How about selling a raised cap, instead of actual Karma?
Then cap non-subscribers at 30 Karma, first-time subscribers at 50, and every $5 you spend after that gives you more of a cap, whether that's 1 more, or 5 more, whatever.
I do not understand the libertarian/socialist dichotomy that is so prevalent among this community.
How the hell did you come up with conflating libertarianism with socialism?
They're diametrically opposed. Libertarians think Slashdot should be able to charge whatever the hell it's owners want, and that anybody who doesn't like it is free to fuck off. Socialists would think Slashdot should be funded by the government and freely distributed to the masses.
Read what he said again; if we ALL used ad blocking.
If so, advertising on Slashdot wouldn't result in any increased sales, and there'd be zero click-thru (which they do measure, BTW), so people would stop advertising here.
That's all well and good, except that if the government provides something "for free", then they are charging everybody in the market for it, and thereby destroying the market for "elsewhere" to exist.
For things like a library there is a substantial value-add in book stores still, because they carry a larger selection of new books and you get to keep it forever and read it whenever you want, and because you can get stuff like Swank that isn't carried.
For free email, the value add is less, especially if the government service is ad-free.
The worst would be government-provided free internet access, which would decimate the local ISP market. At least with free email, the market is global, so the damage in one region doesn't translate as much to other regions.
I, for instance, tend to prefer dating women who find fat, bearded computer geeks attractive. That's not an evolutionarily sound move on my part, but that's not going to make me dump my lovely girlfriend.
I think that is an evolutionarily sound move on your part, because if you instead dated women who weren't attracted to fat, bearded computer geeks, you'd be arrested and fail to reproduce.
Eric, I usually agree with you buddy, but you're making a crucial mistake here.
You're assuming this is inevitable because PCs will drop below $350.
If that's the magic point at which one can make money, then guess what; PCs won't drop below that point, unless and until there is a VIABLE ALTERNATIVE for the home user.
There isn't. I'm typing this on Linux, and it's perfect for me, but it's nowhere near ready for Joe Sixpack, and some of the things that have to happen for it to get there are totally contrary to the aims of the community.
It's going to be a long time until the day comes that Linux is ready to out-home Microsoft, and by that time, Microsoft may very well have sold people on the idea of paying $300 for a computer plus $19.95 a month for the OS with free Internet access or somesuch nonsense.
Sounds laughable to you and me, but we aren't normal.
As for the PC makers, they recognize that when Joe Sixpack sees a PC he can use for $350 and a PC he can't use for $200, he's either going to pay the extra bucks for one he thinks he can use, or buy the $200 PC, get it home, get frustrated, and take it back, thereby costing the manufacturer and/or reseller a lot of money for a non-sale.
If you think people won't put usability over cost, compare sales of the Jeep Cherokee and the Ford Focus.
meanwhile in Iran today khatami is a democratically elected leader who appears to be trying to modernize the country, walking a fine line between what his voters want and what is acceptable to the religious conservatives, who wield a lot of power in the society.
Now, would the arms shipments to terrorists in Israel be part of modernization, or just a minor concession to the religious conservatives?
On the one hand, because of the above lawsuit and other problems, they take it very seriously from a "screw this up and we'll fire your ass" standpoint, and also from a "management looks at the forms" standpoint.
On the other hand, training a new associate to sell firearms consists of having him watch a fifteen minute video one time, after which he may not actually sell a gun for weeks, and then will be expected to handle the sale without bothering anybody.
Hmm... I am pretty sure that the IBM researchers stated quite clearly that the NSA did not directly interfere with the DES development (in particular, the S-boxes).
Yep, at the time, they sure did.
Then later some of them admitted they were lying, including Dan Coopersmith.
Yeah, the US is so hated and reviled. That's why we have to heavily restrict immigration every year...
If the US had unrestricted borders we'd have 3 billion people living here. The US is hated and reviled by a very vocal minority, most of whom are jealous that our television is so much cooler than theirs.
Just like Microsoft have to make a profit on Internet Explorer, Outlook Express, Windows Media Player ad infinitum ad nauseum.
They do; those are only available for a product they want people to buy.
If they gave them away, in fully updated and functional versions, for other OSes, you'd have a point; but they have only given away half-ass versions when they've deigned to support other platforms at all.
WMP is a potential exception in that it's in their best interest to encourage people to use that format, so it might make sense to release a basic Linux player.
* Running any open relay, even a honey pot, is probably against most ISP's AUP.
A honeypot ISN'T an open relay, it just looks like one to specific sites.
Accepting mail doesn't make one an open relay, only delivering it.
* Some ISPs use some standard tools to check their customers to see if they are running open relays.
If your ISP is using one of those tools and it doesn't actually require receipt of the relayed mail, you'll be doing them a big favor by pointing out the brokeness of their tool. Or, just configure the server to block connections from your ISP's IP block, other than your IPs.
If you buy a product from me on the condition that you only use it while wearing your grandmother's dress and masturbating into a jar of peanut butter, and you can't abide by those conditions, then don't buy the product.
Put that in big print on the front of the box, and I won't.
Put it on a little piece of paper inside that I didn't read at all, or didn't read until after I payed and opened the box (thereby making it difficult or impossible for me to return), and you can eff off while I masturbate into strawberry jelly in my sister's dress instead.:-)
I work for a company just like the one you describe. The programmers are miserable.
I, however, am a system administrator. My job consists of keeping servers running, and then when something breaks, I figure out whose code broke, page them, and go back to bed.
Thus, the bad decisions management makes about the programming projects result in greater need for my services, but don't really frustate me directly that much on a daily basis, with an occasional exception.
That's pretty damn good for the planet as a whole, but rather mediocre for a first world nation. Note that, around 1800, the U.S. was by far the richest nation on earth, in terms of life expectancy, infant mortality, calories per capita, death rates, etc. This was before the age of corporate power, so it may be hard for you to believe. Until around the 1970's we were still at the top of the pack, although europe had wwII to deal with. Since then we;ve slipped to the bottom half of the top 15 or so industrialized nations in terms of the figures cited above (except possibly the calories/person) as well as more modern measures such as literacy, availability of health care, divorce rates, etc.
Yes, and in all of those nations that are ahead of us, all THEIR wealth was generated by corporations, as well.
Slashdot Mirror
Now, Sun offers up the ultimate proof: Linux is just fine as long as it impacts the x86 world - but don't dare put it on a platform that affects us.
Yeah, don't dare put it on, say, a Cobalt Raq...
Replace your primary TV set at home with one of those, and write back in a week.
You enjoyed it because of the novelty.
How about selling a raised cap, instead of actual Karma?
Then cap non-subscribers at 30 Karma, first-time subscribers at 50, and every $5 you spend after that gives you more of a cap, whether that's 1 more, or 5 more, whatever.
Ooops. Just realized there's two ways to interpret your use of "dichotomy", and damned if I didn't pick the less-likely one...
I do not understand the libertarian/socialist dichotomy that is so prevalent among this community.
How the hell did you come up with conflating libertarianism with socialism?
They're diametrically opposed. Libertarians think Slashdot should be able to charge whatever the hell it's owners want, and that anybody who doesn't like it is free to fuck off. Socialists would think Slashdot should be funded by the government and freely distributed to the masses.
Read what he said again; if we ALL used ad blocking.
If so, advertising on Slashdot wouldn't result in any increased sales, and there'd be zero click-thru (which they do measure, BTW), so people would stop advertising here.
That's all well and good, except that if the government provides something "for free", then they are charging everybody in the market for it, and thereby destroying the market for "elsewhere" to exist.
For things like a library there is a substantial value-add in book stores still, because they carry a larger selection of new books and you get to keep it forever and read it whenever you want, and because you can get stuff like Swank that isn't carried.
For free email, the value add is less, especially if the government service is ad-free.
The worst would be government-provided free internet access, which would decimate the local ISP market. At least with free email, the market is global, so the damage in one region doesn't translate as much to other regions.
I, for instance, tend to prefer dating women who find fat, bearded computer geeks attractive. That's not an evolutionarily sound move on my part, but that's not going to make me dump my lovely girlfriend.
I think that is an evolutionarily sound move on your part, because if you instead dated women who weren't attracted to fat, bearded computer geeks, you'd be arrested and fail to reproduce.
Microsoft wants the case dismissed.
And in a related story, people in hell want ice water.
Eric, I usually agree with you buddy, but you're making a crucial mistake here.
You're assuming this is inevitable because PCs will drop below $350.
If that's the magic point at which one can make money, then guess what; PCs won't drop below that point, unless and until there is a VIABLE ALTERNATIVE for the home user.
There isn't. I'm typing this on Linux, and it's perfect for me, but it's nowhere near ready for Joe Sixpack, and some of the things that have to happen for it to get there are totally contrary to the aims of the community.
It's going to be a long time until the day comes that Linux is ready to out-home Microsoft, and by that time, Microsoft may very well have sold people on the idea of paying $300 for a computer plus $19.95 a month for the OS with free Internet access or somesuch nonsense.
Sounds laughable to you and me, but we aren't normal.
As for the PC makers, they recognize that when Joe Sixpack sees a PC he can use for $350 and a PC he can't use for $200, he's either going to pay the extra bucks for one he thinks he can use, or buy the $200 PC, get it home, get frustrated, and take it back, thereby costing the manufacturer and/or reseller a lot of money for a non-sale.
If you think people won't put usability over cost, compare sales of the Jeep Cherokee and the Ford Focus.
You'll have to ask his parents on that one. :-)
Actually, your previous employer pays the unemployment, not taxes.
All your taxes pay for is the cushy salaries for the unfireable government employees who misadministrate the insane rules.
Hell, it sounds like JMS's own "Crusade" series, five years later.
meanwhile in Iran today khatami is a democratically elected leader who appears to be trying to modernize the country, walking a fine line between what his voters want and what is acceptable to the religious conservatives, who wield a lot of power in the society.
Now, would the arms shipments to terrorists in Israel be part of modernization, or just a minor concession to the religious conservatives?
K-Mart is a really odd bird about firearms sales.
On the one hand, because of the above lawsuit and other problems, they take it very seriously from a "screw this up and we'll fire your ass" standpoint, and also from a "management looks at the forms" standpoint.
On the other hand, training a new associate to sell firearms consists of having him watch a fifteen minute video one time, after which he may not actually sell a gun for weeks, and then will be expected to handle the sale without bothering anybody.
Hmm... I am pretty sure that the IBM researchers stated quite clearly that the NSA did not directly interfere with the DES development (in particular, the S-boxes).
Yep, at the time, they sure did.
Then later some of them admitted they were lying, including Dan Coopersmith.
Yeah, the US is so hated and reviled. That's why we have to heavily restrict immigration every year...
If the US had unrestricted borders we'd have 3 billion people living here. The US is hated and reviled by a very vocal minority, most of whom are jealous that our television is so much cooler than theirs.
Remember what happened with DES. The NSA said "make these changes. We can't tell you why." IBM made the changes.
20 years later, when differential cryptography was "discovered", it turned out those changes made it more resistant to differential cryptography...
Just like Microsoft have to make a profit on Internet Explorer, Outlook Express, Windows Media Player ad infinitum ad nauseum.
They do; those are only available for a product they want people to buy.
If they gave them away, in fully updated and functional versions, for other OSes, you'd have a point; but they have only given away half-ass versions when they've deigned to support other platforms at all.
WMP is a potential exception in that it's in their best interest to encourage people to use that format, so it might make sense to release a basic Linux player.
* Running any open relay, even a honey pot, is probably against most ISP's AUP.
A honeypot ISN'T an open relay, it just looks like one to specific sites.
Accepting mail doesn't make one an open relay, only delivering it.
* Some ISPs use some standard tools to check their customers to see if they are running open relays.
If your ISP is using one of those tools and it doesn't actually require receipt of the relayed mail, you'll be doing them a big favor by pointing out the brokeness of their tool. Or, just configure the server to block connections from your ISP's IP block, other than your IPs.
If you buy a product from me on the condition that you only use it while wearing your grandmother's dress and masturbating into a jar of peanut butter, and you can't abide by those conditions, then don't buy the product.
:-)
Put that in big print on the front of the box, and I won't.
Put it on a little piece of paper inside that I didn't read at all, or didn't read until after I payed and opened the box (thereby making it difficult or impossible for me to return), and you can eff off while I masturbate into strawberry jelly in my sister's dress instead.
I work for a company just like the one you describe. The programmers are miserable.
I, however, am a system administrator. My job consists of keeping servers running, and then when something breaks, I figure out whose code broke, page them, and go back to bed.
Thus, the bad decisions management makes about the programming projects result in greater need for my services, but don't really frustate me directly that much on a daily basis, with an occasional exception.
And sometimes fish are born with 2 heads...
I believe I can say without fear of contradiction that irradiating these flies will not cause them to give birth to 2-headed fish.
In the US over 50% of the income generated is from SMALL BUSINESS
Small businesses have exploded into the tremendous wealth generators they are today for primarily two reasons:
1) The cheapness of modern office appliances, especially computers, which comes from the economies of scale of the corporations that make them.
2) Doing business servicing big corporations.
The truth is, PEOPLE do the WORK that MAKE thos corporations what they are
Yes; and it's those people you're insulting you say corporations are a bad thing.
That's pretty damn good for the planet as a whole, but rather mediocre for a first world nation. Note that, around 1800, the U.S. was by far the richest nation on earth, in terms of life expectancy, infant mortality, calories per capita, death rates, etc. This was before the age of corporate power, so it may be hard for you to believe. Until around the 1970's we were still at the top of the pack, although europe had wwII to deal with. Since then we;ve slipped to the bottom half of the top 15 or so industrialized nations in terms of the figures cited above (except possibly the calories/person) as well as more modern measures such as literacy, availability of health care, divorce rates, etc.
Yes, and in all of those nations that are ahead of us, all THEIR wealth was generated by corporations, as well.