Well I have a 15 year military background, and I took the whole "Mission Accomplished" thing as it was intended--the end of a military operation (i.e. the defeat of Saddam Hussein's traditional military). Anyone who wants to take it differently just doesn't understand the nature of military operations, or are exteremely cynical/partisan.
I disagree. Not that I'm a war monger, but our involvement in Iraq over the past 18 years has been a BOON for the intelligence community. In contrast to your statement, Iraq this time around has been the BEST thing we could have done strategically to fight terror. We have mastered techniques and tactics over the past 7 years that rival our capabilities at the height of the cold war.
One good measure is how many of the 18 provinces are turned over to Iraqi security. Two more where turned over yesterday, leaving something like 7 left. The last one will be Baghdad (the province, not just the city). Once that is accomplished, we have no need (or desire) for conventional military deployment there. Leave some support troops and trainers behind and move on to the next conflict.
Well said. I don't mind though as my career field directly benefits from Middle East conflict. If we pull out now, we'll just be back in 5 years, assuring me many more years of job security. Of course, I'd prefer world peace and all, but if stupid politicians want to keep making the same mistakes over-and-over and keep going back to Iraq every couple of years or so, my family is financially sound for it, and I'm cool with that.
I'll take the bait. What's wrong with talking to leaders of terrorist states? I mean, NOT talking to them doesn't seem to be working. Talking to Ghaddafy seems to have worked (just one example off the top of my head).
Does he still cling to the 1-2 brigades per month? I've heard him temper those figures as of late. Perhaps he's pandering for votes while appeasing the base.
Well, I support Obama, and I'm professionally tied to the war in Iraq. I can tell you that your statement that Obama has been "consistent" is absolutely false. What gained my support for Obama was his obvious capability to reevaluate his position in Iraq and temper it to a more realistic, more "presidential" position. We no longer hear about how he will start pulling one brigade per month out. Instead, we hear him use the voice of reason and talk of listening to the commanders that he will become chief of. Perhaps he said those things to beat Hilary, but he hasn't gone back to his extreme "get out now!" stance he previously held.
Again, another statement that doesn't understand military operations. "One career general" actually means "one career general and his ENTIRE staff". You are crazy to think the people are remotely qualified to judge the situation on the ground...unless Brittney and Paris somehow start working in Baghdad. Maybe High School Musical 4 and Dancing with the Stars can be flimed on location? Miley Cyrus as our war correspondent? That's about the only way the average citizen would even be able to point to Iraq on a map, let alone make sound judgment about the situation on the ground.
Anyone who cites the "Mission Accomplished" statement as some sort of gaffe is either purely partisan, or doesn't understand military operations. Just for the record, yes, the mission was accomplished. Read the OPORDER issued for that phase of the engagement, understand the mission and the end-state requirements and then tell me what's wrong with the whole "Mission Accomplished" fiasco. Wars consist of a string of smaller missions, and in this case, that specific mission was accomplished. Yes, it was an overt PR attempt (and that is a legitimate criticism), but NO, it wasn't an erroneous statement.
Well, seems like my guess isn't so "terrible" after all. It appears that 40-49% of their funding comes from government subsidies. Note, I wasn't inferring that INDIVIDUAL donors make up 50%. I said PRIVATE donations make up about 50%, which would include corporations. And no, they don't make substantial amounts of money on merchandise, as evident by their (0.5% in 2005, for example). The gap between private donors and public funds is made up by the Corporation of Public Broadcasting.
Historically, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting has received 15% to 20% of its annual operating revenue from Federal sources and 25% to 29% from State and local taxes.
Well they are doing their annual pledge drive right now and they state that "nearly half" of their funds come from private donations. Since they don't have advertisements, I'd guess close to 50% would come from gov't subsidies.
Pirates are all just spoiled little rich kids, eh?
Well since he was in college and said they are "LIKE" a bunch of rich kids, maybe he was just practicing similes versus metaphors. Anyways, it peeves me when/.ers refute anything they disagree with by using canned, incorrectly used Logic101 responses. I don't really see a straw man in the classic (i.e.-correct) sense; misrepresentation of an opponent's position. If you want to pick on his argument, I'd say "overgeneralization" would be in order.
I have a hard time with your argument, without supporting evidence. For example, if I ditch the cab driver without paying, that isn't theft? Services don't count because no property was involved? Just asking, because I'm not sure I buy your "theft-must-equal-loss-of-property" argument without further support. Surely I'd be charged with theft if I were somehow able to run the car wash without putting money in the machine? If I jump in my car and drive away from the Jiffy Lube without paying, is that theft only because I have new oil in the car, but not because I didn't pay for the labor?
Pirates are hoarders. I know a guy who has over 1000 movies pirated and burned to DVD, complete with color photocopies of the dvd covers and hard cases, sorted neatly in his bookshelf on display. It probably costs him nearly as much to copy it, print the cover, buy the case, buy the dvds, maintain the dvd burner/computers as it would have been to just buy them at the store. But, that's not the point. The point is he was ABLE to pirate them. He also has more software than he'll ever use. Just because. That is the mentality that is so hard for us non-pirates to understand.
That's not necessarily true. I've made far more money recording than from concerts and merchandise. As a session artist, I don't belong to any band, don't tour, don't sell stuff other than my ability to lay down some sweet tracks in the studio. I suppose I could make more money playing live than in the studio, but I don't...nor have many legendary session musicians.
I'm a PBS donor, but not for one minute do I think that they'd survive without huge government subsidies. In other words, if you are a taxpayer, you are also a PBS donor!
The only thing worse than the free-for-all mentality of pirates is turning around and profiting off of the illegal activity. I would hope anyone caught making money off of pirating would be doubly punished. And saying it is futile to catch pirates doesn't mean we just stop and say it's ok to steal, just because it is hard to enforce.
I thought the term "Pirate" stemmed from the "anything goes" mentality of a software pirate. Just like pirates of the open seas can do anything they want and there's nobody to stop them. Then again, maybe the term has changed meaning with younger generations, but I clearly remember the pirate analogy being the origin of the term way back 30 years ago or so.
I've traveled all over the world, and have lived in the UK and Germany. Capitalism is the same (at least in Western Europe). The only places I've been that were significantly different --due to deeply ingrained cultural issues-- are Egypt and Mexico. If you would like to posit that those two places have inherently better systems of capitalism in place, I got a bunch of socio-economic statistics in my favor to dispute that.
One thing to consider is the difficulty of downloading the song legally vs. illegally. I went to the Radiohead site to check it out (was gonna pay $0, since I'm not a fan) and I couldn't get the site to display correctly and/or I couldn't figure out what to do (can't remember the details). I found it on bittorrent about 2 minutes later. Now that it is also available on iTunes, I would have just gone there first, knowing I could sample the songs there and buy it if I liked what I heard. This logic also works in explaining why I prefer iTunes DRM-laden songs to the Amazon DRM-free tracks. Why should I waste my time searching on Amazon, when I know it will be on iTunes, but the chance is very good that it won't be on Amazon? For a while, I'd check Amazon first, but I got so many hits with the "we'll be adding this to our catalog soon" messages, it was not worth my time. You gotta remember there are tons of non-geeks who don't want to spend all night perusing music catalogs. Some of us graduated college a long time ago and have other things to do now;-)
It worked so well that the Radiohead album in question is now available on iTunes for $0.99 per track! I love a nice fairy-tale like Radiohead supposedly changing the music distribution with their bold new paradigm. Hell, Trent Reznor leaving USB sticks of his music laying around public toilets is more interesting than naming your own price.
I agree. Steam gets in the way in tangible ways, unlike the supposedly bad DRM of other systems (like iTunes). When I boot up my PC, the system hangs for what feels like an eternity, only to see that Steam is firing up in the system tray. It hogs resources, and is always popping up with stuff when not asked. It sucks like Adobe updater sucks. I don't mind DRM when I don't notice it, but Steam is constantly in my face.
Perhaps it's the company I keep, but I haven't seen a digital video camera that ISN'T firewire compliant. Most of the ones I've used as a creative professional are firewire ONLY, as a matter of fact. Same goes for external hard drives...the bottom dollar ones are the only ones I've seen that are USB only, but most of the others are Firewire only, or both. Cameras (photographic) don't need firewire, because they aren't passing huge amounts of data back AND forth, so granted, digital cameras are pretty much all USB. The main problem with this decision by Apple is that they bundle iMovie with MacBooks, but now there is a gap in how to get DV into the MacBook. I "guess" I could capture to my G4 then copy the.dv file over to my MacBook over the network, but that kind of defeats the whole point of having a mobile DV platform for $1000 (plus cost of video camera).
I've even had to buy firewire cards for both my PCs just because of all the firewire compliant gear I have. Considering I paid something like $15 bucks for the card and 5 minutes of my time to install it, I find it ridiculous that leaving it out would save enough money for Apple to be worth the trade-off. More realistically, Apple is just trying to get us creative types to spring for the more expensive platform. I have no problem with that, but obviously, others do.
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Well I have a 15 year military background, and I took the whole "Mission Accomplished" thing as it was intended--the end of a military operation (i.e. the defeat of Saddam Hussein's traditional military). Anyone who wants to take it differently just doesn't understand the nature of military operations, or are exteremely cynical/partisan.
I disagree. Not that I'm a war monger, but our involvement in Iraq over the past 18 years has been a BOON for the intelligence community. In contrast to your statement, Iraq this time around has been the BEST thing we could have done strategically to fight terror. We have mastered techniques and tactics over the past 7 years that rival our capabilities at the height of the cold war.
One good measure is how many of the 18 provinces are turned over to Iraqi security. Two more where turned over yesterday, leaving something like 7 left. The last one will be Baghdad (the province, not just the city). Once that is accomplished, we have no need (or desire) for conventional military deployment there. Leave some support troops and trainers behind and move on to the next conflict.
Well said. I don't mind though as my career field directly benefits from Middle East conflict. If we pull out now, we'll just be back in 5 years, assuring me many more years of job security. Of course, I'd prefer world peace and all, but if stupid politicians want to keep making the same mistakes over-and-over and keep going back to Iraq every couple of years or so, my family is financially sound for it, and I'm cool with that.
Hey, so far it has been a fairly sane/intelligent discussion. Definitely not par for the course around here!
I'll take the bait. What's wrong with talking to leaders of terrorist states? I mean, NOT talking to them doesn't seem to be working. Talking to Ghaddafy seems to have worked (just one example off the top of my head).
Does he still cling to the 1-2 brigades per month? I've heard him temper those figures as of late. Perhaps he's pandering for votes while appeasing the base.
Well, I support Obama, and I'm professionally tied to the war in Iraq. I can tell you that your statement that Obama has been "consistent" is absolutely false. What gained my support for Obama was his obvious capability to reevaluate his position in Iraq and temper it to a more realistic, more "presidential" position. We no longer hear about how he will start pulling one brigade per month out. Instead, we hear him use the voice of reason and talk of listening to the commanders that he will become chief of. Perhaps he said those things to beat Hilary, but he hasn't gone back to his extreme "get out now!" stance he previously held.
Again, another statement that doesn't understand military operations. "One career general" actually means "one career general and his ENTIRE staff". You are crazy to think the people are remotely qualified to judge the situation on the ground...unless Brittney and Paris somehow start working in Baghdad. Maybe High School Musical 4 and Dancing with the Stars can be flimed on location? Miley Cyrus as our war correspondent? That's about the only way the average citizen would even be able to point to Iraq on a map, let alone make sound judgment about the situation on the ground.
Anyone who cites the "Mission Accomplished" statement as some sort of gaffe is either purely partisan, or doesn't understand military operations. Just for the record, yes, the mission was accomplished. Read the OPORDER issued for that phase of the engagement, understand the mission and the end-state requirements and then tell me what's wrong with the whole "Mission Accomplished" fiasco. Wars consist of a string of smaller missions, and in this case, that specific mission was accomplished. Yes, it was an overt PR attempt (and that is a legitimate criticism), but NO, it wasn't an erroneous statement.
Well, seems like my guess isn't so "terrible" after all. It appears that 40-49% of their funding comes from government subsidies. Note, I wasn't inferring that INDIVIDUAL donors make up 50%. I said PRIVATE donations make up about 50%, which would include corporations. And no, they don't make substantial amounts of money on merchandise, as evident by their (0.5% in 2005, for example). The gap between private donors and public funds is made up by the Corporation of Public Broadcasting.
Historically, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting has received 15% to 20% of its annual operating revenue from Federal sources and 25% to 29% from State and local taxes.
source: Wikipedia. Wikipedia's source: http://www.cpb.org/stations/reports/revenue/2005PublicBroadcastingRevenue.pdf
Well they are doing their annual pledge drive right now and they state that "nearly half" of their funds come from private donations. Since they don't have advertisements, I'd guess close to 50% would come from gov't subsidies.
Pirates are all just spoiled little rich kids, eh?
Well since he was in college and said they are "LIKE" a bunch of rich kids, maybe he was just practicing similes versus metaphors. Anyways, it peeves me when /.ers refute anything they disagree with by using canned, incorrectly used Logic101 responses. I don't really see a straw man in the classic (i.e.-correct) sense; misrepresentation of an opponent's position. If you want to pick on his argument, I'd say "overgeneralization" would be in order.
I have a hard time with your argument, without supporting evidence. For example, if I ditch the cab driver without paying, that isn't theft? Services don't count because no property was involved? Just asking, because I'm not sure I buy your "theft-must-equal-loss-of-property" argument without further support. Surely I'd be charged with theft if I were somehow able to run the car wash without putting money in the machine? If I jump in my car and drive away from the Jiffy Lube without paying, is that theft only because I have new oil in the car, but not because I didn't pay for the labor?
Pirates are hoarders. I know a guy who has over 1000 movies pirated and burned to DVD, complete with color photocopies of the dvd covers and hard cases, sorted neatly in his bookshelf on display. It probably costs him nearly as much to copy it, print the cover, buy the case, buy the dvds, maintain the dvd burner/computers as it would have been to just buy them at the store. But, that's not the point. The point is he was ABLE to pirate them. He also has more software than he'll ever use. Just because. That is the mentality that is so hard for us non-pirates to understand.
That's not necessarily true. I've made far more money recording than from concerts and merchandise. As a session artist, I don't belong to any band, don't tour, don't sell stuff other than my ability to lay down some sweet tracks in the studio. I suppose I could make more money playing live than in the studio, but I don't...nor have many legendary session musicians.
I'm a PBS donor, but not for one minute do I think that they'd survive without huge government subsidies. In other words, if you are a taxpayer, you are also a PBS donor!
The only thing worse than the free-for-all mentality of pirates is turning around and profiting off of the illegal activity. I would hope anyone caught making money off of pirating would be doubly punished. And saying it is futile to catch pirates doesn't mean we just stop and say it's ok to steal, just because it is hard to enforce.
I thought the term "Pirate" stemmed from the "anything goes" mentality of a software pirate. Just like pirates of the open seas can do anything they want and there's nobody to stop them. Then again, maybe the term has changed meaning with younger generations, but I clearly remember the pirate analogy being the origin of the term way back 30 years ago or so.
I've traveled all over the world, and have lived in the UK and Germany. Capitalism is the same (at least in Western Europe). The only places I've been that were significantly different --due to deeply ingrained cultural issues-- are Egypt and Mexico. If you would like to posit that those two places have inherently better systems of capitalism in place, I got a bunch of socio-economic statistics in my favor to dispute that.
Wow. Pirates will go to any length to validate their nasty habits.
One thing to consider is the difficulty of downloading the song legally vs. illegally. I went to the Radiohead site to check it out (was gonna pay $0, since I'm not a fan) and I couldn't get the site to display correctly and/or I couldn't figure out what to do (can't remember the details). I found it on bittorrent about 2 minutes later. Now that it is also available on iTunes, I would have just gone there first, knowing I could sample the songs there and buy it if I liked what I heard. This logic also works in explaining why I prefer iTunes DRM-laden songs to the Amazon DRM-free tracks. Why should I waste my time searching on Amazon, when I know it will be on iTunes, but the chance is very good that it won't be on Amazon? For a while, I'd check Amazon first, but I got so many hits with the "we'll be adding this to our catalog soon" messages, it was not worth my time. You gotta remember there are tons of non-geeks who don't want to spend all night perusing music catalogs. Some of us graduated college a long time ago and have other things to do now ;-)
It worked so well that the Radiohead album in question is now available on iTunes for $0.99 per track! I love a nice fairy-tale like Radiohead supposedly changing the music distribution with their bold new paradigm. Hell, Trent Reznor leaving USB sticks of his music laying around public toilets is more interesting than naming your own price.
I agree. Steam gets in the way in tangible ways, unlike the supposedly bad DRM of other systems (like iTunes). When I boot up my PC, the system hangs for what feels like an eternity, only to see that Steam is firing up in the system tray. It hogs resources, and is always popping up with stuff when not asked. It sucks like Adobe updater sucks. I don't mind DRM when I don't notice it, but Steam is constantly in my face.
Perhaps it's the company I keep, but I haven't seen a digital video camera that ISN'T firewire compliant. Most of the ones I've used as a creative professional are firewire ONLY, as a matter of fact. Same goes for external hard drives...the bottom dollar ones are the only ones I've seen that are USB only, but most of the others are Firewire only, or both. Cameras (photographic) don't need firewire, because they aren't passing huge amounts of data back AND forth, so granted, digital cameras are pretty much all USB. The main problem with this decision by Apple is that they bundle iMovie with MacBooks, but now there is a gap in how to get DV into the MacBook. I "guess" I could capture to my G4 then copy the .dv file over to my MacBook over the network, but that kind of defeats the whole point of having a mobile DV platform for $1000 (plus cost of video camera).
I've even had to buy firewire cards for both my PCs just because of all the firewire compliant gear I have. Considering I paid something like $15 bucks for the card and 5 minutes of my time to install it, I find it ridiculous that leaving it out would save enough money for Apple to be worth the trade-off. More realistically, Apple is just trying to get us creative types to spring for the more expensive platform. I have no problem with that, but obviously, others do.