Can you imagine every transaction paying sales tax to 8 states? Just because they have a distribution point?
I agree. This has to exist. Think of this from a grocery shopper's perspective. I work for General Mills, and I know we have distribution points in a number of different states. Should you, as a customer going into a grocery store and buying a box of cereal, have to pay sales tax for your state as well as eight states you don't live in, just because the product came through those distribution points on its way to you? Of course not! This is just an attempt by several states to tax interstate commerce, which is constitutionally outside their realm, and they should be justly smacked down for this.
Note: I think it is probably ok if a state like New York wants to pass a law saying Amazon has to collect sales tax for New Yorkers buying on its site. In that sense, it is treating Amazon like any other retail option selling in New York. But you can't just tax goods bought by people from other states. Unless such a law is in place, Amazon should be paying property taxes, and that's it.
In conclusion, I really think Amazon's argument is flawed in this case; it's not about whether they or a subsidiary truly owns the distribution points. It's about the constitutionality of a state levying an interstate commerce tax, and that's what they should be disputing.
..this is what you get in a society when everybody believes that they deserve everything and yet everybody is unwilling to do any hard work.
I would also add that this is what you get in a society where morality, integrity, and honesty are increasingly going the way of the dodo.
The best way to counter this is to do more testing, and make the tests worth more. I had a number of comp sci classes in college where homework was worth 10% of the grade and you could work on it with anyone. The whole stated point of the homework was to learn the material in whatever the best way was for you, which would hopefully allow you to pass the tests, which were justly worth 90% of your grade.
Yes, in Europe, they mostly view the americans as a bunch of unwashed barbarians.
I couldn't care less what the Europeans think. Us "unwashed barbarians" beat them to a representative system of government, have the larger economy despite having 25% less population than Europe (300 million vs their 400 million), have a harder working populace with a higher level of productivity, and have saved them all from tyranny on multiple occossians. They can think what they want, but our success speaks for itself.
Oh, and am I the only one that finds it ironic that any European would consider an Amarican an "unwashed barbarian"? Ever try standing next to a French woman? She'll have hairy legs and armpits and often reek due to lack of deodarant/showers.
They say cleanliness is next to Godliness, so it should come as no suprise that citizens of these godless, athiestic societies smell like a butt crack.
I've never heard of this "unification" nonsense until the Republican Party started becoming unpopular.
Then you haven't been listening very well. It was not the Republicans who came up with any of this. It was, and continues to be, Democrats who are always about "unifying the country".
It started in 2000 with the disputed election. George W Bush won, but because the popular vote went to Al Gore, Democrats argued there should be some sort of concessions given to them, or some sort of power sharing agreement put into place, in order to unify the country (since the claim was that Bush didn't really win the election or represent the will of the people).
The Democrats continued to make that argument as well (again in 2001) when the senate was split 50-50 among Democrats and Republicans after so called "jumping Jim Jeffords" suddenly left the Republican party, declared himself an independent and voted with the democrats for organizational purposes. Instead of being 51-49 as it was after the election, it was now 50-50, and Democrats argued that there should be some kind of power sharing agreement set up to unify things (despite the fact that Republicans still had the technical majority since Vice President Cheney could break ties).
Democrats continued to call on Republicans to help them "unify" the country the whole time they were out of power, and constantly said Republicans needed to cave in order to represent "all Americans".
Finally, this argument continues today, and is being played in the news media constantly (which is probably why you are getting sick of it). However, it's not Republicans saying it if you listen closely. It is again coming from Democrats, and they are constantly talking about their need to unify the country around Barack Obama after the divisive nominating contest. In this case though, when they reference "the country" they are talking about the democratic party nationwide needing to unite.
So in conclusion, don't blame Republicans for all this craziness. I think most Republicans, including myself, understand that there are going to be political differences. Deep down, I think most Democrats do too, but they were out of power so long that begging Republicans to "unify the country" was about their only shot at getting their way. And you can't blame them for trying.
InfoWorld needs to take their own advice...
on
Pimp My Datacenter
·
· Score: 1
Well, it's obvious InfoWorld didn't pimp their own datacenter, as they just got roasted by the slashdot effect.
Actually, there was a period of time where I almost stopped believing in God, using as my justification logic and scientific evidence. Then I started seeing people get healed in several different churches, in several different cities. I've actually seen people in my home church that I've known all my life get healed from major things. Because of years of long personal relationships with them, I know they aren't shills (which snake oil salesmen used to use to convince people their tonics worked). I saw a person who had been nearly paralyzed for five years after a car accident get up and walk, and she'd been to just about every doctor you could imagine beforehand with no success. They didn't know what to make of it. A lot of this stuff has only started relatively recently (going on for maybe a year), but it's really made me rethink a lot of my beliefs.
All I know is this: I've seen people that I have known for years, that I know had major medical issues, suddenly have them disappear in one night after prayer. If I were to immediately discount the observations I've seen and to immediately write off the existence of God given what I've seen, it would be the height of being illogical and unscientific. God is the best explanation for the facts I've observed, and until another theory fits the facts better, or until mine is disproved, the logical and scientific course of action would be to proceed with the theory that God exists and is the cause of these events. Note: Some would say that the correct theory is that everything has a natural cause, and we just haven't found the cause of these things yet. That's not a theory though. That's a statement of belief, a statement that they believe they will find the natural theory, but it's not the theory per se, because it doesn't attempt to explain the facts in question.
Remember, science is really nothing more than a quest to discover the underlying causes of the effects we observe. It does not necessarilly preclude the existence of God. So far, most effects we have studied with science are determined to be the result of a natural law, but it would be a logical fallacy to conclude that, "All effects I've observed so far are caused by natural laws, therefore every effect I observe in the future will be caused by a natural law." It makes sense to look first for a natural explanation, given that statement, but it doesn't mean we can be guaranteed to find one. And the other thing science doesn't do is tell us is the point of the universe, or why these natural laws exist. Were they written by a God? Science has no way to say...
Conclusion: you said it isn't logical for me to believe in God based on no evidence or an old book. I don't (although the Bible has some pretty good credibility when checking it's history against what archaeologists have found, and I don't think it's completely unreasonable to believe it based on that track record). I believe in God based on my own observations, and the fact that my observations seem to contradict natural laws that we've proven are in normally in force.
I also disagree, and cite as evidence the sport of paintball. Paintball is both a sport and a first person shooter, so it *ought* to fall right into the researchers target zone, but it doesn't. This is because any minor psychological advantage you might get is completely overwhelmed by how obvious a target you are. People quickly notice and blast you, even if only the smallest part of you is showing. That can also hold true in speedball as well as woodsball, and even in realistic computer FPS's (because red sticks out in a green forest online as much as in real life).
So really, the researchers got this all wrong, and the only time when you may get an advantage is sports where you AREN'T directly attacking each other (and instead are putting a ball in the hoop, for example). Had they read their history books, specifically parts about the British redcoats fighting Indians in the woods (and getting wasted, despite having all the guns), they might have saved themselves a lot of research grant money.
Of course, critical thinking and logic are anathema to anyone who believes in god.
Given 1: I believe in God.
Given 2: I am an excellent computer engineer, with dual degrees in computer engineering and computer science.
Given 3: Earning dual degrees in computer engineering and computer science and working as a computer engineer require strong critical thinking and logical skills. They also require having taken classes in logic and critical thinking.
Step 1: Earning computer science and computer engineering degrees and working in the computer engineering field require logical and critical thinking skills (Given 3), and I work in this field and have those degrees (Given 2). Therefore, it follows that I have logical and critical thinking skills.
Step 2: I have logical and critical thinking skills (Step 1), and I believe in God (Given 1). Therefore, there exist some people who believe in God and have critical thinking and logical skills.
Conclusion: I have disproved your statement that "critical thinking and logic are anathema to anyone who believes in god" by counterexample. QED.
Unless you have space for infinite backups, his method is write. At some point, you'll run out of space and have to delete old backups to make room for the new ones.
And don't forget China's infamous Dragon chip, which was their attempt to make their own domestic CPUs to avoid reliance on Western companies like AMD and Intel. The end result was that they created a chip equivalent to a (slow) 486, at approximately the same time Intel was bringing the Core 2 Duo to market.
China isn't the only country hacking US interests so whats the big deal here? I'm pretty sure we have just as many hackers hacking into not only Chinese systems, but probably every country out there that doesn't align with our interests.
Yes, but China is known to A) do more hacking than other nations (perhaps because it has more people in general) and B) to do better hacking/cyber crimes than a lot of other nations. Most other nations (example: Nigeria) have people who commit cybercrimes and fraud, but they tend to be far less sophisticated and rely on social engineering a lot. And additionally, the criminals don't tend to be as well organized or work collectively, which is more common with Chinese hackers (possibly because their military coordinates it). That's why the Chinese are a bigger threat: they have more hackers, they are working together and have many more weapons in their arsenal of cyber attacks than criminals in other countries.
And as for us hacking into others systems, I'm sure our military may do some of that, but our companies don't tend to engage in stealing the intellectual properties of others. Many Chinese companies, however, are perfectly happy to break the law if they can make a quick buck. Just look at their knockoff industry... they do more of that than original thinking.
*Of course the price of the phone is rolled up into the price of the service you get - that's why new phones need a 2 year service plan because after 2 years you will have paid off the cost of phone. It is also why when you renew your contract you get a new phone, since you have paid off the old one and are making payments on the new one.
That's all well and good in theory, but that isn't even remotely how things happen in practice. Cell phone companies actually use these plans to protect themselves from free market competitive forces and to secretly overcharge people for services and products they've already paid for. I can (and will) back that assertion up with examples in the next few paragraphs, but let me say first I hope those lawsuits suck tens of billions of dollars out of these cell phone companies, because they've easilly gotten billions in ill-gotten gain. On to the examples:
When my wife and I got married December 2006, I was three months away from a new phone and and ending a two year contract. We went to Verizon and asked to consolidate our two phones into one family plan. They did this, but then without telling us extended our contract by a full year. All we wanted was consolidated billing: we kept our same phones, our same numbers, etc. Nothing changed. But they extended our contract by a year, and suddenly I'm continuing to pay off my already paid off phone, I didn't get a new one, I'm told leaving will cost me a 200 dollar termination fee (for what, I might ask, since my phone is paid off), and getting a new phone will cause them to extend my contract by two years.
But it gets better than that. My wife and I found we weren't using all that many cell phone minutes, so we went back a few months later to lower the minutes on our plan. They secretly extended our contract again without telling us. Meaning once again I'm paying for a paid off old crappy phone, I still didn't have a new one, and I was going to get charged an early termination fee (for no justifiable reason) if I quit.
So that's how these things really work in practice. They do nothing but screw over the consumer in what really is an entirely illegal way. Obviously, if I had known in either case my contract was going to be extended, I would have said no way (I didn't find out about those secret extensions until months after the second incident). What it comes down to is this: I was unknowingly placed by Verizon into a contract I never agreed to, and then was charged an early termination fee quitting it! That is the definition of unethical, I'm not the only one they did this to, and the judge can't take away enough billions from them to satisfy us (or make up for what all these cell phone companies have done to American consumers).
Actually, I would go even farther and say that if you ever have a situation where two people need to be typing into the same section of code at the same time, something is wrong with your development process and you are going to be in trouble. I could see this being useful in letting one type at a time, and many watch, but having multiple people typing in the same spot is asking for a mess.
All that said, I'm not sure why this is becoming such a big deal right now. People in my Iowa State software engineering class (my junior year of college) made a collaborative software editor for Eclipse as one of their TWO projects for the semester. This just isn't that hard, or that big a deal...
He noted that the various dependencies of the lock are lost in the haze of 15 years of code changes, "all this has built up to a kind of Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt about the BKL: nobody really knows it, nobody really dares to touch it and code can break silently and subtly if BKL locking is wrong."
I'm a software developer myself on a very large project myself, and this book has absolutely revolutionized what I do. Having things break silently in the kernel is a sure sign that dependency problems in the code exist, and most of this book is about ways to break dependencies effectively and get code under test. And that's the other thing... if they aren't writing tests for everything they do, then even the code they write today is legacy code. Code without tests can't be easilly checked for correctness when a change is made, can fail silently easilly, and can't be understood as easilly.
That's what this book is about, and if things in the kernel have deteriorated to such a state then they need to swallow their pride and take a look at resources designed to cope with this. I know they are all uber-coders in many respects, but everyone has something they can improve on, and from the description they give of their own code, this is their area for improving.
Many would accuse you of dodging the issue with that definition. The problem is that to get those stem cells, a fertilized human egg is, at some point, stopped from developing farther. If life begins at conception, trying to tell people you only killed a blastocyst, not an embryo, isn't going to do much for you.
I think you put RDA back in. I just looked at a recent picture of him on wikipedia, and he looks more than good enough to reprise his role. If Harrison Ford can do Indiana Jones again, then looking at what I see of MacGyver I would say he looks ready (except that he'll have to grow his mullet back out).
I think as long as the original actor is in good enough shape and recognizable, you put them back into the role, and I think that's definately the case for RDA.
I take back what I said above about RDA and the mastercard commercial. Looking at this recent picture of him on wikipedia, he TOTALLY looks like he's in good enough shape for the movie. He looks way better than Harrison Ford even, so if Ford is ready for Indiana Jones, then I'm sure RDA can reprise MacGyver.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Dean_Anderson
They need to keep it 80's because MacGyver with 21st century tech wouldn't work anyway. I think the 80's was probably about the only decade when a concept like MacGyver would work, for the following reasons:
Things just aren't simple enough or accessible enough anymore. Think about the 80's... things were starting to get really high tech, PCs had just been invented, etc, but all that was still in the early stages. It was easy for Mac to hotwire or jury-rig a car, mess with a computer, oscilloscope or some other high tech piece of equipment, tie the wires of a car phone into a car security system, etc.
On a modern show, what is Mac going to do? Almost everything is an integrated circuit these days. Intel cpus are made with 45 nm process. You can't just go in and mess with the wiring on something like that, or even repair it when it breaks. In fact, almost none of our technology can be repaired anymore. Most of it has to be scrapped, and a new factory chip put in, because no one can physically deal with the level of miniaturization we have now using just their hands. And going back to the car example, most modern cars have computers built into everything, including the tires. There's a lot less jury rigging that can go on with those. And the security systems, with chips inside keys, etc, etc, makes it a lot harder to just go hotwire one.
The other issue MacGyver of the 21st century would have to deal with is the level of specialization required to do most anything. You can't just jump into a device and start messing with it, because as was stated above, most things are computerized integrated circuits. There are a lot more black boxes and many more types of engineers involved in almost any project, so knowledge of basic principles and a strong grasp of chemistry doesn't carry you nearly as far.
That said, I think if they are going to have a 21st century MacGyver, they need to rewrite his back story a bit. I think in the show he had a physics (and maybe chemistry?) degree, but for this decade they'd better give him a compsci/computer engineering degree instead (perhaps still combined with his physics or chem degree). And they almost have to make him more hacker-ish. In the 21st century, 90% of what he does would touch computers, so if they make him a reverse engineering expert specializing in software (which is the easiest thing to circumvent/mess with/jury rig), he might be believable again. I've seen clips on youtube of people hacking those electronic signs over freeways and putting in their own personal messages, and there's really no end to what software you can hack at this point. So if they took that route, he'd be believable again.
Lastly, though, I think they need to have RDA in the role, and I think it's good that he's probably in his 50s. Mac was always a lifelong learner, so you could convincingly say he went back to school in the interim and picked up the comp sci degree. Also, I don't think I would find a movie or show like MacGyver very convincing in this day and age unless the star was probably 45. There's just too much to know for some 28 year old to take the part and seem convincing, no matter how much of a buff action star he may be. So if RDA can work out and get into shape again (he didn't look the greatest in that superbowl mastercard commercial), I think he's absolutely the one who should be cast for this.
Furthermore, use of a taser or other electrical stun device in an already restrained individual IS torture pure and simple. It's no more acceptable than handcuffung and then beating the subject.
That's not true. If the subject is bound hand and foot, and gagged, perhaps. Otherwise, if only handcuffs have been used, they can still be kicking officers, biting, drawing blood, etc. If they don't settle down, a taser is perfectly reasonable. Also, I think you'd be hard pressed to find a case where the officer doesn't first say, "Settle down or you are going to be tased." Often this warning is issued repeatedly before action is taken. At that point, the use of the taser was clearly the coice of the belligerant individual, and I don't feel bad if they pretty much choose to be tased.
I recently saw a training program where officers are themselves tazed briefly in a controled situation so they will understand exactly the effects of the force they might use on a subject. That seems like a good idea to me and is very likely to lead to more appropriate uses.
This is already done in every police academy in the country (if there are any exceptions I'd be very suprised). My brother-in-law is in the academy now, and being tased and shot with pepper spray are required for every officer. Police officers all know what it's like to be tased, and it does lead to more reasonable uses. It is also why taser use isn't torture today. The cops know what they are doing, and I think you see less abuse of the taser than you used to see when beatings were used.
IMHO, Taser International is so anxious to advertise their product as perfect and a panacea that they CAUSE it to be mis-used through disinformation.
This is probably true. Taser does seem to get carried away with its advertising. However, every police officer I know does understand that Tasers may, in rare circumstances, kill someone. However, they use them under the assumption that a Taser is less lethal than a gun, and that is probably true. I know some police departments that carry only Tasers now instead of guns. This is especially common on forces dealing primarilly with college campuses, because on those you are likely to have a lot of semi-violent drunks, fighters, people possibly on drugs, and generally youthful people that can run fast and throw a hard punch. However, you don't have too many hardened criminals carrying heavy weaponry. So tasers are a good way to subdue people who are probably stronger and in better shape than the cops without having to use a gun.
Slashdot Mirror
It depends... are you thinking of the number 500000 :D
I agree. This has to exist. Think of this from a grocery shopper's perspective. I work for General Mills, and I know we have distribution points in a number of different states. Should you, as a customer going into a grocery store and buying a box of cereal, have to pay sales tax for your state as well as eight states you don't live in, just because the product came through those distribution points on its way to you? Of course not! This is just an attempt by several states to tax interstate commerce, which is constitutionally outside their realm, and they should be justly smacked down for this.
Note: I think it is probably ok if a state like New York wants to pass a law saying Amazon has to collect sales tax for New Yorkers buying on its site. In that sense, it is treating Amazon like any other retail option selling in New York. But you can't just tax goods bought by people from other states. Unless such a law is in place, Amazon should be paying property taxes, and that's it.
In conclusion, I really think Amazon's argument is flawed in this case; it's not about whether they or a subsidiary truly owns the distribution points. It's about the constitutionality of a state levying an interstate commerce tax, and that's what they should be disputing.
I would also add that this is what you get in a society where morality, integrity, and honesty are increasingly going the way of the dodo.
The best way to counter this is to do more testing, and make the tests worth more. I had a number of comp sci classes in college where homework was worth 10% of the grade and you could work on it with anyone. The whole stated point of the homework was to learn the material in whatever the best way was for you, which would hopefully allow you to pass the tests, which were justly worth 90% of your grade.
I couldn't care less what the Europeans think. Us "unwashed barbarians" beat them to a representative system of government, have the larger economy despite having 25% less population than Europe (300 million vs their 400 million), have a harder working populace with a higher level of productivity, and have saved them all from tyranny on multiple occossians. They can think what they want, but our success speaks for itself.
Oh, and am I the only one that finds it ironic that any European would consider an Amarican an "unwashed barbarian"? Ever try standing next to a French woman? She'll have hairy legs and armpits and often reek due to lack of deodarant/showers.
They say cleanliness is next to Godliness, so it should come as no suprise that citizens of these godless, athiestic societies smell like a butt crack.
Then you haven't been listening very well. It was not the Republicans who came up with any of this. It was, and continues to be, Democrats who are always about "unifying the country".
It started in 2000 with the disputed election. George W Bush won, but because the popular vote went to Al Gore, Democrats argued there should be some sort of concessions given to them, or some sort of power sharing agreement put into place, in order to unify the country (since the claim was that Bush didn't really win the election or represent the will of the people).
The Democrats continued to make that argument as well (again in 2001) when the senate was split 50-50 among Democrats and Republicans after so called "jumping Jim Jeffords" suddenly left the Republican party, declared himself an independent and voted with the democrats for organizational purposes. Instead of being 51-49 as it was after the election, it was now 50-50, and Democrats argued that there should be some kind of power sharing agreement set up to unify things (despite the fact that Republicans still had the technical majority since Vice President Cheney could break ties).
Democrats continued to call on Republicans to help them "unify" the country the whole time they were out of power, and constantly said Republicans needed to cave in order to represent "all Americans".
Finally, this argument continues today, and is being played in the news media constantly (which is probably why you are getting sick of it). However, it's not Republicans saying it if you listen closely. It is again coming from Democrats, and they are constantly talking about their need to unify the country around Barack Obama after the divisive nominating contest. In this case though, when they reference "the country" they are talking about the democratic party nationwide needing to unite.
So in conclusion, don't blame Republicans for all this craziness. I think most Republicans, including myself, understand that there are going to be political differences. Deep down, I think most Democrats do too, but they were out of power so long that begging Republicans to "unify the country" was about their only shot at getting their way. And you can't blame them for trying.
Well, it's obvious InfoWorld didn't pimp their own datacenter, as they just got roasted by the slashdot effect.
Actually, there was a period of time where I almost stopped believing in God, using as my justification logic and scientific evidence. Then I started seeing people get healed in several different churches, in several different cities. I've actually seen people in my home church that I've known all my life get healed from major things. Because of years of long personal relationships with them, I know they aren't shills (which snake oil salesmen used to use to convince people their tonics worked). I saw a person who had been nearly paralyzed for five years after a car accident get up and walk, and she'd been to just about every doctor you could imagine beforehand with no success. They didn't know what to make of it. A lot of this stuff has only started relatively recently (going on for maybe a year), but it's really made me rethink a lot of my beliefs.
All I know is this: I've seen people that I have known for years, that I know had major medical issues, suddenly have them disappear in one night after prayer. If I were to immediately discount the observations I've seen and to immediately write off the existence of God given what I've seen, it would be the height of being illogical and unscientific. God is the best explanation for the facts I've observed, and until another theory fits the facts better, or until mine is disproved, the logical and scientific course of action would be to proceed with the theory that God exists and is the cause of these events. Note: Some would say that the correct theory is that everything has a natural cause, and we just haven't found the cause of these things yet. That's not a theory though. That's a statement of belief, a statement that they believe they will find the natural theory, but it's not the theory per se, because it doesn't attempt to explain the facts in question.
Remember, science is really nothing more than a quest to discover the underlying causes of the effects we observe. It does not necessarilly preclude the existence of God. So far, most effects we have studied with science are determined to be the result of a natural law, but it would be a logical fallacy to conclude that, "All effects I've observed so far are caused by natural laws, therefore every effect I observe in the future will be caused by a natural law." It makes sense to look first for a natural explanation, given that statement, but it doesn't mean we can be guaranteed to find one. And the other thing science doesn't do is tell us is the point of the universe, or why these natural laws exist. Were they written by a God? Science has no way to say...
Conclusion: you said it isn't logical for me to believe in God based on no evidence or an old book. I don't (although the Bible has some pretty good credibility when checking it's history against what archaeologists have found, and I don't think it's completely unreasonable to believe it based on that track record). I believe in God based on my own observations, and the fact that my observations seem to contradict natural laws that we've proven are in normally in force.
I also disagree, and cite as evidence the sport of paintball. Paintball is both a sport and a first person shooter, so it *ought* to fall right into the researchers target zone, but it doesn't. This is because any minor psychological advantage you might get is completely overwhelmed by how obvious a target you are. People quickly notice and blast you, even if only the smallest part of you is showing. That can also hold true in speedball as well as woodsball, and even in realistic computer FPS's (because red sticks out in a green forest online as much as in real life).
So really, the researchers got this all wrong, and the only time when you may get an advantage is sports where you AREN'T directly attacking each other (and instead are putting a ball in the hoop, for example). Had they read their history books, specifically parts about the British redcoats fighting Indians in the woods (and getting wasted, despite having all the guns), they might have saved themselves a lot of research grant money.
Given 1: I believe in God.
Given 2: I am an excellent computer engineer, with dual degrees in computer engineering and computer science.
Given 3: Earning dual degrees in computer engineering and computer science and working as a computer engineer require strong critical thinking and logical skills. They also require having taken classes in logic and critical thinking.
Step 1: Earning computer science and computer engineering degrees and working in the computer engineering field require logical and critical thinking skills (Given 3), and I work in this field and have those degrees (Given 2). Therefore, it follows that I have logical and critical thinking skills.
Step 2: I have logical and critical thinking skills (Step 1), and I believe in God (Given 1). Therefore, there exist some people who believe in God and have critical thinking and logical skills.
Conclusion: I have disproved your statement that "critical thinking and logic are anathema to anyone who believes in god" by counterexample. QED.
Unless you have space for infinite backups, his method is write. At some point, you'll run out of space and have to delete old backups to make room for the new ones.
I can top that... we've been using it for about 125% of my lifetime :D.
Don't forget .ng (Nigeria). I don't think anything good ever comes from that domain.
Lol, I thought it was Gal Civ 2 as well.
And don't forget China's infamous Dragon chip, which was their attempt to make their own domestic CPUs to avoid reliance on Western companies like AMD and Intel. The end result was that they created a chip equivalent to a (slow) 486, at approximately the same time Intel was bringing the Core 2 Duo to market.
Yes, but China is known to A) do more hacking than other nations (perhaps because it has more people in general) and B) to do better hacking/cyber crimes than a lot of other nations. Most other nations (example: Nigeria) have people who commit cybercrimes and fraud, but they tend to be far less sophisticated and rely on social engineering a lot. And additionally, the criminals don't tend to be as well organized or work collectively, which is more common with Chinese hackers (possibly because their military coordinates it). That's why the Chinese are a bigger threat: they have more hackers, they are working together and have many more weapons in their arsenal of cyber attacks than criminals in other countries.
And as for us hacking into others systems, I'm sure our military may do some of that, but our companies don't tend to engage in stealing the intellectual properties of others. Many Chinese companies, however, are perfectly happy to break the law if they can make a quick buck. Just look at their knockoff industry... they do more of that than original thinking.
That's all well and good in theory, but that isn't even remotely how things happen in practice. Cell phone companies actually use these plans to protect themselves from free market competitive forces and to secretly overcharge people for services and products they've already paid for. I can (and will) back that assertion up with examples in the next few paragraphs, but let me say first I hope those lawsuits suck tens of billions of dollars out of these cell phone companies, because they've easilly gotten billions in ill-gotten gain. On to the examples:
When my wife and I got married December 2006, I was three months away from a new phone and and ending a two year contract. We went to Verizon and asked to consolidate our two phones into one family plan. They did this, but then without telling us extended our contract by a full year. All we wanted was consolidated billing: we kept our same phones, our same numbers, etc. Nothing changed. But they extended our contract by a year, and suddenly I'm continuing to pay off my already paid off phone, I didn't get a new one, I'm told leaving will cost me a 200 dollar termination fee (for what, I might ask, since my phone is paid off), and getting a new phone will cause them to extend my contract by two years.
But it gets better than that. My wife and I found we weren't using all that many cell phone minutes, so we went back a few months later to lower the minutes on our plan. They secretly extended our contract again without telling us. Meaning once again I'm paying for a paid off old crappy phone, I still didn't have a new one, and I was going to get charged an early termination fee (for no justifiable reason) if I quit.
So that's how these things really work in practice. They do nothing but screw over the consumer in what really is an entirely illegal way. Obviously, if I had known in either case my contract was going to be extended, I would have said no way (I didn't find out about those secret extensions until months after the second incident). What it comes down to is this: I was unknowingly placed by Verizon into a contract I never agreed to, and then was charged an early termination fee quitting it! That is the definition of unethical, I'm not the only one they did this to, and the judge can't take away enough billions from them to satisfy us (or make up for what all these cell phone companies have done to American consumers).
Actually, I would go even farther and say that if you ever have a situation where two people need to be typing into the same section of code at the same time, something is wrong with your development process and you are going to be in trouble. I could see this being useful in letting one type at a time, and many watch, but having multiple people typing in the same spot is asking for a mess.
All that said, I'm not sure why this is becoming such a big deal right now. People in my Iowa State software engineering class (my junior year of college) made a collaborative software editor for Eclipse as one of their TWO projects for the semester. This just isn't that hard, or that big a deal...
Wow. It sounds like it's about time someone on the kernel team reads Working Effectively With Legacy Code by Michael Feathers.
I'm a software developer myself on a very large project myself, and this book has absolutely revolutionized what I do. Having things break silently in the kernel is a sure sign that dependency problems in the code exist, and most of this book is about ways to break dependencies effectively and get code under test. And that's the other thing... if they aren't writing tests for everything they do, then even the code they write today is legacy code. Code without tests can't be easilly checked for correctness when a change is made, can fail silently easilly, and can't be understood as easilly.
That's what this book is about, and if things in the kernel have deteriorated to such a state then they need to swallow their pride and take a look at resources designed to cope with this. I know they are all uber-coders in many respects, but everyone has something they can improve on, and from the description they give of their own code, this is their area for improving.
Many would accuse you of dodging the issue with that definition. The problem is that to get those stem cells, a fertilized human egg is, at some point, stopped from developing farther. If life begins at conception, trying to tell people you only killed a blastocyst, not an embryo, isn't going to do much for you.
I think you put RDA back in. I just looked at a recent picture of him on wikipedia, and he looks more than good enough to reprise his role. If Harrison Ford can do Indiana Jones again, then looking at what I see of MacGyver I would say he looks ready (except that he'll have to grow his mullet back out).
I think as long as the original actor is in good enough shape and recognizable, you put them back into the role, and I think that's definately the case for RDA.
I take back what I said above about RDA and the mastercard commercial. Looking at this recent picture of him on wikipedia, he TOTALLY looks like he's in good enough shape for the movie. He looks way better than Harrison Ford even, so if Ford is ready for Indiana Jones, then I'm sure RDA can reprise MacGyver. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Dean_Anderson
They need to keep it 80's because MacGyver with 21st century tech wouldn't work anyway. I think the 80's was probably about the only decade when a concept like MacGyver would work, for the following reasons:
Things just aren't simple enough or accessible enough anymore. Think about the 80's... things were starting to get really high tech, PCs had just been invented, etc, but all that was still in the early stages. It was easy for Mac to hotwire or jury-rig a car, mess with a computer, oscilloscope or some other high tech piece of equipment, tie the wires of a car phone into a car security system, etc.
On a modern show, what is Mac going to do? Almost everything is an integrated circuit these days. Intel cpus are made with 45 nm process. You can't just go in and mess with the wiring on something like that, or even repair it when it breaks. In fact, almost none of our technology can be repaired anymore. Most of it has to be scrapped, and a new factory chip put in, because no one can physically deal with the level of miniaturization we have now using just their hands. And going back to the car example, most modern cars have computers built into everything, including the tires. There's a lot less jury rigging that can go on with those. And the security systems, with chips inside keys, etc, etc, makes it a lot harder to just go hotwire one.
The other issue MacGyver of the 21st century would have to deal with is the level of specialization required to do most anything. You can't just jump into a device and start messing with it, because as was stated above, most things are computerized integrated circuits. There are a lot more black boxes and many more types of engineers involved in almost any project, so knowledge of basic principles and a strong grasp of chemistry doesn't carry you nearly as far.
That said, I think if they are going to have a 21st century MacGyver, they need to rewrite his back story a bit. I think in the show he had a physics (and maybe chemistry?) degree, but for this decade they'd better give him a compsci/computer engineering degree instead (perhaps still combined with his physics or chem degree). And they almost have to make him more hacker-ish. In the 21st century, 90% of what he does would touch computers, so if they make him a reverse engineering expert specializing in software (which is the easiest thing to circumvent/mess with/jury rig), he might be believable again. I've seen clips on youtube of people hacking those electronic signs over freeways and putting in their own personal messages, and there's really no end to what software you can hack at this point. So if they took that route, he'd be believable again.
Lastly, though, I think they need to have RDA in the role, and I think it's good that he's probably in his 50s. Mac was always a lifelong learner, so you could convincingly say he went back to school in the interim and picked up the comp sci degree. Also, I don't think I would find a movie or show like MacGyver very convincing in this day and age unless the star was probably 45. There's just too much to know for some 28 year old to take the part and seem convincing, no matter how much of a buff action star he may be. So if RDA can work out and get into shape again (he didn't look the greatest in that superbowl mastercard commercial), I think he's absolutely the one who should be cast for this.
That's not true. If the subject is bound hand and foot, and gagged, perhaps. Otherwise, if only handcuffs have been used, they can still be kicking officers, biting, drawing blood, etc. If they don't settle down, a taser is perfectly reasonable. Also, I think you'd be hard pressed to find a case where the officer doesn't first say, "Settle down or you are going to be tased." Often this warning is issued repeatedly before action is taken. At that point, the use of the taser was clearly the coice of the belligerant individual, and I don't feel bad if they pretty much choose to be tased.
This is already done in every police academy in the country (if there are any exceptions I'd be very suprised). My brother-in-law is in the academy now, and being tased and shot with pepper spray are required for every officer. Police officers all know what it's like to be tased, and it does lead to more reasonable uses. It is also why taser use isn't torture today. The cops know what they are doing, and I think you see less abuse of the taser than you used to see when beatings were used.
This is probably true. Taser does seem to get carried away with its advertising. However, every police officer I know does understand that Tasers may, in rare circumstances, kill someone. However, they use them under the assumption that a Taser is less lethal than a gun, and that is probably true. I know some police departments that carry only Tasers now instead of guns. This is especially common on forces dealing primarilly with college campuses, because on those you are likely to have a lot of semi-violent drunks, fighters, people possibly on drugs, and generally youthful people that can run fast and throw a hard punch. However, you don't have too many hardened criminals carrying heavy weaponry. So tasers are a good way to subdue people who are probably stronger and in better shape than the cops without having to use a gun.
No. The real reason is that people are finally moving over to Vista, which is of course stopping storm dead in its tracks with UAC.