As I understood it, it was actually the case that the panes were generally thicker at the bottom, but for a different reason. If you have an uneven pane of glass, which end do you put at the bottom? The thicker one, of course...
I don't think that we'll be seing UNIX die anytime soon, especially not to "distributed computing." What is it that constitutes distributed computing that can't be done with a modern UNIX? I can securely access all of my data from any box connected to the Internet, and I don't think there is really any more I could ask for.
For the paranoid, there is always the "distributed computing" where your PC becomes a dumb terminal for "their" (government / Microsoft / MPAA / Satan -- your choice) network. You connect, run the applications from their servers, store your data on their servers, and sell them your soul.
Okay, I know what happened. Some 31337 H4X0R broke into the LA Times website and stole all of their journalistic integrity. Or maybe it was an agent of the MPAA.
More seriously, I find this article to be truly pathetic. Did they have a momentary lapse in judgement, or have they always lacked a sense of ethics? While it is okay to print this article, it isn't ethical without contacting the other party for their side of the story, and allowing them fair comment and criticsm. The implication of having only one side of an issue is that it is the official opinion of LA Times.
So now, we have the official views of a paper being written by the spokesman of a special-interest group. This has certainly happened before, though with a bit more subtlety. The fact that this is being done openly gives me the shivers.
Am I surprised that the American dominated internet is full of seething anger, bitterness, and outright hatred at times? Not really.
You forgot to mention stereotypes. I am tired of people that perpetrate the faux political correctness that makes it okay to stereotype and attack any majority group. Sure, there are plenty of Americans that have a warped world view that places them at the exact center of the known Universe, but it is quite apparent that there are plenty of non-Americans that are equally close-minded.
If you are going to complain about the abrasive nature of Internet communications, this is not the right way to contribute.
There is ultimately a significant difference between a trademark on Java and one on Linux. Java is a normal English word; Linux is not. In fact, the only other use of 'Linux' of which I am aware is a brand of laundry detergent.
Having the media on your own hardware gives you total control. When the media is stored only on a remote server, you lose the ability to watch/listen to what you want, when you want.
Say, for example, that this was the only way movies were avaliable. I turn on my TV, select Star Wars: A New Hope, and press play. And everything is great. Except when the Special Edition movies are made. What if Lucas were to decide that these were how the original movies were really supposed to be, and that only the special edition would be avaliable? Would I be happy? Not a chance. I want to own my music and movies, even when they never exist in relation to a physical medium.
I think the biggest issue with the old technic motors is the gear ratio. They spin very fast, but have practically no torque. This means you have to use up some of your precious gears just to make the thing useful, plus the assembly gets kind of bulky (A 24:1 reduction using a worm gear is about right for the motor I have).
The new motors are much better, as you can connect useful things directly, where the old motor doesn't always fit where it is needed, with the increased size due to the reduction gears.
It is truly ignorant to think that just because something is natural it is also right. Chimpanzees have been observed to systematically wipe out compteting tribes, a practice that in humans would be regarded as genocide. Does that make genocide right? No. We have risen above our genetics (well, usually). We can regard the world from a very different point of view, that of preservation rather than expansion without regard to consequences. This is something to be proud of.
Whoever thought up Intel's "our CPU makes the internet faster!" campaign should be flogged.
No way! It really does make the Internet go faster. Case study: My computer. I had a PII at home on a 56K modem, and then went off to college and bought a PIII, which is much faster on the 10/T campus network...
Actually, I don't think flogging would be sufficient.
On another note, why is it that Intel always does the real improvements in their processers in the middle of a series, instead of between series? Like Coppermine. I think it would have made more sense to not call anything a P3 name until Coppermine instead of 'ooh we have streaming SIMD'. Okay, I'm done now.
I don't understand why anyone really wanted to go to the Fox.com website in the first place. It is a perversion of HTML. The page consists of nothing but a bunch of Flash 'movies' that act as menus. Why not just use standard href tags?
Also, the site seems to be designed specifically with only broadband users in mind. I feel sorry for anyone trying to use this site on a 56K modem or paying by the MB.
There's hardly a text link to be found. The only way to get to a new page is by clicking in one of the Flash movies or on a picture that has no alt text. Perhaps this will change in light of the AOL suit...
what if some wacko dictator says it's illegal for new babies have red hair? do you care? what about if they make having new male babies illegal? wouldn't this be considered a breach of human rights? what do you do about it? how can you stop it?
Excellent point. We shouldn't allow this technology because of the potential for it to be abused. Just like books. We shouldn't have books, because evil dictators could ban the ones they don't like. Down with books!
Really though. It makes no sense to oppose a technology simply because it might be abused.
Most CD players require that the CD be burnt in a single session. That is, you have to copy all of the tracks to your HD, then burn them to the CD in one fell swoop. You won't be able to add anything later, as this 'locks' the disk, but at least it will work in all CD players.
"Those who would trade freedom for security deserve neither freedom nor security" -- Ben Franklin (I think that is the quote)
From the article: In an interview with Reuters Television, the Belgian software scientist was adamant that the system must remain open and neutral -- free of heavy-handed rules governing content.
This is pathetic. Who is going to handle Internet regulation, if not a governmental agency? Are we to create a new international group with these powers, or should we just grant this power to the W3C? The only reason they are saying this is because the public is rightfully distrustful of government regulation.
Also, the comparison to drivers' licenses is way off the mark. Drivers are licenced to prevent accidents. Improper behavior on the Internet is almost exclusively intentional. Refusing to give me a driver's license doesn't stop me from commiting vehicular homicide. The idea that this would somehow make it easier to stop child pornongraphy is wrong too. It is not difficult to find where a page is being hosted and demand the ISP take it down. How would licensing change this?
Licensing Internet users would artificially limit who could contribute, destroying the open forum which currently exists. Small players would be removed, allowing the media giants to dominate yet another medium. He who controls the present controls the past. He who controls the past controls the future.
The idea of teaching 'how to think' by limiting subject matter to reading and math strikes me as absurd. The biggest problems in schools (at least in America) is motivation. Limiting the curriculum to speed reading and math would do nothing to help this. Math is all about the applications. Otherwise, it is just manipulation of symbols. There is no thought in that.
To me, there is a lot to be said for a well rounded education. My education has led me to a point where I am learning more and more about less and less, but I am glad that I have a basic understanding of many fields of human knowledge. Our schools are not so out of date that they cannot give this level of education.
The idea of teaching 'how to think' by limiting subject matter to reading and math strikes me as absurd. The biggest problems in schools (at least in America) is motivation. Limiting the curriculum to speed reading and math would do nothing to help this. Math is all about the applications. Otherwise, it is just manipulation of symbols. There is no thought in that.
To me, there is a lot to be said for a well rounded education. My education has led me to a point where I am learning more and more about less and less, but I am glad that I have a basic understanding of many fields of human knowledge. Our schools are not so out of date that they cannot give this level of education.
Slashdot Mirror
As I understood it, it was actually the case that the panes were generally thicker at the bottom, but for a different reason. If you have an uneven pane of glass, which end do you put at the bottom? The thicker one, of course...
For the paranoid, there is always the "distributed computing" where your PC becomes a dumb terminal for "their" (government / Microsoft / MPAA / Satan -- your choice) network. You connect, run the applications from their servers, store your data on their servers, and sell them your soul.
I know a statistic I'd like to see: Anonymous Coward's karma rating. Any bets on how low it is?
And actually, we still don't have fast ethernet in the dorms.
More seriously, I find this article to be truly pathetic. Did they have a momentary lapse in judgement, or have they always lacked a sense of ethics? While it is okay to print this article, it isn't ethical without contacting the other party for their side of the story, and allowing them fair comment and criticsm. The implication of having only one side of an issue is that it is the official opinion of LA Times.
So now, we have the official views of a paper being written by the spokesman of a special-interest group. This has certainly happened before, though with a bit more subtlety. The fact that this is being done openly gives me the shivers.
You forgot to mention stereotypes. I am tired of people that perpetrate the faux political correctness that makes it okay to stereotype and attack any majority group. Sure, there are plenty of Americans that have a warped world view that places them at the exact center of the known Universe, but it is quite apparent that there are plenty of non-Americans that are equally close-minded.
If you are going to complain about the abrasive nature of Internet communications, this is not the right way to contribute.
There is ultimately a significant difference between a trademark on Java and one on Linux. Java is a normal English word; Linux is not. In fact, the only other use of 'Linux' of which I am aware is a brand of laundry detergent.
"I can imagine a world without war, without hate. Then I can imagine us attacking that world, because they'd never expect it." -- Jack Handey
Say, for example, that this was the only way movies were avaliable. I turn on my TV, select Star Wars: A New Hope, and press play. And everything is great. Except when the Special Edition movies are made. What if Lucas were to decide that these were how the original movies were really supposed to be, and that only the special edition would be avaliable? Would I be happy? Not a chance. I want to own my music and movies, even when they never exist in relation to a physical medium.
The new motors are much better, as you can connect useful things directly, where the old motor doesn't always fit where it is needed, with the increased size due to the reduction gears.
It is truly ignorant to think that just because something is natural it is also right. Chimpanzees have been observed to systematically wipe out compteting tribes, a practice that in humans would be regarded as genocide. Does that make genocide right? No. We have risen above our genetics (well, usually). We can regard the world from a very different point of view, that of preservation rather than expansion without regard to consequences. This is something to be proud of.
No way! It really does make the Internet go faster. Case study: My computer. I had a PII at home on a 56K modem, and then went off to college and bought a PIII, which is much faster on the 10/T campus network...
Actually, I don't think flogging would be sufficient.
On another note, why is it that Intel always does the real improvements in their processers in the middle of a series, instead of between series? Like Coppermine. I think it would have made more sense to not call anything a P3 name until Coppermine instead of 'ooh we have streaming SIMD'. Okay, I'm done now.
Also, the site seems to be designed specifically with only broadband users in mind. I feel sorry for anyone trying to use this site on a 56K modem or paying by the MB.
There's hardly a text link to be found. The only way to get to a new page is by clicking in one of the Flash movies or on a picture that has no alt text. Perhaps this will change in light of the AOL suit...
I, for one, am thoroughly unimpressed.
Excellent point. We shouldn't allow this technology because of the potential for it to be abused. Just like books. We shouldn't have books, because evil dictators could ban the ones they don't like. Down with books!
Really though. It makes no sense to oppose a technology simply because it might be abused.
Most CD players require that the CD be burnt in a single session. That is, you have to copy all of the tracks to your HD, then burn them to the CD in one fell swoop. You won't be able to add anything later, as this 'locks' the disk, but at least it will work in all CD players.
From the article:
In an interview with Reuters Television, the Belgian software scientist was adamant that the system must remain open and neutral -- free of heavy-handed rules governing content.
This is pathetic. Who is going to handle Internet regulation, if not a governmental agency? Are we to create a new international group with these powers, or should we just grant this power to the W3C? The only reason they are saying this is because the public is rightfully distrustful of government regulation.
Also, the comparison to drivers' licenses is way off the mark. Drivers are licenced to prevent accidents. Improper behavior on the Internet is almost exclusively intentional. Refusing to give me a driver's license doesn't stop me from commiting vehicular homicide. The idea that this would somehow make it easier to stop child pornongraphy is wrong too. It is not difficult to find where a page is being hosted and demand the ISP take it down. How would licensing change this?
Licensing Internet users would artificially limit who could contribute, destroying the open forum which currently exists. Small players would be removed, allowing the media giants to dominate yet another medium. He who controls the present controls the past. He who controls the past controls the future.
To me, there is a lot to be said for a well rounded education. My education has led me to a point where I am learning more and more about less and less, but I am glad that I have a basic understanding of many fields of human knowledge. Our schools are not so out of date that they cannot give this level of education.
To me, there is a lot to be said for a well rounded education. My education has led me to a point where I am learning more and more about less and less, but I am glad that I have a basic understanding of many fields of human knowledge. Our schools are not so out of date that they cannot give this level of education.