I'm a fan of Linux in general and Ubuntu in specific....and I don't think of myself as an idiot. I'm even fairly tech savvy - I'm a full-time software developer.
And yet, even after two weeks of really, really trying to get Ubuntu running on my desktop - it wouldn't install. I had a 2-3 page thread on the Ubuntu forums detailing my problem and everything I'd done to fix it. Eventually, people stopped offering suggestions.
So, yeah, maybe he's an idiot. And maybe I'm an idiot too. And maybe all the people at the Ubuntu forums are idiots too....but sometimes things are actually pretty darn hard to accomplish.
I'm not sure why Comcast gets so much hate. Maybe it depends on the local market you are in?
I've called Comcast a handful of times and I've always had very short waits and someone who speaks and understands English.
The most recent call was because of poor signal quality. I spent about 10 minutes on the phone and they sent out a tech the next day. The tech showed up, ran a new line and then took the time to properly attached the cable line to my house; it was a major improvement.
It's all just speculation without seeing the source code (or, if it's your thing, spending a lot of time looking at the asm).
But, there are really only two possibilities....either
1.) The bad code is making a call into OS code that is affected by the patch and it *used* to work but doesn't.
In that case, you can blame MS for not enforcing backwards compatibility. Any program, malicious or not, is now broken.
2.) The patch changed some data in OS code that would have been fine, except that the OS code was in a modified state because some malicious code changed it.
If it's two - you can blame MS for patching something that was already invalid. You can also blame MS for allowing OS code to be modified by a 3rd party, since MS is also responsible for the OS.
Either way, I think MS should get some blame. Yes, it would be great if people didn't let their computers get infected; but certainly, there is enough blame to go around.
You can't really blame MS for a crash that happens because the.DLLs/code on someone's machine has been modified by a malicious 3rd party.
But, you can expect an MS (or any other OS) to take appropriate actions to avoid patching a file that isn't exactly what is expected.
What you'd really hope for, is that when a problem is detected during the update process (IE - Crap - this.DLL isn't the.DLL we expect. Something is wrong!' - instead of modifying the.DLL it would present the user with some meaningful information like, 'Hey - this patch failed. You probably have a virus....you should get that fixed'. Or something similar.
It's possible that the patch took some reasonable efforts to ensure the patch would only be applied as expected; but I don't know. I do know that, even if it did, it didn't work.
There is a world of difference between an 'infected' Windows machine that has some annoying pop-ups showing up every 15 minutes, but is otherwise functional, and a Windows machine that won't boot because of a recently installed patch.
Except the 19 year old hottie of a daughter still won't choose the old loser over the attractive jerk guys in her community college.
Sure - maybe after she gets knocked up and the guy runs - you can swoop in and land yourself a semi-hot 22 year old milf or something.
But let's face it, the only reason you like the cute red-head was because she was cute. And there was probably even a fat ugly chick who had a crush on you - but you ignored her in exactly the same way the cute chick ignored you.
And now? You say you wouldn't be interested in the former cute girl because she's a fatty with children.
It's clear you aren't advocating any sort of meaningful change; you aren't saying, 'Hey - we should look at more important things than looks, because they are fleeting and these other traits are more likely to lead to a happy relationship'. You're just holding a grudge because you didn't end up on the good side of the genetic lotto that determines how physically attractive we are.
Because of how good they are at it. It's just, people don't want to say that.
If you are a high school senior competing on the Varsity wrestling squad and you are paired up against another high school senior, also representing his team's varsity squad - you are expected to do everything in your power to win (short of completely disregarding the rules).
Even intentionally breaking the rules can be an effective strategy. Going out of bounds is against the rules; you aren't supposed to run out of bounds. You can be penalized for it, but done in moderation at at time when the situation calls for it - you are expected to do it.
It's expected that you go out there and do everything you can to win.
That's how most of the working class sees *their* job. They are just fighting the good fight.
The problem with CEOs and what not, is that they are SO MUCH BETTER AT IT, than the rest of us. Average American might make 40k. CEO might make 20x that amount - 800k. They are twenty times better at it than us.
Now you've got an Olympic level wrestler paring up against a pudgy junior kid who has never wrestled before in his life. Suddenly, if the Olympic level guy tries his best - he's a JERK. Replace junior high kid with junior high girl and even more people will agree. He has such an advantage that he shouldn't try his hardest. He should go easy, intentionally avoid hurting the kid and, some would argue, even let the kid score a few points.
I know people will get upset with my saying CEOs are 'better' at stuff than regular folk. And there are plenty of CEOs that seem to have done a really bad job of running a company and, we all agree, ANYONE, could have done better. And that's fine, when I say better, I'm speaking only in terms of their income.
Average CEO is better at earning money than the average American worker. Hands down.
Why or how that came to be, I don't know. Is it fair? Probably not. But when it comes to earning potential - they are so unbelievably out of the range of what an average American could even *DREAM* of earning; people get upset when they play 'hard-ball'.
When Joe-Nobody demands a raise - hey good for him. When Joe-CEO does it, 'GREEDY BASTARD! He already makes so much...how can 10 million not be enough'.
And maybe they are right, but it's certainly the same thing regular folk do all the time.
Game companies can't have it both ways (they can try, but eventually customers will wise up).
With 'private' servers they host (and only they can host) and even various DRM techniques; they've produced games that require the servers to be up and running for games to continue to work.
That game you legal purchased and own....you can only expect it to work as advertised, so long as the company continues to keep their end up and running.
It's easy for people to dismiss concerns of 'Ummm - what if the shut down the servers' and simply say, 'Come'on Microsoft isn't going anywhere!'. But, even in the short time that online gameplay can be expected - we've seen TONS of games lose functionality.
Apparently, every Xbox game that was playable on Xbox Live is now crippleware.
Maybe you only play games for 6 months and move on...but some people don't. They enjoy replaying their games. I'll play through FF1 every 2-4 years and that came out in 1987. It's still fun, at least for me. Sure, only a select few games get that level of replay value; but it's *your* game. Or, it should be.
This is all just another step towards having to 'rent' your games in order to play them. And sitting back and idling dismissing it as 'no big deal' just invites the problem to continue.
You can debate whether or not the $50 dollars is a good deal or not, or whether or not it's a trivial cost. If you intend to own a console for six years before upgrading; the Xbox live fees have added $300 dollars to the TCO of the Xbox360.
That may or may not be a problem for you. You might argue that the Xbox Live gives you better online features that justify the additional cost.
That's why people consider different consoles, compare them, and ultimately decide on whichever console is a good fit.
Regardless of how you feel about the $50 dollars; I think we can all agree that whenever console producers change the rules, we (the customers) stand to get hurt.
It might not have been the deciding factor for you; but it could have been for someone else. Changing the rules of the purchase after the fact is always going to introduce potential problems.
Similarly, if Microsoft were to discontinue Xbox Live - a lot of people who purchased the Xbox *because* of that service are going to be shafted.
One of the biggest reasons I went with a PS3 was not wanting to pay another fee to play a game I already paid for, on the internet (access to which I already pay for).
Even at half that distance riding a bike can be awfully difficult.
I was 11 miles from work. By car it was a 20 minute drive (22 according to Gmaps).
On my bicycle it was, easily, 3x that time. More like an hour and twenty minutes. And in the few months that I rode my bicycle I had flat tires on three separate occasions.
After the first flat, I learned to carry gear and be able and ready to change the tube - but seriously, what a headache.
It was winter, so just getting dressed for the ride was a pain in the ass. When I got to work, frozen, I'd go straight to the bathroom and try to clean myself up enough to not be a distraction. Then I'd change out of my cycling/winter gear and put on business casual crap.
It was a huge friggin pain in the ass. Compared to the car, where I'd just take off my coat when I got into the office.
It took my ~40 minute daily commute and turned it into a 2.5 hour nightmare.
Get a job. Work sufficiently long that your short period of work isn't a red flag. While working full-time, job hunt. Tell potential employers, flat out, what your salary requirement is.
IE - if you make 50k but you think you should make 65k. Send out resumes that say you need 65k to consider a job offer.
If you can't get 65k, from anyone, you aren't underpaid....you are just over-valuing your skills. If you *can* get 65k from someone else, there is a good chance you are underpaid. At that point, you've got a job and a better job offer.
If the new job is completely better and you want to leave - go. If you like your old job, and just want more money - you schedule a meeting with your boss and you say, 'Look, I really like working here, I'm doing a great job, I don't want to leave....but financially, I'm not sure that things are working out. I've got another offer for 68k - and, while I really don't want to leave here, I think that, unless you can match it, I really need to do what is best for me and my family. Heck, I'd even take a 65k because I like it here so much'.
Now, you don't have to worry about losing your job - if your boss says no, you politely thank him and everyone and blah, blah, blah, say your good-byes and take the new job.
I'll just throw out my.02 - not that it means much.
I went to Northern Il. University - not exactly the best school, not a bad school either though. I was told, by the University, that the average starting salary for their Computer Science graduates was 59k.
Not to toot my own horn, but I was a big fish in a little pond, if that makes sense. I had internships and Fermi, Hewitt Associates, Volt. I was also the Microsoft Student Ambassador for the University and had a 3.9 GPA in my major.
I had interviews with every company I spoke to at the job fair, and job offers from all three that I pursued. They were 40k, 43k and 50k (but ~50% travel required). I negotiated the 43k up to 47k.
I was pissed.
I felt like a failure after all that - but my roommate who was also Comp Sci ended up taking months to land his first gig at ~30k. Similarly, every one of my friends that was Comp. Sci. - who I knew well enough to find out, ended up making less than 50k out of the gate. Many less than 40k And a few took several months to land a job.
My girlfriend at the time, was finishing her Masters and even with that, she started at 45k....which pissed her off to no end at the time.
To this date, none of us, have ever gotten a call from NIU asking us what our starting salary was. Everyone I knew personally, took a position for far less than the 'average'.
That same argument can be made about the vast majority of realistic video games.
FPS? Go join the military. Guitar Hero? Join a band. Fighting game? Go take MMA classes. Madden? Go play Football. Soccer game? Go outside and play soccer.
Naturally, if you give it more than the most superficial consideration - you'd be able to see that there is a world of difference between turning on a game and pressing 'play' and doing it in real life. You also make the incorrect assumption that everyone who enjoys video games is physically able to participate in the real-world physical version.
I can turn on FIFA 09 and play for 30 minutes after work. I'd be hard pressed to organize a game of soccer with 22 of my friends. I'd be even more hard pressed to play a full season of soccer with the World Cup as my goal.
First, the in-game players are designed to emulate the abilities of real world, *professional* players. 99.9999% of the population cannot play on that level. Second, there is dramatically different levels of risk associated with the two tasks. Playing soccer in real life is far more dangerous than on the video game. I broke my arm playing soccer, I've never done that playing a video game. Third, you've got logistic issues.....you need a place to play, you need goals, you need nets, you need gear, you should really have a ref. Those things aren't free. And if you want to have any sort of structure - with teams and scores - you'll need insurance.
I played on a local Rugby team around here for a season a few years after college. It was fun - but we were part of a league and the dues to cover the insurance, pay the ref, and hold a field were not cheap. And that's not addressing the costs of the uniform, the gear, nor the travel (nor the liquor afterwords, but that's a different story).
Bottom line is - you are talking about two things that are completely different. They aren't mutually exclusive. They are only superficially related. Not liking a type of video game is fine. Liking a real-world equivalent is fine. But advocating that the 'real world' version is a good replacement for the video game really misses the point of video games.
The post above yours made the claim that "caffeine, in moderate doses, enhances mental focus".
I've got a slew of scientific studies that support his claim, and then I've got some random guy on Slashdot saying, 'Pshhhh, your ignorance is mind boggling stupid!'
Scientific studies.....vs.....insult throwing guy on Slashdot who offers no counter point.
First, encryption doesn't guarantee privacy - it just makes it more difficult to read the contents of something. It's a constant one-upping as we use better encryption techniques and get better technology.
The best encryption will probably be laughable in 20 years. Probably less. Look at WEP. Less than 10 years for that to be considered worthless.
From wikipedia.... "...no public-key encryption scheme has been shown to be secure against eavesdroppers with unlimited computational power. Proofs of security for asymmetric key cryptography therefore hold only with respect to computationally-limited adversaries"
So, really, what I've said is correct. It's just a question of degree. If you want to be president of the United States when you are 55, what you said back in an 'encrypted' e-mail when you were 19 about how you hate ______ people; well, that could come back to bite you. Theoretically.
Second, the public key/private key system isn't perfect for the same reason that PGP doesn't really work that great. If you want to communicate with someone you need for *them* to already have a public key.
Let's say you are a famous person, like Tiger Woods and you want to chat up the hottie you met at a golf tournament - and you don't want anyone to see it. Well, the odds of her having a public key/private key pair setup so that you can e-mail her and have her read it....virtually zero.
Third - There have already been demonstrable exploits to SSL. I understand that SSL is just one type of asymmetric encryption; but it's probably the most relevant to our discussion.
The catch there, isn't that they've managed to crack the encryption algorithm or any of that jazz; but they've found a way around it. It works. It allowed them to impersonate others and get vital, supposedly safe thanks to our asymmetric encryption, data. So, I guess it's only as good as the weakest link?
Fourth - the encryption only protects the content of your message *in transmission*. So, even if that hottie you hit on behind your wife's back does have a public key and can decrypt your encrypted message....you have no control over the security of her PC. It could be compromised in a number of ways. And, if you are a typical user (IE - non techy) there is a reasonable chance that your computer is compromised. And, then you've got the whole 'the recipient' can make copies of whatever you sent. They can decrypt it and post it on the internet, forward it to everyone, take a screen shot, pull out a digital camera and take a picture of the screen and mail it out to everyone.
Bottom line is, nothing we've got even comes close to a guaranteed, lasting, privacy solution.
Every packet your send out goes through multiple intermediate servers. They may or may not log it. You can't control if they do or do not log it. The real server logs on websites are totally separate from the online history view you might see.
There are even laws that say that *have* to log activity for certain periods of time.
Communication anywhere, in any form, requires that the sender understand what they are sending and the receiver to understand what was sent.
How could you possibly write a letter to a random stranger and be 100% sure that nobody else can read it? First, since you aren't going to deliver it yourself (and, in the case of the internet, hand delivery would mean no internet) you have to give it to someone else. You give your information to the post man who could easily open it. It's just paper, after all. The postman gives it to someone else, and to someone else, who gives it to someone else. At any step in this process, the information within can be obtained.
If you have some super advanced encryption method....that's awesome. Except a stranger won't know how to decode it. If a stranger can figure it out, anyone can figure it out. If the stranger can't figure it out, your message is meaningless.
If you and the stranger agree to a type of encryption with public/private keys and any of that best practice stuff; *that* information still has to be communicated. If you first mail your 'encryption key' to your stranger; then mail the encrypted message - now it just means you'd need for your information to be peeked at twice.
If your web-browser is smart enough to be able to decrypt information from a webserver - why wouldn't some hacker's program be able to? Provided they were snooping the negotiation phase between your pc and the server? Magic?
And none of that deals with the fact that *after* the other person receives the information; it's out of your hands. Nothing stops the recipient from publishing that information or making copies of it.
You might be able to mail the first message anonymously - but any communication back and forth requires that the person you mail to has an address to mail back to you. Even if you use a PO box or something; there is still a trail. You still need to get the letter somehow.
Privacy is impossible. Better privacy - sure - we can do that.
Companies are magical entities with an endless supply of money. That money comes from somewhere.
You can start a lawn care business and pay all of your employees 100k a year + benefits and be competitive. You won't have customers, you won't make a profit. Because the average guy cutting grass for you isn't bringing in over 100k in profit.
It's a zero sum game.
Being 'overpaid' is nearly as bad as being underpaid. The majority of people are going to spend whatever they make and enter into long-term contracts on the assumption that they can make that much money, forever. It reduces their ability to get new jobs and it makes them a liability for the company (which makes the company want to get rid of them, because taking a pay cut is often more difficult than simply firing someone).
I don't want to get into a generational pissing match. Yes, there are certainly positions and roles that require both skill and experience. I'm not suggesting otherwise.
What I *am* saying is that people should get paid relative to what they *do*...not how long they've been doing it.
When your pay is relative to what value you provide, it will always be easy to find another job with similar benefits. Because companies feel they are getting a fair deal.
Some people work a job for 20 years and *get better* at it, each and every year. A lot of people don't. They come in and they do the same job they've done for 20 years. In a lot of positions, the job has changed sufficiently that 14 of those 20 years isn't even relevant anymore.
You see this in software a lot. Yes, a really good developer or team lead who has spent 20 years gaining experience and improving is worth his or her weight in gold. But for the people who show up, do enough to not get fired, and go home....their skills can actually diminish as they gain experience because they don't keep up with the changes in the job. The company I work for transitioned from Access + VB6 to MsSQL +.Net and some of the most experienced developers we have (in terms of years, not ability) are also the least productive.
Slashdot Mirror
I don't know.
I'm a fan of Linux in general and Ubuntu in specific....and I don't think of myself as an idiot. I'm even fairly tech savvy - I'm a full-time software developer.
And yet, even after two weeks of really, really trying to get Ubuntu running on my desktop - it wouldn't install. I had a 2-3 page thread on the Ubuntu forums detailing my problem and everything I'd done to fix it. Eventually, people stopped offering suggestions.
So, yeah, maybe he's an idiot. And maybe I'm an idiot too. And maybe all the people at the Ubuntu forums are idiots too....but sometimes things are actually pretty darn hard to accomplish.
I'm not sure why Comcast gets so much hate. Maybe it depends on the local market you are in?
I've called Comcast a handful of times and I've always had very short waits and someone who speaks and understands English.
The most recent call was because of poor signal quality. I spent about 10 minutes on the phone and they sent out a tech the next day. The tech showed up, ran a new line and then took the time to properly attached the cable line to my house; it was a major improvement.
After that, internet worked great again.
It's all just speculation without seeing the source code (or, if it's your thing, spending a lot of time looking at the asm).
But, there are really only two possibilities....either
1.) The bad code is making a call into OS code that is affected by the patch and it *used* to work but doesn't.
In that case, you can blame MS for not enforcing backwards compatibility. Any program, malicious or not, is now broken.
2.) The patch changed some data in OS code that would have been fine, except that the OS code was in a modified state because some malicious code changed it.
If it's two - you can blame MS for patching something that was already invalid. You can also blame MS for allowing OS code to be modified by a 3rd party, since MS is also responsible for the OS.
Either way, I think MS should get some blame. Yes, it would be great if people didn't let their computers get infected; but certainly, there is enough blame to go around.
Sort of.....
You can't really blame MS for a crash that happens because the .DLLs/code on someone's machine has been modified by a malicious 3rd party.
But, you can expect an MS (or any other OS) to take appropriate actions to avoid patching a file that isn't exactly what is expected.
What you'd really hope for, is that when a problem is detected during the update process (IE - Crap - this .DLL isn't the .DLL we expect. Something is wrong!' - instead of modifying the .DLL it would present the user with some meaningful information like, 'Hey - this patch failed. You probably have a virus....you should get that fixed'. Or something similar.
It's possible that the patch took some reasonable efforts to ensure the patch would only be applied as expected; but I don't know. I do know that, even if it did, it didn't work.
There is a world of difference between an 'infected' Windows machine that has some annoying pop-ups showing up every 15 minutes, but is otherwise functional, and a Windows machine that won't boot because of a recently installed patch.
Except the 19 year old hottie of a daughter still won't choose the old loser over the attractive jerk guys in her community college.
Sure - maybe after she gets knocked up and the guy runs - you can swoop in and land yourself a semi-hot 22 year old milf or something.
But let's face it, the only reason you like the cute red-head was because she was cute. And there was probably even a fat ugly chick who had a crush on you - but you ignored her in exactly the same way the cute chick ignored you.
And now? You say you wouldn't be interested in the former cute girl because she's a fatty with children.
It's clear you aren't advocating any sort of meaningful change; you aren't saying, 'Hey - we should look at more important things than looks, because they are fleeting and these other traits are more likely to lead to a happy relationship'. You're just holding a grudge because you didn't end up on the good side of the genetic lotto that determines how physically attractive we are.
The real reason?
Because of how good they are at it. It's just, people don't want to say that.
If you are a high school senior competing on the Varsity wrestling squad and you are paired up against another high school senior, also representing his team's varsity squad - you are expected to do everything in your power to win (short of completely disregarding the rules).
Even intentionally breaking the rules can be an effective strategy. Going out of bounds is against the rules; you aren't supposed to run out of bounds. You can be penalized for it, but done in moderation at at time when the situation calls for it - you are expected to do it.
It's expected that you go out there and do everything you can to win.
That's how most of the working class sees *their* job. They are just fighting the good fight.
The problem with CEOs and what not, is that they are SO MUCH BETTER AT IT, than the rest of us. Average American might make 40k. CEO might make 20x that amount - 800k. They are twenty times better at it than us.
Now you've got an Olympic level wrestler paring up against a pudgy junior kid who has never wrestled before in his life. Suddenly, if the Olympic level guy tries his best - he's a JERK. Replace junior high kid with junior high girl and even more people will agree. He has such an advantage that he shouldn't try his hardest. He should go easy, intentionally avoid hurting the kid and, some would argue, even let the kid score a few points.
I know people will get upset with my saying CEOs are 'better' at stuff than regular folk. And there are plenty of CEOs that seem to have done a really bad job of running a company and, we all agree, ANYONE, could have done better. And that's fine, when I say better, I'm speaking only in terms of their income.
Average CEO is better at earning money than the average American worker. Hands down.
Why or how that came to be, I don't know. Is it fair? Probably not. But when it comes to earning potential - they are so unbelievably out of the range of what an average American could even *DREAM* of earning; people get upset when they play 'hard-ball'.
When Joe-Nobody demands a raise - hey good for him. When Joe-CEO does it, 'GREEDY BASTARD! He already makes so much...how can 10 million not be enough'.
And maybe they are right, but it's certainly the same thing regular folk do all the time.
Game companies can't have it both ways (they can try, but eventually customers will wise up).
With 'private' servers they host (and only they can host) and even various DRM techniques; they've produced games that require the servers to be up and running for games to continue to work.
That game you legal purchased and own....you can only expect it to work as advertised, so long as the company continues to keep their end up and running.
It's easy for people to dismiss concerns of 'Ummm - what if the shut down the servers' and simply say, 'Come'on Microsoft isn't going anywhere!'. But, even in the short time that online gameplay can be expected - we've seen TONS of games lose functionality.
Apparently, every Xbox game that was playable on Xbox Live is now crippleware.
Maybe you only play games for 6 months and move on...but some people don't. They enjoy replaying their games. I'll play through FF1 every 2-4 years and that came out in 1987. It's still fun, at least for me. Sure, only a select few games get that level of replay value; but it's *your* game. Or, it should be.
This is all just another step towards having to 'rent' your games in order to play them. And sitting back and idling dismissing it as 'no big deal' just invites the problem to continue.
I'm not much of a race fan - so while her Wikipedia does tell what races she's won, I don't have a frame of reference.
I know that the Pikes Peak race has been going on for nearly 100 years...and that this was the first girl to win.
I don't know how she relates to male drivers.
Is racing a male-dominated sport? Or is gender insignificant?
Top Female Driver?
Where does that put her overall?
You can debate whether or not the $50 dollars is a good deal or not, or whether or not it's a trivial cost. If you intend to own a console for six years before upgrading; the Xbox live fees have added $300 dollars to the TCO of the Xbox360.
That may or may not be a problem for you. You might argue that the Xbox Live gives you better online features that justify the additional cost.
That's why people consider different consoles, compare them, and ultimately decide on whichever console is a good fit.
Regardless of how you feel about the $50 dollars; I think we can all agree that whenever console producers change the rules, we (the customers) stand to get hurt.
It might not have been the deciding factor for you; but it could have been for someone else. Changing the rules of the purchase after the fact is always going to introduce potential problems.
Similarly, if Microsoft were to discontinue Xbox Live - a lot of people who purchased the Xbox *because* of that service are going to be shafted.
One of the biggest reasons I went with a PS3 was not wanting to pay another fee to play a game I already paid for, on the internet (access to which I already pay for).
Even at half that distance riding a bike can be awfully difficult.
I was 11 miles from work. By car it was a 20 minute drive (22 according to Gmaps).
On my bicycle it was, easily, 3x that time. More like an hour and twenty minutes. And in the few months that I rode my bicycle I had flat tires on three separate occasions.
After the first flat, I learned to carry gear and be able and ready to change the tube - but seriously, what a headache.
It was winter, so just getting dressed for the ride was a pain in the ass. When I got to work, frozen, I'd go straight to the bathroom and try to clean myself up enough to not be a distraction. Then I'd change out of my cycling/winter gear and put on business casual crap.
It was a huge friggin pain in the ass. Compared to the car, where I'd just take off my coat when I got into the office.
It took my ~40 minute daily commute and turned it into a 2.5 hour nightmare.
Possibly off-topic - but - can anyone tell me if there is much demand for x86 assembler developers?
I'm a 'cookie cutter' .Net Developer. From what I understand, I'm pretty much a dime a dozen....I'm thinking of trying something new.
Here's how you do it....
Get a job. Work sufficiently long that your short period of work isn't a red flag. While working full-time, job hunt. Tell potential employers, flat out, what your salary requirement is.
IE - if you make 50k but you think you should make 65k. Send out resumes that say you need 65k to consider a job offer.
If you can't get 65k, from anyone, you aren't underpaid....you are just over-valuing your skills. If you *can* get 65k from someone else, there is a good chance you are underpaid. At that point, you've got a job and a better job offer.
If the new job is completely better and you want to leave - go. If you like your old job, and just want more money - you schedule a meeting with your boss and you say, 'Look, I really like working here, I'm doing a great job, I don't want to leave....but financially, I'm not sure that things are working out. I've got another offer for 68k - and, while I really don't want to leave here, I think that, unless you can match it, I really need to do what is best for me and my family. Heck, I'd even take a 65k because I like it here so much'.
Now, you don't have to worry about losing your job - if your boss says no, you politely thank him and everyone and blah, blah, blah, say your good-byes and take the new job.
I'll just throw out my .02 - not that it means much.
I went to Northern Il. University - not exactly the best school, not a bad school either though. I was told, by the University, that the average starting salary for their Computer Science graduates was 59k.
Not to toot my own horn, but I was a big fish in a little pond, if that makes sense. I had internships and Fermi, Hewitt Associates, Volt. I was also the Microsoft Student Ambassador for the University and had a 3.9 GPA in my major.
I had interviews with every company I spoke to at the job fair, and job offers from all three that I pursued. They were 40k, 43k and 50k (but ~50% travel required). I negotiated the 43k up to 47k.
I was pissed.
I felt like a failure after all that - but my roommate who was also Comp Sci ended up taking months to land his first gig at ~30k. Similarly, every one of my friends that was Comp. Sci. - who I knew well enough to find out, ended up making less than 50k out of the gate. Many less than 40k And a few took several months to land a job.
My girlfriend at the time, was finishing her Masters and even with that, she started at 45k....which pissed her off to no end at the time.
To this date, none of us, have ever gotten a call from NIU asking us what our starting salary was. Everyone I knew personally, took a position for far less than the 'average'.
Muscle doesn't turn to flab. Ever.
Fair enough :)
That same argument can be made about the vast majority of realistic video games.
FPS? Go join the military. Guitar Hero? Join a band. Fighting game? Go take MMA classes. Madden? Go play Football. Soccer game? Go outside and play soccer.
Naturally, if you give it more than the most superficial consideration - you'd be able to see that there is a world of difference between turning on a game and pressing 'play' and doing it in real life. You also make the incorrect assumption that everyone who enjoys video games is physically able to participate in the real-world physical version.
I can turn on FIFA 09 and play for 30 minutes after work. I'd be hard pressed to organize a game of soccer with 22 of my friends. I'd be even more hard pressed to play a full season of soccer with the World Cup as my goal.
First, the in-game players are designed to emulate the abilities of real world, *professional* players. 99.9999% of the population cannot play on that level. Second, there is dramatically different levels of risk associated with the two tasks. Playing soccer in real life is far more dangerous than on the video game. I broke my arm playing soccer, I've never done that playing a video game. Third, you've got logistic issues.....you need a place to play, you need goals, you need nets, you need gear, you should really have a ref. Those things aren't free. And if you want to have any sort of structure - with teams and scores - you'll need insurance.
I played on a local Rugby team around here for a season a few years after college. It was fun - but we were part of a league and the dues to cover the insurance, pay the ref, and hold a field were not cheap. And that's not addressing the costs of the uniform, the gear, nor the travel (nor the liquor afterwords, but that's a different story).
Bottom line is - you are talking about two things that are completely different. They aren't mutually exclusive. They are only superficially related. Not liking a type of video game is fine. Liking a real-world equivalent is fine. But advocating that the 'real world' version is a good replacement for the video game really misses the point of video games.
Maybe you could elaborate?
The post above yours made the claim that "caffeine, in moderate doses, enhances mental focus".
I've got a slew of scientific studies that support his claim, and then I've got some random guy on Slashdot saying, 'Pshhhh, your ignorance is mind boggling stupid!'
Scientific studies.....vs.....insult throwing guy on Slashdot who offers no counter point.
Like all of the Union auto workers making fat cash working in Detroit?
And yeah, PGP uses public/private key. My wording sort of made it sound like I was suggesting otherwise.
A couple of things....
First, encryption doesn't guarantee privacy - it just makes it more difficult to read the contents of something. It's a constant one-upping as we use better encryption techniques and get better technology.
The best encryption will probably be laughable in 20 years. Probably less. Look at WEP. Less than 10 years for that to be considered worthless.
From wikipedia....
"...no public-key encryption scheme has been shown to be secure against eavesdroppers with unlimited computational power. Proofs of security for asymmetric key cryptography therefore hold only with respect to computationally-limited adversaries"
So, really, what I've said is correct. It's just a question of degree. If you want to be president of the United States when you are 55, what you said back in an 'encrypted' e-mail when you were 19 about how you hate ______ people; well, that could come back to bite you. Theoretically.
Second, the public key/private key system isn't perfect for the same reason that PGP doesn't really work that great. If you want to communicate with someone you need for *them* to already have a public key.
Let's say you are a famous person, like Tiger Woods and you want to chat up the hottie you met at a golf tournament - and you don't want anyone to see it. Well, the odds of her having a public key/private key pair setup so that you can e-mail her and have her read it....virtually zero.
Third - There have already been demonstrable exploits to SSL. I understand that SSL is just one type of asymmetric encryption; but it's probably the most relevant to our discussion.
Here's an article about one of them.
http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2009/07/kaminsky/
The catch there, isn't that they've managed to crack the encryption algorithm or any of that jazz; but they've found a way around it. It works. It allowed them to impersonate others and get vital, supposedly safe thanks to our asymmetric encryption, data. So, I guess it's only as good as the weakest link?
Fourth - the encryption only protects the content of your message *in transmission*. So, even if that hottie you hit on behind your wife's back does have a public key and can decrypt your encrypted message....you have no control over the security of her PC. It could be compromised in a number of ways. And, if you are a typical user (IE - non techy) there is a reasonable chance that your computer is compromised. And, then you've got the whole 'the recipient' can make copies of whatever you sent. They can decrypt it and post it on the internet, forward it to everyone, take a screen shot, pull out a digital camera and take a picture of the screen and mail it out to everyone.
Bottom line is, nothing we've got even comes close to a guaranteed, lasting, privacy solution.
Every packet your send out goes through multiple intermediate servers. They may or may not log it. You can't control if they do or do not log it. The real server logs on websites are totally separate from the online history view you might see.
There are even laws that say that *have* to log activity for certain periods of time.
I'd actually disagree. I'd say it is impossible.
Communication anywhere, in any form, requires that the sender understand what they are sending and the receiver to understand what was sent.
How could you possibly write a letter to a random stranger and be 100% sure that nobody else can read it? First, since you aren't going to deliver it yourself (and, in the case of the internet, hand delivery would mean no internet) you have to give it to someone else. You give your information to the post man who could easily open it. It's just paper, after all. The postman gives it to someone else, and to someone else, who gives it to someone else. At any step in this process, the information within can be obtained.
If you have some super advanced encryption method....that's awesome. Except a stranger won't know how to decode it. If a stranger can figure it out, anyone can figure it out. If the stranger can't figure it out, your message is meaningless.
If you and the stranger agree to a type of encryption with public/private keys and any of that best practice stuff; *that* information still has to be communicated. If you first mail your 'encryption key' to your stranger; then mail the encrypted message - now it just means you'd need for your information to be peeked at twice.
If your web-browser is smart enough to be able to decrypt information from a webserver - why wouldn't some hacker's program be able to? Provided they were snooping the negotiation phase between your pc and the server? Magic?
And none of that deals with the fact that *after* the other person receives the information; it's out of your hands. Nothing stops the recipient from publishing that information or making copies of it.
You might be able to mail the first message anonymously - but any communication back and forth requires that the person you mail to has an address to mail back to you. Even if you use a PO box or something; there is still a trail. You still need to get the letter somehow.
Privacy is impossible. Better privacy - sure - we can do that.
How is overpaying someone good for the economy?
Companies are magical entities with an endless supply of money. That money comes from somewhere.
You can start a lawn care business and pay all of your employees 100k a year + benefits and be competitive. You won't have customers, you won't make a profit. Because the average guy cutting grass for you isn't bringing in over 100k in profit.
It's a zero sum game.
Being 'overpaid' is nearly as bad as being underpaid. The majority of people are going to spend whatever they make and enter into long-term contracts on the assumption that they can make that much money, forever. It reduces their ability to get new jobs and it makes them a liability for the company (which makes the company want to get rid of them, because taking a pay cut is often more difficult than simply firing someone).
I don't want to get into a generational pissing match. Yes, there are certainly positions and roles that require both skill and experience. I'm not suggesting otherwise.
What I *am* saying is that people should get paid relative to what they *do*...not how long they've been doing it.
When your pay is relative to what value you provide, it will always be easy to find another job with similar benefits. Because companies feel they are getting a fair deal.
Some people work a job for 20 years and *get better* at it, each and every year. A lot of people don't. They come in and they do the same job they've done for 20 years. In a lot of positions, the job has changed sufficiently that 14 of those 20 years isn't even relevant anymore.
You see this in software a lot. Yes, a really good developer or team lead who has spent 20 years gaining experience and improving is worth his or her weight in gold. But for the people who show up, do enough to not get fired, and go home....their skills can actually diminish as they gain experience because they don't keep up with the changes in the job. The company I work for transitioned from Access + VB6 to MsSQL + .Net and some of the most experienced developers we have (in terms of years, not ability) are also the least productive.