My dad doesn't play racing games, and he's not even into driving as a sport, so I'd say that he's a good control. My dad's driving habits and mine are very close, including the amount that we're willing to go over the speed limit in most circumstances. In the fringe circumstances, I'd say that the only reason I drive faster than my dad is because I don't have children to worry about.
So, in other words, no. I'm not even a particularly aggressive driver.
I'm not saying that's what Russia is actively doing Actually, I'd go ahead and take that step if I were you. Allofmp3 was shut down by the Russians for doing something that was borderline legal in Russia. We have hackers doing something that (I presume) is illegal in Russia not being shut down by the Russians. While it's possible that it just so happens that a group of hackers working for the Russian mafia just happened to create a worm with great strategic importance to the Russians, great enough to withstand pressure from the international community, I find it more likely that they actively supported it.
The problem with that thinking is that this ecosystem is entirely created by humans, and that there are no limits on population in the first place. The internet's not like an enclosed valley which can support 300 sheep no matter what. The limits on what the internet can handle are constantly expanding, and so far there's been little to no strain.
As for whether the worm is cool and impressive, well, that depends on what you think cool and impressive are. It's extremely well built, runs quite well and is hard to catch once it's entrenched. It's a lot like the mafia, and if you're like the rest of the US, that is cool. Also like the mafia, it's really only cool if you're the one running the show or you have little to no experience with it.
Slashdot: the place where blaming the article for not doing a rigorous scientific study of the value of different forms of entertainment gets you +4, insightful.
My writeup was very similar to the accepted submission, including a direct link to the original paper Well, that's where you went wrong! You must not be new here, so let me give you my perspective. I've been hanging out here for about a year and a half, and I've noticed that Slashdot doesn't actually link to what's making the news, it links to the news that was made by something. If there's a cool site about how to make a jumbo jet with cardboard and semen, they'll link to Arstechnica's discussion about that site. If wikileaks gets a new memo about how Bill Gates bathes in the blood of infants every night, Slashdot links to the NY Times, with maybe a sub link to the original memo (if the editor doesn't notice it's there).
A lot of the reason for this is that engineers live and work in a world where 1+1=2, and everything follows a similarly, objectively correct principle. Whereas when you deal with religion or human behavior, 1+1=2 in some cases, 1+1=3 for high values of 1, and 1+1=-9 when you're dealing with another continent. The Americans likes one all powerful God who knows everything, but lets us live our lives as we see fit. The Japanese like their ancestors to be in charge, Indians tend to like a lot of Gods who have human tendencies and are shaped like animals, while Europeans like their gods to be dead. None of these can be proven correct, none of these can be proven wrong, and all of these tend to get people worked up enough to fight and, sometimes, kill over. If you can accept opposing points of view, then this isn't a bad thing. If you're used to being able to see things absolutely correctly because it follows principles which are correct, then suddenly these beliefs are irrefutable facts that are only opposed by people who are wrong. This certainly doesn't apply to everyone, or even the majority, but I can see people who have these tendencies being overrepresented in both engineering disciplines and terrorist organizations.
I disagree. Sometimes the beauty is the final product, sometimes the beauty is the method of making the final product. I remember seeing a program that would open itself and then edit itself so that it would print out its own source code where, at first glance, it looked like a simple string parser. Printing out its source code isn't art, but the way it was done does qualify it as art.
For something like Unreal Tournament or Half Life or Super Columbine Massacre: RPG!, the end product is what required the skill. For a 100k program to show graphics as good as an XBox game with a fully fleshed out level and multiple weapons, the skill is in the code itself, so that's where the art is.
The problem is that binocular vision get's less accurate at longer distances. Also, for whatever reason, the robot might not be able to use two "eyes". Either way, another method of approximating distance would come in useful for anything that gets a lot of every day use.
They're a lot of the problem. If Israel had treated the Arabs rationally and compassionately to begin with, they wouldn't have a lot of the problems that they do today. However, in recent years they've shown that they're willing to make concessions; when's the last time a ceasefire's worked for more than a month?
It sounds like this is proposing something along the lines of Asimov's Three Laws of Robots, only instead of not being able to harm humans at all, they're able to harm humans only in an ethical manner.
Instead of sending human soldiers into Iraq who are able to go crazy and kill civilians, you could send in a robot that wouldn't have emotional responses. Instead of having VA hospitals filled with injured people, you could have dangerous assignments filled out with robots that are replaceable.
However, there's too much potential for abuse for me to feel comfortable about this. As the gap between the weapons available to citizens and the weapons available to the government widens, the ability for the government to abuse its own citizens grows.
If you've got battlebots, why not have one against another to resolve international conflicts, rather than destroy infrastructure and the like? We've already built structures to solve international conflicts, and it works extremely well when the two sides are willing to work through those structures. The US doesn't need battlebots to deal with European powers, because both sides are willing to talk it through instead. However, when Iraq refuses to cooperate, or the Arabs in Israel refuse to cooperate, the procedures break down and you're left with two countries that can't reach an agreement without raising the stakes.
In other words, for those countries willing to abide by a mountain of treaties, the problem's already solved. It's the other countries that are the problem, and they're unlikely to resolve their differences like this anyway.
"Hmm... FORWARD the $2,601... ooorrr..." Or be caught with $2,601 that was transferred from someone's bank account whose identity was stolen by someone in Nigeria? Decisions, decisions.
Right, and I'll bet the two different parties actually had differences in their policies, and didn't hate each other irrationally for holding a different set of morals, neither of which can be shown to be more or less correct than the other one. What do you call this dream land?
He's probably referring to the pirating as causing the cost to go up. The problem with that thinking is that higher costs just drive more people to piracy. Taking the content without paying for it is wrong, but the more you charge for something, the more people are going to try to acquire it illegally.
Actually, if you RTFA and know about the motley fool, you would realize that Microsoft is one of the stocks they say you should own. It's an argument piece, not the Fool coming out and saying you should sell Microsoft.
It was a debate. While slashdot wrote off the rebuttal, it's actually a well written and well thought out argument. Also, you'll notice that Microsoft is an inside value pick, meaning it's a safe bet stock because it's undervalued compared to it's debt, earnings and holding.
The arguments boil down to one guy saying that you're an idiot if you think that Microsoft is going away, the other one says that Microsoft is on the decline, and since it's not the big winner it's a loser. In my opinion, they're both right, although the one saying that Microsoft is a loser takes the longer look and, therefore, more risk of being wrong (what happens if the XBox becomes the PS2 of this generation of systems?). Slashdot got this one wrong, not The Fool.
The Geneva Conventions only apply to soldiers in uniform, and it only applies to those countries that signed the treaty. That's why their "enemy combatants" instead of "soldiers". As much as I disagree with what the US is doing, it's not the same as what the Vietnamese did to US soldiers. Like it or not, international law only applies to soldiers, and since terrorists aren't soldiers for a nation, but fighters for a cause, the laws don't apply.
I'd also like to point out that, while there are conventions for war that western countries tend to follow, China is in the section of the world that has the worst record for treatment of prisoners. Vietnam and Japan were both brutal to POW's. Who's to say whether China would pretend to abide by the rules like the rest of the world does?
I agree with you. My favorite racing game is Need for Speed 3, and yet I don't crash through road signs with impunity, don't cut corners, and don't use pit maneuvers to pull cars over. Also, every effect I've felt from video games I've felt from movies, whether it's driving or an action movie.
You've got to give them credit for trying though. Fox News is obviously making an attempt to distort the facts, and often the threat of a lawsuit is enough to bring them in line.
On that same note, this is one of the perks that Bioware gets from being part of EA, the use of a large legal department.
Wait a minute, you're offering a compromise and speaking as if there were a middle ground and not just two extremes. You and your views have no place in politics.
In this regard at least, they're striking a balance between the needs of professional, highly qualified people and the needs of unqualified people who aren't doing upkeep or can't do upkeep. The problem with saying that everyone should be standards compliant is that there are sites incapable of being standards compliant because their writers can't.
A lot of people would argue that if they break, they break, who cares? This is going to sound lame, but the web wasn't built on the principle of exclusion, it was built on the principle that anyone who can put something on the internet, should. It was built by random people putting things together.
Standards make life easier for the professional and those with the ability to perform upkeep when the target changes, but for the amateurs standards can be a royal pain in the ass. In the case of the web, I strongly believe that the browsers should favor the amateurs over the professionals, because the professionals can conform a lot easier.
The commercialization of space at all is going to be beneficial in the long run. As much fun as it is to have all developments come from the government and funded exclusively by Congress, there's a lot to be said for companies who can earn money getting a lot of people to go to space. Eventually, we'll see better ideas about waste management and how to stay healthy in zero-g.
Slashdot Mirror
My dad doesn't play racing games, and he's not even into driving as a sport, so I'd say that he's a good control. My dad's driving habits and mine are very close, including the amount that we're willing to go over the speed limit in most circumstances. In the fringe circumstances, I'd say that the only reason I drive faster than my dad is because I don't have children to worry about.
So, in other words, no. I'm not even a particularly aggressive driver.
You mean like this?
The problem with that thinking is that this ecosystem is entirely created by humans, and that there are no limits on population in the first place. The internet's not like an enclosed valley which can support 300 sheep no matter what. The limits on what the internet can handle are constantly expanding, and so far there's been little to no strain.
As for whether the worm is cool and impressive, well, that depends on what you think cool and impressive are. It's extremely well built, runs quite well and is hard to catch once it's entrenched. It's a lot like the mafia, and if you're like the rest of the US, that is cool. Also like the mafia, it's really only cool if you're the one running the show or you have little to no experience with it.
Slashdot: the place where blaming the article for not doing a rigorous scientific study of the value of different forms of entertainment gets you +4, insightful.
A lot of the reason for this is that engineers live and work in a world where 1+1=2, and everything follows a similarly, objectively correct principle. Whereas when you deal with religion or human behavior, 1+1=2 in some cases, 1+1=3 for high values of 1, and 1+1=-9 when you're dealing with another continent. The Americans likes one all powerful God who knows everything, but lets us live our lives as we see fit. The Japanese like their ancestors to be in charge, Indians tend to like a lot of Gods who have human tendencies and are shaped like animals, while Europeans like their gods to be dead. None of these can be proven correct, none of these can be proven wrong, and all of these tend to get people worked up enough to fight and, sometimes, kill over. If you can accept opposing points of view, then this isn't a bad thing. If you're used to being able to see things absolutely correctly because it follows principles which are correct, then suddenly these beliefs are irrefutable facts that are only opposed by people who are wrong. This certainly doesn't apply to everyone, or even the majority, but I can see people who have these tendencies being overrepresented in both engineering disciplines and terrorist organizations.
But I thought the line "everybody's doing it" scared high school students away!
I disagree. Sometimes the beauty is the final product, sometimes the beauty is the method of making the final product. I remember seeing a program that would open itself and then edit itself so that it would print out its own source code where, at first glance, it looked like a simple string parser. Printing out its source code isn't art, but the way it was done does qualify it as art.
For something like Unreal Tournament or Half Life or Super Columbine Massacre: RPG!, the end product is what required the skill. For a 100k program to show graphics as good as an XBox game with a fully fleshed out level and multiple weapons, the skill is in the code itself, so that's where the art is.
The problem is that binocular vision get's less accurate at longer distances. Also, for whatever reason, the robot might not be able to use two "eyes". Either way, another method of approximating distance would come in useful for anything that gets a lot of every day use.
They're a lot of the problem. If Israel had treated the Arabs rationally and compassionately to begin with, they wouldn't have a lot of the problems that they do today. However, in recent years they've shown that they're willing to make concessions; when's the last time a ceasefire's worked for more than a month?
It sounds like this is proposing something along the lines of Asimov's Three Laws of Robots, only instead of not being able to harm humans at all, they're able to harm humans only in an ethical manner.
Instead of sending human soldiers into Iraq who are able to go crazy and kill civilians, you could send in a robot that wouldn't have emotional responses. Instead of having VA hospitals filled with injured people, you could have dangerous assignments filled out with robots that are replaceable.
However, there's too much potential for abuse for me to feel comfortable about this. As the gap between the weapons available to citizens and the weapons available to the government widens, the ability for the government to abuse its own citizens grows.
In other words, for those countries willing to abide by a mountain of treaties, the problem's already solved. It's the other countries that are the problem, and they're unlikely to resolve their differences like this anyway.
Right, and I'll bet the two different parties actually had differences in their policies, and didn't hate each other irrationally for holding a different set of morals, neither of which can be shown to be more or less correct than the other one. What do you call this dream land?
Some would say the better route would be that no skimming would happen at all...
He's probably referring to the pirating as causing the cost to go up. The problem with that thinking is that higher costs just drive more people to piracy. Taking the content without paying for it is wrong, but the more you charge for something, the more people are going to try to acquire it illegally.
Actually, if you RTFA and know about the motley fool, you would realize that Microsoft is one of the stocks they say you should own. It's an argument piece, not the Fool coming out and saying you should sell Microsoft.
It was a debate. While slashdot wrote off the rebuttal, it's actually a well written and well thought out argument. Also, you'll notice that Microsoft is an inside value pick, meaning it's a safe bet stock because it's undervalued compared to it's debt, earnings and holding.
The arguments boil down to one guy saying that you're an idiot if you think that Microsoft is going away, the other one says that Microsoft is on the decline, and since it's not the big winner it's a loser. In my opinion, they're both right, although the one saying that Microsoft is a loser takes the longer look and, therefore, more risk of being wrong (what happens if the XBox becomes the PS2 of this generation of systems?). Slashdot got this one wrong, not The Fool.
The Geneva Conventions only apply to soldiers in uniform, and it only applies to those countries that signed the treaty. That's why their "enemy combatants" instead of "soldiers". As much as I disagree with what the US is doing, it's not the same as what the Vietnamese did to US soldiers. Like it or not, international law only applies to soldiers, and since terrorists aren't soldiers for a nation, but fighters for a cause, the laws don't apply.
I'd also like to point out that, while there are conventions for war that western countries tend to follow, China is in the section of the world that has the worst record for treatment of prisoners. Vietnam and Japan were both brutal to POW's. Who's to say whether China would pretend to abide by the rules like the rest of the world does?
I agree with you. My favorite racing game is Need for Speed 3, and yet I don't crash through road signs with impunity, don't cut corners, and don't use pit maneuvers to pull cars over. Also, every effect I've felt from video games I've felt from movies, whether it's driving or an action movie.
You've got to give them credit for trying though. Fox News is obviously making an attempt to distort the facts, and often the threat of a lawsuit is enough to bring them in line.
On that same note, this is one of the perks that Bioware gets from being part of EA, the use of a large legal department.
Wait a minute, you're offering a compromise and speaking as if there were a middle ground and not just two extremes. You and your views have no place in politics.
In this regard at least, they're striking a balance between the needs of professional, highly qualified people and the needs of unqualified people who aren't doing upkeep or can't do upkeep. The problem with saying that everyone should be standards compliant is that there are sites incapable of being standards compliant because their writers can't.
A lot of people would argue that if they break, they break, who cares? This is going to sound lame, but the web wasn't built on the principle of exclusion, it was built on the principle that anyone who can put something on the internet, should. It was built by random people putting things together.
Standards make life easier for the professional and those with the ability to perform upkeep when the target changes, but for the amateurs standards can be a royal pain in the ass. In the case of the web, I strongly believe that the browsers should favor the amateurs over the professionals, because the professionals can conform a lot easier.
The commercialization of space at all is going to be beneficial in the long run. As much fun as it is to have all developments come from the government and funded exclusively by Congress, there's a lot to be said for companies who can earn money getting a lot of people to go to space. Eventually, we'll see better ideas about waste management and how to stay healthy in zero-g.