Well check your facts, trollass. In ancient greece the "love" for youngsters (both male and female) was quite normal and not even openly condamned as sex wasn't conceived as a "perversion" neither was sex with young people. Sex hasn't become less deeply ingrained in some thousand years as well as it is a basic human desire, far stronger then others and unlike the despicable alcohol consumption, it's natural and healthy.
Today we understand that there are dangers coming with sex (the possibility of sexually trasmitted diseases) and we also have a much more protective attitude toward the youngsters, expecially when it comes to protecting them from exploitations by other adults and that includes sexual exploitation. Also, the will of youngsters is also taken much more in consideration then in the past.
In other words, many adults now try both to protect their offspring from other adults (for instance rapists and molesters) but also try to protect them from themselves, as their lack of experience and lack of maturity are also great dangers that are often not taken in consideration; just telling them NOT do to thing or scaring them into believing "sex is evil", or forbidding them to have sex or even learn more about sex is not going to protect them, on the contrary that kind of "dealing" with the youngs is what helps fueling pornography and "perverse" behaviors.
As for the kiddie porn, what is wrong is that some people who enjoy it sometime decide to move from fantasy to reality and by doing so they often if not always attempt to have sex with kids by -forcing- or -seducing- them into sex. That's obviously unacceptable because nobody can force somebody else to do something , and forcing is what rapists do. As for the -seduction- part kids are unexperienced and that's why they should know more, understand when somebody is trying to seduce them into sex, rather then find themselves in situation they don't understand cause mommy talked about bees and other bullshit.
As for real kids, age 0-14/16 I guess (but it really depends also on maturity level) one parent can't but be on the constant lookout and never ever leave them without the supervision of more then one adult, all of them very trustable and very supervised ones.
I agree with you that some information doesn't necessarily need to be made public or that some information shouldn't be made at all public without your consent.
My problem is with censorship as the instrument of restricting access to information that shouldn't be avaiable without your permission to being with. Why ?
Because it -simply- doesn't work. Assume today you enjoy reading some text on the internet that you like, but that is deemed to be controversial or derogatory or otherwise "dangerous" by someone else.
Assume "someone else" has the power to impose censorship on this text. Wouldn't you be royally pissed ? Wouldn't you find some other way to read the text or see the picture ? You probably would and you would probably succeed if you really are interested into the text or picture or whatever.
Now for the shake of making things clear, I oppose child pornography because I guess the childs natural ignorance on the emotional and physical implications of sex is being exploited for monetary gains. The problems is not with sex which is natural and fine, but with the fact that childrens often (not always, but often) aren't emotively ready for sex and take the risks associated with unprotected sex as a minor annoyance, because they're often (not always) not "mature" enough to understand consequences of illness.
Because of their natural lack of what some call as "maturity" they're easy target for exploitation, including sexual one.
But censorship is only a way to -temporarily- remove the exploitation from the eyes of many, instead of making them aware of WHY it is a kind of exploitation and why they shouldn't be scared by sex, but they should stay away from people exploiting them.
Remember Prohibitionism era ? It was effectively trying to cut the production and distribution of alcohol, but it never worked because the demand for alcohol was consistent and was probably reinforced by the fact alcohol become a "forbidden thing" and we all known how youngsters are attracted by things that are forbidden by adults during their transition to maturity. Police spent enormous resources trying to address the "alcohol" problem, just to see all the effort wasted because it was a pointless investment to begin with.
"Tracking and hunting" approach, typical of today knee-jerk reactionism, doesn't address the psycological problems child pornographers have, which probably is caused by an unhealthy approach to sex, seen as a "problem" or "filthy issue" instead of a completely natural expression of human beings. Education on the subject of sex works in the long term, while repression and prohibition has done more damages then good.
The dynamic nature of internet makes censorship absolutely useless ; today BT blocks 100 child porn site, tomorrow 200 more pop up somewhere else or some new technology/idea will make them harder to trace.
Not only is this attempt utterly useless, but it also supports the concept that censorship is the answer to internal security problems ; in other words , they're selling security by obscurity for the marketing purpose of showing they're "concerned". While people who are very concerned by child pornography may consider a good sane sex education as an alternative, far reaching solution to the issue.
Oh come on ! You're assuming Monsanto isn't messing up because it's a company, therefore it must be following law ? Enron was a company, was it following law ? I guess you don't even know which law you're talking about ?
There's a lot of guilty or not guilty by assumption and prejudice going on I guess; remember it is "NOT guilty" until proven guilty, not the other way around !
1. If a tree falls and you don't see it falling, does that mean the tree is still standing ?
1. If a person is cleared and avoid prosecution only because of a technicality, does that make the person innocent ?
Italians were "won" by Berlusconi because of his masterful use of rethorics and methods of mass mediatic communication and because of the lack of ANY serious opposition. Italians basically bought the line that "if he's so good at managing his empire, then it must be good at managing state" which is obviously a non-sequituer, but the lack of a strong opposition, prepared to counter attack the flaming rethoric and propaganda won him the elections.
Even now the routine gets repeated over and over, exactly like Neo-Cons minions do in America calling "liberal" anything that moves , Berlusconi minions call "communist" anything that moves. And the opposition in italy doesn't really know how to handle that , while in U.S. some opposition is finally forming and preparing (but the situation is a lot more complicated by war).
People also bought into the concept that a strong unopposable majority is a good thing, because it makes the decision process quickier and more manageable ; while that's true from a management point of view, it is a total failure from a political representative one when the majority utterly refuses even to -discuss- arguments with the opposition, littering them with "you communist" or "you liberal" attacks or more substle rethorics. It's like talking to a wall, therefore the minority (even if the minority is a good 45% of population) gets no representation and no voice. How can this be good ?
distinctly European bias (Oh no lets avoid technology progress as that would ruin our little socialistic state... It is the same argument that they have invoked against genetic technologies)
And here is were I stopped reading your message further. Anybody who's buying political propaganda that Europe is made by a group of socialist luddites obviously doesn't have much to say about technology and its developement, as he/she is easily derailed and inflamed by rethorical generalizations and probably has a political agenda, or vested interests in nanotechnology.
Call me a troll if you wish, I don't care, facts still are facts regardless of politics and fact is you're using the pseudo-argument:
Europe is Socialist --> technology ruins socialism --> Europe opposes technology --> therefore anything concerning technology but coming from europe must be discounted.
I suggest you stop talking about technology until you understand what is rethoric and why engineers and people -really- interested in technology avoid it like the plague it is.
Give up the timing thing, unless you follow all televisions 24h a day for 365 days. Berlusconi isn't a fool , as his mediacenters know exactly how long can his "hawks" remain on TV so that nobody can tell he or his representative were on tv for too much time. Don't look for enormous sizable errors as thanks to the support of his hired brains he will not do one.
Yes being prosecuted doesn't mean the prosecuted is guilty. He was found guilty of corruption but know what...he couldn't be punished because the terms for prosecution expired.
At least italian voters can comfort themselves thinking they're not the only "advanced" country fooled by a ton of rethoric and by a media that is anything but "liberal".
The Inet as we know it today has its roots in the ARPAnet project, which was conceived to let command & control centers communicate during and after a nuclear attack.
Of course I like today high speed internet, but I would have traded off the absence of Internet with absence of nuclear weapons in a snap ; I would still be using BBSes and Fidonet , but at least I wouldn't be "terrorized" by the prospect of nuclear explosion , dirty nuclear bomb and other WMDs.
1) just some boxcutters 2) a moderate amount of brains (buy ticket, learn some minor piloting skill, look at a timetable) 3) an _enormous_ amount of will (unfortunately spoiled by religious extremism brainwashing exacerbated by a borderline religious, opposed ideology propaganda)
I guess you're hitting the nail right on its head.
It's interesting to notice how much the defence system is trying to "outsource responsability" to private prison-interrogators/investigators/so-called-exper ts, a strategy apparently borrowed from corporations which pay outsourcers to bring away and sustain their risks and legal problems as much as possible, effectively providing some kind of shielding or delay from responsability and accountability.
Probably we'll see more and more "we didn't know!" outcries and the blame will be shifted to whoever was given the "job" of providing and analyzing information , CIA or FBI or Private Contractor X (or to Soldier Joe the scapegoat)
The problem is Private Contractor X could be a limited liability company, which offers another level of reponsability shielding to whoever is running it or is behind it ; effectively making nobody responsible, as-if intelligence/military failures were business failures. Indeed the approach to the prison-scandal , as you say, is that of a PR failure which is typical of companies ! That further reinforces my sensation that this whole iraq-problem is being managed as-if it was a private enterprise attempting to privatize profits and socialize costs.
Writer: I just created the word "ssssnnmmmafuz" Wow I'm creative ! It means a lot to me, and only to me ! I could have written about something else well covered by others, but that would not have been creative so who cares.
Programmer: I just managed to make this algorithm 10% more efficient than the previous algo. Yeah I'm not going to become famous because nobody is going to notice anyway, but that algorithm is helping folding@home understand what's going on with prions and the mad cow disease. In the long run I'm helping save some life maybe.
I mean come on ! Anybody can write any nonsense and claim they're creative : indeed they're , technically speaking , but who cares ?
In my opinion the bookwriter isn't more creative then a programmer, when it comes to using language. Everybody must abide to certain rules of language syntax and rules of communication...that's true for programmers as well but they wrestle with a number of variable, constrains and constant that are given by both the language they're using and the binary nature of computers.
The really creative writer/artist, imho, is the one who manages to convey a message or a truth that was either hidden and not well understood or simply misunderstood ; programmers usually aren't creative in this way , but neither are many writers.
From the Cease and Desist letter the guy received from Ammerucan Asshats:
Your unauthorized use of AMERICAN EXPRESSWAY, a mark virtually identical to our client's "AMERICAN EXPRESS"(TM) mark, is likely to cause consumers to be confused, mistaken, or deceived as to the source of origin of your services.
Your service ? It's a joke it's not a service.
It is likely that someone viewing your advertisements and other uses of AMERICAN EXPRESSWAY and "MEMBERSHIP HAS ITS PRIVILEGES" (TM) would believe that your services are connected with, affiliated with, approved by, or otherwise sponsored by our client, when in fact they are not. Your continued use of our client's marks violates the Federal Lanham Act, 15 U.S.C. 1114, 1125(a), and 1125(c). In addition, your continued use of these marks constitutes a deceptive business practice and unfair competition in violation of state law.
For competition to exist, the guy making the joke should be using the joke for the purpose of incrementing the sales of his own brand of credit cards at expense of Ammmerukan Assgrabbers ; that could probably be considered as a kind of unfair competition.
It is quite evident that this is a standardized Cease & Desist Letter sent to companies that are abuusing a brand to ATTRACT customers ; they're probably routinely sent by thousands to scare the hell out of ignorants, who can't spot that they're standardized. The "lawyer" , assuming she is one, didn't even care to adapt the letter. Brilliant, really brilliant.
Even in a court, it would not stand one minute as during the judgement actual confusion is also evaluated , not only potential.
That is NOT protecting the trademark from abuse, that's a kind of harrasment that probably, in a few occasions, borderlines indirect blackmailing as the consumer is "offered" to pay in advance to avoid further prosecutions (which is a lie, they still can prosecute you).
Well if you consider the number of countries in which Simpsons are aired (all the rich western countries at least) , the hefty check that surely is demanded for each episode airing rights (which probably includes some re-airing rights as well), the sizable number of episodes that can be resold for a number of years...the fact that advertisers probably pay premium for being aired near Simpsons...
basically Simpsons is a goldmine
Apparently the voices are now getting $125k per episode, which of course is already an hell a lot of money for the majority of the population, but their request of $360k is just a negotiation request that will probably be reduce to around somewhere between $200-250k. If I was in their position I'd try getting some more from Murdoch rich coffers.
What is laughable is not that they're asking $$ for working, the laughable fact is that such request could be met and all this money is around a cartoon, even a successful one.
I mean Jesus all this kind of money around a cartoon and still no cure for diseases ? What a fucked up system.
Well one thing is saying that your PC "doesn't like" Bittorrent for some reason and drops connection, another is saying bittorrent disrupts connections.
It's like saying "given that my car isn't working after I installed this modification, this modification will stop any car, therefore it's a bad mod" It's a little logical mess we have here.
Try searching on the net for different implementation of Bittorrent, there are at least 3-4, one may work well for you.
The client develoeprs have to recognize that yes, sharing is nice and leeching is bad, but disrupting the users' connection is a Very Bad Thing
Disrupting user connection ? Like throwing a bomb on a thing may disrupt the thing, but the inet connection of the user isn't disrupted at all.
What really happens is that the download/upload speed are tied in Bittorrent, but you can use Opera Explorer YouNameItProgram at the same time and there will be no disruption at all.
If by "disruption" you mean that the use of bittorrent will take some of the bandwidth avaiable to the user, then even Explorer is a "disruptive" application, any application would be "disruptive".
The fact that customers with Asynchronous DSL lines (aka ADSL) will have their download speed limited when they upload -at the same time- is not a Bittorrent fault ( easy explanation, very technical explanation)
Ok so let's try again, as I think this is a good discussion and we managed not to start a flame on it, therefore it attracts my attention.
I basically agree with you on some important points, except the distinction between data and information. You say you use the two words interchangeably, I don't and my concern may seem to be limited to semantics of the issue, which is already an important issue to me as if we don't agree on the words we may agree on everything else, but some communication problem may arise (even outside of this conversation).
I think we agree on:
the fact that, thanks to computers and information technology advancements we can now
a) collect more data/information about anything thanks mainly to mechanical sensors (cameras, for instance) and human sensors (people noticing something and typing whatever they noticed in a database) b) store this d/i in a less expensive, faster way c) push this d/i trought algoritms designed to find if data is equal, not equal or statistically similar (number of occourrences, matching words et al) in a few seconds d) sharing this d/i in a very quick, relatively unexpensive way thanks to computer networks.
So far, fine. We have access to tons of data/information, we can process it with algoritms ; this definitely is advancement from the past technology (pen,paper,library, a lot of patience). I guess we both welcome to some extent the fact that such tools do exist.
Now, back to data/information dicotomy I have in mind. Let's use an example for the shake of simplicity:
Joe wants the following information: a) Joe wants to visit a Walmart store at 11 o'clock Sunday b) Joe wants to know if this is possible (which is the real question, is the visit possible ?)
Joe thinks that 1)the store must be open for him to be able to visit it 2)maybe it is closed on sundays, therefore it is a good idea to check if it open before wasting time
Timeframe: 1970
Joe starts collecting data 1) from white pages , store's telephone number (data) 2) calls store 3) telephone busy 4) calls a friend (database) friend says he doesn't know 5) calls another friend, friend says "yes it's open" Time spent: 5 minutes
Timeframe: 2000 Joe starts collecting data 1) Joe knows the store must have a website but he doesn't know the URL (data) 2) "Googles" (IT,search engine) to find the website (bunch of data) 3) Finds the website that says "store is open" (data that actually is the information he was looking for) Time spent: 1 minute or less
Now for a more complex question (ok an extreme question, but a question indeed)
Joe wants to know the average content of fat in a sample of 1000 McDonald hamburgers. The hamburges must come each from a different restaurant and must be bought the same day. The analysis must be done by at least 3 indipendent laboratories on each hamburger with the same methodology and instruments The answer to this complex question with complex restrictions is indeed a number with an unit of measure (for instance, 10grams).
Assuming that all the data required is not secret and avaiable from a number of databases, assuming Joe knows how to push all this data in a computer and use algoritms on the data, he may find the answer 10grams.
(on a tangent, if he pushes "10grams" alone in a database this is just a piece of data, not the answer-information he was looking for)
How did he "mine" the information he wanted from that bunch of "data" ? How did he relate all the data in a way that the answer he was looking for was presented and produced by the computer ? Was it really any easier for him to obtain the information he was looking for -BECAUSE- of the mere presence & avaiability & speed of tools he used ?
I argue that the information extraction was just -faster- (and that is good), but not any easier as he had to employ a lot of powerful
No, my argument is about what do you qualify as information and what difference there is between data and information if any.
You say, the point of IT is to get information and to study it with less effort then before: indeed it now takes less time to browse trought one entire library and that is unquestionably usefull.
Later you say that I should either choose to acknowledge that I want ease of _data_ use or stop asking for better technology
(which is already a false dicotomy because I can at the same time NOT acknowledge that I want data ease-of-use AND ask for better computing because I want, for instace, to play video games)
because , you say, we can't advance computer technology (whatever it means to you) without making getting and studying information easier ; but I can, for instace, increase the instruction per second a CPU can crunch and that would make data analysis faster, but not easier because fast doesn't mean easy, I could run 100 meters in 10 seconds or in 5 seconds , but it still would require an highly skilled runner not to stumble at such speeds. Same for data analysis, faster CPU is probably better , but doesn't make data analysis easier.
In my opinion there's a difference between data and information : for instace , "0" or "1" is not information unless you attach some meaning to "0" as "false" and "1" as "true" or any other meaning you want.
For instace let's say I know how much money you own , let's say $100. That's data to me, I can later attach a meaning to it, that you're poor or you're rich depending on how much money I have or how much money anybody else have.
"Sky color is blue" is just a perception of sky I have and it's data, as taken standalone it only means "Sky color is blue". You need to connect this data with enough other data to make use of it, for instace "you own a blue pastel " and "you own a piece of paper"
By taking the tree pieces of data standalone I can't infer you are able to paint sky only because I have three pieces of data , one about sky and two about you, because I don't have the information about you that you actually know how paint sky. I need another piece of data "he can paint", but even so I could only -suppose- that you can paint sky (which is enough for some application, but not for every) because I didn't actually see you paint a blue sky.
A more up to date example: I may have data you have borrowed the book "building bombs" and data "you bought a clock" and "you bought electrical wires and a battery"..all this data suggest that you may be building a bomb, but the information I want "is he a terrorist or not ?" is still not avaiable unless we obtain the data "he detonated a bomb in a bulding full of people".
One possible definition of information may be "a useful answer given to a question"
You talk about computers, and how easily they can be used to contain and analyze a lot of "information" so that it is now easier to connect dots and infer information that we didn't have. You suggest that _we_ are the cause of our own problems, because "we" supported "information wants to be free" statement.
You talk about information, but what you don't say is that data is not information; and computer treat data, bits, not information.
For instace, let's say I have the following data 1) you posted a message on Slashdot at xxxx time 2) your telephone line was busy at xxxx time 3) a call was initiated at xxxx-1 time 4) your lights were switched on at xxxx time 5) you were seen by a camera entering your house at xxxx-2 time
With all this data, I could reasonably suppose that you posted this message on slashdot and call this "information on your activity" but that is wrong, wrong wrong because
1) a virus took control of your pc 2) the virus dialed to your isp 3) the virus posted on slashdot 4) the fact you were in the house is a coincidence
So what we have is not information on your activity, yet it seems like it is information, but it's only a bunch of data.
I could add a sensor to detect your physical presence, but it can be fooled, as much as today is it possible to make a realistic video of your face saying anything, also thanks to computers.
The real information here is 1) that we can collect a bunch of data easily 2) that the data collecting devices can be fooled 3) that is relatively easy to make false digital data
One little tought on privacy: if data about you can and will be collected, no matter how and by how and if legally or illegally, what should we define as privacy ?
Let's take for granted companies will attempt to use RDIF or any other technology to get to know even more then they already do about our spending habits (marketing guys want to know a lot about us)
Now, if they can track in almost-real time or realtime MY spending habits, history, locations and choices... why can't I know THEIRS with the same ease ?
Imagine going to *anycompany* and asking "Hey I bought this stuff from you and I know that you know I did ; I'd like to track your company habits as well". Police will be summoned and you'll be likely charged with
1)invasion of private property (they'll lie) 2)industrial espionage 3)being a tinfoil-hat fool
Or if they're a little gentle they'll just say "go stuff yourself, that's not stuff you're supposed to know"
Well companies, data about me is not stuff you're supposed to know, so get lost as well.
Well said ! Let me add that sometimes apparent wastes of time and resources (like this otherwise nice duracell hack which btw should make duracell marketing have an orgasm, what about sending some tech toy to that guy Duracell ?) can lead to unexpected discoveries.
For instance Joseph Prisley back in 1772 was "playing" with a candle and jar and noticed that the candle didn't burn anymore after a while if you covered it with a jar (big deal, we say today..but back then it was). Then he placed a plant (dunno why he tought about putting a plant in there) in the jar , later a mouse and a plant and a candle in the jar and discovered that WITH the plant the mouse lived and the candle burned.
Photosynthesis was under his very eyes , he tought that some gas was in there with particular properties (oxygen, but he didn't know).
Later Lavosier _repeated_ his experiment and named the gas oxygen.
All of this because some guy back in 1772 was playing with jars, mouses and plants and he probably looked like a crazy fool to the bystanders.
Slashdot Mirror
Well check your facts, trollass. In ancient greece the "love" for youngsters (both male and female) was quite normal and not even openly condamned as sex wasn't conceived as a "perversion" neither was sex with young people.
Sex hasn't become less deeply ingrained in some thousand years as well as it is a basic human desire, far stronger then others and unlike the despicable alcohol consumption, it's natural and healthy.
Today we understand that there are dangers coming with sex (the possibility of sexually trasmitted diseases) and we also have a much more protective attitude toward the youngsters, expecially when it comes to protecting them from exploitations by other adults and that includes sexual exploitation. Also, the will of youngsters is also taken much more in consideration then in the past.
In other words, many adults now try both to protect their offspring from other adults (for instance rapists and molesters) but also try to protect them from themselves, as their lack of experience and lack of maturity are also great dangers that are often not taken in consideration; just telling them NOT do to thing or scaring them into believing "sex is evil", or forbidding them to have sex or even learn more about sex is not going to protect them, on the contrary that kind of "dealing" with the youngs is what helps fueling pornography and "perverse" behaviors.
As for the kiddie porn, what is wrong is that some people who enjoy it sometime decide to move from fantasy to reality and by doing so they often if not always attempt to have sex with kids by -forcing- or -seducing- them into sex. That's obviously unacceptable because nobody can force somebody else to do something , and forcing is what rapists do. As for the -seduction- part kids are unexperienced and that's why they should know more, understand when somebody is trying to seduce them into sex, rather then find themselves in situation they don't understand cause mommy talked about bees and other bullshit.
As for real kids, age 0-14/16 I guess (but it really depends also on maturity level) one parent can't but be on the constant lookout and never ever leave them without the supervision of more then one adult, all of them very trustable and very supervised ones.
Ahaha this is funny, but other then funny what is it ?
I agree with you that some information doesn't necessarily need to be made public or that some information shouldn't be made at all public without your consent.
My problem is with censorship as the instrument of restricting access to information that shouldn't be avaiable without your permission to being with. Why ?
Because it -simply- doesn't work. Assume today you enjoy reading some text on the internet that you like, but that is deemed to be controversial or derogatory or otherwise "dangerous" by someone else.
Assume "someone else" has the power to impose censorship on this text. Wouldn't you be royally pissed ? Wouldn't you find some other way to read the text or see the picture ? You probably would and you would probably succeed if you really are interested into the text or picture or whatever.
Now for the shake of making things clear, I oppose child pornography because I guess the childs natural ignorance on the emotional and physical implications of sex is being exploited for monetary gains. The problems is not with sex which is natural and fine, but with the fact that childrens often (not always, but often) aren't emotively ready for sex and take the risks associated with unprotected sex as a minor annoyance, because they're often (not always) not "mature" enough to understand consequences of illness.
Because of their natural lack of what some call as "maturity" they're easy target for exploitation, including sexual one.
But censorship is only a way to -temporarily- remove the exploitation from the eyes of many, instead of making them aware of WHY it is a kind of exploitation and why they shouldn't be scared by sex, but they should stay away from people exploiting them.
No it isn't a good idea.
Remember Prohibitionism era ? It was effectively trying to cut the production and distribution of alcohol, but it never worked because the demand for alcohol was consistent and was probably reinforced by the fact alcohol become a "forbidden thing" and we all known how youngsters are attracted by things that are forbidden by adults during their transition to maturity. Police spent enormous resources trying to address the "alcohol" problem, just to see all the effort wasted because it was a pointless investment to begin with.
"Tracking and hunting" approach, typical of today knee-jerk reactionism, doesn't address the psycological problems child pornographers have, which probably is caused by an unhealthy approach to sex, seen as a "problem" or "filthy issue" instead of a completely natural expression of human beings. Education on the subject of sex works in the long term, while repression and prohibition has done more damages then good.
The dynamic nature of internet makes censorship absolutely useless ; today BT blocks 100 child porn site, tomorrow 200 more pop up somewhere else or some new technology/idea will make them harder to trace.
Not only is this attempt utterly useless, but it also supports the concept that censorship is the answer to internal security problems ; in other words , they're selling security by obscurity for the marketing purpose of showing they're "concerned". While people who are very concerned by child pornography may consider a good sane sex education as an alternative, far reaching solution to the issue.
Bollywood is gearing up to sell mp3s as by the time RIAA figures out what is the way to follow we'll all have learned hindi.
Oh come on ! You're assuming Monsanto isn't messing up because it's a company, therefore it must be following law ? Enron was a company, was it following law ? I guess you don't even know which law you're talking about ?
There's a lot of guilty or not guilty by assumption and prejudice going on I guess; remember it is "NOT guilty" until proven guilty, not the other way around !
I'll explain
1. If a tree falls and you don't see it falling, does that mean the tree is still standing ?
1. If a person is cleared and avoid prosecution only because of a technicality, does that make the person innocent ?
Italians were "won" by Berlusconi because of his masterful use of rethorics and methods of mass mediatic communication and because of the lack of ANY serious opposition. Italians basically bought the line that "if he's so good at managing his empire, then it must be good at managing state" which is obviously a non-sequituer, but the lack of a strong opposition, prepared to counter attack the flaming rethoric and propaganda won him the elections.
Even now the routine gets repeated over and over, exactly like Neo-Cons minions do in America calling "liberal" anything that moves , Berlusconi minions call "communist" anything that moves. And the opposition in italy doesn't really know how to handle that , while in U.S. some opposition is finally forming and preparing (but the situation is a lot more complicated by war).
People also bought into the concept that a strong unopposable majority is a good thing, because it makes the decision process quickier and more manageable ; while that's true from a management point of view, it is a total failure from a political representative one when the majority utterly refuses even to -discuss- arguments with the opposition, littering them with "you communist" or "you liberal" attacks or more substle rethorics. It's like talking to a wall, therefore the minority (even if the minority is a good 45% of population) gets no representation and no voice. How can this be good ?
distinctly European bias (Oh no lets avoid technology progress as that would ruin our little socialistic state... It is the same argument that they have invoked against genetic technologies)
And here is were I stopped reading your message further. Anybody who's buying political propaganda that Europe is made by a group of socialist luddites obviously doesn't have much to say about technology and its developement, as he/she is easily derailed and inflamed by rethorical generalizations and probably has a political agenda, or vested interests in nanotechnology.
Call me a troll if you wish, I don't care, facts still are facts regardless of politics and fact is you're using the pseudo-argument:
Europe is Socialist --> technology ruins socialism --> Europe opposes technology --> therefore anything concerning technology but coming from europe must be discounted.
I suggest you stop talking about technology until you understand what is rethoric and why engineers and people -really- interested in technology avoid it like the plague it is.
Start from this link (in italian, try babelfish.
Give up the timing thing, unless you follow all televisions 24h a day for 365 days. Berlusconi isn't a fool , as his mediacenters know exactly how long can his "hawks" remain on TV so that nobody can tell he or his representative were on tv for too much time. Don't look for enormous sizable errors as thanks to the support of his hired brains he will not do one.
Yes being prosecuted doesn't mean the prosecuted is guilty. He was found guilty of corruption but know what...he couldn't be punished because the terms for prosecution expired.
At least italian voters can comfort themselves thinking they're not the only "advanced" country fooled by a ton of rethoric and by a media that is anything but "liberal".
The Inet as we know it today has its roots in the ARPAnet project, which was conceived to let command & control centers communicate during and after a nuclear attack.
Of course I like today high speed internet, but I would have traded off the absence of Internet with absence of nuclear weapons in a snap ; I would still be using BBSes and Fidonet , but at least I wouldn't be "terrorized" by the prospect of nuclear explosion , dirty nuclear bomb and other WMDs.
Thank governments again for WHAT ?
All they needed for 9/11 was
1) just some boxcutters
2) a moderate amount of brains (buy ticket, learn some minor piloting skill, look at a timetable)
3) an _enormous_ amount of will (unfortunately spoiled by religious extremism brainwashing exacerbated by a borderline religious, opposed ideology propaganda)
I guess you're hitting the nail right on its head.
r ts, a strategy apparently borrowed from corporations which pay outsourcers to bring away and sustain their risks and legal problems as much as possible, effectively providing some kind of shielding or delay from responsability and accountability.
It's interesting to notice how much the defence system is trying to "outsource responsability" to private prison-interrogators/investigators/so-called-expe
Probably we'll see more and more "we didn't know!" outcries and the blame will be shifted to whoever was given the "job" of providing and analyzing information , CIA or FBI or Private Contractor X (or to Soldier Joe the scapegoat)
The problem is Private Contractor X could be a limited liability company, which offers another level of reponsability shielding to whoever is running it or is behind it ; effectively making nobody responsible, as-if intelligence/military failures were business failures. Indeed the approach to the prison-scandal , as you say, is that of a PR failure which is typical of companies ! That further reinforces my sensation that this whole iraq-problem is being managed as-if it was a private enterprise attempting to privatize profits and socialize costs.
Well writing indeed != programming
...that's true for programmers as well but they wrestle with a number of variable, constrains and constant that are given by both the language they're using and the binary nature of computers.
Writer: I just created the word "ssssnnmmmafuz" Wow I'm creative ! It means a lot to me, and only to me ! I could have written about something else well covered by others, but that would not have been creative so who cares.
Programmer: I just managed to make this algorithm 10% more efficient than the previous algo. Yeah I'm not going to become famous because nobody is going to notice anyway, but that algorithm is helping folding@home understand what's going on with prions and the mad cow disease. In the long run I'm helping save some life maybe.
I mean come on ! Anybody can write any nonsense and claim they're creative : indeed they're , technically speaking , but who cares ?
In my opinion the bookwriter isn't more creative then a programmer, when it comes to using language. Everybody must abide to certain rules of language syntax and rules of communication
The really creative writer/artist, imho, is the one who manages to convey a message or a truth that was either hidden and not well understood or simply misunderstood ; programmers usually aren't creative in this way , but neither are many writers.
From the Cease and Desist letter the guy received from Ammerucan Asshats:
Your unauthorized use of AMERICAN EXPRESSWAY, a mark virtually identical to our client's "AMERICAN EXPRESS"(TM) mark, is likely to cause consumers to be confused, mistaken, or deceived as to the source of origin of your services.
Your service ? It's a joke it's not a service.
It is likely that someone viewing your advertisements and other uses of AMERICAN EXPRESSWAY and "MEMBERSHIP HAS ITS PRIVILEGES" (TM) would believe that your services are connected with, affiliated with, approved by, or otherwise sponsored by our client, when in fact they are not. Your continued use of our client's marks violates the Federal Lanham Act, 15 U.S.C. 1114, 1125(a), and 1125(c). In addition, your continued use of these marks constitutes a deceptive business practice and unfair competition in violation of state law.
For competition to exist, the guy making the joke should be using the joke for the purpose of incrementing the sales of his own brand of credit cards at expense of Ammmerukan Assgrabbers ; that could probably be considered as a kind of unfair competition.
It is quite evident that this is a standardized Cease & Desist Letter sent to companies that are abuusing a brand to ATTRACT customers ; they're probably routinely sent by thousands to scare the hell out of ignorants, who can't spot that they're standardized. The "lawyer" , assuming she is one, didn't even care to adapt the letter. Brilliant, really brilliant.
Even in a court, it would not stand one minute as during the judgement actual confusion is also evaluated , not only potential.
That is NOT protecting the trademark from abuse, that's a kind of harrasment that probably, in a few occasions, borderlines indirect blackmailing as the consumer is "offered" to pay in advance to avoid further prosecutions (which is a lie, they still can prosecute you).
Well if you consider the number of countries in which Simpsons are aired (all the rich western countries at least) , the hefty check that surely is demanded for each episode airing rights (which probably includes some re-airing rights as well), the sizable number of episodes that can be resold for a number of years ...the fact that advertisers probably pay premium for being aired near Simpsons...
basically Simpsons is a goldmine
Apparently the voices are now getting $125k per episode, which of course is already an hell a lot of money for the majority of the population, but their request of $360k is just a negotiation request that will probably be reduce to around somewhere between $200-250k. If I was in their position I'd try getting some more from Murdoch rich coffers.
What is laughable is not that they're asking $$ for working, the laughable fact is that such request could be met and all this money is around a cartoon, even a successful one.
I mean Jesus all this kind of money around a cartoon and still no cure for diseases ? What a fucked up system.
Well one thing is saying that your PC "doesn't like" Bittorrent for some reason and drops connection, another is saying bittorrent disrupts connections.
It's like saying "given that my car isn't working after I installed this modification, this modification will stop any car, therefore it's a bad mod" It's a little logical mess we have here.
Try searching on the net for different implementation of Bittorrent, there are at least 3-4, one may work well for you.
The client develoeprs have to recognize that yes, sharing is nice and leeching is bad, but disrupting the users' connection is a Very Bad Thing
Disrupting user connection ? Like throwing a bomb on a thing may disrupt the thing, but the inet connection of the user isn't disrupted at all.
What really happens is that the download/upload speed are tied in Bittorrent, but you can use Opera Explorer YouNameItProgram at the same time and there will be no disruption at all.
If by "disruption" you mean that the use of bittorrent will take some of the bandwidth avaiable to the user, then even Explorer is a "disruptive" application, any application would be "disruptive".
The fact that customers with Asynchronous DSL lines (aka ADSL) will have their download speed limited when they upload -at the same time- is not a Bittorrent fault ( easy explanation, very technical explanation)
Ok so let's try again, as I think this is a good discussion and we managed not to start a flame on it, therefore it attracts my attention.
:
:
I basically agree with you on some important points, except the distinction between data and information. You say you use the two words interchangeably, I don't and my concern may seem to be limited to semantics of the issue, which is already an important issue to me as if we don't agree on the words we may agree on everything else, but some communication problem may arise (even outside of this conversation).
I think we agree on
the fact that, thanks to computers and information technology advancements we can now
a) collect more data/information about anything
thanks mainly to mechanical sensors (cameras, for instance) and human sensors (people noticing something and typing whatever they noticed in a database)
b) store this d/i in a less expensive, faster way
c) push this d/i trought algoritms designed to find if data is equal, not equal or statistically similar (number of occourrences, matching words et al) in a few seconds
d) sharing this d/i in a very quick, relatively unexpensive way thanks to computer networks.
So far, fine. We have access to tons of data/information, we can process it with algoritms ; this definitely is advancement from the past technology (pen,paper,library, a lot of patience). I guess we both welcome to some extent
the fact that such tools do exist.
Now, back to data/information dicotomy I have in mind. Let's use an example for the shake of simplicity
Joe wants the following information:
a) Joe wants to visit a Walmart store at 11 o'clock Sunday
b) Joe wants to know if this is possible (which is the real question, is the visit possible ?)
Joe thinks that
1)the store must be open for him to be able to visit it
2)maybe it is closed on sundays, therefore it is
a good idea to check if it open before wasting time
Timeframe: 1970
Joe starts collecting data
1) from white pages , store's telephone number (data)
2) calls store
3) telephone busy
4) calls a friend (database) friend says he doesn't know
5) calls another friend, friend says "yes it's open"
Time spent: 5 minutes
Timeframe: 2000
Joe starts collecting data
1) Joe knows the store must have a website but he doesn't know the URL (data)
2) "Googles" (IT,search engine) to find the website (bunch of data)
3) Finds the website that says "store is open"
(data that actually is the information he was looking for)
Time spent: 1 minute or less
Now for a more complex question (ok an extreme question, but a question indeed)
Joe wants to know the average content of fat in a sample of 1000 McDonald hamburgers. The hamburges must come each from a different restaurant and must be bought the same day. The analysis must be done by at least 3 indipendent laboratories on each hamburger with the same methodology and instruments
The answer to this complex question with complex restrictions is indeed a number with an unit of measure (for instance, 10grams).
Assuming that all the data required is not secret and avaiable from a number of databases, assuming Joe knows how to push all this data in a computer and use algoritms on the data, he may find the answer 10grams.
(on a tangent, if he pushes "10grams" alone in a database this is just a piece of data, not the answer-information he was looking for)
How did he "mine" the information he wanted from that bunch of "data" ? How did he relate all the data in a way that the answer he was looking for was presented and produced by the computer ? Was it really any easier for him to obtain the information he was looking for -BECAUSE- of the mere presence & avaiability & speed of tools he used ?
I argue that the information extraction was just -faster- (and that is good), but not any easier as he had to employ a lot of powerful
No, my argument is about what do you qualify as information and what difference there is between data and information if any.
..all this data suggest that you may be building a bomb, but the information I want "is he a terrorist or not ?" is still not avaiable unless we obtain the data "he detonated a bomb in a bulding full of people".
You say, the point of IT is to get information and to study it with less effort then before: indeed it now takes less time to browse trought one entire library and that is unquestionably usefull.
Later you say that I should either choose to acknowledge that I want ease of _data_ use or stop asking for better technology
(which is already a false dicotomy because I can at the same time NOT acknowledge that I want data
ease-of-use AND ask for better computing because I want, for instace, to play video games)
because , you say, we can't advance computer technology (whatever it means to you) without making getting and studying information easier ; but I can, for instace, increase the instruction per second a CPU can crunch and that would make data analysis faster, but not easier because
fast doesn't mean easy, I could run 100 meters in 10 seconds or in 5 seconds , but it still would require an highly skilled runner not to stumble at such speeds. Same for data analysis, faster CPU is probably better , but doesn't make data analysis easier.
In my opinion there's a difference between data and information : for instace , "0" or "1" is not information unless you attach some meaning to "0" as "false" and "1" as "true" or any other meaning you want.
For instace let's say I know how much money you own , let's say $100. That's data to me, I can later attach a meaning to it, that you're poor or you're rich depending on how much money I have or how much money anybody else have.
"Sky color is blue" is just a perception of sky I have and it's data, as taken standalone it only means "Sky color is blue". You need to connect this data with enough other data to make use of it, for instace "you own a blue pastel " and "you own a piece of paper"
By taking the tree pieces of data standalone I can't infer you are able to paint sky only because I have three pieces of data , one about sky and two about you, because I don't have the information about you that you actually know how paint sky. I need another piece of data "he can paint", but even so I could only -suppose- that you can paint sky (which is enough for some application, but not for every) because I didn't actually see you paint a blue sky.
A more up to date example: I may have data you have borrowed the book "building bombs" and data "you bought a clock" and "you bought electrical wires and a battery"
One possible definition of information may be "a useful answer given to a question"
You talk about computers, and how easily they can
be used to contain and analyze a lot of "information" so that it is now easier to connect dots and infer information that we didn't have. You suggest that _we_ are the cause of our own problems, because "we" supported "information wants to be free" statement.
You talk about information, but what you don't
say is that data is not information; and computer treat data, bits, not information.
For instace, let's say I have the following data
1) you posted a message on Slashdot at xxxx time
2) your telephone line was busy at xxxx time
3) a call was initiated at xxxx-1 time
4) your lights were switched on at xxxx time
5) you were seen by a camera entering your house at xxxx-2 time
With all this data, I could reasonably suppose that you posted this message on slashdot and call this "information on your activity" but that is wrong, wrong wrong because
1) a virus took control of your pc
2) the virus dialed to your isp
3) the virus posted on slashdot
4) the fact you were in the house is
a coincidence
So what we have is not information on your activity, yet it seems like it is information, but it's only a bunch of data.
I could add a sensor to detect your physical presence, but it can be fooled, as much as today is it possible to make a realistic video of your face saying anything, also thanks to computers.
The real information here is
1) that we can collect a bunch of data easily
2) that the data collecting devices can be fooled
3) that is relatively easy to make false digital data
One little tought on privacy: if data about you can and will be collected, no matter how and by how and if legally or illegally, what should we define as privacy ?
Let's take for granted companies will attempt to use RDIF or any other technology to get to know even more then they already do about our spending habits (marketing guys want to know a lot about us)
... why can't I know THEIRS with the same ease ?
Now, if they can track in almost-real time or realtime MY spending habits, history, locations and choices
Imagine going to *anycompany* and asking "Hey I bought this stuff from you and I know that you know I did ; I'd like to track your company habits as well". Police will be summoned and you'll be likely charged with
1)invasion of private property (they'll lie)
2)industrial espionage
3)being a tinfoil-hat fool
Or if they're a little gentle they'll just say "go stuff yourself, that's not stuff you're supposed to know"
Well companies, data about me is not stuff you're supposed to know, so get lost as well.
Well said ! Let me add that sometimes apparent wastes of time and resources (like this otherwise nice duracell hack which btw should make duracell marketing have an orgasm, what about sending some tech toy to that guy Duracell ?) can lead to unexpected discoveries.
For instance Joseph Prisley back in 1772 was "playing" with a candle and jar and noticed that the candle didn't burn anymore after a while if you covered it with a jar (big deal, we say today..but back then it was). Then he placed a plant (dunno why he tought about putting a plant in there) in the jar , later a mouse and a plant and a candle in the jar and discovered that WITH the plant the mouse lived and the candle burned.
Photosynthesis was under his very eyes , he tought that some gas was in there with particular properties (oxygen, but he didn't know).
Later Lavosier _repeated_ his experiment and named the gas oxygen.
All of this because some guy back in 1772 was playing with jars, mouses and plants and he probably looked like a crazy fool to the bystanders.
How exactly are they ? They're both running on solar panels.