I sympathize! I was trying to talk a friend over the phone through a series of instructions the other night. I kept telling him to type an URL, with the leading http:/// but everytime he kept saying "Ok! I can see the search results" and then he'd go looking for the web site in the list.
Not sure if he was dropping the http:/// or if IE directs even http:/// addresses to its intrusive search engine, but I got him to install FireFox instead. At least its search and address bar are separate.
Anyway, I was tearing my hair out. He couldn't distinguish between going to a web site and searching for it,
Handy hint: Firefox's search box is too small, but you can edit it with Chrome to make it bigger.
Does anyone know anyone who has had a *bad* experience (as in, lost money) with Second Life?
All I hear about in the popular press is Anshe Chung, Anshe Chung, Anshe Chung. These give you the distinct impression there's millions to be made, easily. If anyone has experience to the contrary, lets hear it...
How many licenses of Windows *didn't* the WGA get a chance to run on?
I've got more PCs than I can count (well, on one hand) and Bill has sold me a copies for Windows for each. The guy is ahead.
Now add the PCs that I've got Windows for that no longer run. Bill rigs the install so you can't transfer your license to another machine when it breaks, not legally and now not technically. These days they don't even give you a recovery CD/DVD, let alone an installation CD/DVD.
If Intel are going to enter the discrete 3d market, then they better aim for the top slot. That means pulling out all stops, and getting to the top of those benchmark charts and having an all-green compatibility list.
If they're going to aim for the #3 slot in a market, well, they might as well not bother. Intel have the technical smarts sure. I hope they also have the business smarts too.
Are you trolling? I own laptops with the Intel, the Radeon XPress and nVidia 3d chipsets and two nVidia desktops, so I reckon I'm qualified to express an opinion.
For the games and graphics software I run, it's fine. The Intel game compatibility list says which games do and don't give acceptable frame rates. I said that in the first post.
Compared to the 5700, yes, hate to scare you, but it really does scream. The nVidia GeForce FX is a dog of a card. It has a very slow PixelShader implementation, and nVidia was caught rigging the benchmarks to make it look acceptable. The drivers are wonky. Here's the link for the sad story: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GeForce_FX
Intel have a Game Compatibility List on their website. Not sure what your situation is, but my lappie use i945. DOOM III is fine, but Quake IV isn't. If Intel want to really penetrate the graphics market, obviously their next list will have to be all green spots. "Intel: The way it's meant to be played!";-)
Serious gamers bitch that the 9XX series is low end. Maybe it is. But it whips my nVidia 5700 and that's good enough for me!
Here's a list of supported Linuxes. Bizarrely Ubuntu isn't mentioned, but some folks seem to have it running. Mandriva works out of the box. Google is your friend. You may be able to find more up to date information than these: Good Luck!
> Microsoft... which would let people store digital information in durable physical artifacts > and other forms to be preserved and revealed to future generations, and maybe even to future civilizations.
When I first read this, my first thoughts were about Digital Rights Management... I childed myself, hey, Microsoft can do projects for public good to propel humanity into a better future too, like the old timers' IBM. Maybe Microsoft are just looking for some good karma and good PR?
But then my hopes were dashed:
> The project was revealed when their patent application recently became public."
Someone at Microsoft smells a buck. At that, a buck out of the dead. Really, Microsoft? Does anyone sell "I am not a Cash Cow" T-shirts? Holograms on your tombstone? Now you can get DMCA MPAA notices when you're dead too.
Intel's previous foray into the Discrete Graphics Market was the Intel i740. I got one, agreeing with PC salesman "Hey, you can't go wrong with Intel can you?" It was quite a decent chip for its time, and the driver was very stable. I don't ever recall graphics hanging once! It was disappointing when Intel bailed out of the 3D market, but to their credit they continued to update the drivers whenever a new version of DirectX rolled out.
Intel have already made a return of sorts to 3D with their Media Accelerator 9XX series chips you'll find in many Intel laptops. It's funny, because you'd expect an embedded chipset to be lame; lowest common denominator, shared RAM and akk. But this lappie has it and the graphics scream. It's faster than my nVidia 5700 which is two years old. The driver is stable too; never crashed. If they can do this with an embedded chipset 3d, imagine what they can do when they really put their mind to it?
nVidia and ATI have the market to themselves these days. nVidia has got pretty lax regarding driver stability for these days, and it's damned near impossible to get support out of them. They've fobbed off support to OEMs, who slap electronics onto cards and are in no position to help with driver problems. That's the sort of thing that happens when a company dominates a market.
If Intel can come out with some high performance electronics and stable drivers, well, Welcome back, Intel! I for one welcome you as my new Overlord!
By widespread I meant that someone outside the US had done it first:-)
Yes, that solar program is limited to Sydney and as the linked SMH.com.au article says the people in the program do it for the love rather than the money. I'm not aware of any other states that are doing it. The Aussie Government does give a $4K rebate for Solar Home Owners, but its chickenfeed compared to what they're investing the nuclear and coal industry.
This is more widespread than you realize. Aussies have been doing it for a couple of years now. Just the thing for a desert country where it seldom rains:
You think they're going to leave it out there for China to shoot it down? It's like when you see someone practicing reverse parking on your neighbors car. You briskly move yours into the garage.
It happens, but not that often. When they catch one, law enforcement does a dog and pony show and we applaud wildly. But they just keep coming.
Arrests don't seem to happen that often. Do a google for "spammer arrested", and most of the hits are about the Buffalo spammer. He was arrested back in 2003 to much fanfare. However my mailbox is still full of. Maybe there is more than one of them out there?
I'm guessing spammers spam because they know the chance of them being caught is nigh on zero. Yet, this is a criminal racket just like any other criminal racket. If some serious money is put into law enforcement, then spammers might finally get the shakes. Apart from pump-n-dump stocks (get off yer asses SEC), spammers aren't hard to catch. Consider Mortgage spammers. If you reply to a Mortgage spam (I am told) you will later be called by a seemingly unrelated mortgage agency. They have bought your contacts off the spammers. Everything can be traced, and if we have the feds seeded spammers with 1-use-only phone numbers, buying stuff and tracking it just like they do any other illegal contraband, of course they can bust it. Make receiving spammed contact details an offence too: The recipient must be reasonably confident that the leads they received are not spam. Harder to prove, but if there is a reasonable chance of prosecution buyers of spam harvests will become shyer and the market dry up. Lets make it a legal requirement that ISPs have to report spamming users to the feds.
And let's get beyond "fines" for offenders. Fines for any profitable business are merely an operating expense. What really scares company directors is Jail time. This has been used in L.A. to force companies comply with laws they'd otherwise have simply paid out. If a spammer thinks there is a 0.0001% chance of him being caught (and then let off with a warning), they will do it. If they think they probably can't sell their harvest, have a 50% chance of being caught and will definitely go to Jail, they won't!
So why isn't this happening? (1) It's not an issue for politicans. I want to see Obama/Hillary/McCain arguing about Spam!!! and so... (2) The money isn't budgeted for law enforcement. With some Elliot Nesses on Spam, I reckon we can crack this. How do we let the politicians know this is an issue for us?
If Ted Turner bought MGM just for it's library of old films, well, why do Apple and MS let themselves be randsomed by record company executives?
Why not launch their own record labels?
"Whoa man" you say "They're software companies." Look at SONY. They're into everything; electronics, PC, movies, spyware *and* records. Why can't Apple or MS do this too?
Yes, we might like to use the word "Arist", but it's a consumer industry just like any other. They can hire all the usual record industry types for the spotting/sleazing/recording/promoting. There is no shortage of "Artists" out there either: The plethora (yes, a plethora) of Idol shows show you can take pretty much anybody and make them a star. I'm sure there are many eager bands out there who would jump at the chance to sign. Apple are perceived as "cool", so they could get away with this (but can't call it Apple Records; maybe iRecords?). Microsoft *thinks* they're cool, and hey they're loaded, so they can do it too.
The whole DRM thing shows the copyright laws are badly broken, and no amount of lobbying is going to save the record companies. They've fumbled the ball, and keep missing the point. Look at the chance they had with Napster, and they let it slip through their greedly little fingers. They've fumbled again, so this is a good chance for Apple (or MS) to take the lead. I reckon with their sort of money, they could drive the big four out of existance.
Hmm... I think I just did some free Business Development work for Steve Jobs and Bill Gates. Oh well. Enjoy anyway!
Yahoo in particular got in pretty thick with the Chinese Government, helping them find and jail those reporters and bloggers. Jerry Wang was completely unapologetic about it.
I find it a little hard to believe Yahoo is going to do an about face. Can you imagine Yahoo executives at their next liason with the Chinese Government telling them "Ok, Commies, the rules have just changed. From now on, we're going to insist things are done right around here!" It's a nice thought, but it just isn't going to happen. Walk away from money? Never! (Unless they think they've lost the market to locals anyway?)
If those companies came out together publicly and criticized the Chinese Government, we might see something. But short of that I'm guessing it's just to make us feel better. "Oh Google and Yahoo? That's old hat; They have an NGO Code of Conduct now."
Yes, they're dabbling in evil these days. Deciding if it is for them, and how far they want to go into it. But they do offer great search. Nothing comes close. I even do my spellchecks in Google these days; it's contextual so give it a few words and its guesses will blow you away. The Microsoft Visual Studio help searching is so lousy, it is faster for me to dialup and search Google instead.
And his research partner. His partner is smarter because (1) he let Barry be the guinea pig, and (2) he hates people who star in informercials. http://www.vianet.net.au/~jrwarren/
Here's a good piece about their research and the scientific community's sledging:
Lehk: > actually it has to do with casino lobbyists, remember jack abramoff(sp?)? Lehk: > he was in deep with the casinos, among others.
Ahhh... Thanks for that Lehk. Wasn't aware of that piece of the jigsaw puzzle.
xjerky: >You're kidding right? You forget that most of the illegality of online xjerky: >gambling stems from avoiding taxes....and the party that favors increasing taxes just took over.
Which makes this really ironic: "One of Abramoff's first acts as a tribal gaming lobbyist was to defeat a Congressional bill to tax Indian casinos".
VGPowerlord: > Actually, we like Japan and China. After all, they make everything sold in stores here! Was in Japan last year. Much of their stuff is made in China nowdays too!
Google is lousy for Product Reviews. Seach for a review on anything, and you'll get pages of web shops with the text "Add your own review" (invariably empty). I guess many people searching for "reviews" are consumers, rather than frustrated product review authors!
I've stuck in a few feedback items for Google to clean this up. No luck yet. Hopefully Google will get around to fixing it.
> Canada... look at how the US is screwing us over soft lumber and such.
I was actually in Canada about a year and a half ago and still have the paper: This was when the US imposed tarrifs on Canadian lumber despite the free trade agreement, and said, basically "so sue us!" The front page had a headline about this and photos of all the Canadian Negotiators, none of whom were happy.
Australia had a similar problem. According to the Aussie press, Australian lamb producers built up the American market for lamb, pumping a lot of money into advertising and promotion. U.S. lamb producers then got Congress to put a quota, and took the market over. The U.S. claimed this was for "unfair practices" which was just a lot of baloney. I doubt most Americans ever even heard of this case, but in Australia its was widely reported. When the U.S. signed a "free trade" agreement with the U.S., Aussie agricultural produce was excluded. A year afterwards the agreement was shown to be heavily favoring the U.S.
So there you go. Canada, Britain and Australia. Probably the most loyal friends the U.S. has.
Here's some stuff about the Free Trade and the Internet Gambling Laws. BTW the WTO said the U.S. isn't breaking the law, but its against the spirit of free trade and this is what people see:
http://www.freetrade.org/pubs/FTBs/FTB-024.pdfhttp://www.tradeobservatory.org/headlines.cfm?refI D=70041
Two Aussies won the Nobel for Medicine by proving that stomach ulcers are caused bacteria rather than 'stress' as used to be beleived. They proved it when one of them, on the spur of the moment, drank a vat containing the bacteria. He said he felt very sick afterwards, and he also he survived the bacteria it was his wife who nearly killed him!:-)
BTW although his is now accepted, at the time they were ridiculed by other scientists who though the idea preposterous. Got to be inpependent thinkers, Slashdotters. ("Yes! We're all individuals!" "No, I mean you are all different" "Yes, we're all different!")
Slashdot Mirror
I sympathize! I was trying to talk a friend over the phone through a series of instructions the other night. I kept telling him to type an URL, with the leading http:/// but everytime he kept saying "Ok! I can see the search results" and then he'd go looking for the web site in the list.
Not sure if he was dropping the http:/// or if IE directs even http:/// addresses to its intrusive search engine, but I got him to install FireFox instead. At least its search and address bar are separate.
Anyway, I was tearing my hair out. He couldn't distinguish between going to a web site and searching for it,
Handy hint: Firefox's search box is too small, but you can edit it with Chrome to make it bigger.
Does anyone know anyone who has had a *bad* experience (as in, lost money) with Second Life?
All I hear about in the popular press is Anshe Chung, Anshe Chung, Anshe Chung. These give you the distinct impression there's millions to be made, easily. If anyone has experience to the contrary, lets hear it...
How many licenses of Windows *didn't* the WGA get a chance to run on?
I've got more PCs than I can count (well, on one hand) and Bill has sold me a copies for Windows for each. The guy is ahead.
Now add the PCs that I've got Windows for that no longer run. Bill rigs the install so you can't transfer your license to another machine when it breaks, not legally and now not technically. These days they don't even give you a recovery CD/DVD, let alone an installation CD/DVD.
Sorry, Bill. Not impressed by you crying pour.
If Intel are going to enter the discrete 3d market, then they better aim for the top slot. That means pulling out all stops, and getting to the top of those benchmark charts and having an all-green compatibility list.
If they're going to aim for the #3 slot in a market, well, they might as well not bother. Intel have the technical smarts sure. I hope they also have the business smarts too.
Are you trolling? I own laptops with the Intel, the Radeon XPress and nVidia 3d chipsets and two nVidia desktops, so I reckon I'm qualified to express an opinion.
For the games and graphics software I run, it's fine. The Intel game compatibility list says which games do and don't give acceptable frame rates. I said that in the first post.
Compared to the 5700, yes, hate to scare you, but it really does scream. The nVidia GeForce FX is a dog of a card. It has a very slow PixelShader implementation, and nVidia was caught rigging the benchmarks to make it look acceptable. The drivers are wonky. Here's the link for the sad story: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GeForce_FX
> MySpace Sues Spam King Scott Richter,
It would have been easy to find him. He'd been the only one on MySpace with no friends.
I hope they spammed him a summons every 3 minutes.
Intel have a Game Compatibility List on their website. Not sure what your situation is, but my lappie use i945. DOOM III is fine, but Quake IV isn't. If Intel want to really penetrate the graphics market, obviously their next list will have to be all green spots. "Intel: The way it's meant to be played!" ;-)
s b/CS-021400.htm
e ng/products/linux/feature/279817.htm7 83d .php?t=435050
http://www.intel.com/support/graphics/intel945gm/
Serious gamers bitch that the 9XX series is low end. Maybe it is. But it whips my nVidia 5700 and that's good enough for me!
Here's a list of supported Linuxes. Bizarrely Ubuntu isn't mentioned, but some folks seem to have it running. Mandriva works out of the box. Google is your friend. You may be able to find more up to date information than these: Good Luck!
http://www.intel.com/cd/channel/reseller/asmo-na/
http://www.ubuntuforums.org/showthread.php?p=2028
http://www.linuxquestions.org/questions/showthrea
> Microsoft ... which would let people store digital information in durable physical artifacts
> and other forms to be preserved and revealed to future generations, and maybe even to future civilizations.
When I first read this, my first thoughts were about Digital Rights Management...
I childed myself, hey, Microsoft can do projects for public good to propel
humanity into a better future too, like the old timers' IBM. Maybe Microsoft
are just looking for some good karma and good PR?
But then my hopes were dashed:
> The project was revealed when their patent application recently became public."
Someone at Microsoft smells a buck. At that, a buck out of the dead.
Really, Microsoft? Does anyone sell "I am not a Cash Cow" T-shirts?
Holograms on your tombstone? Now you can get DMCA MPAA notices when you're dead too.
Intel's previous foray into the Discrete Graphics Market was the Intel i740. I got one, agreeing with PC salesman "Hey, you can't go wrong with Intel can you?" It was quite a decent chip for its time, and the driver was very stable. I don't ever recall graphics hanging once! It was disappointing when Intel bailed out of the 3D market, but to their credit they continued to update the drivers whenever a new version of DirectX rolled out.
Intel have already made a return of sorts to 3D with their Media Accelerator 9XX series chips you'll find in many Intel laptops. It's funny, because you'd expect an embedded chipset to be lame; lowest common denominator, shared RAM and akk. But this lappie has it and the graphics scream. It's faster than my nVidia 5700 which is two years old. The driver is stable too; never crashed. If they can do this with an embedded chipset 3d, imagine what they can do when they really put their mind to it?
nVidia and ATI have the market to themselves these days. nVidia has got pretty lax regarding driver stability for these days, and it's damned near impossible to get support out of them. They've fobbed off support to OEMs, who slap electronics onto cards and are in no position to help with driver problems. That's the sort of thing that happens when a company dominates a market.
If Intel can come out with some high performance electronics and stable drivers, well, Welcome back, Intel! I for one welcome you as my new Overlord!
By widespread I meant that someone outside the US had done it first :-)
Yes, that solar program is limited to Sydney and as the linked SMH.com.au article says the people in the program do it for the love rather than the money. I'm not aware of any other states that are doing it. The Aussie Government does give a $4K rebate for Solar Home Owners, but its chickenfeed compared to what they're investing the nuclear and coal industry.
This is more widespread than you realize. Aussies have been doing it for a couple of years now. Just the thing for a desert country where it seldom rains:
- cold-beer-is-on-the-house/2004/12/06/1102182229401 .html
http://www.smh.com.au/news/National/Where-the-icy
> Microsoft has ... has put out an email call for technical users to participate in testing Service Pack 1,
No thanks Bill. I'll wait for my degraded video and audio like everyone else.
> Vista's Software Protection Platform (SPP) can put unvalidated copies of the software into a reduced-functionality mode
:-o
You mean it can get worse?
Every time Bill Gates says "Cool" the word leaks some of its meaning.
> put unvalidated copies of the software into a reduced-functionality mode
Bill, I think before you play hard to get, you should first see if anyone might be interested to begin with.
> India Brings Back Orbiting Satellite to Earth
n dc/la-fg-satellite19jan19,0,2329821.story
You think they're going to leave it out there for China to shoot it down?
It's like when you see someone practicing reverse parking on your neighbors car.
You briskly move yours into the garage.
http://www.latimes.com/news/nationworld/washingto
It happens, but not that often. When they catch one, law enforcement does a dog and pony show and we applaud wildly. But they just keep coming.
Arrests don't seem to happen that often. Do a google for "spammer arrested", and most of the hits are about the Buffalo spammer. He was arrested back in 2003 to much fanfare. However my mailbox is still full of. Maybe there is more than one of them out there?
I'm guessing spammers spam because they know the chance of them being caught is nigh on zero. Yet, this is a criminal racket just like any other criminal racket. If some serious money is put into law enforcement, then spammers might finally get the shakes. Apart from pump-n-dump stocks (get off yer asses SEC), spammers aren't hard to catch. Consider Mortgage spammers. If you reply to a Mortgage spam (I am told) you will later be called by a seemingly unrelated mortgage agency. They have bought your contacts off the spammers. Everything can be traced, and if we have the feds seeded spammers with 1-use-only phone numbers, buying stuff and tracking it just like they do any other illegal contraband, of course they can bust it. Make receiving spammed contact details an offence too: The recipient must be reasonably confident that the leads they received are not spam. Harder to prove, but if there is a reasonable chance of prosecution buyers of spam harvests will become shyer and the market dry up. Lets make it a legal requirement that ISPs have to report spamming users to the feds.
And let's get beyond "fines" for offenders. Fines for any profitable business are merely an operating expense. What really scares company directors is Jail time. This has been used in L.A. to force companies comply with laws they'd otherwise have simply paid out. If a spammer thinks there is a 0.0001% chance of him being caught (and then let off with a warning), they will do it. If they think they probably can't sell their harvest, have a 50% chance of being caught and will definitely go to Jail, they won't!
So why isn't this happening? (1) It's not an issue for politicans. I want to see Obama/Hillary/McCain arguing about Spam!!! and so... (2) The money isn't budgeted for law enforcement. With some Elliot Nesses on Spam, I reckon we can crack this. How do we let the politicians know this is an issue for us?
If Ted Turner bought MGM just for it's library of old films, well, why do Apple and MS let themselves be randsomed by record company executives?
Why not launch their own record labels?
"Whoa man" you say "They're software companies." Look at SONY. They're into everything; electronics, PC, movies, spyware *and* records. Why can't Apple or MS do this too?
Yes, we might like to use the word "Arist", but it's a consumer industry just like any other. They can hire all the usual record industry types for the spotting/sleazing/recording/promoting. There is no shortage of "Artists" out there either: The plethora (yes, a plethora) of Idol shows show you can take pretty much anybody and make them a star. I'm sure there are many eager bands out there who would jump at the chance to sign. Apple are perceived as "cool", so they could get away with this (but can't call it Apple Records; maybe iRecords?). Microsoft *thinks* they're cool, and hey they're loaded, so they can do it too.
The whole DRM thing shows the copyright laws are badly broken, and no amount of lobbying is going to save the record companies. They've fumbled the ball, and keep missing the point. Look at the chance they had with Napster, and they let it slip through their greedly little fingers. They've fumbled again, so this is a good chance for Apple (or MS) to take the lead. I reckon with their sort of money, they could drive the big four out of existance.
Hmm... I think I just did some free Business Development work for Steve Jobs and Bill Gates. Oh well. Enjoy anyway!
Yahoo in particular got in pretty thick with the Chinese Government, helping them find and jail those reporters and bloggers. Jerry Wang was completely unapologetic about it.
e tail.cfm?ReleaseID=187725
Here's several pages of waffle by Yahoo's Media Relations department: http://yhoo.client.shareholder.com/press/ReleaseD
So far as I can tell, it says absolutely nothing.
The Hong Kong Journalists association is much more to the point: http://www.fcchk.org/media/FCCToYahoo2.htm
I find it a little hard to believe Yahoo is going to do an about face. Can you imagine Yahoo executives at their next liason with the Chinese Government telling them "Ok, Commies, the rules have just changed. From now on, we're going to insist things are done right around here!" It's a nice thought, but it just isn't going to happen. Walk away from money? Never! (Unless they think they've lost the market to locals anyway?)
If those companies came out together publicly and criticized the Chinese Government, we might see something. But short of that I'm guessing it's just to make us feel better. "Oh Google and Yahoo? That's old hat; They have an NGO Code of Conduct now."
... for not stating the obvious:
"I, for one, welcome our new overlords."
Yes, they're dabbling in evil these days. Deciding if it is for them, and how far they want to go into it. But they do offer great search. Nothing comes close. I even do my spellchecks in Google these days; it's contextual so give it a few words and its guesses will blow you away. The Microsoft Visual Studio help searching is so lousy, it is faster for me to dialup and search Google instead.
> Hell - medium-term exposure to Robin Warren's homepage background art could give you an ulcer!
:-)
He'd probably say the same thing about Barry's Infomercial
> I bet that crazy fool brought down the median lifespan.
t ml
I saw a show on these guys going to the Nobel ceremony. They're actually very funny.
Here's the whacky guy:
http://www.cockeyed.com/citizen/marshall/intro.sh
And his research partner. His partner is smarter because (1) he let Barry be the guinea pig, and (2) he hates people who star in informercials.
http://www.vianet.net.au/~jrwarren/
Here's a good piece about their research and the scientific community's sledging:
http://www.csicop.org/si/2004-11/bacteria.html
Lehk: > actually it has to do with casino lobbyists, remember jack abramoff(sp?)?
_ lobbying_scandalc le/2005/04/30/AR2005043001147.html
Lehk: > he was in deep with the casinos, among others.
Ahhh... Thanks for that Lehk. Wasn't aware of that piece of the jigsaw puzzle.
xjerky: >You're kidding right? You forget that most of the illegality of online
xjerky: >gambling stems from avoiding taxes....and the party that favors increasing taxes just took over.
Which makes this really ironic: "One of Abramoff's first acts as a tribal gaming lobbyist was to defeat a Congressional bill to tax Indian casinos".
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Abramoff_Indian
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Abramoff
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/arti
VGPowerlord: > Actually, we like Japan and China. After all, they make everything sold in stores here!
Was in Japan last year. Much of their stuff is made in China nowdays too!
Google is lousy for Product Reviews. Seach for a review on anything, and you'll get pages of web shops with the text "Add your own review" (invariably empty). I guess many people searching for "reviews" are consumers, rather than frustrated product review authors!
r =500300_5120955_
I've stuck in a few feedback items for Google to clean this up. No luck yet. Hopefully Google will get around to fixing it.
Meanwhile zdnet.com and pcmag.com are good places to start for mainstream PC products. For example: http://review.zdnet.com/4566-3243_16-0.html?filte
> Canada ... look at how the US is screwing us over soft lumber and such.
I was actually in Canada about a year and a half ago and still have the paper: This was when the US imposed tarrifs on Canadian lumber despite the free trade agreement, and said, basically "so sue us!" The front page had a headline about this and photos of all the Canadian Negotiators, none of whom were happy.
Australia had a similar problem. According to the Aussie press, Australian lamb producers built up the American market for lamb, pumping a lot of money into advertising and promotion. U.S. lamb producers then got Congress to put a quota, and took the market over. The U.S. claimed this was for "unfair practices" which was just a lot of baloney. I doubt most Americans ever even heard of this case, but in Australia its was widely reported. When the U.S. signed a "free trade" agreement with the U.S., Aussie agricultural produce was excluded. A year afterwards the agreement was shown to be heavily favoring the U.S.
So there you go. Canada, Britain and Australia. Probably the most loyal friends the U.S. has.
Here's some stuff about the Free Trade and the Internet Gambling Laws. BTW the WTO said the U.S. isn't breaking the law, but its against the spirit of free trade and this is what people see:
http://www.freetrade.org/pubs/FTBs/FTB-024.pdf
http://www.tradeobservatory.org/headlines.cfm?refI D=70041
Two Aussies won the Nobel for Medicine by proving that stomach ulcers are caused bacteria rather than 'stress' as used to be beleived. They proved it when one of them, on the spur of the moment, drank a vat containing the bacteria. He said he felt very sick afterwards, and he also he survived the bacteria it was his wife who nearly killed him! :-)
BTW although his is now accepted, at the time they were ridiculed by other scientists who though the idea preposterous. Got to be inpependent thinkers, Slashdotters. ("Yes! We're all individuals!" "No, I mean you are all different" "Yes, we're all different!")