For the sake of newcomers, it's important to note that Guild of Grammar Nazis and the Spelling Nazi Brotherhood have a bilateral-cooperation agreement, thereby ensuring work for both unions' members.
Most excellent points! Following that, New Zeeland would be free for induction, provided that stop hiding and simply - and truthfully - refer to themselves as Neu Neu Zeeland.
Was it wise to expose our (not now) secret code of recognition, whereby you responded to my obvious misuse of it's and it with your own two matching and missing commas? Kindly keep to the code: a dangling parenthesis indicates that all replies are to be encoded with PGG (pretty good grammar) so as to avoid detection by the enemy.
Jeffersonian constructs are all but impossible, save for the precepts given to the Acolytes of Sers Strunk and White, for they alone shall keep language alive for an Eon. Knowing this, how could I possibly reject their so-called insidious words in the event that I may become utterly brainwashed? No, not even milk could make it so.
Ah - C. The systems language that's so extensive that few resisted its allure to use it as an applications language - even to the point of attempting un-optimized math (X^Y? Complex numbers? Spicoli? Anyone? Anyone?) and string manipulation (all together now: "Duh, gee, Tennessee - aren't strings just bytes in contiguous mem'ry? Dar'harf, it just makes sense that it all stops at zero!").
Even better that it was the spawning ground for the need for object-oriented programming, and the concordant wealth of C++ experts - 99.9999% of whom have never, not even once, heard of object-oriented requirements discovery.
Bless you, BikeHelmet, for correctly referring to it as a low level language.
Kindly have the decency to identify us correctly by our Sacred Relic - Strunk and White's Elements of Style, First Edition.
I hope you did not mean for us to lump us in the Later Editioners - who eat off of their bellies, when there are perfectly good tables about for use of that function.
In any case, your abbreviation of the Holy Name of our Sacred Relic may well have been alleviated by the acceptable, yet colloquial (although arcane), use of et cetera, hereby illustrated as per Rule 2, as you are but no doubt aware of so to do: Stunk and White, etc.
(And yes, I thank you in advance for the opportunity of scoring points with my peers to compact my typography by ending a sentence with the abbreviated form of et cetera, thereby saving a full period. My deep appreciation is also given for the bonus points scored as well that the word period preceded it's synonymously named punctuation mark in the previous sentence. It is for this alone that I defer to kindness and not rag upon the lack of calendar year reference, similarly missing.
After all, a good Grammar Nazi is never a quibbling Sematics Nazi, nor worse, a Syntax Nazi (this last reference having been given, quite naturally, with highest reverence to the ghosts of alt.syntax).) *
Kindly remember, and please never forget: if something can be said with few words, it's worth saying very well; therefore, it worth saying with a great many words, in order to be at one's best, if for no other reason. (N.B., it is well and good that initiates question the validity of verbosity over being succinct, as an object lesson that the admonishment for clarity overrides.)
In closing, I am further compelled to compliment you upon the quite deft class-naming used for our gathering place, indicating, as it does, this modern forum while simultaneously not excluding Usenet, that is, as goes without saying, our one true Kobol, with the codex modification as it applies, naturally, to the mythology presented only in the contempory BattleStar Gallactica.
* Note the parenthetical salvation of the egregious Usenet syntax error had the sentence been constructed to end thus: alt.syntax.
Well, the summary is clear on the what - but if you're curious about the point of making the measurement in the first place (beyond because we can, etc.) - from TFA:
If found, these waves would be the clearest evidence yet in support of the "inflation theory," which suggests that all of the currently observable universe expanded rapidly from a subatomic volume, leaving in its wake the telltale cosmic background of gravitational waves.
OK, cool, I can see that. At the same time, I honestly wonder if it worked that well or if it was just part of IBM's sale's pitch.
In any case, I think it's pretty safe to say and bet that any of the BUNCH machines were better than the IBM - technically. But just like the Windows user's adherence to that OS because he has less change to cope with (insofar as his belief system supports) - if you did change, you were happier.
Can't fight marketing. You don't have to have the #1 product. Having the #2 product with a better rap and better positioning is often the way companies win.
The real question should be "Why are we still using ancient text messages instead of regular email?"
Because I can send "Call me" in an SMS and all they have to do while reading the message is to hit send to call me?
All of my friends in Japan regularly do full-on email on their phones, and only have a vague-if-any notion of what a regular "text message" is elsewhere.
All of your friends in Japan have a completely different enculturation with cell phones, going back to the HandyPhone, from back when the whole notion was just a wet dream for Americans. Further, their data systems are many and varied - as are their usage costs. Email is standard transport, regardless of location in Japan or your service provider.
Japan is about speed, efficiency and cool. Email is all of those - there.
My opinions are based on my Japanese friends and my limited use of cell phones there.
That is *so* 1990s.
So is Shawn Colvin's A Few Small Repairs and B.B. King's Deuces Wild - your point?
The parent is mostly correct regarding the Civil War and the wikipedia entry is lacking. I can't speak for the parent, but I am aware of this from a portion of James Burke's Day the Universe Changed series.
The punch card reading technology came from looms, sure - unless you count music boxes. Looms used continuous punched paper first - the music box again.
The punch card was used in 1880 US Census - that statistical application that you talk about - not so much because of the machinery to handle it - it was because of its size, and that was by design.
There were a glut of older cash drawers that could used for keeping the stacks neat and/or in sorted piles.
So, you've got the computing machinery and techniques in place - do you use a strip or a card? When using a card, do you contract to build new carrying boxes or do you re-purpose the vastly available and nearly-useless-therefore-cheap surplus cash drawers? Note the supporting statement from your own wiki reference:
The Columbia site says Hollerith took advantage of available boxes designed to transport paper currency.
I not sure about your analysis of why IBM grabbed the market over Univac. I do recall that in the old days, there was IBM and then there was BUNCH - Burroughs, Univac, NCR, Control Data and Honeywell.
I think if you look back to 1929 and thereafter (read: the rebuilding of American business after the Great Crash), IBM was the key producer of cards and card-related technologies. So the real reason that IBM computers were compatible with the cards that corporations had was more likely that they were IBM cards in the first place.
IBM's history stretches continuously back to the 19th century, and its name means International Business Machines. Univac came from Remington Rand in 1950 - a large industrialist that made, among other things, typewriters, as I recall. So from the Great Crash to 1950, you have nothing from Univac to buy - but you do have IBM. Now computers come along, and the one company that survived the crash and is helping your business get Really Organized is selling you a new type of Business Machine - supply compatible with some of their old. Or - you could buy a Univac.
I could be wrong - I don't think I am, though, for what that's worth.
Just about anyone who has written about how software fails was an engineer working for IBM.
So, are you saying (in your loud exclusion of Sun): a) Engineers working for Sun didn't produce failed software or systems? b) Engineers working for Sun didn't write about their failed software or systems?
You've made the case for IBM's engineering incompetence. Are you making the case that Sun engineering is pure genius or are you making the case that Sun is obfuscating scum?
It rather seems to me that you're making an entirely different case, but I'll keep that opinion to myself.
In the USA, one of our states, New Mexico, only allowed the sale of lottery tickets under provision that a portion goes to the local horse racers and horse tracks - can't lose that gambling money. In another, Texas, they're trying to tax satellite TV because it costs less than cable and that's just unfair.
As soon as we heard that you're taxing Google to subsidize the BBC, your application was automatically generated and submitted to committee for review. Granted, you sort of fell through a logic loophole in our take-over-the-world software as it was never targeted at you, a close friend and ally.
However, given that you are now acting like us, we are no longer a people separated by a common language - we are one.
Welcome, as our 51st state!
If you'd like any advice on how to further your insane and incredible taxation of valid business to support pet projects, just ask!
To make a long post short, what exactly is wrong with advertising subsidizing suscription costs?
In theory, you're on very firm ground. In reality, maybe not so much.
What's wrong is that the rubber stopped meeting the road in the early 80s. You'd buy a paper on a weekday and the whole front page would be full of what Reagan & co were up to. Great stuff. I got what I paid for - and then some - due to advertising subsidies (if not truly the other way around). And that was any paper I'd pick up - home in podunkville or in an airport in a Big City.
Today's paper from anywhere is similarly the same, with only an occasional exception: sensational, tabloid pablum.
Not news - news product. Let me put it this way: ever go to the "Science" rack at Borders? I have. They had a lot of books on the "science" of remote viewing - you know: close your eyes and believe that ImaginationLand is really real and what you're doing is really valid research. (Haven't been to a Borders since.) Borders doesn't sell books - they sell book product.
Today's newspapers are to news what Borders is to books.
If you want to look at ads and pay on top of that, fine, that's your right. Many people are happy to do that with The National Enquirer.
But if you want news, vote with your wallet and stop paying the subscription.
Get your news on-line, ala carte (not bundled!!!), supporting 100% by advertising - and let the editors get the web hit reports to decide if its time that actually start doing their jobs. But let them get the same web hit reports for their competitors - just like in the old days, where print media knew which papers were selling the most.
And if the numbers show that they're really justified in giving us bundles and sensationism, well, we asked for it.
But if the numbers show that we want news - in-depth, thoughtful and thought-provoking - news, well, maybe we'll start getting that.
By the way - you seem to like the current newspaper model. When did you first learn of Guantanamo?
Let me put a long post short: advertisers like pablum - it's all lowest common denominator selling. Subscribers might like news, instead. Who's paying for your news? The advertisers. Advertisers paying for a national or international reach can afford to target intelligent ads to intelligent readers - the ala carte, tracked, web model. And FWIW - The National Enquirer isn't going anywhere - someone has to tell us about B-17s on the dark side of the moon.
My friend, you almost nailed it - ads or subscription, but not both. Here's the part that I think that you've left out:
They have the same distribution model as for-pay TV: it's a bundle, whether you want it or not. Just finance? Just the cooking section? Just sports? Just local news? Just national or international news? No way - you have to take the whole thing.
Now, cable and satellite have us bent over, but we've rebelled against the papers. Want a story or subject of interest? It's on the web, it's free and you simply have to put up with annoying ads (aren't they all?). But you do not have to wade through - or pay for - a bunch of crap that you don't care about or don't care about today.
The problem can't be solved by changing from ink to e-ink because the problem isn't the distribution medium.
It's the distribution model. Bundling is dead.
<rant> Fuck 'em all. They turned our news centers into profit centers. And they're getting exactly what's been coming to them for doing it - bankruptcy. I'm not all anti-profit; I'm simply against sensationalism. Huntley, Brinkley, Cronkite and Friendly never needed it. I remember paying cash money for the whole rag and liking it just to see Calvin Trillin, Sidney Harris, Mike Royko and William F. Buckley on the editorial page - they thought well and consequently wrote those thoughts well. No room for them or their likes now when the headlines scream and the reporters say just what sells and the readers put up with it because someone is serving their ADD. They say/. karma is cheap, but I'll say this - real-life karma can be a real bitch. </rant>
You may be right. I attempted suicide in 9th and 10th grades. I was speaking for myself.
However, there are probably many reasons to attempt suicide, and a cry for help may be one of them - in which case, perhaps a mocking teacher is treating the symptom.
On the other hand, and the article doesn't say, a lot depends on what happens next and what the teacher does next.
Here's another theory of attempted suicide, rather than plea-for-help: fuck it, I'm outta here, oh-crap-now-what-do-I-say, it didn't work. Being ignored, or being coddled, or being chided make it worse. Being made fun of for fucking up something that simple has a sobering tendency to get your attention and will make you pause. That pause may - only may, I make no pretense of being an expert - may buy the time required to get the kid the help needed.
In any case, I am a bit callous some days, but I submit that I did, from a certain point of view, think through my comment and never intended flippancy.
I'm not sure if I agree with the statement that the teacher has no business being in authority over severely depressed kids.
I expect that galls you, but I'm not in it to be contrary, nor to gall you.
It's like this - the job of a teacher is to teach. Period. This new-age idea that teachers should be on the lookout for those danger signs and then consult professionals, and have appropriate sensitivity and on and on is - in my strongest opinion - a load of baloney. Were I in that situation, and asked innocently - out of concern, as I've found most all teachers do care to some degree about their students - what the scarring was, and got that answer, and had that response from some kid in class, I'd lightning-rod deflect the ridicule to come from me (not the peer group - some peers will side with the teacher, more importantly, some always side against the teacher (exactly what the kid may need)) and then not consult a professional. I'd alert counseling, and they'd call social services and social services would have the kid removed from the home, immediately. At least, that's how it works in my school district (chain of events - not our debated mocking part).
Any parent whose kid is attempting suicide is a total moron. Any parent who sends the kid to school with scars to show off is a total moron.
It's the parent's job to parent, it's the teacher's job to teach. When the teacher becomes aware of a parenting lack, sensitivity and nurturing are not in order - simple action is.
Today's teachers are required to be teachers, janitors and nursemaids. You want me to add in on-the-watch-for-severe-depression? No way. You require that and you'll get a more a more sensitive teacher and you may theoretically save a life - theoretically. Give a kid a steady diet of that kind of teacher and I submit you'll simply get lower SAT scores.
Sorry if my callousness comes across as being a dick. Most people in RL tend to know me as a nice guy and uncommonly sensitive.
Here's an anecdote for you. I was divorced and mostly raising my kids myself, some help from the ex-wife. I drop the son off for a sleep-over, but nearby construction displaced a family of skunks and they scurried under the ex's house and started stinking the place up. The kid calls me, I race over to the rescue. He'd gathered up all of his stuff - except for one lousy homework paper, that was no longer a top priority, as I hope you'd imagine.
Gets to school, teacher asks where the homework is, he explains he had to leave it behind because of the skunks.
I get a call from the asst. principal to leave work. Get to the school, I'm confronted by four teachers - I am after all a male and therefore a threat. And the most maddening and oblique discussion takes place. After 15 minutes of this bullshit, I start to lose it - why am I there?
Because skunks is a danger term for an abused child. Incredulous, my jaw drops, but the lead bitch is insistent on this fact and then goes on to ask with all of her authority if
Yes, DirecTV's HR-20 series does exactly that - OTA digital channel DVR, supported. I used to have a high-def TiVo, and I have to go only by memory, but I thought it could, as well. From what I understand, this isn't too uncommon now, and I believe that Dish offers a similar box.
The comments were from TFA - in fact, it left out this lead-in paragraph:
The eighth-grade boy held out his wrists for teacher Carlos Polanco to see.
He had just explained to Polanco and his history classmates at Virgil Middle School in Koreatown why he had been absent: He had been in the hospital after an attempt at suicide.
On the basis of the idea that the teacher decided to step off of the politically-correct, baby-em-all bus - and did decide to try to scare the kid straight - I like him too. More teachers have gotten further with a little ridicule than with nurturing, and each and every one us knows it.
Or - did the AC above simply try to get a rise by advocating death?
Good points - especially about supporting your local library! I think too few people realize what a wonderful resource they truly are.
FWIW, you've seen now the business case for a DVR, be it computer-based or part of cable/satellite. I watch nothing in real-time except for classic movies or PBS - I don't pay extra for movie channels (same reasons as yourself) - and those are the only commercial free choices. Otherwise, it's a simple procedure - record on DVR, watch later, skip commercials.
Welcome, once again, to another episode of cable operators complaining about internet delivery and content bundles. All together now - (sorry, I'm very snarky today) - cry me a river.
The real issue is that all of the current non-OTA TV delivery systems have bitten off much more than they can chew.
Like it or not, the #1 driver for a cable subscription is TV - and they already cannot deliver on that.
I'm not a big sports fan (but so what if I am or not?), but I can reliably report this: during a hockey and a basketball game, I DVR'd OTA and my so-called high-def service of same channels. Hockey results: OTA clear, puck actually disappeared with paid service. Round-ball results: OTA clear, paid service unable to distinguish if foot over line or ref was blind during slo-mo playback.
And here's some technical anecdotes: 1. Your channel package choice or size of bundle won't impact anything, it's backbone limited. 2. When I upgraded to "HD" satellite, my house's RG-58 didn't cut it due to bandwidth limits on the RG-58. The '58 was ok for the short wall-to-TV pigtails, not otherwise. 3. They can fiber this and cable that and MPEG-4 the other, but no one is supporting the infrastructure to get the job done.
And a real big issue - once you've made the grade to premium cable or premium satellite, and you've replaced your TV - name your reasons, they're all valid: a) I want a new one, b) new TV standards and my set is getting old anyway, c) time to branch out and support my computer and Hulu, HTPC, et al, in the living room - you'll replace that TV with an HDTV and you'll go with the HD package from your for-pay provider (cable or satellite). The HDTV is an investment-grade purchase, just like your PC (any flavor), and the HD programming is too small an incremental price increase to pass up.
Here's the invective we can now look forward to: if you're complaining about your TV quality, you'll be told the bandwidth suckers using torrents are to blame. If you're complaining about your internet service, you'll be told that the primary service is directed at TV quality. Either way, do not expect that the future holds a world where you're really going to get what you think you're paying for.
Mark my words.
(PS - No apologies to those not interested in HDTV, or TV - you're not the big market to these companies, and that's all I'm ragging on - I'm not dis'ing anyone's lifestyle or entertainment choices. HTH.)
And, FWIW, that particular domain has been with GoDaddy since 2003, and the androiddata.com archive is showing a copyright of 2002.. Odd that you conjecture that such a site has had no business for six years.
And yes, if you stop and study the law more closely than you have the archives, you'll find that domain squatting is a completely separate case from trademarks.
You do understand that this isn't a domain squatting case? If generous, I'd give you the benefit of the doubt that you're trying to establish that the guy doesn't have a business.
Of course, you did read in TFA that Specht is very definitely stating that contrary to opinion, he is actively developing and marketing product under that name, as he has done for years?
And, the obligatory, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trademark as you are somewhat unclear - he not only can sue under these conditions, he is very, very likely to win.
Whether you find him scum or not is your own opinion.
But, given that he is ready to show in a court of law that his products are current, he has done exactly as you specify:
Maybe if he were actually developing & promoting that product, then he'd have something to say.
If you're bucking for 2nd place in the IRONY Awards, you'll certainly get some votes - although, you'd qualify more highly in other categories.
Slashdot Mirror
You spelled semantics wrong.
For the sake of newcomers, it's important to note that Guild of Grammar Nazis and the Spelling Nazi Brotherhood have a bilateral-cooperation agreement, thereby ensuring work for both unions' members.
Most excellent points! Following that, New Zeeland would be free for induction, provided that stop hiding and simply - and truthfully - refer to themselves as Neu Neu Zeeland.
Brother! I greet you.
Was it wise to expose our (not now) secret code of recognition, whereby you responded to my obvious misuse of it's and it with your own two matching and missing commas? Kindly keep to the code: a dangling parenthesis indicates that all replies are to be encoded with PGG (pretty good grammar) so as to avoid detection by the enemy.
Jeffersonian constructs are all but impossible, save for the precepts given to the Acolytes of Sers Strunk and White, for they alone shall keep language alive for an Eon. Knowing this, how could I possibly reject their so-called insidious words in the event that I may become utterly brainwashed? No, not even milk could make it so.
Ah - C. The systems language that's so extensive that few resisted its allure to use it as an applications language - even to the point of attempting un-optimized math (X^Y? Complex numbers? Spicoli? Anyone? Anyone?) and string manipulation (all together now: "Duh, gee, Tennessee - aren't strings just bytes in contiguous mem'ry? Dar'harf, it just makes sense that it all stops at zero!").
Even better that it was the spawning ground for the need for object-oriented programming, and the concordant wealth of C++ experts - 99.9999% of whom have never, not even once, heard of object-oriented requirements discovery.
Bless you, BikeHelmet, for correctly referring to it as a low level language.
I'm a Gnu, you sword-wielding, insensitive clod!
Kindly have the decency to identify us correctly by our Sacred Relic - Strunk and White's Elements of Style, First Edition.
I hope you did not mean for us to lump us in the Later Editioners - who eat off of their bellies, when there are perfectly good tables about for use of that function.
In any case, your abbreviation of the Holy Name of our Sacred Relic may well have been alleviated by the acceptable, yet colloquial (although arcane), use of et cetera, hereby illustrated as per Rule 2, as you are but no doubt aware of so to do: Stunk and White, etc.
(And yes, I thank you in advance for the opportunity of scoring points with my peers to compact my typography by ending a sentence with the abbreviated form of et cetera, thereby saving a full period. My deep appreciation is also given for the bonus points scored as well that the word period preceded it's synonymously named punctuation mark in the previous sentence. It is for this alone that I defer to kindness and not rag upon the lack of calendar year reference, similarly missing.
After all, a good Grammar Nazi is never a quibbling Sematics Nazi, nor worse, a Syntax Nazi (this last reference having been given, quite naturally, with highest reverence to the ghosts of alt.syntax).) *
Kindly remember, and please never forget: if something can be said with few words, it's worth saying very well; therefore, it worth saying with a great many words, in order to be at one's best, if for no other reason. (N.B., it is well and good that initiates question the validity of verbosity over being succinct, as an object lesson that the admonishment for clarity overrides.)
In closing, I am further compelled to compliment you upon the quite deft class-naming used for our gathering place, indicating, as it does, this modern forum while simultaneously not excluding Usenet, that is, as goes without saying, our one true Kobol, with the codex modification as it applies, naturally, to the mythology presented only in the contempory BattleStar Gallactica.
* Note the parenthetical salvation of the egregious Usenet syntax error had the sentence been constructed to end thus: alt.syntax.
See, ya went all metric on us - we'd have thought of it as 7-3/8 inches by 3-1/4 inches.
But, I'll answer anyway. It's because way back then, many people in the Treasury Dept. collectively decided that 8-1/2 x 11 was way too big.
Anytime!
Well, the summary is clear on the what - but if you're curious about the point of making the measurement in the first place (beyond because we can, etc.) - from TFA:
If found, these waves would be the clearest evidence yet in support of the "inflation theory," which suggests that all of the currently observable universe expanded rapidly from a subatomic volume, leaving in its wake the telltale cosmic background of gravitational waves.
OK, cool, I can see that. At the same time, I honestly wonder if it worked that well or if it was just part of IBM's sale's pitch.
In any case, I think it's pretty safe to say and bet that any of the BUNCH machines were better than the IBM - technically. But just like the Windows user's adherence to that OS because he has less change to cope with (insofar as his belief system supports) - if you did change, you were happier.
Can't fight marketing. You don't have to have the #1 product. Having the #2 product with a better rap and better positioning is often the way companies win.
Cheers!
The real question should be "Why are we still using ancient text messages instead of regular email?"
Because I can send "Call me" in an SMS and all they have to do while reading the message is to hit send to call me?
All of my friends in Japan regularly do full-on email on their phones, and only have a vague-if-any notion of what a regular "text message" is elsewhere.
All of your friends in Japan have a completely different enculturation with cell phones, going back to the HandyPhone, from back when the whole notion was just a wet dream for Americans. Further, their data systems are many and varied - as are their usage costs. Email is standard transport, regardless of location in Japan or your service provider.
Japan is about speed, efficiency and cool. Email is all of those - there.
My opinions are based on my Japanese friends and my limited use of cell phones there.
That is *so* 1990s.
So is Shawn Colvin's A Few Small Repairs and B.B. King's Deuces Wild - your point?
PS - not ragging ya - rock on.
The number of characters that can be printed across CowboyNeal's buttocks.
Just for that, I'm going to get a tattoo of a W on each cheek. That way, I can just bend over and respond to posts about CowboyNeal's ass - WoW -
And if you don't like that, I'll stand on my head and call for my MoM -
The parent is mostly correct regarding the Civil War and the wikipedia entry is lacking. I can't speak for the parent, but I am aware of this from a portion of James Burke's Day the Universe Changed series.
The punch card reading technology came from looms, sure - unless you count music boxes. Looms used continuous punched paper first - the music box again.
The punch card was used in 1880 US Census - that statistical application that you talk about - not so much because of the machinery to handle it - it was because of its size, and that was by design.
There were a glut of older cash drawers that could used for keeping the stacks neat and/or in sorted piles.
So, you've got the computing machinery and techniques in place - do you use a strip or a card? When using a card, do you contract to build new carrying boxes or do you re-purpose the vastly available and nearly-useless-therefore-cheap surplus cash drawers? Note the supporting statement from your own wiki reference:
The Columbia site says Hollerith took advantage of available boxes designed to transport paper currency.
I not sure about your analysis of why IBM grabbed the market over Univac. I do recall that in the old days, there was IBM and then there was BUNCH - Burroughs, Univac, NCR, Control Data and Honeywell.
I think if you look back to 1929 and thereafter (read: the rebuilding of American business after the Great Crash), IBM was the key producer of cards and card-related technologies. So the real reason that IBM computers were compatible with the cards that corporations had was more likely that they were IBM cards in the first place.
IBM's history stretches continuously back to the 19th century, and its name means International Business Machines. Univac came from Remington Rand in 1950 - a large industrialist that made, among other things, typewriters, as I recall. So from the Great Crash to 1950, you have nothing from Univac to buy - but you do have IBM. Now computers come along, and the one company that survived the crash and is helping your business get Really Organized is selling you a new type of Business Machine - supply compatible with some of their old. Or - you could buy a Univac.
I could be wrong - I don't think I am, though, for what that's worth.
Just about anyone who has written about how software fails was an engineer working for IBM.
So, are you saying (in your loud exclusion of Sun):
a) Engineers working for Sun didn't produce failed software or systems?
b) Engineers working for Sun didn't write about their failed software or systems?
You've made the case for IBM's engineering incompetence. Are you making the case that Sun engineering is pure genius or are you making the case that Sun is obfuscating scum?
It rather seems to me that you're making an entirely different case, but I'll keep that opinion to myself.
Dear UK,
In the USA, one of our states, New Mexico, only allowed the sale of lottery tickets under provision that a portion goes to the local horse racers and horse tracks - can't lose that gambling money. In another, Texas, they're trying to tax satellite TV because it costs less than cable and that's just unfair.
As soon as we heard that you're taxing Google to subsidize the BBC, your application was automatically generated and submitted to committee for review. Granted, you sort of fell through a logic loophole in our take-over-the-world software as it was never targeted at you, a close friend and ally.
However, given that you are now acting like us, we are no longer a people separated by a common language - we are one.
Welcome, as our 51st state!
If you'd like any advice on how to further your insane and incredible taxation of valid business to support pet projects, just ask!
Best regards,
The United States of America Club
To make a long post short, what exactly is wrong with advertising subsidizing suscription costs?
In theory, you're on very firm ground. In reality, maybe not so much.
What's wrong is that the rubber stopped meeting the road in the early 80s. You'd buy a paper on a weekday and the whole front page would be full of what Reagan & co were up to. Great stuff. I got what I paid for - and then some - due to advertising subsidies (if not truly the other way around). And that was any paper I'd pick up - home in podunkville or in an airport in a Big City.
Today's paper from anywhere is similarly the same, with only an occasional exception: sensational, tabloid pablum.
Not news - news product. Let me put it this way: ever go to the "Science" rack at Borders? I have. They had a lot of books on the "science" of remote viewing - you know: close your eyes and believe that ImaginationLand is really real and what you're doing is really valid research. (Haven't been to a Borders since.) Borders doesn't sell books - they sell book product.
Today's newspapers are to news what Borders is to books.
If you want to look at ads and pay on top of that, fine, that's your right. Many people are happy to do that with The National Enquirer.
But if you want news, vote with your wallet and stop paying the subscription.
Get your news on-line, ala carte (not bundled!!!), supporting 100% by advertising - and let the editors get the web hit reports to decide if its time that actually start doing their jobs. But let them get the same web hit reports for their competitors - just like in the old days, where print media knew which papers were selling the most.
And if the numbers show that they're really justified in giving us bundles and sensationism, well, we asked for it.
But if the numbers show that we want news - in-depth, thoughtful and thought-provoking - news, well, maybe we'll start getting that.
By the way - you seem to like the current newspaper model. When did you first learn of Guantanamo?
Let me put a long post short: advertisers like pablum - it's all lowest common denominator selling. Subscribers might like news, instead. Who's paying for your news? The advertisers. Advertisers paying for a national or international reach can afford to target intelligent ads to intelligent readers - the ala carte, tracked, web model. And FWIW - The National Enquirer isn't going anywhere - someone has to tell us about B-17s on the dark side of the moon.
My friend, you almost nailed it - ads or subscription, but not both. Here's the part that I think that you've left out:
They have the same distribution model as for-pay TV: it's a bundle, whether you want it or not. Just finance? Just the cooking section? Just sports? Just local news? Just national or international news? No way - you have to take the whole thing.
Now, cable and satellite have us bent over, but we've rebelled against the papers. Want a story or subject of interest? It's on the web, it's free and you simply have to put up with annoying ads (aren't they all?). But you do not have to wade through - or pay for - a bunch of crap that you don't care about or don't care about today.
The problem can't be solved by changing from ink to e-ink because the problem isn't the distribution medium.
It's the distribution model. Bundling is dead.
<rant> /. karma is cheap, but I'll say this - real-life karma can be a real bitch.
Fuck 'em all. They turned our news centers into profit centers. And they're getting exactly what's been coming to them for doing it - bankruptcy. I'm not all anti-profit; I'm simply against sensationalism. Huntley, Brinkley, Cronkite and Friendly never needed it. I remember paying cash money for the whole rag and liking it just to see Calvin Trillin, Sidney Harris, Mike Royko and William F. Buckley on the editorial page - they thought well and consequently wrote those thoughts well. No room for them or their likes now when the headlines scream and the reporters say just what sells and the readers put up with it because someone is serving their ADD. They say
</rant>
You may be right. I attempted suicide in 9th and 10th grades. I was speaking for myself.
However, there are probably many reasons to attempt suicide, and a cry for help may be one of them - in which case, perhaps a mocking teacher is treating the symptom.
On the other hand, and the article doesn't say, a lot depends on what happens next and what the teacher does next.
Here's another theory of attempted suicide, rather than plea-for-help: fuck it, I'm outta here, oh-crap-now-what-do-I-say, it didn't work. Being ignored, or being coddled, or being chided make it worse. Being made fun of for fucking up something that simple has a sobering tendency to get your attention and will make you pause. That pause may - only may, I make no pretense of being an expert - may buy the time required to get the kid the help needed.
In any case, I am a bit callous some days, but I submit that I did, from a certain point of view, think through my comment and never intended flippancy.
I'm not sure if I agree with the statement that the teacher has no business being in authority over severely depressed kids.
I expect that galls you, but I'm not in it to be contrary, nor to gall you.
It's like this - the job of a teacher is to teach. Period. This new-age idea that teachers should be on the lookout for those danger signs and then consult professionals, and have appropriate sensitivity and on and on is - in my strongest opinion - a load of baloney. Were I in that situation, and asked innocently - out of concern, as I've found most all teachers do care to some degree about their students - what the scarring was, and got that answer, and had that response from some kid in class, I'd lightning-rod deflect the ridicule to come from me (not the peer group - some peers will side with the teacher, more importantly, some always side against the teacher (exactly what the kid may need)) and then not consult a professional. I'd alert counseling, and they'd call social services and social services would have the kid removed from the home, immediately. At least, that's how it works in my school district (chain of events - not our debated mocking part).
Any parent whose kid is attempting suicide is a total moron. Any parent who sends the kid to school with scars to show off is a total moron.
It's the parent's job to parent, it's the teacher's job to teach. When the teacher becomes aware of a parenting lack, sensitivity and nurturing are not in order - simple action is.
Today's teachers are required to be teachers, janitors and nursemaids. You want me to add in on-the-watch-for-severe-depression? No way. You require that and you'll get a more a more sensitive teacher and you may theoretically save a life - theoretically. Give a kid a steady diet of that kind of teacher and I submit you'll simply get lower SAT scores.
Sorry if my callousness comes across as being a dick. Most people in RL tend to know me as a nice guy and uncommonly sensitive.
Here's an anecdote for you. I was divorced and mostly raising my kids myself, some help from the ex-wife. I drop the son off for a sleep-over, but nearby construction displaced a family of skunks and they scurried under the ex's house and started stinking the place up. The kid calls me, I race over to the rescue. He'd gathered up all of his stuff - except for one lousy homework paper, that was no longer a top priority, as I hope you'd imagine.
Gets to school, teacher asks where the homework is, he explains he had to leave it behind because of the skunks.
I get a call from the asst. principal to leave work. Get to the school, I'm confronted by four teachers - I am after all a male and therefore a threat. And the most maddening and oblique discussion takes place. After 15 minutes of this bullshit, I start to lose it - why am I there?
Because skunks is a danger term for an abused child. Incredulous, my jaw drops, but the lead bitch is insistent on this fact and then goes on to ask with all of her authority if
Yes, DirecTV's HR-20 series does exactly that - OTA digital channel DVR, supported. I used to have a high-def TiVo, and I have to go only by memory, but I thought it could, as well. From what I understand, this isn't too uncommon now, and I believe that Dish offers a similar box.
Further, I can only speak for the Mac world (my HTPC is a Mac mini), but check this out:
http://www.elgato.com/elgato/na/mainmenu/products/hybrid09/product2.en.html
The comments were from TFA - in fact, it left out this lead-in paragraph:
The eighth-grade boy held out his wrists for teacher Carlos Polanco to see.
He had just explained to Polanco and his history classmates at Virgil Middle School in Koreatown why he had been absent: He had been in the hospital after an attempt at suicide.
On the basis of the idea that the teacher decided to step off of the politically-correct, baby-em-all bus - and did decide to try to scare the kid straight - I like him too. More teachers have gotten further with a little ridicule than with nurturing, and each and every one us knows it.
Or - did the AC above simply try to get a rise by advocating death?
I elect the former.
Personally I would be happy to pay Discovery money to be able to download or stream various programs they provide through the internet.
Save your money, get almost everything you want right here - http://www.getmiro.com/ - now available for more than just Mac.
I swear by it - I'm watching the Hubblecast HD right now (episode 27, in fact).
PS to my PS of "No apologies to those...." What I probably meant was, "No offense to those...." - Like I said - I'm just too snarky today.
Good points - especially about supporting your local library! I think too few people realize what a wonderful resource they truly are.
FWIW, you've seen now the business case for a DVR, be it computer-based or part of cable/satellite. I watch nothing in real-time except for classic movies or PBS - I don't pay extra for movie channels (same reasons as yourself) - and those are the only commercial free choices. Otherwise, it's a simple procedure - record on DVR, watch later, skip commercials.
Welcome, once again, to another episode of cable operators complaining about internet delivery and content bundles. All together now - (sorry, I'm very snarky today) - cry me a river.
The real issue is that all of the current non-OTA TV delivery systems have bitten off much more than they can chew.
So far as I know, NO ONE in the USA is offering HD content as advertised:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HD_Lite
http://www.highdefforum.com/directv-forum/29158-hd-lite-directv-picture-quality.html
http://www.satelliteguys.us/dish-network-forum/51978-facts-about-hd-lite-e.html
http://forums.joeuser.com/309174
http://www.tvnewsday.com/articles/2009/04/22/daily.4/
(I recognize that some of the above links seem to target satellite TV, but if you read through two things become apparent: users are equally slamming cable, and neither satellite nor cable has their arms around a solution.)
Like it or not, the #1 driver for a cable subscription is TV - and they already cannot deliver on that.
I'm not a big sports fan (but so what if I am or not?), but I can reliably report this: during a hockey and a basketball game, I DVR'd OTA and my so-called high-def service of same channels. Hockey results: OTA clear, puck actually disappeared with paid service. Round-ball results: OTA clear, paid service unable to distinguish if foot over line or ref was blind during slo-mo playback.
And here's some technical anecdotes:
1. Your channel package choice or size of bundle won't impact anything, it's backbone limited.
2. When I upgraded to "HD" satellite, my house's RG-58 didn't cut it due to bandwidth limits on the RG-58. The '58 was ok for the short wall-to-TV pigtails, not otherwise.
3. They can fiber this and cable that and MPEG-4 the other, but no one is supporting the infrastructure to get the job done.
And a real big issue - once you've made the grade to premium cable or premium satellite, and you've replaced your TV - name your reasons, they're all valid: a) I want a new one, b) new TV standards and my set is getting old anyway, c) time to branch out and support my computer and Hulu, HTPC, et al, in the living room - you'll replace that TV with an HDTV and you'll go with the HD package from your for-pay provider (cable or satellite). The HDTV is an investment-grade purchase, just like your PC (any flavor), and the HD programming is too small an incremental price increase to pass up.
Here's the invective we can now look forward to: if you're complaining about your TV quality, you'll be told the bandwidth suckers using torrents are to blame. If you're complaining about your internet service, you'll be told that the primary service is directed at TV quality. Either way, do not expect that the future holds a world where you're really going to get what you think you're paying for.
Mark my words.
(PS - No apologies to those not interested in HDTV, or TV - you're not the big market to these companies, and that's all I'm ragging on - I'm not dis'ing anyone's lifestyle or entertainment choices. HTH.)
Uh..... ok.
I was referring, as was the AC I'd mentioned, to http://www.erichspecht.com/ - whose name I'm sure you'll recognize from TFA, which you did read. It does correspond, other than with the listed copyright, to http://web.archive.org/web/20050310015150/http://www.androiddata.com/
And, FWIW, that particular domain has been with GoDaddy since 2003, and the androiddata.com archive is showing a copyright of 2002.. Odd that you conjecture that such a site has had no business for six years.
And yes, if you stop and study the law more closely than you have the archives, you'll find that domain squatting is a completely separate case from trademarks.
You do understand that this isn't a domain squatting case? If generous, I'd give you the benefit of the doubt that you're trying to establish that the guy doesn't have a business.
Of course, you did read in TFA that Specht is very definitely stating that contrary to opinion, he is actively developing and marketing product under that name, as he has done for years?
Another FWIW - http://slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=1219633&cid=27800209 - mine from another part of this topic.
And, the obligatory, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trademark as you are somewhat unclear - he not only can sue under these conditions, he is very, very likely to win.
Whether you find him scum or not is your own opinion.
But, given that he is ready to show in a court of law that his products are current, he has done exactly as you specify:
Maybe if he were actually developing & promoting that product, then he'd have something to say.
If you're bucking for 2nd place in the IRONY Awards, you'll certainly get some votes - although, you'd qualify more highly in other categories.
TFA - sometimes, it's your friend.
Google is in lawsuit city with the registered trademark owner of Android Data, and.....
Um, just Google "Android Data" you will find sites wondering where exactly Android Data is, because there seems to be no company website, etc.
As the AC above pointed out - it's the first hit here: http://search.yahoo.com/search?p=android+data&fr=yfp-t-501&toggle=1&cop=mss&ei=UTF-8
Coincidence or nefarious, or truth is simply stranger than fiction .... any which way, I salute the irony in this thread of life's rich tapestry!