So you've made my argument. If I can't buy Oracle for a better price to compete with (large company X that has a MFN tied to the GSA contract) thereby limiting competition (from little old me) then the damage is done. Being a reseller of a database or a book is not the issue, MFN talks about the buy price and my observation was that the government is smacking Oracle while the Connecticut AG is smacking Amazon/Apple for the opposite.
I'll agree that the government having an MFN contract is more efficient and beneficial to tax payers, but then penalizing a couple of companies for doing the same thing to guarantee their customers the best price smacks of double standards and seems to run afoul of 'equal protection under the law'.
The competition between book sellers is not eliminated. All you have to do is build an e-book business with volume and negotiate the same MFN contract for the suppliers. Then it comes down to how efficient your operation is and how good your value add is. Its only price fixing if it can be proved that Amazon and Apple are conspiring to set the same selling price, not the buying price. Or that that competing e-book sellers are conspiring to set their selling prices. But that's not the case here.
The AG has it wrong 'in that MFNs will reduce the publisher's incentive to offer a discount to Amazon if it would have to offer the same discount to Apple, leading to the establishment of a price floor for e-books offered by the publisher.' is not anti-trust.
I say - so what? Its not anti-trust to negotiate a buying price. Anti-trust is conspiracy to fix the selling price.
I also think you missed on defining excess profits. (Hint - there is no such thing - this term is a socialist invention)
So it still looks the same to me. Lets let buyers Apple = Government and Amazon = larger corp client, and let a book = Oracle and another book = MS SQLsever.
The only difference is that Apple and Amazon resell what they buy, but that doesn't change the equation here with regards to the purchasing and the MFN contract causing a price floor.
I can't get a better price from Oracle because they would then have to extend that benefit to any MFN contract holders.
Looks to me like the government wants it both ways. Sure they're big, and they're the government. This is why Constitutions are designed to limit government, not to limit people.
Maybe I misunderstood the issue then. I thought the issue was the risk of damage to the economy and consumer as in "...leading to the establishment of a price floor for (insert product here)"
"Blumenthal warned in his letter to Amazon (PDF), 'in that MFNs will reduce the publisher's incentive to offer a discount to Amazon if it would have to offer the same discount to Apple, leading to the establishment of a price floor for e-books offered by the publisher.'"
This sounds exactly like how GSA contracts work. More double standards at work here.
Back in the 1995, IBM spent 3.5 billion to purchase Lotus, primarily for Lotus Notes. At that time they could have purchased the internet backbone, routers, CISCO, all of it. Did they make the right choice?
In 1995 Solar One was converted into Solar Two, by adding a second ring of 108 larger 95 m (1,000 ft) heliostats around the existing Solar One, totaling 1926 heliostats with a total area of 82,750 m (891,000 ft). This gave Solar Two the ability to produce 10 megawatts. Solar Two used molten salt, a combination of 60% sodium nitrate and 40% potassium nitrate, as an energy storage medium instead of oil or water as with Solar One.
Their new mission is not to recognized the contributions by Muslims to the fields of mathematics and physics, but to develop a new paradigm for approximating numbers.
Just don't confuse metric with english units lest you miss Mars by a few 100,000 units of whatever
Sounds like the next step is to supoena the ISP for the home address of that IP, then go to the police with the original police report info. The should be able to make a house call. Getting legal aid from the university or otherwise should also be pursued. Even better if you can activate a laptop camera and catch a picture.
Hong Kong has a very long 800m moving walkway. I've also seen shorter ones at airports and some shorter ones for inclines in Sydney Australia near the music conservatory.
It seems to me that creating a new TLD is like printing money. Anyone with a brand to protect will be coerced into buying up their {brand}.{TLD} to park it and prevent abuse.
Consider for example: www.disney.xxx or www.ford.xxx
Creating this won't eliminate porn on the other TLDs and centralized censorship is generally a bad idea.
Ditto. I wouldn't rely on HTML/CSS and browsers to render something to be printed. Use PDF or an image to provide reliability in printing. If you plan to use barcodes, I'd suggest either interleaved 2 of 5 or one of the 2-d barcode formats like PDF417.
Federally funded Nevada geothermal plant sponsored by Harry Reid triggers massive earthquakes in San Francisco and causes the giant Yellowstone caldera in Wyoming to rise another 50 ft.
There are some excellent add-on program to the middle school curriculum such as First Lego League. And it needs parents to volunteer after school to coach the kids and provide judges for the various competition levels, state, regional, national and world (in Sweden). http://www.firstlegoleague.org/
Re:Windows 7 is actually kinda good
on
Time To Dump XP?
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· Score: 1
I have a work and a personal machine on Win 7 64-bit now and I like it. Still need to use (virtual) XP for some software that does not have compatible drivers yet. Also, some print drivers such as for HP color printers only have a universal version that works in Win7/64 and they don't provide all the printer's features. I'd settle for color support. What I'm missing in 7 is:
the toolbar: I like to make a dev tools bar at the top of my screen, and leave generic common tools in the quickstart bar next to the Start button. Using ObjectDock to replace this function.
network neighborhood shortcuts: having to make shortcuts to network resources in a regular folder
WebDAV: can't seem to get this working reliably. Worked great in XP, broke in Vista and seem to still be flaky.
In a lot of places, an employer does not need a reason to let someone go. So any reason would do if they want to take it as such. I bet there's more to the story here.
Having been to Australia and seen this in person at a zoo, I can confirm that the bats clean or pleasure each other first, then wrap their leathery wings around each other like a blanket. Perhaps they have a sense of modesty after all.
BTW, the male appendage seemed to be nearly the length of his body. Top that.
From the first couple of posts its pretty unanimous - its their network, their headache for meeting the regulations, their rules. As an employee or contractor, you really don't want customer data on your personal computer - way too much liability. First a couple of simple rules for you:
Never connect a personal laptop to a company network (unless you have permission). Many companies will have you connect via a vpn or gateway so they can secure and monitor network traffic.
Never load PHI (personal health info) or customer databases onto a personal machine for any reason (including test data taken from production).
Never set up a company email account to forward emails to your personal mailbox.
Now for some good practices for companies:
Set up remote access email using web access. Disallow automatic mail forwarding/redirects
Issue company owned encrypted laptops to staff that need them, including contractors.
Set up VPN access. Jupiter VPN works pretty well.
Set up 2-factor authentication for server access. e.g. active identity or RSA cryptocards
Disallow non-company computers from access company networks via VPN.
Set up terminal server/Citrix type virtual environments for access from non-company computers. All that goes to the non-company computer is the screen image.
Getting arrested or detained does not make you guilty. You'll still have your day in court or clear things up at the station.Think of it like a beefed up curfew law for minors.
Office Models
Here are 3 basic office models I've worked in. They're all good for the right reasons.
1. For a small Team on the same project/task A group office would enhance collaboration for hasty/frantic development work ala Agile programming where designs are dynamic and evolving. This should be is a relatively short term arrangement and when the group reforms, be prepared to also rearrange the team office. Headphones and music of choice helps block out unwanted conversation during periods of concentration, though you could listen in on meetings and decisions while working.
2. For mature development/maintenance For longer term development/maintenance individual offices/spaces probably work better because things should be rolling along and folks are working within a framework. These arrangements typically will also set up a war-room to tackle tough problems until they are resolved.
3. For field consultants / professional services If you want your staff to spend more time working in the field on billable time rather than the office, set up a hot desk/hotel or just benches with power above the bench for easy laptop access. For network, of course, you'd have Wi-Fi. No one has a permanent space, though you would provide lockers for field staff to store some personal effects like a reusable coffee mug.
Ask Your Staff
If you want a successful office design, ask your staff and discuss the options with their strengths and weaknesses.
Who gets the window office?
In my opinion: No One. Not even the boss - gotta lead by example: right? Make those the meeting rooms/spaces and aisle. If you have cubicles, keep cubicle walls low - about 4 ft - but add a glass top to 6 ft to keep down noise. For offices, include a window in the door and side for natural light. Add natural light ducts to the roof.
Don't be a square
Include some visual interest in the office design buy incorporating a rounded wall or two and fun colors/design (employee lounge/creative meeting space) and maybe a diagonal aisle. It takes up a little more space, but keeps of the office from being just a square world.
Sound Abatement
Ensure you break up hard surfaces in a large room with soft art (large fabric covered panels) or hanging banners to attenuate sound. There's nothing worse than being on a conference call and sounding like you work in a cave. Actually, this is unfair to caves because they often have very good sound absorption.
Cost
A good office design does not have to cost a fortune. I've seen very nice office design that used simple galvanized steel and fiberglass corrugated roofing, and varnished plywood sheets as basic building materials.
Slashdot Mirror
I'll agree that the government having an MFN contract is more efficient and beneficial to tax payers, but then penalizing a couple of companies for doing the same thing to guarantee their customers the best price smacks of double standards and seems to run afoul of 'equal protection under the law'.
The competition between book sellers is not eliminated. All you have to do is build an e-book business with volume and negotiate the same MFN contract for the suppliers. Then it comes down to how efficient your operation is and how good your value add is. Its only price fixing if it can be proved that Amazon and Apple are conspiring to set the same selling price, not the buying price. Or that that competing e-book sellers are conspiring to set their selling prices. But that's not the case here.
The AG has it wrong 'in that MFNs will reduce the publisher's incentive to offer a discount to Amazon if it would have to offer the same discount to Apple, leading to the establishment of a price floor for e-books offered by the publisher.' is not anti-trust.
I say - so what? Its not anti-trust to negotiate a buying price. Anti-trust is conspiracy to fix the selling price.
I also think you missed on defining excess profits. (Hint - there is no such thing - this term is a socialist invention)
BTW. What's an excess profit? Who gets to decide?
The only difference is that Apple and Amazon resell what they buy, but that doesn't change the equation here with regards to the purchasing and the MFN contract causing a price floor.
I can't get a better price from Oracle because they would then have to extend that benefit to any MFN contract holders.
Looks to me like the government wants it both ways. Sure they're big, and they're the government. This is why Constitutions are designed to limit government, not to limit people.
Maybe I misunderstood the issue then. I thought the issue was the risk of damage to the economy and consumer as in "...leading to the establishment of a price floor for (insert product here)"
This sounds exactly like how GSA contracts work. More double standards at work here.
http://news.slashdot.org/story/10/07/30/2051249/Justice-Department-Joins-Fraud-Lawsuit-Against-Oracle
Those that accuse someone else of bad behavior are most often guilty of the same of offense (in my experience).
Those who can't do, teach. Those who can't teach, manage. Those who can't manage, consult.
Back in the 1995, IBM spent 3.5 billion to purchase Lotus, primarily for Lotus Notes. At that time they could have purchased the internet backbone, routers, CISCO, all of it. Did they make the right choice?
In 1995 Solar One was converted into Solar Two, by adding a second ring of 108 larger 95 m (1,000 ft) heliostats around the existing Solar One, totaling 1926 heliostats with a total area of 82,750 m (891,000 ft). This gave Solar Two the ability to produce 10 megawatts. Solar Two used molten salt, a combination of 60% sodium nitrate and 40% potassium nitrate, as an energy storage medium instead of oil or water as with Solar One.
I switched to the superior Motorola 68000 processors years ago.
Sounds like a candidate for Mike Rowe's Dirty Jobs TV show, except they can't show the images on TV, but his reactions and commentary would be great.
Just don't confuse metric with english units lest you miss Mars by a few 100,000 units of whatever
(oh, that's already been done: ref http://www.jamesoberg.com/mars/loss.html )
Sounds like the next step is to supoena the ISP for the home address of that IP, then go to the police with the original police report info. The should be able to make a house call. Getting legal aid from the university or otherwise should also be pursued. Even better if you can activate a laptop camera and catch a picture.
http://sustainablecities.dk/en/city-projects/cases/hong-kong-re-discovering-escalators-as-public-transport
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Escalator
It seems to me that creating a new TLD is like printing money. Anyone with a brand to protect will be coerced into buying up their {brand}.{TLD} to park it and prevent abuse. Consider for example: www.disney.xxx or www.ford.xxx Creating this won't eliminate porn on the other TLDs and centralized censorship is generally a bad idea.
Ditto. I wouldn't rely on HTML/CSS and browsers to render something to be printed. Use PDF or an image to provide reliability in printing. If you plan to use barcodes, I'd suggest either interleaved 2 of 5 or one of the 2-d barcode formats like PDF417.
Federally funded Nevada geothermal plant sponsored by Harry Reid triggers massive earthquakes in San Francisco and causes the giant Yellowstone caldera in Wyoming to rise another 50 ft.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/dec/15/swiss-geothermal-power-earthquakes-basel
There are some excellent add-on program to the middle school curriculum such as First Lego League. And it needs parents to volunteer after school to coach the kids and provide judges for the various competition levels, state, regional, national and world (in Sweden). http://www.firstlegoleague.org/
In a lot of places, an employer does not need a reason to let someone go. So any reason would do if they want to take it as such. I bet there's more to the story here.
Adventures in Mommyville
It a similar effect as when management brings in a new product or consulting group that is the "silver bullet" that will solve all the problems.
BTW, the male appendage seemed to be nearly the length of his body. Top that.
Has anyone else noticed how the high pitch screech of a wife or girlfriend yelling at you has the same effect?
Now for some good practices for companies:
Getting arrested or detained does not make you guilty. You'll still have your day in court or clear things up at the station.Think of it like a beefed up curfew law for minors.
Office Models Here are 3 basic office models I've worked in. They're all good for the right reasons.
1. For a small Team on the same project/task A group office would enhance collaboration for hasty/frantic development work ala Agile programming where designs are dynamic and evolving. This should be is a relatively short term arrangement and when the group reforms, be prepared to also rearrange the team office. Headphones and music of choice helps block out unwanted conversation during periods of concentration, though you could listen in on meetings and decisions while working.
2. For mature development/maintenance For longer term development/maintenance individual offices/spaces probably work better because things should be rolling along and folks are working within a framework. These arrangements typically will also set up a war-room to tackle tough problems until they are resolved.
3. For field consultants / professional services If you want your staff to spend more time working in the field on billable time rather than the office, set up a hot desk/hotel or just benches with power above the bench for easy laptop access. For network, of course, you'd have Wi-Fi. No one has a permanent space, though you would provide lockers for field staff to store some personal effects like a reusable coffee mug.
Ask Your Staff If you want a successful office design, ask your staff and discuss the options with their strengths and weaknesses.
Who gets the window office? In my opinion: No One. Not even the boss - gotta lead by example: right? Make those the meeting rooms/spaces and aisle. If you have cubicles, keep cubicle walls low - about 4 ft - but add a glass top to 6 ft to keep down noise. For offices, include a window in the door and side for natural light. Add natural light ducts to the roof.
Don't be a square Include some visual interest in the office design buy incorporating a rounded wall or two and fun colors/design (employee lounge/creative meeting space) and maybe a diagonal aisle. It takes up a little more space, but keeps of the office from being just a square world.
Sound Abatement Ensure you break up hard surfaces in a large room with soft art (large fabric covered panels) or hanging banners to attenuate sound. There's nothing worse than being on a conference call and sounding like you work in a cave. Actually, this is unfair to caves because they often have very good sound absorption.
Cost A good office design does not have to cost a fortune. I've seen very nice office design that used simple galvanized steel and fiberglass corrugated roofing, and varnished plywood sheets as basic building materials.
Learning By Example
Tech Top 10 Workspaces (2008) http://slashdot.org/story/08/05/07/1159255/Techs-Top-10-Workspaces