Raising taxes on the rich doesn't really help unless they're not being taxed at all.
As a child growing up on welfare, I realized that I had almost no incentive to work to better myself if what I had to look forward to is giving it all away.
One of the major driving forces in capitalism is people who want to improve their quality of life. If you remove the incentive for the average joe to greatly raise themselves, then the only people who will are those who are ludicrously wealthy, and overall everyone else tends to earn less. Thusly the gap is increased, the filthy rich may earn a little less but are still filthy rich (but produce fewer jobs since they're investing less), the middle class has no incentive to move up and have fewer jobs and earn less since the filthy rich are investing less, and the poor... Well, the poor don't really get much out either way except the satisfaction that the everyone with more money than them is getting screwed for having the audacity to want to improve themselves.
I think you missed a few years in there. Clinton had a PROSPECTIVE balanced budget (which really was quite unbelievable, but I digress). It didn't happen. Didn't stop the prospective saved money from being spent, though. (Which is a criticism of BOTH administrations.)
As annoying as it is to me, I'm sure it must be infuriating for you.
Nonetheless, I can't help but be fascinated at the regular patterns of interference created when a phone uses SMS, as opposed to the irregular patterns during other times. (Is 'irregular pattern' a contradiction in terms?)
There's nothing like setting your phone down on top of your desk and having your PC speakers or your keyboard synth start shouting in the middle of the night.
DEET-DE-DEET DEET-DE-DEET DEET-DE-DEET. BZZZZZT.
Oddly, my TDMA/CDMA phone never did anything like this.
Mobile (cell for you Yanks) phones are banned from flights due to (I presume) radio interference. Will hundreds of RFID tags not pose a similar risk?
Off topic, but is there an American that exists who doesn't know what the term "mobile phone" means? It's true that many people still misapply the term "cellular" to their mobile phones, but they know what "mobile" means.
I return your derogatory use of the word Yank, you Yank.:)
Do you know the life they had before we attacked them? I didn't know it either until I heard someone on Fox(yeah I know) ask Colin Powell a question about it. Turns out they had basicly free water and electricity, gas was 5c a gallon. Colin said that had to change to stabilize the world economy or some such crap. Before we came there, they did have schools and hospitals.
Is that a true statement? I'm wouldn't doubt it.
Does it paint an accurate picture of the average Iraqi's lifestyle? Not necessarily.
It's true that many people are doing without things they had. But it's also amazing to hear what many people are getting now, and they didn't have it before.
But which would you prefer, anyway? Cheap utilities, or the security of not worrying that YOU might be the next person to join that mass grave just outside of town?
Yes, and that would only take a couple of, what, DAYS, surely? CERTAINLY they could cope without infrastructure until THEN!
No, they couldn't. Come to think of it, though, training native people to build their infrastructure is probably why schools are being built, yes?
Just as the US had a responsibility to remove Saddam after they were the ones who put him in power, they are the ones who have the responsibility to begin forward momentum in rebuilding infrastructure in Iraq.
Am I ticked about the probability of wrongdoing with Haliburton contracts? Yes. But that doesn't mean that my knee-jerk response is to say the US shouldn't be helping.
And helping, they are. Many people in Iraq already now live much, much better than they ever have. Some are even online, why don't you check their journals?
Imagine a world where PHBs can turn their office wall into a window onto any cube. Zero privacy. The technology is great, but the potential for abuse is definitely there."
This technology opens us up to all sorts of new privacy abuses--oh, wait, no it doesn't. We've had cameras for years. It's the display that's new.
Wow, my last two posts have been bitter. I suppose Slashdot has finally rubbed off on me.
So when Microsoft uses product integration to promote its stuff, that's bad, but when AOL does it it's good (because they'd be promoting beloved Mozilla)? I see.
It has nothing to do with promoting Mozilla and everything to do with breaking the MSIE stranglehold.
Too bad Opie isn't.:( I have no idea how Opie manages to be composed of such rock solid tools and still crash and require me to use the terminal. (I have no idea, but most Linux distributions do the same thing. Danged Fedora.)
I still have high hopes for it, but in the meantime Zaurus owners are either stuck with Sharp's boring, feature-incomplete ROMs or the presently terrible versions of Opie.
Well, I shouldn't say that about the Sharp ROM. I haven't used it since I got my SL-5500.
Coincidence that 10 year old girls have C cup's now ? I think not...
Yes, actually. I've seen and known girls from all over the world who hit puberty very early and developed almost unbelievably--from well-fed, hormone-packed food selling countries, as well as countries where ANY food was very scarce, and what they could get wasn't hormone-packed.
It seems rediculous to me that it could be a coincidence, but I'm not able to wrap my head around any other options.
There is no reason why we cannot put patents into the realm of the poor inventor AND prevent abuse of the patent system, as you mentioned. In fact, there is no protection against that abuse now!
It's easy to say "Build a better prototype", but not nearly so easy to do it.
Unfortunately, due to the nature of certain ideas, it's not that easy to get someone to sign and NDA. Some inventions cannot be described without explaining how they work. Other times you simply can't get someone's attention with a basic description of an idea.
I agree that there should be restrictions to prevent the abuse you described, but there's no reason why someone should not be allowed to patent an idea BEFORE they have the resources to market it. That's really the best protection there is, and thus far it is usually only wealthy inventors who can obtain it.
Capitalism has little to do with what makes the patent system classist, it is the system for obtaining patents that both makes it classist and allows it to be abused. Granted, there has always been some cost associated with it, but the cost of fabricating prototypes for some things makes it unobtainable in many cases.
Patenting simple ideas and abusing legitimate businesses tends to be the realm of large businesses, not private parties, though it does happen both ways.
Nonetheless, requiring fabrication is a burden that places most patents in a class that only wealthy businesses can pursue.
Finding a private backer isn't all that easy, especially when you can't reveal your invention because you haven't patented it. Saving money can either take time or be beyond the realm of possibility. Patents were made for the small man, NOT for the mega-corporation. That's changed significantly in the years between.
My great grandfather, in his lifetime, twice invented something that could revolutionize the automotive industry. The first time, he could not find a private backer, nor would his wife let him put their house at risk to get the money to patent it himself. He took a gamble on the good will of the men in Detroit, and lost. Terribly. His invention was stolen.
The second time he came up with something far more amazing. This time, he was able to get the money to pursue patenting it. He couldn't get a patent, though, because his prototype was deemed inadequate. He fully intended to pursue marketing it to a company which could make use of it, but he didn't, because he couldn't protect it.
I've personally designed several things that could be quite impactful, but I'm unable to pursue marketing them to companies that could make use of them because I lack the very sophisticated and expensive resources necessary to begin down the path required by the present system. Though I prefer ideas be in the public domain, I know that, generally speaking, to bring an invention or improvement to a wide market so that it will be useful, it must be protected by a patent so a company will consider using it. What can I do? Nothing, presently. It's really killed my passion for invention.
Genuine innovation, and the pursuit of marketing that innovation, is indeed possible without the resources for fabrication. It's happened a lot over the years, but most people aren't able to do anything with it, because the present system is classist.
Slashdot Mirror
Not have NO motivation, but lose a lot of motivation, yes.
(The fact that people who make a lot of money tend to reinvest it also factors in.)
That phrase was just the first thing I thought of. I'm sure there are better terms out there, but I won't nitpick semantics.
Raising taxes on the rich doesn't really help unless they're not being taxed at all.
As a child growing up on welfare, I realized that I had almost no incentive to work to better myself if what I had to look forward to is giving it all away.
One of the major driving forces in capitalism is people who want to improve their quality of life. If you remove the incentive for the average joe to greatly raise themselves, then the only people who will are those who are ludicrously wealthy, and overall everyone else tends to earn less. Thusly the gap is increased, the filthy rich may earn a little less but are still filthy rich (but produce fewer jobs since they're investing less), the middle class has no incentive to move up and have fewer jobs and earn less since the filthy rich are investing less, and the poor... Well, the poor don't really get much out either way except the satisfaction that the everyone with more money than them is getting screwed for having the audacity to want to improve themselves.
I bought two Sun Ray terminals on eBay, thinking they were standard X terminals.
Now I can actually make use of them.
I hope.
Real you! :D
The word 'Real' has always had for letters, as far as I've ever been aware.
I just thought it was obvious, myself.
Yes, I have. That was an indirect point of mine.
I think you missed a few years in there. Clinton had a PROSPECTIVE balanced budget (which really was quite unbelievable, but I digress). It didn't happen. Didn't stop the prospective saved money from being spent, though. (Which is a criticism of BOTH administrations.)
As annoying as it is to me, I'm sure it must be infuriating for you.
Nonetheless, I can't help but be fascinated at the regular patterns of interference created when a phone uses SMS, as opposed to the irregular patterns during other times. (Is 'irregular pattern' a contradiction in terms?)
I have the same problem, but with my GSM phone.
There's nothing like setting your phone down on top of your desk and having your PC speakers or your keyboard synth start shouting in the middle of the night.
DEET-DE-DEET DEET-DE-DEET DEET-DE-DEET. BZZZZZT.
Oddly, my TDMA/CDMA phone never did anything like this.
Mobile (cell for you Yanks) phones are banned from flights due to (I presume) radio interference. Will hundreds of RFID tags not pose a similar risk?
:)
Off topic, but is there an American that exists who doesn't know what the term "mobile phone" means? It's true that many people still misapply the term "cellular" to their mobile phones, but they know what "mobile" means.
I return your derogatory use of the word Yank, you Yank.
Do you know the life they had before we attacked them? I didn't know it either until I heard someone on Fox(yeah I know) ask Colin Powell a question about it. Turns out they had basicly free water and electricity, gas was 5c a gallon. Colin said that had to change to stabilize the world economy or some such crap. Before we came there, they did have schools and hospitals.
Is that a true statement? I'm wouldn't doubt it.
Does it paint an accurate picture of the average Iraqi's lifestyle? Not necessarily.
It's true that many people are doing without things they had. But it's also amazing to hear what many people are getting now, and they didn't have it before.
But which would you prefer, anyway? Cheap utilities, or the security of not worrying that YOU might be the next person to join that mass grave just outside of town?
Yes, and that would only take a couple of, what, DAYS, surely? CERTAINLY they could cope without infrastructure until THEN!
No, they couldn't. Come to think of it, though, training native people to build their infrastructure is probably why schools are being built, yes?
Just as the US had a responsibility to remove Saddam after they were the ones who put him in power, they are the ones who have the responsibility to begin forward momentum in rebuilding infrastructure in Iraq.
Am I ticked about the probability of wrongdoing with Haliburton contracts? Yes. But that doesn't mean that my knee-jerk response is to say the US shouldn't be helping.
And helping, they are. Many people in Iraq already now live much, much better than they ever have. Some are even online, why don't you check their journals?
You might note that there are cities in America that DO require every citizen to own a firearm. (Google can reveal which)
You might also note their incredibly low crime rates--especially violent crime.
http://bugzilla.mozilla.org/show_bug.cgi?id=184433
I didn't know, myself, but I happened to run across this while looking at release notes. Looks like it's fixed for 0.9, though.
Imagine a world where PHBs can turn their office wall into a window onto any cube. Zero privacy. The technology is great, but the potential for abuse is definitely there."
This technology opens us up to all sorts of new privacy abuses--oh, wait, no it doesn't. We've had cameras for years. It's the display that's new.
Wow, my last two posts have been bitter. I suppose Slashdot has finally rubbed off on me.
The days of the 486DX4 versus the Pentium come to mind...
They're only, what, almost a decade late making the observation that it's no longer as relevant for the average consumer?
Sorry, I'm a bit bitter today.
So when Microsoft uses product integration to promote its stuff, that's bad, but when AOL does it it's good (because they'd be promoting beloved Mozilla)? I see.
It has nothing to do with promoting Mozilla and everything to do with breaking the MSIE stranglehold.
Indeed, they are.
:( I have no idea how Opie manages to be composed of such rock solid tools and still crash and require me to use the terminal. (I have no idea, but most Linux distributions do the same thing. Danged Fedora.)
Too bad Opie isn't.
I still have high hopes for it, but in the meantime Zaurus owners are either stuck with Sharp's boring, feature-incomplete ROMs or the presently terrible versions of Opie.
Well, I shouldn't say that about the Sharp ROM. I haven't used it since I got my SL-5500.
In fact, the X Window System is one of the tools that LTSP makes use of.
Coincidence that 10 year old girls have C cup's now ? I think not...
Yes, actually. I've seen and known girls from all over the world who hit puberty very early and developed almost unbelievably--from well-fed, hormone-packed food selling countries, as well as countries where ANY food was very scarce, and what they could get wasn't hormone-packed.
It seems rediculous to me that it could be a coincidence, but I'm not able to wrap my head around any other options.
There is no reason why we cannot put patents into the realm of the poor inventor AND prevent abuse of the patent system, as you mentioned. In fact, there is no protection against that abuse now!
It's easy to say "Build a better prototype", but not nearly so easy to do it.
Unfortunately, due to the nature of certain ideas, it's not that easy to get someone to sign and NDA. Some inventions cannot be described without explaining how they work. Other times you simply can't get someone's attention with a basic description of an idea.
I agree that there should be restrictions to prevent the abuse you described, but there's no reason why someone should not be allowed to patent an idea BEFORE they have the resources to market it. That's really the best protection there is, and thus far it is usually only wealthy inventors who can obtain it.
Capitalism has little to do with what makes the patent system classist, it is the system for obtaining patents that both makes it classist and allows it to be abused. Granted, there has always been some cost associated with it, but the cost of fabricating prototypes for some things makes it unobtainable in many cases.
Patenting simple ideas and abusing legitimate businesses tends to be the realm of large businesses, not private parties, though it does happen both ways.
Nonetheless, requiring fabrication is a burden that places most patents in a class that only wealthy businesses can pursue.
Finding a private backer isn't all that easy, especially when you can't reveal your invention because you haven't patented it. Saving money can either take time or be beyond the realm of possibility. Patents were made for the small man, NOT for the mega-corporation. That's changed significantly in the years between.
My great grandfather, in his lifetime, twice invented something that could revolutionize the automotive industry. The first time, he could not find a private backer, nor would his wife let him put their house at risk to get the money to patent it himself. He took a gamble on the good will of the men in Detroit, and lost. Terribly. His invention was stolen.
The second time he came up with something far more amazing. This time, he was able to get the money to pursue patenting it. He couldn't get a patent, though, because his prototype was deemed inadequate. He fully intended to pursue marketing it to a company which could make use of it, but he didn't, because he couldn't protect it.
I've personally designed several things that could be quite impactful, but I'm unable to pursue marketing them to companies that could make use of them because I lack the very sophisticated and expensive resources necessary to begin down the path required by the present system. Though I prefer ideas be in the public domain, I know that, generally speaking, to bring an invention or improvement to a wide market so that it will be useful, it must be protected by a patent so a company will consider using it. What can I do? Nothing, presently. It's really killed my passion for invention.
Genuine innovation, and the pursuit of marketing that innovation, is indeed possible without the resources for fabrication. It's happened a lot over the years, but most people aren't able to do anything with it, because the present system is classist.
Not everyone has a shop in their backyard sophisticated enough to build anything their imagination can dream of.