I take it you don't have much spam, where you are...sure, $1 per message sounds like a lot, but my guess would be $.50: think of the _interruption_ time it involves. These (lucky, few) people with jobs are getting paid $50 a day or more, and have to stop what they're doing 'cause the 'you have mail' flag comes up. [No, they don't have to stop, but burn someone for not responding to the boss's mail in a hurry, and you'll see that recipient watching that flag like a TV set] And every time it's spam, he merely deletes it, and goes back to what he was working on. It really _does_ add up.
But as to spam coverage; I have sendmail check the RBLs before accepting mail, and that blocks in excess of 2,000 spams a day. Then spamassassin filters the rest, and I'm down to a mere several-hundred a day in the "Spam" folder. I'm not even a company. No one here is on AOL. People have no reason to think my penis is small, or my breast need enlargement, or that I'm in dire need of pharmaceuticals from Canada. I'm a guy, staying with his Mom, now that she's had a stroke.
Say what you will about the delete key, spam is outta control. I'm personally surprised that someone hasn't blown up some spammer's house thus far.
I feel for any project who's had a good run...but we don't just live and die by the GPL, no matter how noble that is.
I bought 25 486's from salvage ar $3.05US, each. Figuring in the one-time setup labor and the each-time configuration time, it just almost doesn't make sense to build and sell them when Linksys is able to put 2.5 kernels into their firmware and squeeze'em out for only $40US.
The cheap $3 hardware is great, but the memory's harder and harder to get, they won't access drives as large as 1G (which makes upgrades easier, etc) and paying "real" money for a machine, like a slow celeron or P2 (shudder) is still gonna be more than $40, more often than not.
Now sure, I love being able to use the same core talents on every device I use....I'd like to make a 'roomba' vacuum cleaner or a robot mower run on Linux so I could improve the AI in it so it can learn the 'proper' way to mow or vac. But it just doesn't make ecomomic sense.:(
Doesn't it bother you about Jesse Jackson? Let me be clear- this isn't a troll, it's to wake people up.
Martin Luther King had to have been the most courageous black man to ever live; I've lived in the south- even today there are pockets of people who'd like to shoot'em on sight. It could only have been worse, 40 years ago. I respect that; it took a lot of courage to stand up as a target and speak his mind.
I support the original equal rights measure that he founded. But why do we have Jesse Jackson? All he does seems to incite racial violence, not stop it. He works to infuriate the races towards each other, not heal. Case in point:
A riot breaks out in Decatur, Illinois (just this year, or late last year I believe). Just a bunch of stupid kids taking the excuse of a football game to bash each other. Jesse arrives with his enterage and declares "This is racially biased- let my people go!". Eventually it all works out and comes to nothing.
Right now a black man is freed from prison somewhere near NYC; I think it was in the Bronx. This black man is an example to us all: served in the military, no criminal record, working two jobs to support his family. An intruder enters his home, goes up to the second floor in his child's bedroom and is practically leaning over the kid when the good guy puts two, non-fatal slugs into him.
They're packing up from the shooting, taking away the bad guy noticing his very long criminal record, they put him in jail. What sucks is that, because the good guy's gun was registered in Florida, not New York, they take the good guy to jail, too!
Where was Jesse Jackson? In hiding, hoping people would stop thinking about his illegitimate child. HERE is a man behaving like a model citizen...a model BLACK citizen. We should all hope to get the strength to be like him. But Jesse doesn't want to suport the concept of a black man who doesn't need anyone...he needs black folks that feel overcome...trapped...and dare I say it, slaves.
It goes back to what I said last night: the liberal programs that started out as a good idea are now perverse, and hurting the exact people for which they exist.
But notice how easy it is for me to be called a racist...bigot...asshole...jerk for actually wanting to enforce the original intent of the liberals. Interesting paradox, isn't it?
WMD aren't non-existing; they did with them, what they did with their Mig27's in the first half of the Persian Gulf War: they took'em to a sometimes-friend in Iran and Syria. It's too easy to think that Bill Clinton (around 1997), the entire UN, and a whole raft of independent security analysts all mis-interpreted the existance of these weapons, especially since we sold them some in the 80's to fight Iran, who was holding our 400+ hostages.
They were there...they caught traces in the water. Trust me: this isn't a lie.
Prove to me that (was it flight 800?) that went down in the Everglades during the Clinton administration *wasn't* shot down by a SAM to keep him from having to fight terrorism. 270 people witnessed the white smoke headed toward the target. I mean, airplane...
Clinton, like Carter, made us look weak. He hid the truth and 'took it like a man' instead of doing something about it. It's probably why 9/11 happened. Carter looked weak, too...and they took the hostages. Do you think they'd have tried that when Regan was in power? HELL NO! They'd be afraid of being nuked!
Bush didn't steal the election, we did. I was freezing in my sleeping bag, staying up until 3AM on a work night, praying with tears in my eyes that Gore wouldn't win. 8 years of obvious smoke-and-mirrors is more than I can bear. "The definition of alone" and "the definition of is"...is there anyone on the planet that thinks he didn't do it, and needed clarification on these two, well-known concepts? A man of merit (see: all presidents before him) would have stepped down.
Politics is all about making money. Cheney was one that was visible...just because he was vindicated on several occaisions about Halliburton, and the Democrats couldn't make it stick. The Democrats have no new ideas (like a tax cut) so they have to push the "they're worse than us" mantra. So sad. I used to vote Democratic.
Personally? I think Terry McAullife (leader of the Democratic National Party) was the best thing to ever happen to the Republican party. Let's go nuke the gay, baby, victimized, wales! Woohoo!
Isn't it interesting that people stating their opinion on the right use their ID, and people on the left seem to prefer to remain "Anonymous Coward"s? That gives me great hope. And pride, too.
I don't really mind...it's just the truth...and there have been several times I've been weeks-early with news, and it got modded-down. What's karma put on the table for me?
"Oh spare us your rabid right-wing/libertarian ranting."
Let me be clear about this; I'm not just some 13yo kid following the party line. Let me explain:
I was born in 1963, so I saw the 'glory' of a society transitioning from the upright, conservative "things are really swell, Dad" society to one that largely hated the government (for the VietNam war) and decided to do drugs in a search for 'wider consiousness' and extolled peace at every turn.
In the years that followed, California became the Mecca of the the Left, fighting for women's rights, pushing 'save the trees' and 'no nukes' movements. The plight of the urban poor was always an issue, too. Now...I all for women's rights, and I hate it when I have to cut a tree in my back yard (or anywhere, really). And I'm for any plan that gets a kid outta the ghetto, but thanks to liberal policies, it's harder now.
But this ain't that. These kinds of movements have largely been proven to be 100% the opposite to the original good sense:
Women: yes, they should vote, take up arms in conflict if they're moxie enough to join, and in *almost* all ways completely equal to men. But there's a very big difference between men and women, children...women can (voluntarily or by surprise) have children and be off work for a large fraction of a year. Then you have to hire another person to fill-in for that time, too. How can you pay salary to someone for that much time and stay in business? But the movement's not about that anymore...it's about hating men. Taking kids from dads that actually want to care for their children in divorces and generally making their lives miserable.
Where was NOW when Bill was brought up on charges for Kathleen Willy, Monica, and the whole crew of women reporting to have been abused by him? They were almost non-existant on the topic. He single-handedly rolled the clock back on the movement, showing men that you can grope your AA and keep your job, lying like a 9-year-old when caught.
The "Save the Trees" movement was not only against clearcutting (a good idea) but now they've taken it to such an extreme that houses in Colorado and California are being burnt up when the forest catches fire. With light, regular trimming of these forests, fires would be much less a problem. No, I'm not advocating that all trees be cut- but let's remember that even at this late date the largest use of wood these days is still firewood. (I used to work in that industry)
Nukes: The Russians had a *lot* of good reasons to think we'd want to blast them off the planet. Patton, scores of bungled detant efforts, the shhot-down of Gary Powers' U2, the space race, and the realization that at the end of the war, we both emerged as equal superpowers.
But the No-Nukes movement got a great shot-in-the arm when the Russians actually supported the movement. (They don't miss a trick.) And when Regan came in, looking like a bumbling fool with his finger on the button, setting up the farce of SDI (which is just now a technical possibility) the show was for the Russian's benefit: they gave every penny to defense. There are SIX LAYERS of subway tunnels in Moscow, intended as fallout shelters. They made enough nukes to loose half and STILL blow up the world 20-30 times over. But they hadn't published a Lenningrad phonebook since 1974. Roads that lost streetsigns went without. People went without. They were miserable, scared, and the yahoo on the other side of the planet is acting like he could effortlessly win...so they fell. But socialism doesn't work, anyway.
Urban Poor: The liberals don't understand anything at depth. Sure, hand out a little money when times are tough, point them in the direction of the unemployment office, and send'em back to school if that'll help. But paying a family of four $800 a month, and putting them up in shacks isn't living...it's surviving. And watching TV let's us know how the 'other half' lives, and they desire more...and drugs sales are the answer. Sure, it only makes the problem
Liberals are all for saving nature, stopping business, and building big government. And they're even for alternative, CLEAN energy like this...as long as it's not where they have to look at it.
They're all for women's rights...unless it's Bill Clinton on the prowl.
They're all for freedom of choice as long as it only applies the the choice of abortion, and not school vouchers that might actually SAVE some of the poor urban kids from the continued ghetto.
Do we really care what they have to say about anything? Do we really want'em running the country?
Yeah, that bugs me, too...but this is (largely) being played in America...home of the mono-lingulars. There's so much room to travel in America, we have no need for a second language.
But the Linux version I just stopped playing *did* have Germans speaking German....that was pretty cool.
This is an excellent game...and we're damned lucky to have it. I feel compelled to pay someone, somewhere for this great offering. (I was getting tired of Quake/UT).
As an older hacker, I can tell ya that it's always been a declining artform since about 1966. It started with some pretty good contenders like Johhny Quest, Flintstones and Jetsons and some short-run oddities that were honest, varied shows with some kinda plot, and reasonable at that.
But then the concept original programming gave way to shows with the attention span of a squirrel. Hair-Bear Bunch, Scooby Doo ("And we woulda made it too, if it weren't for those meddling kids!") and the truly odd HR Puffinstuff. Everything was canned snippets (standing in the air, feet a-blur and THEN start moving, usually with the sound of a ricohchet)
I think what soured it for me most was that every Saturday morning was just another attempt to take some mindless concept, put sugar on it, and it magically becomes a kids' breakfast cereal. Anything for a buck. Very few of those are still around now, but a handful were good enough to remain 'classic' whereas 'Comet Kehoutek Crisps' or 'Oil Embargo Chews' were clearly designed to capitalize on something WAY too short-sighted.
I'm not in the Madison Avenue family, but from what I've learned since those mind-numbing sessions, it appears to have been the dumping ground for admen. Perhaps it's the 'happy hunting ground' for guys who'd lost it, but were too endearing to fire them. No more originality and no understanding of the kids involved.
Not that it was not all bad.
Some things in my lifetime were actualy BETTER than these days. Everyone knows the extreme coolness of the larger GI Joe. There was more, too...I once had a 1/12 or 1/15th scale B-25 bomber. The beast went together with SCREWS, not the usual glue. It was 4 feet across! I had one of the see-through P-51 Mustang models, and a Texaco truck large enough to sit on, made of steel. as well as the steel 'Michigan Shovels' and dump truck. Both oversized and solid, too. And there were very cool submarine models, Easy Bake Ovens for the girls.
But don't think this is all just nostalgia...I'm keenly aware of how much 'dreck' Gilligan's Island was, and how I used to love it. Same for Dark Shadows and Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea. It's part past-perception, part current-perception, and I was busy much of the time between 1963 and 1978 taking vacations with my parents (46 states in 15 years), so maybe I should count my blessings and just shut up, no?
I agree that drinking sodas is a bad way to go. Yet, I still consume about 3L a day of some cheap-but-amazingly-good pseudo-Mountain Dew. (It's called Mountain Holler; see Save-A-Lot: 58 cents!)
I'm already working hard to stop smoking- that's the top of the list. If I can kill that demon, the next two are increased exercise and moving towards drinking water-only.
As to exercise: what's a good choice for people like us? It seems pointless to run in place for 20 minutes. Biking has gotten downright dangerous. Is there anything *you* do that you find interesting/useful?
I'm serious; I want something that doesn't amount to standing in the rain....ya know? Painballs? Swimming? (can't, BTW) Karate?
I couldn't agree more. With all the other crap they have to put up with (the blazing sun, about a zillion religions that don't necessarily get along, and world-class beaucracy the likes of which have never been imagined, much less SEEN by mortal man, and people starving while cows are seen as religious symbols) they really deserve a break. A big one.
But remember that Coca-Cola spent 18 years lobbying just to get the OK to make and sell it's product there- this OpenSource OK will probably be on both sides of the fence for decades.
"There are two kinds of weather here in New Dheli;
HOT: hot enough to melt a doorknob.
COLD: only hot enough to make it mushy." --Samuel Clements:)
[Sarcasm] I want to start a process where I prove that all even numbers are, in fact 'even' or divisible by two. I'll need a worldwide network of computers to set about to prove this....all the way to the last number! [/Sarcasm]
Balls. Scan for anomalous radio signals. Study the growth patterns of wheat over the last 100 years, use it to win the lottery. There's not much less useful that that old saw, factoring prime numbers, sorting prime numbers, using prime numbers in wallpaper patterns, or brushing one's teeth with prime numbers.
See also 'Chaos theory': Measure some activity transacted with infinite precision, measure it in only 8-digit precision, and then look like an ape when you can't predict what's going to happen...."it's chaos"....
C'mon, guys- start using that intellect and curiosity for real-world stuff.
I'm so worried about the things that are happening.
Have the Americans invaded? No, not according to my press secretary....FARSCAPE's going off!:)
(Exactly what kind of crack do they smoke in Iraq, anyway??!?! We've taken several towns, blown up various members of their leadership and they say no one's in Iraq yet. Saddam still thinks he **WON** the first half of the Gulf War. Good drugs, man.)
Well Linux doesn't really rely on a BIOS either; at some point early in the process it uses it, for example to use the boot track...but once the kernel's loaded and the execution turns over to it, I'm not sure it ever references it again.
The PC BIOS is code that's built much like the COM and EXE files; there's a particular way that Microsoft has settled on...and Linux doesn't use. It's something in the way the function calls are made. (Been a long time since I wrote embedded C code!)
But that's still no reason for SCO to have not stayed on top of the marketplace that is, in fact, their own survival. Kinda like a ship captain that hasn't counted the lifeboats hoses or belts. No safety inspections- we've gotta get the boat painted!
SCO was once a strong, well-respected effort, and I was a part of that, trying to encourage it's use everywhere. But somewhere they figured the software would mind itself, and it was time to start extracting money from the system...and they never seemed to turn back, until there was no money left to extract, and they started changing 'unit' names.
At one point they were going to rename the Santa Cruz Operation, a well-known company in Unix 'Tarantella'. This sounds reasonable until you try it with another well known company: R.J. Reynolds calling their entire Phillip Morris and Kraft divisions "Marlboro Light".
I swear- why do we respect these people, 'cause they look good in a suit? I don't even have a completed college education, and I had to start at a really poor college...but even *I* coulda given them better business guidance than they gave. And they wouldn't have the time to even give me an inteview for a tech position if I asked...
I'd be happy if they'd upgrade *anything* to make it not look like it did in freakin' 1989! They have to face it: Nobody (with a brand name and a company to feed) does Unix like Linux. Even *BSD, a company (depending on which one you're talking about) makes VAST strides over SCO. Sure, SCO's got uptime and a vast application library...but it's a BEAR when it comes back up, and the apps are all vertical and expensive.
I mean....here we are in 2003, and you STILL have to make sure your host hardware is compatible with SCO. How could they let this get so bad? Now they blame everyone else.
Yet, it's still better at what it does, than Windows: it doesn't stake a claim to your grandchildren's choice of operating system....and your cash...and theirs.
I started on a "Fortune" brand Unix box, but took up SCO for about a decade...I'm tellin' ya: it sucks. The management team is to blame. They charged for the Development System (cc and friends to you and me) and they even charged to ship their 'skunkware' disk, containing a lot of public domain stuff that worked FAR better than their own stuff.
I told them that charging $1100 for their source of programs and future was insane. And "They looked at me, uncomprehendingly, like cows at a passing train..."
Nobody listens when there's still time to dodge the oncoming semi.
It might be enough to teach his gunners which end the bullet exits; in the last 450-500 attempts, they've never gotten close.:)
But it's not their fault; Arabia is a primitive society. There, one man tells the people what to do, right or wrong, and keeps out the media.
In America, the president does what *we* want him to, and we get news from wherever we want it. We can open our own stores about as easy as mailing a letter....the police need a judge to ok bashing down our doors, and we frown highly on middle-aged men raping small boys.
But, we must be wrong. I hear it all the time. We're 'international terrorists' and give to the world only death and destruction. (And generally 40% of it's food...much without repayment or even expectation of payment.)
It's tough being such a bad country. Quick- I'm feeling evil- let's go drop some food over Ethoipia again...we'll save some more lives!
I had a buddy that worked in Huntsville, Alabama, for a DoD kinda place. He created/tuned rocket engines on a 'Fat' Mac way back when.
He was always worried about 'creating something that might hurt someone', but I could never see the fear in that. Let's say I create a rocket-thingy. It's *intended* use is to shoot down attacking hijacked aircraft. But what if it misses and hits someone on the ground?
What I'm getting to is, even if you don't expect it to, it could. (See also Apache) And if your product *is* used in anger, there's also a chance for it to save the day. We just have to hope that those we counted on at the last election do what we expect.
So don't sweat it- if it's what you like, do it- get paid, go home, have babies and live happily ever after.
Nope: The corporate guys (and a handful of fussy folks) produce the base product so that it can be easily quantified and easily installed.
While it's out, the Linux 'rank and file' continually works to improve it. Wether they're paid or not- for the love of the game. This is Linux's power base. THESE are the guys to thank profusely. If you're maintaining any Linux project, no matter the size, I thank you!
The drugery of customer support is done by the people charging for it; that makes them motivated to do a good job. (If only we could get'em to do documentation, too!)
Linux is a moving target. Linux gets better *every* day. It doens't have to happen all at once, and at severe risk to a person's applications a'la Microsoft. So jump on anywhere, and let it take you to new things and places!
Nah, just larger than these current cellphones that you have to open with surgical tools. If they were just *phones* size wouldn't be an issue. But to send text messages and such, you've gotta have something better, ya know?
For some reason there's a huge divide between American cellphones and Japanese, I know. Which is odd, don'tcha think? They come off the same assembly lines in the same country: Japan.
About the bombing-Iraq comment: this is what keeps all the other countries behind America...doing what's right, instead of doing what's economical and/or easy. That's why, when Europe has a problem (like a world war, Soviet aggression, etc) they call US to intervene, not the UN.
I'd love to debate this with ya, but I don't think the guys at Slashdot want us to do it here. Drop me a line, aye?
Which Illuminatti keeps telling us that doing text-entry on a cellphone is a really fun, good idea?
Whoever it is, has never tried to communicate by pressing M-M-M, G-G, R-R-R. And blogging is just another application pushing this to the limit.
We don't need to blow our brains out, trying to type (as well as display) on a cellphone....WE NEED BETTER CELLPHONES. It doesn't have to be the size of a lunchbox...just a little larger. How about doubling the size and using handwriting input? Maybe a keyboard with real letter-keys? And a 1" screen isn't gonna cut it, either.
How about something like a tricorder: snap it on your belt and 'Bluetooth' a set of headphones to it? When it's time to enter a lot of text, just unclip the main unit and lift the lid to start doing some real work.
Since before the world 'slapped themselves in the forehead' and realized we only need a handful of Amazon.coms, only a couple of PayPals, and NOT another mega-auction site, someone has been pushing the internet on these microscopic devices. And the industry has greeted this technology with a yawn. It's great stuff....but using it is very annoying.
Let's quit wasting time trying to make the phones small-and-sexy; let's make'em useful, instead!
Nah, don't feel bad; this is normally the right approach to take. Usually hearing both sides is important and the right thing to do. (See FoxNews.com and their outta-sight ratings!) Similarly, Communisim is the wrong thing to do; but in cyberspace, it works- we call it Linux.:)
My playful comeback was hyperbole; I don't think the Microsoft Corporation has intentionally ever killed anyone. Similarly, I don't think Saddam has killed anyone...in the last 10 minutes. It was an over-exaggeration intended to illustrate. I coulda used the "This milk's sour! Let's leave it in the fridge; maybe it'll get better" analogy and been more accurate.
I did like Microsoft _gear_, but then Logitech made gear as good, if not better, for half the price. Everything I've got here is Logitech (mouse, keyboard, webcam) partly because I don't have to be reminded of the 20 years I wasted installing their computer OS, but mostly because I couldn't find anything that would touch it, for the price.
But there are two things you can count on from Microsoft:
1. Dismal sales on anything but their OS/Office software and
2. Anything they touch, they permeate. Every standard they adopt, they change it so that the pre-existing applications and tools appear to break. And it's part of their kudzu-like attempt to sneak tendrils into every portion of American life.
Slashdot Mirror
I take it you don't have much spam, where you are...sure, $1 per message sounds like a lot, but my guess would be $.50: think of the _interruption_ time it involves. These (lucky, few) people with jobs are getting paid $50 a day or more, and have to stop what they're doing 'cause the 'you have mail' flag comes up. [No, they don't have to stop, but burn someone for not responding to the boss's mail in a hurry, and you'll see that recipient watching that flag like a TV set] And every time it's spam, he merely deletes it, and goes back to what he was working on. It really _does_ add up.
But as to spam coverage; I have sendmail check the RBLs before accepting mail, and that blocks in excess of 2,000 spams a day. Then spamassassin filters the rest, and I'm down to a mere several-hundred a day in the "Spam" folder. I'm not even a company. No one here is on AOL. People have no reason to think my penis is small, or my breast need enlargement, or that I'm in dire need of pharmaceuticals from Canada. I'm a guy, staying with his Mom, now that she's had a stroke.
Say what you will about the delete key, spam is outta control. I'm personally surprised that someone hasn't blown up some spammer's house thus far.
Great name!
Does this come installed with Teething 1.0? How about Thrush 1.0? Are there any other baby-disease names we could offer the KDE people? :)
Maybe this means it won't be so sappy. It hits me about the way CHiPs does...just too seventies-sappy.
But then when it first came out (and was interesting, BTW) I was only like 10. >)
I feel for any project who's had a good run...but we don't just live and die by the GPL, no matter how noble that is.
I bought 25 486's from salvage ar $3.05US, each. Figuring in the one-time setup labor and the each-time configuration time, it just almost doesn't make sense to build and sell them when Linksys is able to put 2.5 kernels into their firmware and squeeze'em out for only $40US.
The cheap $3 hardware is great, but the memory's harder and harder to get, they won't access drives as large as 1G (which makes upgrades easier, etc) and paying "real" money for a machine, like a slow celeron or P2 (shudder) is still gonna be more than $40, more often than not.
Now sure, I love being able to use the same core talents on every device I use....I'd like to make a 'roomba' vacuum cleaner or a robot mower run on Linux so I could improve the AI in it so it can learn the 'proper' way to mow or vac. But it just doesn't make ecomomic sense. :(
RIP, LRP. We hardly knew ye.
Testify, brother!
Doesn't it bother you about Jesse Jackson? Let me be clear- this isn't a troll, it's to wake people up.
Martin Luther King had to have been the most courageous black man to ever live; I've lived in the south- even today there are pockets of people who'd like to shoot'em on sight. It could only have been worse, 40 years ago. I respect that; it took a lot of courage to stand up as a target and speak his mind.
I support the original equal rights measure that he founded. But why do we have Jesse Jackson? All he does seems to incite racial violence, not stop it. He works to infuriate the races towards each other, not heal. Case in point:
A riot breaks out in Decatur, Illinois (just this year, or late last year I believe). Just a bunch of stupid kids taking the excuse of a football game to bash each other. Jesse arrives with his enterage and declares "This is racially biased- let my people go!". Eventually it all works out and comes to nothing.
Right now a black man is freed from prison somewhere near NYC; I think it was in the Bronx. This black man is an example to us all: served in the military, no criminal record, working two jobs to support his family. An intruder enters his home, goes up to the second floor in his child's bedroom and is practically leaning over the kid when the good guy puts two, non-fatal slugs into him.
They're packing up from the shooting, taking away the bad guy noticing his very long criminal record, they put him in jail. What sucks is that, because the good guy's gun was registered in Florida, not New York, they take the good guy to jail, too!
Where was Jesse Jackson? In hiding, hoping people would stop thinking about his illegitimate child. HERE is a man behaving like a model citizen...a model BLACK citizen. We should all hope to get the strength to be like him. But Jesse doesn't want to suport the concept of a black man who doesn't need anyone...he needs black folks that feel overcome...trapped...and dare I say it, slaves.
It goes back to what I said last night: the liberal programs that started out as a good idea are now perverse, and hurting the exact people for which they exist.
But notice how easy it is for me to be called a racist...bigot...asshole...jerk for actually wanting to enforce the original intent of the liberals. Interesting paradox, isn't it?
WMD aren't non-existing; they did with them, what they did with their Mig27's in the first half of the Persian Gulf War: they took'em to a sometimes-friend in Iran and Syria. It's too easy to think that Bill Clinton (around 1997), the entire UN, and a whole raft of independent security analysts all mis-interpreted the existance of these weapons, especially since we sold them some in the 80's to fight Iran, who was holding our 400+ hostages.
They were there...they caught traces in the water. Trust me: this isn't a lie.
Prove to me that (was it flight 800?) that went down in the Everglades during the Clinton administration *wasn't* shot down by a SAM to keep him from having to fight terrorism. 270 people witnessed the white smoke headed toward the target. I mean, airplane...
Clinton, like Carter, made us look weak. He hid the truth and 'took it like a man' instead of doing something about it. It's probably why 9/11 happened. Carter looked weak, too...and they took the hostages. Do you think they'd have tried that when Regan was in power? HELL NO! They'd be afraid of being nuked!
Bush didn't steal the election, we did. I was freezing in my sleeping bag, staying up until 3AM on a work night, praying with tears in my eyes that Gore wouldn't win. 8 years of obvious smoke-and-mirrors is more than I can bear. "The definition of alone" and "the definition of is"...is there anyone on the planet that thinks he didn't do it, and needed clarification on these two, well-known concepts? A man of merit (see: all presidents before him) would have stepped down.
Politics is all about making money. Cheney was one that was visible...just because he was vindicated on several occaisions about Halliburton, and the Democrats couldn't make it stick. The Democrats have no new ideas (like a tax cut) so they have to push the "they're worse than us" mantra. So sad. I used to vote Democratic.
Personally? I think Terry McAullife (leader of the Democratic National Party) was the best thing to ever happen to the Republican party. Let's go nuke the gay, baby, victimized, wales! Woohoo!
Isn't it interesting that people stating their opinion on the right use their ID, and people on the left seem to prefer to remain "Anonymous Coward"s? That gives me great hope. And pride, too.
I don't really mind...it's just the truth...and there have been several times I've been weeks-early with news, and it got modded-down. What's karma put on the table for me?
"Oh spare us your rabid right-wing/libertarian ranting."
Let me be clear about this; I'm not just some 13yo kid following the party line. Let me explain:
I was born in 1963, so I saw the 'glory' of a society transitioning from the upright, conservative "things are really swell, Dad" society to one that largely hated the government (for the VietNam war) and decided to do drugs in a search for 'wider consiousness' and extolled peace at every turn.
In the years that followed, California became the Mecca of the the Left, fighting for women's rights, pushing 'save the trees' and 'no nukes' movements. The plight of the urban poor was always an issue, too. Now...I all for women's rights, and I hate it when I have to cut a tree in my back yard (or anywhere, really). And I'm for any plan that gets a kid outta the ghetto, but thanks to liberal policies, it's harder now.
But this ain't that. These kinds of movements have largely been proven to be 100% the opposite to the original good sense:
Women: yes, they should vote, take up arms in conflict if they're moxie enough to join, and in *almost* all ways completely equal to men. But there's a very big difference between men and women, children...women can (voluntarily or by surprise) have children and be off work for a large fraction of a year. Then you have to hire another person to fill-in for that time, too. How can you pay salary to someone for that much time and stay in business? But the movement's not about that anymore...it's about hating men. Taking kids from dads that actually want to care for their children in divorces and generally making their lives miserable.
Where was NOW when Bill was brought up on charges for Kathleen Willy, Monica, and the whole crew of women reporting to have been abused by him? They were almost non-existant on the topic. He single-handedly rolled the clock back on the movement, showing men that you can grope your AA and keep your job, lying like a 9-year-old when caught.
The "Save the Trees" movement was not only against clearcutting (a good idea) but now they've taken it to such an extreme that houses in Colorado and California are being burnt up when the forest catches fire. With light, regular trimming of these forests, fires would be much less a problem. No, I'm not advocating that all trees be cut- but let's remember that even at this late date the largest use of wood these days is still firewood. (I used to work in that industry)
Nukes: The Russians had a *lot* of good reasons to think we'd want to blast them off the planet. Patton, scores of bungled detant efforts, the shhot-down of Gary Powers' U2, the space race, and the realization that at the end of the war, we both emerged as equal superpowers.
But the No-Nukes movement got a great shot-in-the arm when the Russians actually supported the movement. (They don't miss a trick.) And when Regan came in, looking like a bumbling fool with his finger on the button, setting up the farce of SDI (which is just now a technical possibility) the show was for the Russian's benefit: they gave every penny to defense. There are SIX LAYERS of subway tunnels in Moscow, intended as fallout shelters. They made enough nukes to loose half and STILL blow up the world 20-30 times over. But they hadn't published a Lenningrad phonebook since 1974. Roads that lost streetsigns went without. People went without. They were miserable, scared, and the yahoo on the other side of the planet is acting like he could effortlessly win...so they fell. But socialism doesn't work, anyway.
Urban Poor: The liberals don't understand anything at depth. Sure, hand out a little money when times are tough, point them in the direction of the unemployment office, and send'em back to school if that'll help. But paying a family of four $800 a month, and putting them up in shacks isn't living...it's surviving. And watching TV let's us know how the 'other half' lives, and they desire more...and drugs sales are the answer. Sure, it only makes the problem
Liberals are all for saving nature, stopping business, and building big government. And they're even for alternative, CLEAN energy like this...as long as it's not where they have to look at it.
They're all for women's rights...unless it's Bill Clinton on the prowl.
They're all for freedom of choice as long as it only applies the the choice of abortion, and not school vouchers that might actually SAVE some of the poor urban kids from the continued ghetto.
Do we really care what they have to say about anything? Do we really want'em running the country?
Yeah, that bugs me, too...but this is (largely) being played in America...home of the mono-lingulars. There's so much room to travel in America, we have no need for a second language.
But the Linux version I just stopped playing *did* have Germans speaking German....that was pretty cool.
This is an excellent game...and we're damned lucky to have it. I feel compelled to pay someone, somewhere for this great offering. (I was getting tired of Quake/UT).
As an older hacker, I can tell ya that it's always been a declining artform since about 1966. It started with some pretty good contenders like Johhny Quest, Flintstones and Jetsons and some short-run oddities that were honest, varied shows with some kinda plot, and reasonable at that.
But then the concept original programming gave way to shows with the attention span of a squirrel. Hair-Bear Bunch, Scooby Doo ("And we woulda made it too, if it weren't for those meddling kids!") and the truly odd HR Puffinstuff. Everything was canned snippets (standing in the air, feet a-blur and THEN start moving, usually with the sound of a ricohchet)
I think what soured it for me most was that every Saturday morning was just another attempt to take some mindless concept, put sugar on it, and it magically becomes a kids' breakfast cereal. Anything for a buck. Very few of those are still around now, but a handful were good enough to remain 'classic' whereas 'Comet Kehoutek Crisps' or 'Oil Embargo Chews' were clearly designed to capitalize on something WAY too short-sighted.
I'm not in the Madison Avenue family, but from what I've learned since those mind-numbing sessions, it appears to have been the dumping ground for admen. Perhaps it's the 'happy hunting ground' for guys who'd lost it, but were too endearing to fire them. No more originality and no understanding of the kids involved.
Not that it was not all bad.
Some things in my lifetime were actualy BETTER than these days. Everyone knows the extreme coolness of the larger GI Joe. There was more, too...I once had a 1/12 or 1/15th scale B-25 bomber. The beast went together with SCREWS, not the usual glue. It was 4 feet across! I had one of the see-through P-51 Mustang models, and a Texaco truck large enough to sit on, made of steel. as well as the steel 'Michigan Shovels' and dump truck. Both oversized and solid, too. And there were very cool submarine models, Easy Bake Ovens for the girls.
But don't think this is all just nostalgia...I'm keenly aware of how much 'dreck' Gilligan's Island was, and how I used to love it. Same for Dark Shadows and Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea. It's part past-perception, part current-perception, and I was busy much of the time between 1963 and 1978 taking vacations with my parents (46 states in 15 years), so maybe I should count my blessings and just shut up, no?
Nostalgia just isn't what it used to be. :)
I agree that drinking sodas is a bad way to go. Yet, I still consume about 3L a day of some cheap-but-amazingly-good pseudo-Mountain Dew. (It's called Mountain Holler; see Save-A-Lot: 58 cents!)
I'm already working hard to stop smoking- that's the top of the list. If I can kill that demon, the next two are increased exercise and moving towards drinking water-only.
As to exercise: what's a good choice for people like us? It seems pointless to run in place for 20 minutes. Biking has gotten downright dangerous. Is there anything *you* do that you find interesting/useful?
I'm serious; I want something that doesn't amount to standing in the rain....ya know? Painballs? Swimming? (can't, BTW) Karate?
I couldn't agree more. With all the other crap they have to put up with (the blazing sun, about a zillion religions that don't necessarily get along, and world-class beaucracy the likes of which have never been imagined, much less SEEN by mortal man, and people starving while cows are seen as religious symbols) they really deserve a break. A big one.
:)
But remember that Coca-Cola spent 18 years lobbying just to get the OK to make and sell it's product there- this OpenSource OK will probably be on both sides of the fence for decades.
"There are two kinds of weather here in New Dheli;
HOT: hot enough to melt a doorknob.
COLD: only hot enough to make it mushy."
--Samuel Clements
[Sarcasm] I want to start a process where I prove that all even numbers are, in fact 'even' or divisible by two. I'll need a worldwide network of computers to set about to prove this....all the way to the last number! [/Sarcasm] Balls. Scan for anomalous radio signals. Study the growth patterns of wheat over the last 100 years, use it to win the lottery. There's not much less useful that that old saw, factoring prime numbers, sorting prime numbers, using prime numbers in wallpaper patterns, or brushing one's teeth with prime numbers. See also 'Chaos theory': Measure some activity transacted with infinite precision, measure it in only 8-digit precision, and then look like an ape when you can't predict what's going to happen...."it's chaos".... C'mon, guys- start using that intellect and curiosity for real-world stuff.
So cool...I think I woulda wrote it like this:
:)
I'm so worried about the things that are happening.
Have the Americans invaded? No, not according to my press secretary....FARSCAPE's going off!
(Exactly what kind of crack do they smoke in Iraq, anyway??!?! We've taken several towns, blown up various members of their leadership and they say no one's in Iraq yet. Saddam still thinks he **WON** the first half of the Gulf War. Good drugs, man.)
Well Linux doesn't really rely on a BIOS either; at some point early in the process it uses it, for example to use the boot track...but once the kernel's loaded and the execution turns over to it, I'm not sure it ever references it again.
The PC BIOS is code that's built much like the COM and EXE files; there's a particular way that Microsoft has settled on...and Linux doesn't use. It's something in the way the function calls are made. (Been a long time since I wrote embedded C code!)
But that's still no reason for SCO to have not stayed on top of the marketplace that is, in fact, their own survival. Kinda like a ship captain that hasn't counted the lifeboats hoses or belts. No safety inspections- we've gotta get the boat painted!
SCO was once a strong, well-respected effort, and I was a part of that, trying to encourage it's use everywhere. But somewhere they figured the software would mind itself, and it was time to start extracting money from the system...and they never seemed to turn back, until there was no money left to extract, and they started changing 'unit' names.
At one point they were going to rename the Santa Cruz Operation, a well-known company in Unix 'Tarantella'. This sounds reasonable until you try it with another well known company: R.J. Reynolds calling their entire Phillip Morris and Kraft divisions "Marlboro Light".
I swear- why do we respect these people, 'cause they look good in a suit? I don't even have a completed college education, and I had to start at a really poor college...but even *I* coulda given them better business guidance than they gave. And they wouldn't have the time to even give me an inteview for a tech position if I asked...
I'd be happy if they'd upgrade *anything* to make it not look like it did in freakin' 1989! They have to face it: Nobody (with a brand name and a company to feed) does Unix like Linux. Even *BSD, a company (depending on which one you're talking about) makes VAST strides over SCO. Sure, SCO's got uptime and a vast application library...but it's a BEAR when it comes back up, and the apps are all vertical and expensive.
I mean....here we are in 2003, and you STILL have to make sure your host hardware is compatible with SCO. How could they let this get so bad? Now they blame everyone else.
Yet, it's still better at what it does, than Windows: it doesn't stake a claim to your grandchildren's choice of operating system....and your cash...and theirs.
I started on a "Fortune" brand Unix box, but took up SCO for about a decade...I'm tellin' ya: it sucks. The management team is to blame. They charged for the Development System (cc and friends to you and me) and they even charged to ship their 'skunkware' disk, containing a lot of public domain stuff that worked FAR better than their own stuff.
I told them that charging $1100 for their source of programs and future was insane. And "They looked at me, uncomprehendingly, like cows at a passing train..."
Nobody listens when there's still time to dodge the oncoming semi.
It might be enough to teach his gunners which end the bullet exits; in the last 450-500 attempts, they've never gotten close. :)
But it's not their fault; Arabia is a primitive society. There, one man tells the people what to do, right or wrong, and keeps out the media.
In America, the president does what *we* want him to, and we get news from wherever we want it. We can open our own stores about as easy as mailing a letter....the police need a judge to ok bashing down our doors, and we frown highly on middle-aged men raping small boys.
But, we must be wrong. I hear it all the time. We're 'international terrorists' and give to the world only death and destruction. (And generally 40% of it's food...much without repayment or even expectation of payment.)
It's tough being such a bad country. Quick- I'm feeling evil- let's go drop some food over Ethoipia again...we'll save some more lives!
I had a buddy that worked in Huntsville, Alabama, for a DoD kinda place. He created/tuned rocket engines on a 'Fat' Mac way back when.
He was always worried about 'creating something that might hurt someone', but I could never see the fear in that. Let's say I create a rocket-thingy. It's *intended* use is to shoot down attacking hijacked aircraft. But what if it misses and hits someone on the ground?
What I'm getting to is, even if you don't expect it to, it could. (See also Apache) And if your product *is* used in anger, there's also a chance for it to save the day. We just have to hope that those we counted on at the last election do what we expect.
So don't sweat it- if it's what you like, do it- get paid, go home, have babies and live happily ever after.
Nope: The corporate guys (and a handful of fussy folks) produce the base product so that it can be easily quantified and easily installed.
While it's out, the Linux 'rank and file' continually works to improve it. Wether they're paid or not- for the love of the game. This is Linux's power base. THESE are the guys to thank profusely. If you're maintaining any Linux project, no matter the size, I thank you!
The drugery of customer support is done by the people charging for it; that makes them motivated to do a good job. (If only we could get'em to do documentation, too!)
Linux is a moving target. Linux gets better *every* day. It doens't have to happen all at once, and at severe risk to a person's applications a'la Microsoft. So jump on anywhere, and let it take you to new things and places!
Nah, just larger than these current cellphones that you have to open with surgical tools. If they were just *phones* size wouldn't be an issue. But to send text messages and such, you've gotta have something better, ya know?
About the bombing-Iraq comment: this is what keeps all the other countries behind America...doing what's right, instead of doing what's economical and/or easy. That's why, when Europe has a problem (like a world war, Soviet aggression, etc) they call US to intervene, not the UN.
I'd love to debate this with ya, but I don't think the guys at Slashdot want us to do it here. Drop me a line, aye?
Nice short message. I'll bet you were going for first post. (20 minutes ago!) :) It shows it's from a cellphone. I'm with you: Cellphones suck!
Which Illuminatti keeps telling us that doing text-entry on a cellphone is a really fun, good idea?
Whoever it is, has never tried to communicate by pressing M-M-M, G-G, R-R-R. And blogging is just another application pushing this to the limit.
We don't need to blow our brains out, trying to type (as well as display) on a cellphone....WE NEED BETTER CELLPHONES. It doesn't have to be the size of a lunchbox...just a little larger. How about doubling the size and using handwriting input? Maybe a keyboard with real letter-keys? And a 1" screen isn't gonna cut it, either.
How about something like a tricorder: snap it on your belt and 'Bluetooth' a set of headphones to it? When it's time to enter a lot of text, just unclip the main unit and lift the lid to start doing some real work.
Since before the world 'slapped themselves in the forehead' and realized we only need a handful of Amazon.coms, only a couple of PayPals, and NOT another mega-auction site, someone has been pushing the internet on these microscopic devices. And the industry has greeted this technology with a yawn. It's great stuff....but using it is very annoying.
Let's quit wasting time trying to make the phones small-and-sexy; let's make'em useful, instead!
"You're right, I should have been clearer."
Nah, don't feel bad; this is normally the right approach to take. Usually hearing both sides is important and the right thing to do. (See FoxNews.com and their outta-sight ratings!) Similarly, Communisim is the wrong thing to do; but in cyberspace, it works- we call it Linux. :)
My playful comeback was hyperbole; I don't think the Microsoft Corporation has intentionally ever killed anyone. Similarly, I don't think Saddam has killed anyone...in the last 10 minutes. It was an over-exaggeration intended to illustrate. I coulda used the "This milk's sour! Let's leave it in the fridge; maybe it'll get better" analogy and been more accurate.
I did like Microsoft _gear_, but then Logitech made gear as good, if not better, for half the price. Everything I've got here is Logitech (mouse, keyboard, webcam) partly because I don't have to be reminded of the 20 years I wasted installing their computer OS, but mostly because I couldn't find anything that would touch it, for the price.
But there are two things you can count on from Microsoft:
But other than that, their fine! :>