I don't want to pay $0.77 extra for every CDR that I buy.
Really? I bought a spindle of 100 at a wholesaler in Vancouver called Lin Haw for $39 Cdn and paid NO levy! I do agree with what you're saying though...why should I be taxed for activities that have nothing to do with any artists? But there are still ways around it.
I also believe that you can apply to have the tax refunded if you can demonstrate that they are for uses that have nothing to do with copyrighted material. Your LUG activities would certainly qualify and you should maybe consider looking into it, though it's a bureaucratic pain in the ass.
Anyone else notice that the Symantec spokesman was referred to as Mr Smith in the article?
I'd like to share a revelation that I've had during my time here. It came to me when I tried to classify your species and I realized that you're not actually mammals....Every mammals on this planet instinctively develops an equilibrium with the surrounding environment. But you humans do not. You move to an area, and you multiply... and multiply until every natural resource is consumed. The only way you can survive is to spread to another area....There is another organism on this planet that follows the same pattern. Do you know what it is?...A virus. Human beings are a disease. A cancer of this planet. You are a plague. And we... are the cure.
I'm a relatively new employee (~2 months) at a software engineering shop. I am the sole IT person for a 100+ person company, with 50+ remote VPN users, 40+ developers, 30+ servers, firewalls, etc. I do it all, from desktop and application support, to security, to servers.
Only one thing to do...pray!...oh and find out where the closest supply of Jolt is. You're gonna need it.
I reject the notion that my inaction would make me bear any sort of responsibility for someone else's criminal actions. That's like saying a woman who dresses a certain way deserves to get raped.
Of course, that being said, I am not going to make it easy for them, not because of any sort of ethical obbligation, but rather because I don't want to subject myself to the inconvenience.
Nice troll...even managed to get it posted as a Slashdot article!
That may be true with a biological system, but it DOES NOT APPLY to electronics. The truth of the matter is, virus writers do nothing but cause havoc, and cost money. So I have a box that's unsecured...so what? That's MY business, NOT yours! Where does it say that you now have the right to fuck with it? Do you somehow think that by buggering it up, you're "helping" me? No, how you help is by leaving it the hell alone! What virus writers and crackers and kiddies do is the moral equivalent of wandering through a neighbourhood and trying everyone's door to see if it's unlocked and then stealing from those whose doors aren't locked. Either that or spraying grafitti or trashing the place. They are not heroes...they aren't "Morpheus" fighting against the "evil machines", they are common thieves and vandals and should be viewed as such and treated accordingly.
I've got 3 drives in sliders and I use a 4 week cycle for backup jobs (Monday1, Monday2...Monday4 etc). I change the drives once a week so when the drive goes back in it's getting files for a different number backup job written to it. It takes 12 weeks for the cycle to start repeating itself and the backup files to start being overwritten.
Nope. I've got a copy of Office XP that doesn't require activation. That's what I use if I have to install XP. Also M$ added activation to newer editions of 2000, which I found out when one of my clients bought a bunch of new computers. No prob...I just took one of their older copies which was sans activation and threw it up on the server, and ran my installs from there.
Like I said, it shouldn't matter if I have one install or 50 with the same serial as long as I have the licences to back them up. It's none of their frigging business what goes on on my networks and if ever I find out there's an app trying to phone home to mama, that IP is going to get blackholed.
Well that's a pretty sucky way of doing things! I'm glad I don't administer Macs! Rather than letting me just crack open one copy, leaving the rest in a filing cabinet somewhere, then load the install files onto a server and install from there, there going to make me open every bloody box and run the install locally? That sucks! I know I've got licenses for every computer and can produce them if need be, why should they care where the source comes from?
What kind of sick airline uses Windows servers to do check in and track flights/passengers. Is their IT department completely slow? They deserve what they get.
I'll tell you what kind...the kind that NEEDS to run custom apps! The sort of custom apps that can't be or haven't been ported to *nix! You wanna stop beating the "evil Microsoft" dead horse and start offering some USEFUL alternatives, fine. I know I'm going to be waiting a loooong time for that one. Hell, I'm still waiting for a viable replacement for Ms Exchange.
BTW I support a Medical services provider with numerous Windows boxen in multiple locations (yes, gasp! they run Windows...it's that custom app thing again!) and not one of those boxen succumed to any of the last spate of virii/worms. It's not all that hard to secure Windows. And I know this to be true: If everyone was running *nix, we'd be bitching about the latest *nix exploit!
Also I can't understand why we don't lay the blame firmly at the feet of who it belongs to, namely the shit-sucking script kiddies that write these things! So a Windows box has security holes in it...so what! Does that give you the right to mess with it? Do you wander through your neighbourhood trying doors to see if any are unlocked? If I leave my door unlocked, do you have the right now to walk in and steal from me? Ethically it's the same thing. These scumbags are not heroes, they're not "Neo" or "Trinity" or "Morpheus", they're little better than the lowest form of common thief and should be treated accordingly.
The universe has been around for billions of years and extends across unimaginably vast distances and yet pathetic little man with a lifespan like an eyeblink thinks he can offer insight as to its nature or its ability (or lack thereof) to sustain itself? Ha! The arrogance! Not even beginning to scratch the surface! How long has it been since man has so much as discovered the existance of galaxies? Less than 100 years? Soooo Johnny-come lately, do tell about the "nature of the universe"! Humans should learn to shut up and simply observe and not make grandiose statements about how things are as they are in no position to do so.
...that IT doesn't recommend Apple solutions because they need less support...
What a load of shit. The reason we aren't recommending Macs is we are dealing with users who a) don't have time to learn a new O/S and a new way of doing things. and b) have to have a platform that can run the software that they need to get their jobs done. What does that software nearly always run on? Windows. What does it often NOT run on? Mac. That's it in a nutshell. It's not which is better or which is less likely to crap out or which one needs the least amount of support, it's which ever one gets the job done that the users demand, pure and simple.
This is a dangerious misconception...one which everyone who wishes to remain in tech support should avoid entertaining at all costs. That attitude of smug superiority and thinly veiled contempt with which you treat your users will come back to bite you one day, and you'll find yourself cut in favour of someone a little more diplomatic and understanding.
I do tech support for a growing rehab/physiotherapy clinic, staffed with a great many physiotherapists, occupational therapists, psychologists, and doctors. These people manage to do the wildest things to their computers sometimes, and the doctors seem to be the worst offenders. Are they dim-witted? Far from it! The truth is they have a skill set that is different from mine and they don't have time to learn a new one, and why should they? That's what I'm there for...to fix their screw-ups and to find the ones that aren't actually their fault, it's really the hardware or M$ mal-ware that's gone south. To develop routines for them so that they can get through their assigned tasks quickly and efficiently.
As techs, we help them to do their jobs. We shouldn't expect them to know how to do ours as well.
You should accept the fact that the comapny owns your time when you are at work, and in most companies where working late hours you should accept that your boss has the right to monitor your behavior also when you are not at work.
WTF??? I don't gotta accept shit, and you need to re-think your view on employment...except that is, unless you're some sort of MBA-wannabe troll, in which case I'd suggest that you go and hang yourself. Employment should always be viewed as a business transaction where you are exchanging a portion of your time for dollars. That portion of time is fixed, just as the dollar amount is by an employment agreement, and outside that portion of time, they have no control whatsoever. Any "agreement" that doesn't take that basic premise into account is an agreement that I for one would NEVER enter into...and they can shove their drug tests and their polygraphs and their tracking cell-phones where the sun don't shine!
Look I know times are tough, but y'all gotta stop being "job-beggars" and start standing up for yourselves and for your rights.
The theater was packed (opening night), and several people started laughing openly at this guy say how stealing one copy of a movie online steals his ability to make a living for his family. I heard a guy behind me say to the person next to him that he was going to start pirating movies if this was the "sh*t these assw*pes are gonna make me sit through before they get to the f***ing movie". The person next to him agreed.
Maybe we need to start a little campaign...something along the lines of everyone shouting: "Look, I already paid to see the f***ing movie, didn't I!?!" every time one of these ads comes on. Wonder if they'd clue in? Naaah, I doubt it.
"Don't cheat yourself out of the magic. Movies - They're worth it!"
I know there's a plan to run commericals in theatres that are along those lines, but the last movie I saw in the theatre (T3) had a commerical for one of the local broadband providers with the tag line "listen to music online". Talk about mixed messages eh?
I don't know about other people, but I know that all of the movies have downloaded in the past I had actually paid to go see them before/after I had downloaded it and/or bought the dvd if I thought it was good. Not even Kazaa can beat Dolby 5.1 and a dvd picture:)
I'm the same. If I think it's going to be good, I'll see it in the theatre. If it's exceptional, I'll buy the DVD, even after I've downloaded it (after seeing it in the theatre). On the other hand, if it's a steaming pile of shit like Pearl Harbour (Thank heaven I didn't pay to see that abortion), I'll delete it immediately and contemplate sending a bill the the studio for the wasted time/bandwidth/disk space.
The company I worked for had a 110% turn-over rate for employees.
Lesson #1 If you do tech support, DONT WORK FOR OTHER COMPANIES!!! I learned that lesson very early on. I did a work practicum as part of my training and the asshole I worked for was charging me out at $80/hr! Me, a practicum student who didn't know shit...80 frigging bucks an hour! Well hell, I thought...if he can get $80/hr for me, so can I. So when they hired me on after the practicum concluded I paid as much attention to the business side of things as I could. A couple of months later when they laid me off I simply started working for myself. That was four years ago and I've never looked back.
No..."consulting" is when they charge you $300 an hour even though they don't tell you anything you couldn't have found out for yourself. Freelance tech support is when you charge $60 to $100 an hour, depending on the nature of the problem and your relationship with the customer, for tech support on a piece-work basis. They're happy because they are still getting off cheaper than hiring someone full time and you're happy because you're not punching a clock. My experience has been that the guys that put up ads in the grocery store usually don't understand the nature of the business and/or lack sufficient expertise to provide any real support beyone the most basic of problems...the fact that they're "lowballing" is offset by their lack of experience. However there's a real niche market for those that handle a little uncertainty and are adept at problem solving. Most places I visit, when I quote a base rate of $75 an hour they don't even bat an eye. It's like "shop time" at the local mechanic.
Slashdot Mirror
I don't want to pay $0.77 extra for every CDR that I buy.
Really? I bought a spindle of 100 at a wholesaler in Vancouver called Lin Haw for $39 Cdn and paid NO levy! I do agree with what you're saying though...why should I be taxed for activities that have nothing to do with any artists? But there are still ways around it.
I also believe that you can apply to have the tax refunded if you can demonstrate that they are for uses that have nothing to do with copyrighted material. Your LUG activities would certainly qualify and you should maybe consider looking into it, though it's a bureaucratic pain in the ass.
How about 500,000 US Military deaths in WWII vs. 39,000 for Canada?
Really? Well seeings how the US has about 10 times the population...and how many of those US Military deaths were due to "friendly fire"?
Or maybe us Canadians are simply better at not getting shot!
...and blame a bunch of Ay-rabs!
Bernie Shifman!
Be afraid...be very, very afraid!
I'm a relatively new employee (~2 months) at a software engineering shop. I am the sole IT person for a 100+ person company, with 50+ remote VPN users, 40+ developers, 30+ servers, firewalls, etc. I do it all, from desktop and application support, to security, to servers.
...oh and find out where the closest supply of Jolt is. You're gonna need it.
Only one thing to do...pray!
I reject the notion that my inaction would make me bear any sort of responsibility for someone else's criminal actions. That's like saying a woman who dresses a certain way deserves to get raped.
Of course, that being said, I am not going to make it easy for them, not because of any sort of ethical obbligation, but rather because I don't want to subject myself to the inconvenience.
Nice troll...even managed to get it posted as a Slashdot article!
That may be true with a biological system, but it DOES NOT APPLY to electronics. The truth of the matter is, virus writers do nothing but cause havoc, and cost money. So I have a box that's unsecured...so what? That's MY business, NOT yours! Where does it say that you now have the right to fuck with it? Do you somehow think that by buggering it up, you're "helping" me? No, how you help is by leaving it the hell alone! What virus writers and crackers and kiddies do is the moral equivalent of wandering through a neighbourhood and trying everyone's door to see if it's unlocked and then stealing from those whose doors aren't locked. Either that or spraying grafitti or trashing the place. They are not heroes...they aren't "Morpheus" fighting against the "evil machines", they are common thieves and vandals and should be viewed as such and treated accordingly.
Well she can lie to me all she wants!
I've got 3 drives in sliders and I use a 4 week cycle for backup jobs (Monday1, Monday2...Monday4 etc). I change the drives once a week so when the drive goes back in it's getting files for a different number backup job written to it. It takes 12 weeks for the cycle to start repeating itself and the backup files to start being overwritten.
Nope. I've got a copy of Office XP that doesn't require activation. That's what I use if I have to install XP. Also M$ added activation to newer editions of 2000, which I found out when one of my clients bought a bunch of new computers. No prob...I just took one of their older copies which was sans activation and threw it up on the server, and ran my installs from there.
Like I said, it shouldn't matter if I have one install or 50 with the same serial as long as I have the licences to back them up. It's none of their frigging business what goes on on my networks and if ever I find out there's an app trying to phone home to mama, that IP is going to get blackholed.
Well that's a pretty sucky way of doing things! I'm glad I don't administer Macs! Rather than letting me just crack open one copy, leaving the rest in a filing cabinet somewhere, then load the install files onto a server and install from there, there going to make me open every bloody box and run the install locally? That sucks! I know I've got licenses for every computer and can produce them if need be, why should they care where the source comes from?
What kind of sick airline uses Windows servers to do check in and track flights/passengers. Is their IT department completely slow? They deserve what they get.
I'll tell you what kind...the kind that NEEDS to run custom apps! The sort of custom apps that can't be or haven't been ported to *nix! You wanna stop beating the "evil Microsoft" dead horse and start offering some USEFUL alternatives, fine. I know I'm going to be waiting a loooong time for that one. Hell, I'm still waiting for a viable replacement for Ms Exchange.
BTW I support a Medical services provider with numerous Windows boxen in multiple locations (yes, gasp! they run Windows...it's that custom app thing again!) and not one of those boxen succumed to any of the last spate of virii/worms. It's not all that hard to secure Windows. And I know this to be true: If everyone was running *nix, we'd be bitching about the latest *nix exploit!
Also I can't understand why we don't lay the blame firmly at the feet of who it belongs to, namely the shit-sucking script kiddies that write these things! So a Windows box has security holes in it...so what! Does that give you the right to mess with it? Do you wander through your neighbourhood trying doors to see if any are unlocked? If I leave my door unlocked, do you have the right now to walk in and steal from me? Ethically it's the same thing. These scumbags are not heroes, they're not "Neo" or "Trinity" or "Morpheus", they're little better than the lowest form of common thief and should be treated accordingly.
The universe has been around for billions of years and extends across unimaginably vast distances and yet pathetic little man with a lifespan like an eyeblink thinks he can offer insight as to its nature or its ability (or lack thereof) to sustain itself? Ha! The arrogance! Not even beginning to scratch the surface! How long has it been since man has so much as discovered the existance of galaxies? Less than 100 years? Soooo Johnny-come lately, do tell about the "nature of the universe"! Humans should learn to shut up and simply observe and not make grandiose statements about how things are as they are in no position to do so.
...that IT doesn't recommend Apple solutions because they need less support...
What a load of shit. The reason we aren't recommending Macs is we are dealing with users who a) don't have time to learn a new O/S and a new way of doing things. and b) have to have a platform that can run the software that they need to get their jobs done. What does that software nearly always run on? Windows. What does it often NOT run on? Mac. That's it in a nutshell. It's not which is better or which is less likely to crap out or which one needs the least amount of support, it's which ever one gets the job done that the users demand, pure and simple.
2. Japanese anime model 1 (techie chick): ... Has no nipples or gonads. ... has... nipples and gonads.
3. Japanese anime model 2 (Hentai model!):
Wattsamatter? Afraid to say pussy?
End Users Aren't So Bright
This is a dangerious misconception...one which everyone who wishes to remain in tech support should avoid entertaining at all costs. That attitude of smug superiority and thinly veiled contempt with which you treat your users will come back to bite you one day, and you'll find yourself cut in favour of someone a little more diplomatic and understanding.
I do tech support for a growing rehab/physiotherapy clinic, staffed with a great many physiotherapists, occupational therapists, psychologists, and doctors. These people manage to do the wildest things to their computers sometimes, and the doctors seem to be the worst offenders. Are they dim-witted? Far from it! The truth is they have a skill set that is different from mine and they don't have time to learn a new one, and why should they? That's what I'm there for...to fix their screw-ups and to find the ones that aren't actually their fault, it's really the hardware or M$ mal-ware that's gone south. To develop routines for them so that they can get through their assigned tasks quickly and efficiently.
As techs, we help them to do their jobs. We shouldn't expect them to know how to do ours as well.
You should accept the fact that the comapny owns your time when you are at work, and in most companies where working late hours you should accept that your boss has the right to monitor your behavior also when you are not at work.
WTF??? I don't gotta accept shit, and you need to re-think your view on employment...except that is, unless you're some sort of MBA-wannabe troll, in which case I'd suggest that you go and hang yourself. Employment should always be viewed as a business transaction where you are exchanging a portion of your time for dollars. That portion of time is fixed, just as the dollar amount is by an employment agreement, and outside that portion of time, they have no control whatsoever. Any "agreement" that doesn't take that basic premise into account is an agreement that I for one would NEVER enter into...and they can shove their drug tests and their polygraphs and their tracking cell-phones where the sun don't shine!
Look I know times are tough, but y'all gotta stop being "job-beggars" and start standing up for yourselves and for your rights.
I keep my cell phone encased in lead.
Why can't you use tinfoil like the rest of us? Tinfoil not good enough for ya?
The theater was packed (opening night), and several people started laughing openly at this guy say how stealing one copy of a movie online steals his ability to make a living for his family. I heard a guy behind me say to the person next to him that he was going to start pirating movies if this was the "sh*t these assw*pes are gonna make me sit through before they get to the f***ing movie". The person next to him agreed.
Maybe we need to start a little campaign...something along the lines of everyone shouting: "Look, I already paid to see the f***ing movie, didn't I!?!" every time one of these ads comes on. Wonder if they'd clue in? Naaah, I doubt it.
"Don't cheat yourself out of the magic. Movies - They're worth it!"
:)
I know there's a plan to run commericals in theatres that are along those lines, but the last movie I saw in the theatre (T3) had a commerical for one of the local broadband providers with the tag line "listen to music online". Talk about mixed messages eh?
I don't know about other people, but I know that all of the movies have downloaded in the past I had actually paid to go see them before/after I had downloaded it and/or bought the dvd if I thought it was good. Not even Kazaa can beat Dolby 5.1 and a dvd picture
I'm the same. If I think it's going to be good, I'll see it in the theatre. If it's exceptional, I'll buy the DVD, even after I've downloaded it (after seeing it in the theatre). On the other hand, if it's a steaming pile of shit like Pearl Harbour (Thank heaven I didn't pay to see that abortion), I'll delete it immediately and contemplate sending a bill the the studio for the wasted time/bandwidth/disk space.
We've slashdotted Erin Gray's pants!
Well this IS Slashdot, so It was bound to happen sooner or later.
The company I worked for had a 110% turn-over rate for employees.
Lesson #1 If you do tech support, DONT WORK FOR OTHER COMPANIES!!! I learned that lesson very early on. I did a work practicum as part of my training and the asshole I worked for was charging me out at $80/hr! Me, a practicum student who didn't know shit...80 frigging bucks an hour! Well hell, I thought...if he can get $80/hr for me, so can I. So when they hired me on after the practicum concluded I paid as much attention to the business side of things as I could. A couple of months later when they laid me off I simply started working for myself. That was four years ago and I've never looked back.
No..."consulting" is when they charge you $300 an hour even though they don't tell you anything you couldn't have found out for yourself. Freelance tech support is when you charge $60 to $100 an hour, depending on the nature of the problem and your relationship with the customer, for tech support on a piece-work basis. They're happy because they are still getting off cheaper than hiring someone full time and you're happy because you're not punching a clock. My experience has been that the guys that put up ads in the grocery store usually don't understand the nature of the business and/or lack sufficient expertise to provide any real support beyone the most basic of problems...the fact that they're "lowballing" is offset by their lack of experience. However there's a real niche market for those that handle a little uncertainty and are adept at problem solving. Most places I visit, when I quote a base rate of $75 an hour they don't even bat an eye. It's like "shop time" at the local mechanic.