it just takes a while to realize you're not quite as hot as you think you are.
I'm in the games industry now, and I'm enjoying it, and doing some really cool stuff. Going to university helped, more for the aspects of project management and software engineering than hacking. It added a level of maturity to my programming skills that was absent before, which helped prevent most of the things discouraging you.
Having the piece of paper saying I know something about computers doesn't hurt either.
So, take a week off... then just program something YOU'RE interested in for a week. Then do it again. If programming is in your blood, you won't be able to stay away for long, but as others have said, you're sounding pretty burned out. Take a break.
Ah, well, LLC actually stands for Limited Liability Company. As far as I have been able to determine, an LLC is somewhere between a partnership and a corporation. Since the goal of this particular LLC is not to make faceless stockholders very rich, but rather to make George Lucas very rich... well take that however you like.
Corporations aren't necessarily inherently evil anyway (although I'm not sure about their lawyers).
Except... Lucasfilm isn't a corporation, it's privately owned (I believe - LucasArts is privately owned, I'm sure of that).
That's pretty sweet - Windows 2000 really doesn't get along with a lot of the old LA games. Now I might actually have a chance of finishing Sam & Max!
Using the brain to store digital information:
The problem is less one of interface than it is one of reprogramming neurons. While this might technically be possible, is there going to be any sort of information density advantage? Human memory has some really nice lossy compression, but that would make it a bad way to store digital data.
Computers "understanding" and "speaking" human language:
I think the only thing we've really learned in the last 30 years is that the problem is a lot harder than we thought it was 30 years ago. There are a multitude of problems, from simple parsing to having a large enough database to understand context. That, and we really don't know what problem we are solving. A speech interface to a database would seem to be to be a useful tool - "what is the weather going to be like today?" opens up the appropriate web page. "Find me a good price on a 1997 Honda Accord" hits the search engines, finds a few dealers in my area, and gets me some pages to view. We don't even have anything this sophisticated without the voice interface. (Speech-to-text + text-to-speech + Google) is not tons better than Google. Yet, we expect a program with the depth of knowledge and subtlety of reasoning that a human posesses. My own version of the Turing Test, "I'll believe it when I see it," suggests to me the system that can pass the Turing Test is a LONG way off.
Software as a weapon:
OK, ID was a poor example - I know I'm 1337 enough to reverse engineer alien technology in a matter of minutes and write a virus using a Mac, but that guy? But really, software as an weapon is only useful against those who use software, and only when that software is of critical importance. Even North Americans aren't THAT reliant on the 'net, although it might be wise to take precautions before we wire all of our brains together...
I like MP3. The "EM" is a nice hard sound to start with, and transitions nicely into the rhyming "pee" and "three" to lead into the next word.
"Ogg" just makes me feel like I'm choking on a donut.
:-)
Wow, if my heatsink fell off, it would fall directly on, and likely short out, my video card - which costs as much or more than my processor.
Welcome to FUD.
The warp scale is irrelevant, this is simple distance divided by time... and it does seem a bit off.
Well, when you put it that way, it's a little less terrifying...
:-)
Of course, the real questions are a) would this law have prevented terrorist activities and b) will it prevent future terroist activities?
I fail to see how stiff sentences are going to be a deterrent to the suicidal. Most of the commentary shortly after the WTC attack was to the effect that the U.S. had been focusing too much on high-tech terrorism, and that is why this attack slipped through. How does focusing even harder on technology help in this case?
I think this is a prime example of how legislation cannot solve every problem. Unfortunately, politicians need to make new laws to justify their existence, and the expectation of the population is that the politicians will make laws and then everything will be OK.
A lone voice cries out (OK, rants) too far down the thread to matter...
Oh well, it's not even my country, I'll survive for a while.
Looks more like a tetrahedron than a pyramid to me...
And sensors that monitor the ion propulsion were reprogrammed to listen for magnetic fields and plasma waves in and around the comet.
OK, that part is definitely cool. Whoever came up with that one deserves some credit.
I'm still boycotting both the RIAA and the MPAA. I still listen to the radio, but I usually don't buy types of products they advertise, or can try to choose a competitor's. :-)
Really, it hasn't been so hard. But then, I like classic rock and have never purchased a DVD in my life, so the tempatation to buy the "latest and greatest" is somewhat diminished.
You know, a fundamental component of capitalism is the right NOT to buy something. Until I can purchase their products with cash, instead of my freedom and soul, then I think I'll do without.
I would say that the requirement to immediately remove material immediately upon the accusation of infringement somewhat defeats the intention of "innocent until proven guilty" as well. It's more like "punished even if eventually found innocent."
*sigh*
Why should software be different?
Uh... because in this case, after I drive away in "your" Ford... your Ford is still in the driveway.
If I built a matter replicator and duplicated your Ford, then it would be a reasonable software analogy.
And under the DMCA, the replicator wouldn't be illegal, but I wouldn't be able to give you one or tell you how to build one. That would be a real shame.
Why is the DMCA a threat?
Because it goes beyond mandating what I may do, it mandates what I may know, and limits what I may legitimately and peacefully tell others in words, pictures, symbols, or their digital (electical, magnetic, optical) equivalents.
That is why.
Wait until they put up pictures of their web server exploding from the /. effect...
Actually, there was some setting, I think it was the filenames to associate...
All of the visible boxes were cleared. But if you SCROLLED DOWN, every other box (previously hidden) was SELECTED.
That just strikes me as dishonest.
And lets not forget the mandatory ad popup when you try to close the player.
And the fact that 99% of the time I can't seem to get past the company firewall to stream anything, although the MS player works 99% of the time.
RealPlayer is apparently some new variant of Pure Evil that I wasn't previously made aware of.
Hmm, naughty, naughty. :-) I do have to agree though, assertions of "lost profits" due to piracy are a bit illogical (or, more precisely, stupid). If that were the case, technically a single person could cause them to "lose" more money than actually exists, much less what that single person has. You can't lose something you never had, doubly so with "intellectual property."
:-) The price of freedom isn't eternal vigilance, it's a few cents per CD-R? :-)
Still, I'd rather be taxed than have to put up with a DMCA-style law in Canada. I can't believe I just said that, but it's true!
Let's see, what have I used the CD burner I have owned for about a year for:
.iso
-Buring the soundtrack to The Longest Journey, available free on their site
-Backups of various software that was purchased online
-Backups of my own work (my OWN music compositions and software)
-Red Hat 7
I'm Canadian. I paid the tax on ALL of those CDs. I'm pretty sure the copyright holder (i.e. me, in several cases) was not compensated.
It's my laptop I'm not allowed to play CSS encrypted DVDs on.
:-) I've never heard much discussion about the legality of obtaining DeCSS, merely about making it available for others.
Hmm... well, technically, you should still be allowed to PLAY them. You simply aren't allowed to GIVE DeCSS to anyone else. Actually obtaining it in the first place is a little bit of a grey area, since you would be one party in the trafficking of a banned item, but I suppose you could claim it just magically appeared on your hard drive.
Bastards.
OK, this part I can agree with.
All the students in my dorm were wired too, but I don't think it had anything to do with computers.
:-)
Oh, how I hated university.
As far as I know, the licensing fees would apply to the use of the names/logos associated with being an official DVD title. It might have to be handled delicately, but it should be legal to implement the algorithm. Unless they have patented the algorithm, in which case it would be next to useless to them, since we wouldn't even have to reverse engineer it, the patent would state it clearly and publicly.
:-)
Would be interesting to test the reaction though.