Will they be able to scan these things in the future using some kind of nanotech viewing device? Nanoscopic devices with all kinds of testing equipment, exploring microscopic things, could be like ants touring a parking lot; instead of us zooming in, they're zooming out.
I also imagine nanites being less destructive, what with being able to slip in between even molecules without having to "measure with microscope, mark with sharpie, cut with ace" (relatively speaking).
They think that the line up of fifteen people is proof of the store's popularity and that they'll adequately fulfill their profit margins.
Plus they know you'll go home, watch some American Idol, and in the process you'll forget your Slashdot musings about how stupid their management is in hiring so few employees, and then come back to them another day.
BTW American Idol trials started yesterday! Politics be damned, I've got to watch Simon be a grade-A jackass again! Isn't apathy fun!
"-- How do you have to wait an hour for HL2 in Steam to unlock?"
You have to log into a remote server to get permission to play the single player game the first time you (re)install it, whether you bought it on CD at the store or got it online via steam. The pirate version gets you into the game right away, no asking anyone for permission. When Valve goes away or stops supporting their product, HL2 will be unplayable; the pirate version will be playable, though.
"-- How does the pirate version load and play faster off the CD than from Steam?"
The pirate version has no CD check. No delays and no CD drive incompatibility issues.
The pirate version, on the other hand, gets your hands on the product right away.
"All I can say is, that was really inconvenient that you couldn't figure out a way to connect to the net for 9 frickin' months. The only answer is "DOH, shoulda thought about that possibility before buying through Steam!""
Why should I ever need to go online in order to activate a single player game? Or any software, for that matter? I should be able to start it up in a log cabin. But then this is the state of software now; you need to log in and beg permission to run the program you paid money for.
The pirate version, on the other hand, gets your hands on the product right away.
"You are over-exaggerating. Yeah, get the pirated DVD, and it's like videotape on DVD"
Again, with pirated DVDs, you get your product, right away, the way you want it, and the corporations don't get to force you to wait or have it on their terms.
Imagine buying a car and then having to a) call Toyota for permission to unlock the door b) call them again for permission to turn it on and drive it c) sit in the parking lot and listen to ads before you drive off.
Would you tolerate that for a car? No? Well then, why would we tolerate that for software?
Actually they need more academic events than just the spelling bee.
That's the problem with this anti-intellectual country; if you flunk out in school and can dunk a ball, you make millions; meanwhile all the intelligence-needing jobs are going overseas, leaving a boatload of well achieved college grads without a job (indeed, more college grads are out of jobs than high school dropouts).
Today's topic is pollution, not global warming (which has been proven to be caused by man - an issue only disputed by people already exposed as paid oil industry shills).
And yes, you are totally out to lunch: we need to stop those chemicals from seeping into our oceans first, before anything else. In case you haven't noticed, organisms are feeding off that stuff and turning into health hazards.
I mean, unless you just like a life without ever seeing a dolphin, eating a shrimp or what not.
The changes in the ocean have nothing to do with the chemicals we dump in the sea. The ocean is far too resilient to be affected by man. And if it isn't, then the free market will care for it. And if the ocean isn't resilient and the free market doesn't want to take care of it, then maybe the ocean and its life forms are not worth saving.
Any questions?
PS: Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind is fiction, I tell you. Fiction!
Oh man, the football and basketball couch jocks will go ape crap over seeing nerds listed as (cyber)athletes and their matches listed as "sporting events".
I remember when ESPN had a "Magic: The Gathering" (in Tokyo, I believe). My coworkers at the time were throwing a hissyfit!
I've heard that automation is highly prevalent in the IT industry and that it's taking even more jobs than offshoring. I kinda laughed out loud at the idea that it's taking a lot of coder jobs, but now I see this foolish trend actually exists.
Automation can only go so far. This is a rubber band phenomenom that will snap back into proper size when automation turns out to fail.
Failure is a guaranteed and major part of any effort to convert analog to digital. Programming is highly analog, believe it or not - it involves a lot of "analog" creativity, even in the optimization process. This is why pure machine language code will always be faster - even if more horribly difficult - than any high level code. Having a machine - programmed by fallible humans - checking fallible code - is just another path for potential failure.
It also has another nastier effect - programmers will get lazier and expect the machine to check their code. If the machine misses something, what experience do they have to catch it?
Inevitably these errors pile up and it'll come down to a human - or team of humans - to dig into the guts of the code and find out what's really wrong. If all this automation actually happens, who will get the job experience to fix all the bugs that got by the automated software checkers?
Because if they do not, Wal Mart WILL decide they want to compete against Circuit City and they'll get into it.
Of course, the **AA suing Wal Mart is like Hideo Nomo swinging a baseball bat at Godzilla. It would look heroic in an advertisement but in real life, Godzilla would swat him into the next geological era. Kinda like Wal Mart will do to the **AA.
Even if they win, they lose. Wal Mart could say either "We won't distribute your stuff at our stores" or, "We demand you sell it at a loss."
Everyone knows Sony is better on its word than MS: if they say the PS3 is coming out, it's coming out, and in large numbers. Mistakes in the past aside, they won't make the same mistake MS did with the 360.
No, indeed, they are making other mistakes.
Disclaimer: I plan on getting a PS3 on the release day.
The doom and gloom talk surround Sony is based on (by order of importance):
a) the arguably prohibitively high price of the PS3 b) the staggering loss it is nonetheless taking per unit sold c) whether or not Blu-Ray will dominate or crash and burn as a next gen DVD format d) the difficulty of programming games for such an ubercomplex processor
In short, if the production cost per unit is too high and the price at the store is too high for customers to buy, Sony may be digging its grave one inch deeper with each unit that comes out.
But I still want one. I'm banking on the PS3 delivering what I crave - gargantuan Speedtree-enhanced environments with very smart interactive NPC's in a nonlinear universe as diverse as Morrowind and Oblivion combined plus as fast and frenzied as Ninety Nine Nights! [PS3 fan boy mode on, must stop now.]
"Simple, companies lay down their own copper or fiber. Verizon already did it a few towns away from me, as they've been doing around the country. But I'm probably not going to see any of that fiber for another few years. Not because Comcast will say no, but because Verizon has to negotiate with each municipality to get a franchise, a process that can take years."
Simple? You call that simple? Even with no regulation involved, that is an extremely expensive proposition. You're running c/f through the streets but then how many central offices will that require? How many customers do you think you will pick up? Granted, strategy #1 is to go for the customers who have no service, but how far will that go? Stop me if I'm speaking in error here.
Verizon might be able to do that for a few cities, but the reality is that most companies prefer to open up existing network's c/f and use it instead, for a VERY good reason: it costs millions, or billions, to run your own c/f network. If they can't do that, competition will be quite stifled even without regulation. Again, please feel free to stop me if I'm speaking in error here.
Plus, some of that 'regulation' may have to do with the constant tearing up of roads to put an ISP's c/f in, and the re-tearing up of roads for putting in another ISP's network. Imagine doing that over and over again for each new competitor. Traffic problems, anyone?
In summary? The word 'natural barrier to entry' comes to mind. Without regulation, these barriers still exist by the sheer nature of the scope of the project.
"Well I at least consider a "no income tax" law to be less relevant than say, cheaper medicine, stem cell research funding, getting homeless people off the streets, helping Africa fight AIDS, Iraq, getting more jobs, and a plethora of other issues. I can also almost guarentee that there will be pork added. A bill like you describe would have people just itching to add things to it. As for poorly-worded, that depends on which intern had the job of typing up the draft. By the way, thanks for mentioning the Do Not Call List. Do you remember that list of exceptions such as political groups and candidates?"
But if even the laws you like will be loaded with pork... does that not damage the credibility of all the "reduce Government NOW!" legislation that Libertarians are dreaming of? Congress will be needed to act to repeal all that evil "regulation"; in so doing, who knows what pork could come of that?
What I'm saying here is your goal is self contradictory.
And yes, I do remember that list of exceptions. I haven't received those calls. I felt very lonely during election season. Ok, no I didn't... but still... heheh... ok I admit, YMMV on that one. Some people will get those "exempt" calls. But come on, the DNC act cut down 99% of the friggin calls. It's outrageously effective for the majority of us who use it. I believe we can agree the DNC act is an exception to the alleged "rule" that Congress always makes bad laws. I can also cite the Civil Rights Act of 1964 as having solved more problems than it created... of course, white supremacists would disagree.....
By the way, just so you know, Net Neutrality is the status quo, and has been ever since these 'internets' were created. It is ISPs and Telco's, not us evil opensourceniks, that are trying to change things.
De regulation won't allow for more ISP's to happen.
a) the copper or fiber was all laid by one telco in a certain region. b) the telco of that region thus owns all that fiber or copper. c) the telco of that region which owns that fiber or copper, can flatly refuse to allow any ISPs on there. d) deregulation makes it easier for them to refuse.
Exactly how does competition happen then?
BTW Congress isn't entirely inefficient like you claim it is; after the Do Not Call List came into being, my telemarketing calls dwindled to ZERO. No "market research" calls, and not even any political calls.
So no, not all legislation passed by Congress is poorly worded or takes attention away from more important issues.
Going by your logic, a "no income tax" law would also be "poorly-worded, include all kinds of pork, and ultimately takes attention away from more important issues."
Let's see. Star Trek will no doubt want to win the special effects arms race, so I'm betting the box office take minus cost of production divided by the amount of days in production will reach warp one - over $186,000 bucks a second.:)
And I can tell you, the mouse and keyboard are a far more accurate way to move, point and shoot, than any console controller.
I say this after kicking tail in Halo, Halo 2, Perfect Dark: Zero, Area 51 and Doom 3 (all deathmatch) PLUS countless single player games. I've also played Oblivion, Kameo: Elements of Power, Fable, Beyond Good & Evil, Prince of Persia (all 3 new versions), and other 3rd player games, and once again, with Oblivion, PoP, Fable, and BG&E, the mouse/keyboard points me to my target a lot faster than a console controller.
It was already going downhill by then, but when they decided to put that horrible disgrace of a show on TV, I stopped watching the channel forever.
The way they dehumanize women on that show all in favor of the almighty 'middle aged man' class (and I'm 35, mind you, I believe that puts me close to ground zero), makes my stomach turn. And I've tried to just appreciate the humor, too... at least until it dawns on me after 5 minutes that there is no humor just shock jock b.s. most likely from people who wish they could get laid.
Slashdot Mirror
Will they be able to scan these things in the future using some kind of nanotech viewing device? Nanoscopic devices with all kinds of testing equipment, exploring microscopic things, could be like ants touring a parking lot; instead of us zooming in, they're zooming out.
I also imagine nanites being less destructive, what with being able to slip in between even molecules without having to "measure with microscope, mark with sharpie, cut with ace" (relatively speaking).
They think that the line up of fifteen people is proof of the store's popularity and that they'll adequately fulfill their profit margins.
Plus they know you'll go home, watch some American Idol, and in the process you'll forget your Slashdot musings about how stupid their management is in hiring so few employees, and then come back to them another day.
BTW American Idol trials started yesterday! Politics be damned, I've got to watch Simon be a grade-A jackass again! Isn't apathy fun!
Actually, I got plenty of help for boneheaded questions on freenode's #linux.
Perhaps somehow you got routed to EFnet one day and didn't notice it?
The parent post needs a whole lotta +mod
"-- How do you have to wait an hour for HL2 in Steam to unlock?"
You have to log into a remote server to get permission to play the single player game the first time you (re)install it, whether you bought it on CD at the store or got it online via steam. The pirate version gets you into the game right away, no asking anyone for permission. When Valve goes away or stops supporting their product, HL2 will be unplayable; the pirate version will be playable, though.
"-- How does the pirate version load and play faster off the CD than from Steam?"
The pirate version has no CD check. No delays and no CD drive incompatibility issues.
The pirate version, on the other hand, gets your hands on the product right away.
"All I can say is, that was really inconvenient that you couldn't figure out a way to connect to the net for 9 frickin' months. The only answer is "DOH, shoulda thought about that possibility before buying through Steam!""
Why should I ever need to go online in order to activate a single player game? Or any software, for that matter? I should be able to start it up in a log cabin. But then this is the state of software now; you need to log in and beg permission to run the program you paid money for.
The pirate version, on the other hand, gets your hands on the product right away.
"You are over-exaggerating. Yeah, get the pirated DVD, and it's like videotape on DVD"
Again, with pirated DVDs, you get your product, right away, the way you want it, and the corporations don't get to force you to wait or have it on their terms.
Imagine buying a car and then having to
a) call Toyota for permission to unlock the door
b) call them again for permission to turn it on and drive it
c) sit in the parking lot and listen to ads before you drive off.
Would you tolerate that for a car? No? Well then, why would we tolerate that for software?
And it's 'Gnu Public License', thank you very much.
Actually they need more academic events than just the spelling bee.
That's the problem with this anti-intellectual country; if you flunk out in school and can dunk a ball, you make millions; meanwhile all the intelligence-needing jobs are going overseas, leaving a boatload of well achieved college grads without a job (indeed, more college grads are out of jobs than high school dropouts).
The cops will be required by the **AA to scan all cars with special equipment that detects copyright infringing data on CDs and DVDs.
Oh wait, I'm giving them ideas.........
Today's topic is pollution, not global warming (which has been proven to be caused by man - an issue only disputed by people already exposed as paid oil industry shills).
And yes, you are totally out to lunch: we need to stop those chemicals from seeping into our oceans first, before anything else. In case you haven't noticed, organisms are feeding off that stuff and turning into health hazards.
I mean, unless you just like a life without ever seeing a dolphin, eating a shrimp or what not.
And I STILL think that "Try moving to a country with better social programs, you fucking bum" AC is a flaming retard.
Woah, did I just say that???
The changes in the ocean have nothing to do with the chemicals we dump in the sea. The ocean is far too resilient to be affected by man. And if it isn't, then the free market will care for it. And if the ocean isn't resilient and the free market doesn't want to take care of it, then maybe the ocean and its life forms are not worth saving.
Any questions?
PS: Nausicaa of the Valley of the Wind is fiction, I tell you. Fiction!
[neo con / libertarian parody off]
Oh man, the football and basketball couch jocks will go ape crap over seeing nerds listed as (cyber)athletes and their matches listed as "sporting events".
I remember when ESPN had a "Magic: The Gathering" (in Tokyo, I believe). My coworkers at the time were throwing a hissyfit!
I've heard that automation is highly prevalent in the IT industry and that it's taking even more jobs than offshoring. I kinda laughed out loud at the idea that it's taking a lot of coder jobs, but now I see this foolish trend actually exists.
Automation can only go so far. This is a rubber band phenomenom that will snap back into proper size when automation turns out to fail.
Failure is a guaranteed and major part of any effort to convert analog to digital. Programming is highly analog, believe it or not - it involves a lot of "analog" creativity, even in the optimization process. This is why pure machine language code will always be faster - even if more horribly difficult - than any high level code. Having a machine - programmed by fallible humans - checking fallible code - is just another path for potential failure.
It also has another nastier effect - programmers will get lazier and expect the machine to check their code. If the machine misses something, what experience do they have to catch it?
Inevitably these errors pile up and it'll come down to a human - or team of humans - to dig into the guts of the code and find out what's really wrong. If all this automation actually happens, who will get the job experience to fix all the bugs that got by the automated software checkers?
Because if they do not, Wal Mart WILL decide they want to compete against Circuit City and they'll get into it.
Of course, the **AA suing Wal Mart is like Hideo Nomo swinging a baseball bat at Godzilla. It would look heroic in an advertisement but in real life, Godzilla would swat him into the next geological era. Kinda like Wal Mart will do to the **AA.
Even if they win, they lose. Wal Mart could say either "We won't distribute your stuff at our stores" or, "We demand you sell it at a loss."
the righteous and the angels all sing "hallelujah!"
Everyone knows Sony is better on its word than MS: if they say the PS3 is coming out, it's coming out, and in large numbers. Mistakes in the past aside, they won't make the same mistake MS did with the 360.
No, indeed, they are making other mistakes.
Disclaimer: I plan on getting a PS3 on the release day.
The doom and gloom talk surround Sony is based on (by order of importance):
a) the arguably prohibitively high price of the PS3
b) the staggering loss it is nonetheless taking per unit sold
c) whether or not Blu-Ray will dominate or crash and burn as a next gen DVD format
d) the difficulty of programming games for such an ubercomplex processor
In short, if the production cost per unit is too high and the price at the store is too high for customers to buy, Sony may be digging its grave one inch deeper with each unit that comes out.
But I still want one. I'm banking on the PS3 delivering what I crave - gargantuan Speedtree-enhanced environments with very smart interactive NPC's in a nonlinear universe as diverse as Morrowind and Oblivion combined plus as fast and frenzied as Ninety Nine Nights! [PS3 fan boy mode on, must stop now.]
"Simple, companies lay down their own copper or fiber. Verizon already did it a few towns away from me, as they've been doing around the country. But I'm probably not going to see any of that fiber for another few years. Not because Comcast will say no, but because Verizon has to negotiate with each municipality to get a franchise, a process that can take years."
Simple? You call that simple? Even with no regulation involved, that is an extremely expensive proposition. You're running c/f through the streets but then how many central offices will that require? How many customers do you think you will pick up? Granted, strategy #1 is to go for the customers who have no service, but how far will that go? Stop me if I'm speaking in error here.
Verizon might be able to do that for a few cities, but the reality is that most companies prefer to open up existing network's c/f and use it instead, for a VERY good reason: it costs millions, or billions, to run your own c/f network. If they can't do that, competition will be quite stifled even without regulation. Again, please feel free to stop me if I'm speaking in error here.
Plus, some of that 'regulation' may have to do with the constant tearing up of roads to put an ISP's c/f in, and the re-tearing up of roads for putting in another ISP's network. Imagine doing that over and over again for each new competitor. Traffic problems, anyone?
In summary? The word 'natural barrier to entry' comes to mind. Without regulation, these barriers still exist by the sheer nature of the scope of the project.
"Well I at least consider a "no income tax" law to be less relevant than say, cheaper medicine, stem cell research funding, getting homeless people off the streets, helping Africa fight AIDS, Iraq, getting more jobs, and a plethora of other issues. I can also almost guarentee that there will be pork added. A bill like you describe would have people just itching to add things to it. As for poorly-worded, that depends on which intern had the job of typing up the draft. By the way, thanks for mentioning the Do Not Call List. Do you remember that list of exceptions such as political groups and candidates?"
But if even the laws you like will be loaded with pork... does that not damage the credibility of all the "reduce Government NOW!" legislation that Libertarians are dreaming of? Congress will be needed to act to repeal all that evil "regulation"; in so doing, who knows what pork could come of that?
What I'm saying here is your goal is self contradictory.
And yes, I do remember that list of exceptions. I haven't received those calls. I felt very lonely during election season. Ok, no I didn't... but still... heheh... ok I admit, YMMV on that one. Some people will get those "exempt" calls. But come on, the DNC act cut down 99% of the friggin calls. It's outrageously effective for the majority of us who use it. I believe we can agree the DNC act is an exception to the alleged "rule" that Congress always makes bad laws. I can also cite the Civil Rights Act of 1964 as having solved more problems than it created... of course, white supremacists would disagree.....
By the way, just so you know, Net Neutrality is the status quo, and has been ever since these 'internets' were created. It is ISPs and Telco's, not us evil opensourceniks, that are trying to change things.
De regulation won't allow for more ISP's to happen.
a) the copper or fiber was all laid by one telco in a certain region.
b) the telco of that region thus owns all that fiber or copper.
c) the telco of that region which owns that fiber or copper, can flatly refuse to allow any ISPs on there.
d) deregulation makes it easier for them to refuse.
Exactly how does competition happen then?
BTW Congress isn't entirely inefficient like you claim it is; after the Do Not Call List came into being, my telemarketing calls dwindled to ZERO. No "market research" calls, and not even any political calls.
So no, not all legislation passed by Congress is poorly worded or takes attention away from more important issues.
Going by your logic, a "no income tax" law would also be "poorly-worded, include all kinds of pork, and ultimately takes attention away from more important issues."
Who except the big corpos can afford to pay the "premium" bandwidth fees?
No net neutrality will only make the big telcos rich and small businesses woefully uncompetitive.
Foreign companies not affected by tiered bandwidth costs will eat our lunch.
Actually it's all about efficiency.
By your logic, the 31337 way to play would be the clunkiest, least accurate and most hobbling controller. Oh, wait........
Let's see. Star Trek will no doubt want to win the special effects arms race, so I'm betting the box office take minus cost of production divided by the amount of days in production will reach warp one - over $186,000 bucks a second. :)
And I can tell you, the mouse and keyboard are a far more accurate way to move, point and shoot, than any console controller.
I say this after kicking tail in Halo, Halo 2, Perfect Dark: Zero, Area 51 and Doom 3 (all deathmatch) PLUS countless single player games. I've also played Oblivion, Kameo: Elements of Power, Fable, Beyond Good & Evil, Prince of Persia (all 3 new versions), and other 3rd player games, and once again, with Oblivion, PoP, Fable, and BG&E, the mouse/keyboard points me to my target a lot faster than a console controller.
LOL seriously though, my wife hated computer games until she got her hands on BG&E for the PS2.
Since then we've been hitting Gamestop every month.
Pity the game wasn't two player; we're now plowing through Kameo for the 360 though. Good stuff. BG&E rocked.
It was already going downhill by then, but when they decided to put that horrible disgrace of a show on TV, I stopped watching the channel forever.
The way they dehumanize women on that show all in favor of the almighty 'middle aged man' class (and I'm 35, mind you, I believe that puts me close to ground zero), makes my stomach turn. And I've tried to just appreciate the humor, too... at least until it dawns on me after 5 minutes that there is no humor just shock jock b.s. most likely from people who wish they could get laid.