Another thing I find interesting is the ability to place phone calls whilst you have not actually passed through security/border control.
Legally speaking, I'm thinking you may not actually be allowed to turn on your phone until you're through (nearly in any airport I've been to, there is a sign saying that phone usage is prohibited, sign that disappears as soon as they've looked at your passport and you sail through).
Though, more than once, I've heard people talk on the phone (and did it myself), using the local network indiscriminately, and giving away information about my arrival, the quality of travel, and where I was at the moment. I've never been questioned about it, but it still seems as though this too is a grey area.
So which constitutional rights do you have? Which laws apply? It was said he came from Holland, do Dutch laws apply?
It seems weird that having just landed, you do not benefit from any protection, and they are free to do as they will. How come that US law applies to a plane that flies around the planet, having departed the US, until it hits the ground in another country, but the other way around doesn't work?
So effectively, until the plane lands in the US, it is still under Dutch law, but not yet under US law? Where is the coherence in this?
Would someone who is enlightened enough please explain?
PS: I'm a security consultant, and have been quizzed quite a few times by US border, but also in the Ukraine, Australia, and where not. It never went very far, usually just being asked if I had any hardware that needed to be declared, and people asking information about the smart cards they were using.
The UK being the big exception. I always refer to "mainland Europe" when I talk about the banking industry, considering that the UK (and I expect Ireland, but never checked) is roughly the same as the US when it comes to credit cards.
When I first arrived to the UK, it took me about 6 months before my bank (HSBC) trusted me with a credit card. I was making in excess of 30k GBP a year (first job), and never had any overdraft. I did have a whole lot of working expenses (consultant, so travelling around the world), hence I really had to juggle.
Then when my CC came, I was in heaven. I could sweat out a couple of grand on travel, hotels and other expenses if required, and not worry about paying extra. Having on average a small month to repay it meant I could do my expenses with relative ease of mind, and never pay interest.
I still have about 8 credit cards (even though I don't live in the UK anymore, they never shut down the accounts), and I've only had to pay interest twice. Once because in Australia the UK debit cards don't work in all ATMs (and neither do they work in most shops), and I had to take out some cash (which means automatic and immediate interests), and once because I bought an expensive bike, and I made the conscious decision to pay it off in 2 months.
Why do I have so many cards? Because in the UK, they're free. Everyone and their brother will give you a credit card if you have a good history (and mine is pretty good now). I have one for food, one for vehicle expenses, one for eating out, one for travel, two for company expenses, etc. This allows me to get the bills and just put them in folders easily. I don't have to go over one big bill, just a handful of small bills that are all very specific.
As with everything, if you're smart about it, credit cards can be extremely helpful. You just need to put a few sliding appointments in your agenda (28 days, if you're lucky your wife or girlfriend can remind you to pay the bills when she gets cranky) and pay on time. Also, don't spend more than you earn, and budget, budget, budget.
Don't buy something on impulse. Research it, spend 10 minutes on the internet to understand if it's a good buy, what is the next best item (even if it's more expensive, just to get a feeling of the price gap), etc. Most people can live a very healthy and luxurious life if they just think about money, rather than putting their head in the sand.
Added bonus? If shit hits the fan, I've got about 40 grand worth of credit card I can use. That, plus the savings I have.
No, you made your kids organ donors. They didn't decide.
It's the same as claiming your child is of a specific religious belief, agnostic, atheist, liberal, democrat, or whatnot. As much as you seem extremely honourable about your after-death actions, I have a hard time accepting people will time and time again press their own ideas onto their children.
Educate them, give them the ability to make their own decision. I doubt that at age 4 and 6, either of them have that ability.
Actually, Guiness is only for human-based titles. The book that holds universal records sadly has a name written with Unicode characters which Slashdot refuses to display.
Well, there is already a lens in front of the iPhone's sensor, so I don't think crop factor due to sensor size comes into play.
The iPhone 4 is supposed to have a 28mm equivalent Field of View. I'm not sure what kind of vignetting this would give on most lenses, but let's assume we put a full-frame lens on it and there is no vignetting, my guess would be that the effective 'crop-factor' would be something around 1.25 (35/28).
Please note I'm really not sure about this, so feel free to correct me.
I stayed in a small hotel for some time in Australia. One night (during the Australian Open), some channel quit working, and I was a bit baffled because I could see a menu on screen, but it didn't react to my remote control. I knew I was watching DVB because I had channels which were only available through digital (or terrestrial, or whatever it's called).
I tried understanding what was happening, made the TV (which was a flat screen with a digital tuner integrated, as my room was marginally "better") search for channels on the digital end, but it couldn't find any.
I went up and found the manager trying to figure out what was happening. I asked if I could help, and was confronted with 12 boxes looking like normal set-top boxes, each having a small display showing different channels. The guy explained that they were picking up digital signals, and re-transmitting it on their in-house coax cable so that all the TVs could have access to the digital channels, without having to buy a flat screen for every room. They had something like 120 rooms (most of them low end, a bed, window and communal showers: TV was a luxury), and the cheap rates meant they didn't want to invest in something that would get stolen at the first opportunity.
The guy who installed it charged them something like 12 * $300 (the coax cable was already there), which was a helluva lot cheaper than 120 * $300 for a digital TV. It all comes down to the number of outputs you have, and how many channels you want to re-deploy. You'll also need to configure every single TV to the frequency you configured initially in the boxes.
The reason why the Australian Open channel didn't work anymore was because of the input coax that brought the DVB signal to the boxes was borked. I rewired the plug for them and got a free lunch the next day.
It really comes down to simple accounting math. Comcast is going to kill the analog signal, so you have a few options.
- Change all the TVs to support digital (I'm assuming you won't need a D-A converter then). - Using a D-A converter is impossible because of wall mounts (so, not really an option). - Invest in D-A converters that would be centrally located, one per channel/service, and as someone said earlier, probably power boosters to get it in all of your buildings. Warning, you will have quality loss.
I've never had the issue of looking for the clutch while driving (I've switched a lot. Couple months in the US, couple months in Europe, couple months in Europe on the wrong side of the road, rinse and repeat). I sit in the car, my right foot goes on the brake pedal, my left foot goes right next to it, where there is (or isn't) a clutch.
If I don't find a clutch pedal, my left foot goes on the foot rest, and stays there. Considering that your hand doesn't even start the "switch gears" process (meaning, physically sense which gear you're in, and in the back of your mind you think whether you're going up or down), you're never even tempted to put your foot down. Most "good" manual drivers will never feel the need, and even if they would, there is only one place where that clutch can be, and only one place your left foot will expect it to be.
On the other hand, someone who's never used his left foot (except for maybe putting the park brake on) and hence has it completely atrophied (and hence imprecise and jerky) will be far quicker confused when hitting the pedal, and far, far more likely to hit the wrong one. Worse yet, if you own a manual, just for shits and giggles, when the road is clear, try to brake with your left foot. You will make your whole car jerk (and the position of your leg/foot will feel very wrong while doing it).
During emergency braking (for a pedestrian for example), not having the reflex to press the clutch is a risk. Not knowing you need to press in the clutch when your car goes in hydroplaning is a risk. Forgetting to press the clutch while you're slowing down in traffic is a risk, as it will make the car accelerate (put the car in second, release clutch lightly without giving gas, car will start moving, remove foot from clutch pedal, brake slightly, car will speed up). Stalling in first gear up hill (and new users automatically pressing the clutch, but not the brakes) will cause you to buy a new rear bumper.
There are so many situations in which an inexperienced driver needs knowledge, knowledge which quite simply isn't acquired properly when going through the hurdle of an automatic licence.
Actually, even though I'm quite in favour of manual cars, sports cars are probably the last car you want to have a manual on. Anyone who claims that sports cars (and I mean high end) should come with manuals has never tried to drive a Lamborghini on normal roads or even worse, through Paris.
And no, the Miata isn't a sports car in my mind;)
I also am very much in favour of not allowing people who learnt to drive an automatic to drive a manual. It's a completely different world. On an automatic, right is forward, left is stop. An ape can do that. Understanding the clutch, and how to use it properly is something which requires many hours of practice and good instructions.
Most European countries will require many hours of driving lessons with an instructor (that is, driving in a special car owned by the company that teaches you to drive, where the instructor also has pedals and can brake, switch gears and whatnot as easily as the student). As I recall, the average number of hours to get a full licence was something like 30 hours driving with an instructor. When you get the piece of paper that allows you to drive, you know how to control your vehicle (even though it doesn't really show with some people).
For Europeans who never got around driving in the US, here's what it's like: zombies. Everyone drives at exactly the same speed. When someone hits the brakes, everyone hits the brakes. Try to imagine being on a relatively large road and having 5 lanes of cars around you. Cars take over from the right, cars merge from lane to lane after indicating for a second, and without looking if it's clear, people go over the speed limit in hordes ("But officer, everyone was speeding!", also, the first rule of driving I heard was "don't go faster than the others, and you'll be fine"), and everything is utterly and completely dumbed down. "Watch out, you may have to get off in about 200 miles, getting closer, just 100 miles, steady there dude. Almost there, just 50 miles to go. OK, get on that dedicated lane, it's just for you. Yes, it goes for 5 miles just to exit the interstate, but we never know, you may miss a big massive gap on your right, they kinda sneak up on you. No, you can't go in that lane anymore now, it's too late. Sorry." This video exemplifies typical american highways.
There are three things though, of which I approve in the US driving style: being able to make a U-turn nearly anywhere (absolutely required considering the configuration of most down-town/suburbia perpendicular roads), being able to take a right turn even though the light is red, and the fact that a pedestrian can cross nearly anywhere, in the middle of a 5 way crossing, or a busy two-way lane, and be absolutely unharmed.
What people need to understand is that "to each his own" driving style makes absolute sense. In the US, you can't go fetch a loaf of bread without a car. You can't go meet up with friends without a car. Every road goes on for decades, and you'll be hard pushed to find a bend on a road. There's a reason why Europeans tend to make fun of Americans for not making cars that can turn, they rarely need to use the steering wheel. Here's an example, I just zoomed in at random. It doesn't make sense to have a manual, because most of the times you just stop at a red light, then accelerate, stop at a red light, accelerate. Rinse and repeat. Most Europeans will freak upon seeing an American highway the first time[1].
Europe, on the other hand, isn't square, at all. There are intricate road scenarios with curvy bends, blind corners, cities with streets so small you have to pull in your side mirrors in order to squeeze through. Again, here is a random example of a European city. There is no logic, hardly any prediction. Y
Considering that the annual amount of produced gold every year would fit in a cube that is about 4.3 meters (about 14 feet) on each side, and that the estimated amount of gold that was ever mined by man would fit in a cube roughly 25 meters (about 82 feet) on a side, I very much doubt that any man on the planet has ever had the luxury to have lunch above "a vat of gold".
Erhm, I don't know about you, but I've been seeing Flash as the ultimate "absolute content display, no matter the browser" medium, coming from a whole lot of companies, going from Pizza places (rather than using AJAX) to banks and movie websites for quite some time now.
Companies still have people managing them who grew up in Microsoft-only classrooms. As the new generations start rising, these ideologies will change. People will know about other browsers. They will know the feeling of having to start Internet Explorer because Firefox wasn't allowed on their school's website to access some lesson.
I truly believe that it is only a matter of time before the decision-makers (or their advisors) have sufficient insight to make the right decisions.
Let's not forget that the tech industry is ridiculously young. Are there any industries that started less than half a century ago? We don't have, like law, retail or finance people with decades of experience. Yeah, we have a few who have between 20 and 40 years of experience under their belt, but look at finance. How many people have 50+ years of experience managing banks? I would think a helluva lot more than IT.
It's just a matter of age. The technology is relatively new, it's normal that people make mistakes. We just need to be careful that those mistakes don't become standards. This was something we saw with the whole list of IEs, but now we're getting back on track again, and guess what: competition is the only thing that made it happen.
Healthy competition, thanks to the guys who work their asses off at Opera, Mozilla, Apple and Microsoft -- we now actually have browsers that are worth something.
Indeed. For most people, this simply means "I could make a buck or two", from something which most probably won't ever have any chance to be monetised.
For real photogs (and I mean, those who are already established professionally), there's a good chance their professional material never made it to Flickr anyhow. I allow myself to paraphrase Ken Rockwell by saying "If you want to take awesome pictures, around the world, and be allowed to take creative pictures in whichever you want, wherever and whenever you wish? Then remain an amateur, and never go professional!".
If this stuff pays for your yearly Flickr Pro subscription, you should be very grateful. I doubt anything else will ever come of it.
Indeed. Conditional spelling of one's name is extremely confusing at times (I have it too). In dutch there's a total of 3 a's in my first name, only 1 in french, and 2 in english; but both the english version and french version are shorter than the dutch.
Though luckily, when you've gone through a few years of slashdot, you become cynical enough that you don't care about anyone anymore, and just stick to one spelling. Usually the simplest one.
Slashdot Mirror
Open case, put desktop fan roughly inside, full blast. If it stops crashing, get better ventilation in your case.
Except that you would see the earth rotation a lot quicker than you apparently expect -- depending on where you are.
At 50mm, depending on your earth location, you would see star trails after 8.5 seconds (equator), or 25 seconds (30 degrees from celestial pole).
The rule of thumb is this:
Around 30 degrees from celestial pole: 1200 / focal length = max exposure time.
Around the equator: 400 / focal length = max exposure time.
I use 600, because that's what I found yielded the best "rule of thumb" for me, as compared to my location.
Another thing I find interesting is the ability to place phone calls whilst you have not actually passed through security/border control.
Legally speaking, I'm thinking you may not actually be allowed to turn on your phone until you're through (nearly in any airport I've been to, there is a sign saying that phone usage is prohibited, sign that disappears as soon as they've looked at your passport and you sail through).
Though, more than once, I've heard people talk on the phone (and did it myself), using the local network indiscriminately, and giving away information about my arrival, the quality of travel, and where I was at the moment. I've never been questioned about it, but it still seems as though this too is a grey area.
So which constitutional rights do you have? Which laws apply? It was said he came from Holland, do Dutch laws apply?
It seems weird that having just landed, you do not benefit from any protection, and they are free to do as they will. How come that US law applies to a plane that flies around the planet, having departed the US, until it hits the ground in another country, but the other way around doesn't work?
So effectively, until the plane lands in the US, it is still under Dutch law, but not yet under US law? Where is the coherence in this?
Would someone who is enlightened enough please explain?
PS: I'm a security consultant, and have been quizzed quite a few times by US border, but also in the Ukraine, Australia, and where not. It never went very far, usually just being asked if I had any hardware that needed to be declared, and people asking information about the smart cards they were using.
The UK being the big exception. I always refer to "mainland Europe" when I talk about the banking industry, considering that the UK (and I expect Ireland, but never checked) is roughly the same as the US when it comes to credit cards.
When I first arrived to the UK, it took me about 6 months before my bank (HSBC) trusted me with a credit card. I was making in excess of 30k GBP a year (first job), and never had any overdraft. I did have a whole lot of working expenses (consultant, so travelling around the world), hence I really had to juggle.
Then when my CC came, I was in heaven. I could sweat out a couple of grand on travel, hotels and other expenses if required, and not worry about paying extra. Having on average a small month to repay it meant I could do my expenses with relative ease of mind, and never pay interest.
I still have about 8 credit cards (even though I don't live in the UK anymore, they never shut down the accounts), and I've only had to pay interest twice. Once because in Australia the UK debit cards don't work in all ATMs (and neither do they work in most shops), and I had to take out some cash (which means automatic and immediate interests), and once because I bought an expensive bike, and I made the conscious decision to pay it off in 2 months.
Why do I have so many cards? Because in the UK, they're free. Everyone and their brother will give you a credit card if you have a good history (and mine is pretty good now). I have one for food, one for vehicle expenses, one for eating out, one for travel, two for company expenses, etc. This allows me to get the bills and just put them in folders easily. I don't have to go over one big bill, just a handful of small bills that are all very specific.
As with everything, if you're smart about it, credit cards can be extremely helpful. You just need to put a few sliding appointments in your agenda (28 days, if you're lucky your wife or girlfriend can remind you to pay the bills when she gets cranky) and pay on time. Also, don't spend more than you earn, and budget, budget, budget.
Don't buy something on impulse. Research it, spend 10 minutes on the internet to understand if it's a good buy, what is the next best item (even if it's more expensive, just to get a feeling of the price gap), etc. Most people can live a very healthy and luxurious life if they just think about money, rather than putting their head in the sand.
Added bonus? If shit hits the fan, I've got about 40 grand worth of credit card I can use. That, plus the savings I have.
These people are not twirling their mustachios
Well, they're students. When I was a student, I used to twirl my mustachio quite a lot.
Unless that wasn't a euphemism?
Every nook and cranny of the device?
Sure, as long as the API provides access to it.
No, you made your kids organ donors. They didn't decide.
It's the same as claiming your child is of a specific religious belief, agnostic, atheist, liberal, democrat, or whatnot. As much as you seem extremely honourable about your after-death actions, I have a hard time accepting people will time and time again press their own ideas onto their children.
Educate them, give them the ability to make their own decision. I doubt that at age 4 and 6, either of them have that ability.
Actually, Guiness is only for human-based titles. The book that holds universal records sadly has a name written with Unicode characters which Slashdot refuses to display.
Well, there is already a lens in front of the iPhone's sensor, so I don't think crop factor due to sensor size comes into play.
The iPhone 4 is supposed to have a 28mm equivalent Field of View. I'm not sure what kind of vignetting this would give on most lenses, but let's assume we put a full-frame lens on it and there is no vignetting, my guess would be that the effective 'crop-factor' would be something around 1.25 (35/28).
Please note I'm really not sure about this, so feel free to correct me.
Nha, just attempting to turn a typo into a joke :)
Nice over-the-top rant, though. Sounds like you need a dose of the good stuff you're preaching about ;)
"Binaural Beats" actually do produce pysiological effects
>>> import binauralbeats
Traceback (most recent call last):
File "", line 1, in
ImportError: No module named binauralbeats
I call bullshit. Nothing pysiological about it.
romance
I don't get it.
And you never will.
And for once the goatse spammer wouldn't have been off-topic.
Clearly the right unit would have been the Library of Congress.
Aye.
I stayed in a small hotel for some time in Australia. One night (during the Australian Open), some channel quit working, and I was a bit baffled because I could see a menu on screen, but it didn't react to my remote control. I knew I was watching DVB because I had channels which were only available through digital (or terrestrial, or whatever it's called).
I tried understanding what was happening, made the TV (which was a flat screen with a digital tuner integrated, as my room was marginally "better") search for channels on the digital end, but it couldn't find any.
I went up and found the manager trying to figure out what was happening. I asked if I could help, and was confronted with 12 boxes looking like normal set-top boxes, each having a small display showing different channels. The guy explained that they were picking up digital signals, and re-transmitting it on their in-house coax cable so that all the TVs could have access to the digital channels, without having to buy a flat screen for every room. They had something like 120 rooms (most of them low end, a bed, window and communal showers: TV was a luxury), and the cheap rates meant they didn't want to invest in something that would get stolen at the first opportunity.
The guy who installed it charged them something like 12 * $300 (the coax cable was already there), which was a helluva lot cheaper than 120 * $300 for a digital TV. It all comes down to the number of outputs you have, and how many channels you want to re-deploy. You'll also need to configure every single TV to the frequency you configured initially in the boxes.
The reason why the Australian Open channel didn't work anymore was because of the input coax that brought the DVB signal to the boxes was borked. I rewired the plug for them and got a free lunch the next day.
It really comes down to simple accounting math. Comcast is going to kill the analog signal, so you have a few options.
- Change all the TVs to support digital (I'm assuming you won't need a D-A converter then).
- Using a D-A converter is impossible because of wall mounts (so, not really an option).
- Invest in D-A converters that would be centrally located, one per channel/service, and as someone said earlier, probably power boosters to get it in all of your buildings. Warning, you will have quality loss.
I hate replying to my own posts, but well.
I've never had the issue of looking for the clutch while driving (I've switched a lot. Couple months in the US, couple months in Europe, couple months in Europe on the wrong side of the road, rinse and repeat). I sit in the car, my right foot goes on the brake pedal, my left foot goes right next to it, where there is (or isn't) a clutch.
If I don't find a clutch pedal, my left foot goes on the foot rest, and stays there. Considering that your hand doesn't even start the "switch gears" process (meaning, physically sense which gear you're in, and in the back of your mind you think whether you're going up or down), you're never even tempted to put your foot down. Most "good" manual drivers will never feel the need, and even if they would, there is only one place where that clutch can be, and only one place your left foot will expect it to be.
On the other hand, someone who's never used his left foot (except for maybe putting the park brake on) and hence has it completely atrophied (and hence imprecise and jerky) will be far quicker confused when hitting the pedal, and far, far more likely to hit the wrong one. Worse yet, if you own a manual, just for shits and giggles, when the road is clear, try to brake with your left foot. You will make your whole car jerk (and the position of your leg/foot will feel very wrong while doing it).
During emergency braking (for a pedestrian for example), not having the reflex to press the clutch is a risk. Not knowing you need to press in the clutch when your car goes in hydroplaning is a risk. Forgetting to press the clutch while you're slowing down in traffic is a risk, as it will make the car accelerate (put the car in second, release clutch lightly without giving gas, car will start moving, remove foot from clutch pedal, brake slightly, car will speed up). Stalling in first gear up hill (and new users automatically pressing the clutch, but not the brakes) will cause you to buy a new rear bumper.
There are so many situations in which an inexperienced driver needs knowledge, knowledge which quite simply isn't acquired properly when going through the hurdle of an automatic licence.
Actually, even though I'm quite in favour of manual cars, sports cars are probably the last car you want to have a manual on. Anyone who claims that sports cars (and I mean high end) should come with manuals has never tried to drive a Lamborghini on normal roads or even worse, through Paris.
And no, the Miata isn't a sports car in my mind ;)
I also am very much in favour of not allowing people who learnt to drive an automatic to drive a manual. It's a completely different world. On an automatic, right is forward, left is stop. An ape can do that. Understanding the clutch, and how to use it properly is something which requires many hours of practice and good instructions.
Most European countries will require many hours of driving lessons with an instructor (that is, driving in a special car owned by the company that teaches you to drive, where the instructor also has pedals and can brake, switch gears and whatnot as easily as the student). As I recall, the average number of hours to get a full licence was something like 30 hours driving with an instructor. When you get the piece of paper that allows you to drive, you know how to control your vehicle (even though it doesn't really show with some people).
For Europeans who never got around driving in the US, here's what it's like: zombies. Everyone drives at exactly the same speed. When someone hits the brakes, everyone hits the brakes. Try to imagine being on a relatively large road and having 5 lanes of cars around you. Cars take over from the right, cars merge from lane to lane after indicating for a second, and without looking if it's clear, people go over the speed limit in hordes ("But officer, everyone was speeding!", also, the first rule of driving I heard was "don't go faster than the others, and you'll be fine"), and everything is utterly and completely dumbed down. "Watch out, you may have to get off in about 200 miles, getting closer, just 100 miles, steady there dude. Almost there, just 50 miles to go. OK, get on that dedicated lane, it's just for you. Yes, it goes for 5 miles just to exit the interstate, but we never know, you may miss a big massive gap on your right, they kinda sneak up on you. No, you can't go in that lane anymore now, it's too late. Sorry." This video exemplifies typical american highways.
There are three things though, of which I approve in the US driving style: being able to make a U-turn nearly anywhere (absolutely required considering the configuration of most down-town/suburbia perpendicular roads), being able to take a right turn even though the light is red, and the fact that a pedestrian can cross nearly anywhere, in the middle of a 5 way crossing, or a busy two-way lane, and be absolutely unharmed.
What people need to understand is that "to each his own" driving style makes absolute sense. In the US, you can't go fetch a loaf of bread without a car. You can't go meet up with friends without a car. Every road goes on for decades, and you'll be hard pushed to find a bend on a road. There's a reason why Europeans tend to make fun of Americans for not making cars that can turn, they rarely need to use the steering wheel. Here's an example, I just zoomed in at random. It doesn't make sense to have a manual, because most of the times you just stop at a red light, then accelerate, stop at a red light, accelerate. Rinse and repeat. Most Europeans will freak upon seeing an American highway the first time[1].
Europe, on the other hand, isn't square, at all. There are intricate road scenarios with curvy bends, blind corners, cities with streets so small you have to pull in your side mirrors in order to squeeze through. Again, here is a random example of a European city. There is no logic, hardly any prediction. Y
Considering that the annual amount of produced gold every year would fit in a cube that is about 4.3 meters (about 14 feet) on each side, and that the estimated amount of gold that was ever mined by man would fit in a cube roughly 25 meters (about 82 feet) on a side, I very much doubt that any man on the planet has ever had the luxury to have lunch above "a vat of gold".
Source.
Erhm, I don't know about you, but I've been seeing Flash as the ultimate "absolute content display, no matter the browser" medium, coming from a whole lot of companies, going from Pizza places (rather than using AJAX) to banks and movie websites for quite some time now.
Companies still have people managing them who grew up in Microsoft-only classrooms. As the new generations start rising, these ideologies will change. People will know about other browsers. They will know the feeling of having to start Internet Explorer because Firefox wasn't allowed on their school's website to access some lesson.
I truly believe that it is only a matter of time before the decision-makers (or their advisors) have sufficient insight to make the right decisions.
Let's not forget that the tech industry is ridiculously young. Are there any industries that started less than half a century ago? We don't have, like law, retail or finance people with decades of experience. Yeah, we have a few who have between 20 and 40 years of experience under their belt, but look at finance. How many people have 50+ years of experience managing banks? I would think a helluva lot more than IT.
It's just a matter of age. The technology is relatively new, it's normal that people make mistakes. We just need to be careful that those mistakes don't become standards. This was something we saw with the whole list of IEs, but now we're getting back on track again, and guess what: competition is the only thing that made it happen.
Healthy competition, thanks to the guys who work their asses off at Opera, Mozilla, Apple and Microsoft -- we now actually have browsers that are worth something.
Also, how could you confuse they're and their?
Is that the one that includes the webcam to observe your children?
Oh no wait that's the Austrian FRITZLBox.
People still sensitive about that one.
All three of them?
Yeah, I don't think the joke was clear enough. Better luck next time.
Indeed. For most people, this simply means "I could make a buck or two", from something which most probably won't ever have any chance to be monetised.
For real photogs (and I mean, those who are already established professionally), there's a good chance their professional material never made it to Flickr anyhow. I allow myself to paraphrase Ken Rockwell by saying "If you want to take awesome pictures, around the world, and be allowed to take creative pictures in whichever you want, wherever and whenever you wish? Then remain an amateur, and never go professional!".
If this stuff pays for your yearly Flickr Pro subscription, you should be very grateful. I doubt anything else will ever come of it.
Indeed. Conditional spelling of one's name is extremely confusing at times (I have it too). In dutch there's a total of 3 a's in my first name, only 1 in french, and 2 in english; but both the english version and french version are shorter than the dutch.
Though luckily, when you've gone through a few years of slashdot, you become cynical enough that you don't care about anyone anymore, and just stick to one spelling. Usually the simplest one.