The blip on STOL Port holds a lot of mystery and always has. STOL Port is quite a work of art if you know the secret. It was formed as not just an airstrip, but as a test ground for the property roads. It is laid out in sections that comes together at different in different lengths. As a plane lands and rolls over the connecting sections, the bumping from a single axle vehicle makes/plays Zip-a-dee-doo-da. The imagineer who thought of this was rumored to have wanted to do the roads like this, but people did not get it. It is guessed that the problem lay with 2 axle vehicles that distorted the melodies.
CONFIRMED: anon 01 AUG 97
I agree that limiting the number of returns to Home Depot would be terrible (I'd rather buy too much and return it than make another trip to HD in the middle of my project), but it would probably be effective at reducing fraud at an electronics retailer. I return building materials after almost every project but I've probably returned electronics 2-3 times in my whole life.
I was a typical Windows user, until about three years ago I decided to try Firefox. I was impressed. Then I got fed up with Norton AV and downloaded ZoneAlarm and AVG for my wife's PC (not libre software, I know). Then I got fed up with MS's WGA program and installed SuSE on my main PC. (I skipped right over my planned OO on Windows step.) Now I'm using Kubuntu and I have no intention of ever going back to Windows.
But if it hadn't been for the easy availability and high quality of Firefox on Windows, I would never have switched to Linux. Firefox is the best weapon in the whole FOSS arsenal.
I agree that because the tests are less than perfect, there is a serious potential for misuse. But I think it depends on the threshold.
A few years ago in RI there were two fatal "road rage" incidents. In the first, there were two guys in traffic. If my memory serves, one cut off the other one. The guy who got cut off then chased the first guy down and pulled him over. Words were exchanged, then guy #2 walks back to his car, pulls a crossbow (!) out of his trunk, and shoots the first guy dead. In the second incident, a guy was cut off in traffic and attempted to chase the perpatrator. He got confused and pulled over the wrong car. He then got out of his car, walked up the the car he had just pulled over, and stabbed the (innocent) gentleman fatally in the heart.
Normal people don't DO that! It doesn't matter if they're geeks, jocks, executive VPs, or what -- it's just ABNORMAL.
I have to think that had these two men taken some sort of "propensity towards violence" test they'd have failed miserably. (Or passed, depending on your point-of-view.) I think we've all met people like this. They're angry. They can't let things go. Everything that happens to them is 1) deliberate and 2) a personal slight. THEY never make mistakes, which is why they can so safely assume that YOUR mistake was a pointed attempt to harrass or humiliate them.
When people "snap", it's almost never a case of a normal person who's cracked under the pressure. It's almost always one of those angry, self-centered pr*cks who's lost his last shred of self-control. Normal people don't WANT to hurt others. They might like the idea in the abstract, but if you put a knife in their hand and tell them to hurt someone, they won't. (That's why the military needs to train their soldiers to be killers.) Normal people also recognize that most of what happens happens/despite/ them; not/because/ of them.
If the test threshold were set high enough, only REAL psychos would get flagged. You'd have false negatives, but you'd at least be identifying SOME of the nuts.
Mind you, I have no confidence that a) the test would be used correctly, b) students wouldn't screw around with their answers, or c) you could legally do anything about it if you DID find out that Mr. So-And-So was a ticking time bomb. I also think that the test is utterly pointless for anyone younger than about 14. But if the concept could be successfully implemented, I think it would be an improvement.
P.S. If you're ever in RI and get chased by a man with a crossbow, keep driving...
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The blip on STOL Port holds a lot of mystery and always has. STOL Port is quite a work of art if you know the secret. It was formed as not just an airstrip, but as a test ground for the property roads. It is laid out in sections that comes together at different in different lengths. As a plane lands and rolls over the connecting sections, the bumping from a single axle vehicle makes/plays Zip-a-dee-doo-da. The imagineer who thought of this was rumored to have wanted to do the roads like this, but people did not get it. It is guessed that the problem lay with 2 axle vehicles that distorted the melodies. CONFIRMED: anon 01 AUG 97
I agree that limiting the number of returns to Home Depot would be terrible (I'd rather buy too much and return it than make another trip to HD in the middle of my project), but it would probably be effective at reducing fraud at an electronics retailer. I return building materials after almost every project but I've probably returned electronics 2-3 times in my whole life.
It's not bad advice. Breaking the rules requires an understanding of the rules to make it effective.
I was a typical Windows user, until about three years ago I decided to try Firefox. I was impressed. Then I got fed up with Norton AV and downloaded ZoneAlarm and AVG for my wife's PC (not libre software, I know). Then I got fed up with MS's WGA program and installed SuSE on my main PC. (I skipped right over my planned OO on Windows step.) Now I'm using Kubuntu and I have no intention of ever going back to Windows.
But if it hadn't been for the easy availability and high quality of Firefox on Windows, I would never have switched to Linux. Firefox is the best weapon in the whole FOSS arsenal.
I agree that because the tests are less than perfect, there is a serious potential for misuse. But I think it depends on the threshold.
/despite/ them; not /because/ of them.
A few years ago in RI there were two fatal "road rage" incidents. In the first, there were two guys in traffic. If my memory serves, one cut off the other one. The guy who got cut off then chased the first guy down and pulled him over. Words were exchanged, then guy #2 walks back to his car, pulls a crossbow (!) out of his trunk, and shoots the first guy dead. In the second incident, a guy was cut off in traffic and attempted to chase the perpatrator. He got confused and pulled over the wrong car. He then got out of his car, walked up the the car he had just pulled over, and stabbed the (innocent) gentleman fatally in the heart.
Normal people don't DO that! It doesn't matter if they're geeks, jocks, executive VPs, or what -- it's just ABNORMAL.
I have to think that had these two men taken some sort of "propensity towards violence" test they'd have failed miserably. (Or passed, depending on your point-of-view.) I think we've all met people like this. They're angry. They can't let things go. Everything that happens to them is 1) deliberate and 2) a personal slight. THEY never make mistakes, which is why they can so safely assume that YOUR mistake was a pointed attempt to harrass or humiliate them.
When people "snap", it's almost never a case of a normal person who's cracked under the pressure. It's almost always one of those angry, self-centered pr*cks who's lost his last shred of self-control. Normal people don't WANT to hurt others. They might like the idea in the abstract, but if you put a knife in their hand and tell them to hurt someone, they won't. (That's why the military needs to train their soldiers to be killers.) Normal people also recognize that most of what happens happens
If the test threshold were set high enough, only REAL psychos would get flagged. You'd have false negatives, but you'd at least be identifying SOME of the nuts.
Mind you, I have no confidence that a) the test would be used correctly, b) students wouldn't screw around with their answers, or c) you could legally do anything about it if you DID find out that Mr. So-And-So was a ticking time bomb. I also think that the test is utterly pointless for anyone younger than about 14. But if the concept could be successfully implemented, I think it would be an improvement.
P.S. If you're ever in RI and get chased by a man with a crossbow, keep driving...