I agree totally... the only sites that have been affected by Australia's laws (as far as I know) are kiddy porn sites, and I don't have a problem with them being censored (in fact I think they should be censored).
I wish the Internet community would get their facts right on the Australian censorship laws. Things really haven't changed since they were brought in, all that has happened is a few sickos have had their sites shut down (and apparently they promptly re-opened them offshore).
At least our public libraries don't use internet filtering, unlike some other countries.
We've seen the same type of thing coming from the draconian content regulation of the leftist Australian government.
The Australian government is anything but leftist. The "Conservative Coalition" that is currently in power is pretty much the Australian equivalent of the Republican party - it's platform is based on family values, helping business and promoting free trade. The Labor party (the leftist party of Australian politics) hasn't been in power since the early 90's.
when you step in and censor gun-rights Web pages and basically anything that does not come from the anti-gun zealots, you're crossing a fine line between protecting your society and oppressing them.
It would would be illegal for the Australain government to censor "gun-rights Web pages", unless they contained some sort of graphic violence or anti-semitism. If you can point out any cases where gun-rights web-sites have been censored, I would like to know so I can consult my local Member of Parliament about it.
If Australia thinks that its filtering policies will stop gun advocates from learning the correct information about guns (such as crime rates that have not been doctored by the government), then they are wrong.
If the Australian Bureau of Statistics (the government funded data-gathering organisation) did in fact alter figures, then this would be a violation of the "Australian Bureau of Statistics Act 1975", and would be a serious offence indeed. It would probably result in a massive inquiry and dismissals of any MPs even thought to be involved in the doctoring. If you have any evidence of this, please pass it on.
I would be surprised if any of the claims you made above were more than rumour, as Australia has a cut-throat parliament, and the Opposition Parties would be happy to reveal any evidence of the Government breaking Australian law. In fact, there is a political party (with several senate seats), the Australian Democrats, whose creed is "keep the bastards honest", i.e. they act as a watchdog on the two primary parties - and have never been shy in revealing breaches of Australian law before.
* Australian voter turnout is 99.8%, compare that to the USA.
* Student politics is a vibrant, and crucial area of studies, much more so than in the US.
* Most Australians are overworked, the burn-out rate (and suicide rate) is the highest in the world.
So, I can't see how your comment about Australians being lazy is justified.
When I read stupid comments like these from Americans, I wonder if a lot of schizophrenia genes got spread about as a result of the country being founded by religious freaks.
Face it, your government is rapidly becoming the laughing stock of the internet
Australia is only becoming a laughing stock because people make a big deal about these stories which would go unnoticed if they were about any other country. For example, the "illegal e-mail forwarding" story was a beat-up about a clueless article in a tabloid newspaper (and it has since been confirmed to be false by the Australian Attorney General). And if the Internet Censorship law was ever actually enacted, I sure haven't noticed... looking around the public library I'm sitting in now, half the people using the Web are looking at hard-core porn.
Most people I talk to see the US as the laughing stock... people can't believe the stupidity of the DMCA, and the Napster decision is baffling (what's next - banning FTP bacause you can get mp3s on it?).
Basically, I'm saying that while I can't wait for the Conservative Coalition to be beaten at the next election, Australia's track record on the Internet really isn't as bad as Americans pretend it is. From what I've heard, you can't get hard-core porn via the Internet in American public libararies:-)
The Kyoto protocol is flawed and is designed to punish succesful countries
Excuse me if I'm wrong, but if a group of countries with less than 30% of the world's population use 90% of the world's resources (which are depleting at a rapid rate), then don't they deserve to be "punished" (where being punished is actually just being told to decrease their resource use)?
According to conservative estimates, we have thirty years to halve the world's resource use, otherwise we will descend into an ecological nightmare.
Basing you pollution credits on population is fundamentally flawed
This is incorrect, basing pollution credits on GNP is the only way to do it. The "North" (First World countries) was the one pushing for these measures, and in order to convince the reluctant "South" (developing nations) that the measures are reasonable, they will have to live with far smaller per-capita resource consumption. Could you imagine convincing a country like India that despite its' massive population, it has to live with a pollution quota smaller than that of the US because it has a low GNP? This would make industrial development impossible (because of the low pollution quota), and would result in India slipping even further behind the nations of the "North".
As an example of the vast difference between resource consumption in the "North" and "South", the resource consumption of an average German is ten times that of an average Argentinean. Basing the pollution quotas on population will cause the wasteful nations of the "North" to invest in resource-efficient solutions, and it may be possible to avoid an environmental disaster.
If you think that resource-efficiency on this scale isn't possible, I suggest you read "Factor Four", a report by the Club of Rome, it clearly demonstrates that fourfold increases in resource productivity are both possible and profitable.
Also, just to clear up a final point, you talk about socialist third world countries. This is a common mistake: First World countries are allied with the North-America/Europe/Japan bloc, Second World countries are those allied with the ever-shrinking Communist bloc, and Third world countries are those that are neutral. Thus, you should have said socialist second world countries.
Sorry this is getting off-topic, but I wanted to point out the flaws in the above post.
I would call America an empire, personally. A rather well-behaved one, but still an empire.
I suggest you read some of the works of Noam Chomsky, especially the book Rogue States, they might make you re-evaluate your statement that America is well behaved.
The polar lander crashed. It was given up for dead. Have some respect for it.
There are several good reasons to find out if the lander really did crash as people had thought up until now, or if some other failure caused it to lose contact with NASA. Firstly, if it did land correctly, NASA would know that their design is sound, and they don't have to spend millions of dollars re-inventing a new landing system. They can just re-use the same technology from the polar lander. Secondly, if it lost contact for some other reason, surely it would be a good idea to find out what that reason is (to avoid wasting resources in creating a new lander that fails in exactly the same way).
this is not the first weird law all weapons in australlia have been confiscated soon they will be a communist country
Wow, I didn't realize that the confiscation of guns (which only happened with military-grade weapons) had anything to do with the proletariat taking over the means of production. Thanks for pointing this out to me.
About 90% of us Australians approved the firearms laws. Public approval of the Government soared after their introduction. We're not all violent, stupid gun-nuts like you Americans.
P.S. Most stories about Australia are exaggerated (like this one - in fact this story is just plain false). The Internet censorship laws have been made redundant and useless by a new amendment - but we didn't hear about this on Slashdot.
P.S. You Americans have stupid laws too... we could all say "how stupid are you guys for letting the RIAA win against Napster... and that DMCA thing is pathetic, ROFL, you Americans are stupid" - and this is exactly what the rest of the world is doing.
Australia is definitely near the top of the list if you're comparing to Equatorial Guinea, Nauru, Kyrgyzstan, and Surinam. Otherwise I think you're suffering from a wee bit of myopia.
I think what he was saying was Australia is one of the biggest contributors per capita. For a country with only the population of the greater New York area, a lot of massive developments have come out of it. There would be no Samba without Australia, and no Enlightenment. (Say what you want about E, but Rasterman initiated the radical change from old-style FVWM window managers, to the new Desktop environments, like E, Gnome, and KDE).
A lot of Gnome developments have come out of Australia, and many Debian gurus are Australian (including the Release Manager, I think). Much of the cutting-edge Linux kernel/file-system experimentation is done in Australian universities, and quite a lot of miscellaneous network development is done by Aussies. Overall, Australia's contributions to Free Software can't be disregarded.
I agree with you, many European countries have made larger contributions than are generally recognised, especially Germany (which is where many KDE developers are from, IIRC). This is the point the earlier poster was making: the U.S. Government shouldn't try to restrict Free Software, because it is a global movement, not just one based in the USA.
If you want a coutry thats had a revolution pal there are plenty to choose from around the world. Go live in one of them though you might find your standard of living becomes somewhat lower.
What, like the USA? Didn't you revolt against the British?
If this happens, there is no money to pay programmers. As a result, intelligent people such as myself, who could command 6 figure salaries in any profession will take different career paths.
Well, if the only reason you're programming is for the money, then good riddance. I would be a coder even if I was only paid $20,000/year. I code because I love to, I don't do it for the money. I bet your coding is inferior to that of people who are passionate coders. I would rethink a career change if I were you, and do something you enjoy.
Unfortunatly or fortunatly as the case may be unions just DO NOT have a place in todays modern working world.... Use your own free will, you do not like your working conditions. QUIT. You do not like your payscale? BETTER YOURSELF and get a better job.
This may be fine from your youthful perspective with your whole life ahead of you, but I will share a story from my own perspective.
In the small city where I live, the main industry was a large steelworks (a series of smelters that produce steel). Unfortunately, the steelworks decided to shut down its local operations, because they were no longer viable - with local coal deposits being exhaused, and environmentalists taking a stand against the gross pollution of their outdated smelters.
The workers at the steelworks - about 15% of the city's population - were out of work. Most of them were in their 40s and 50s, and had no choice but to retrain, there were no jobs for them - as their skills with outdated smelter technologies were useless in today's high-tech world. Many motivated individuals decided to retrain in Information Technology, after hearing about the desperate need for workers in the industry. Unfortunately, they found that no companies wanted to hire 50 year old workers with no experience in the IT industry. They wanted young graduates, or workers with years of experience.
Luckily, the steelworks was largely unionized. The Union stepped in, and staged a large campaign to find jobs for the thousands of retrenched workers. Individually, these aged workers stood no chance of finding work in a new career, but together, they were a large force, determined to find work for every last one of the workers. The Union organized university courses and retraining for the younger workers, and tirelessly campaigned to find jobs for the others.
During this difficult time, the Union rallied support from the larger community to support these workers. Those workers that ran into financial difficulty were supported by others, and fundraisers supported their efforts. The 'Union spirit' carried these workers through this turbulent time, and now, four years later, nearly all of them have found work, or formed their own companies - with financial backing organized by the Union. What could have been a massive tragedy for thousands of workers has been averted, and turned into a testament to human compassion and co-operation.
This is why I do not think unions have outlived their purpose. The concept of a large group of workers co-operating for the good of the whole is as relevant today as ever. Many unions have collapsed into autocracy, and the original spirit of unionism has been forgotten by them, but despite these failures, events such as those I descibed above renew my passion for the concept of a group of workers uniting for the good of all.
In the youthful IT industry, the young professional workers take it for granted that changing careers is easy, but this is not so for older workers, with experience in outdated fields of work. Today's young IT workers will discover this as they get older. Information technology unions need not have collective bargaining as their primary goal, but the concept of a union that provides training and employment services for their members is one that could work well. As people relocate from job to job, one thing can stay constant - the Union, and the training, social interaction, and worker advocacy it provides. It would provide a stable lifeline in the tumult of the IT industry
What most people don't seem to understand is that E is meant to be run *without* Gnome. You can add Gnome to it, but it's designed to be a "graphical shell" in itself, so relying on Gnome for bacground management would go against this goal.
So, having a background selector is a good idea for people like me who don't use Gnome (I use a P133, so Gnome is a bit slow). The background selector is there for people who use E by itself, the way it was intended, so it *shouldn't* be removed at all.
Yes! Libertarianism... If I understand it correctly, it's motto is "who cares about everyone else, what's in it for me?". If you're born with a disability, and cannot work, then there is no welfare, because the Libertarians say "I'm a rich bourgeois pig, I don't need welfare, so let's not have it". Libertarians look at people starving on the streets and say "oh well, it's the natural order of things, too bad".
Let's embrace Libertarianism, and let the rich get richer and the poor get poorer, because, after all, we're rich Slashdotters, and we don't care about the plight of the poor. We all know that for the rich to exist, there must be poor. So we wouldn't want to help them. Their miserable existence supports our own decadence.
Yeah, you really need a high-powered automatic rifle to defend yourself. The right to own a shotgun is OK, you could argue defense. But I can't see why you need to own military-grade weapons - including automatic, and semi-automatic guns, as well as SLRs. Gun-control laws shouldn't be about controlling gun ownership, but controlling what types of guns are owned.
Since Australia restricted the types of guns owned, gun-related deaths have dropped by about 80%, and gun-related crimes are almost non-existent. I wouldn't feel safe in the USA, knowing that any person on the street could legally be carrying a semi-automatic handgun.
Yup. Say what you will about what happened during our election fiasco - most nations would have had people shooting at each other in the streets, or hacking each other up with machetes.
The Australian 1975 election was much like the recent United States one, and I don't remember people "shooting at each other in the streets, or hacking each other up with machetes". The US is not the only civilised country in the world. There are many others, like Australia, Britain, or Canada that are just as stable. Not all countries outside the US are war-torn or led by vicious dictators.
Has Microsoft taken away your right to form a militia? Has Pepsi told you what religion to practice? Has Exxon tried to force you to harbor soldiers against your will? Which basic rights have the corporations take away from you? However, I believe you'll be hard pressed to find one. Exactly what rights are looking for?
Well,I don't know about Microsoft, Pepsi, and Exxon, but McDonalds have done so. They have tried to steal the mother of all rights, Free Speech. Go to McSpotlight.org and find out about it - before McDonalds shuts them down.
I agree. The USA is not as free as most people believe it is. In most countries in the "Western World", you could openly criticise anyone, including rich corporations, or wealthy businessmen, and you would be protected by your right to Free Speech. In the USA, you are likely to get sued. "freedom of speech" has been replaced with "freedom of speech, as long as you don't criticise someone with too much money".
Plus, with the Bible Belt, swearing, and religious statements which do not conform to the norm, are not allowed. Where I come from (Australia), it is not surprising to hear a DJ on the radio commenting on a song by saying "That was a fucking great song, I really enjoy it". Our chat shows are full of swearing and irreverence (especially towards corporations). That is why I'm surprised when I see American talk show hosts (e.g. Oprah) gasping in shock when someone says "crap".
Most people outside the USA view the United States as being much like Stalinist Russia, except, instead of not being able to criticise the Government, you cannot criticise the rich. We see it as a land where you must tread carefully, or you will be sued (or have a heavily-muscled man wearing sun-glasses and a black suit smash your knee-caps). So, I would like to reinforce the comment above that the statement that the USA isn't free is a known fact, and doesn't surprise anyone.
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once you start copying the stupid bread, you've taken away the shopkeeper's ability to profit
So, you would reject a solution to world hunger, just because it would reduce ability for shopkeepers to make massive profits? This is ridiculous. If this is the way most of the world thinks, I want out. You must have been sent mad with greed if this is the way you think, you obviously don't put things in perspective. Let me propose a question - which is a more evil thing: a few grocery stores going out of business, or rejecting a solution to world hunger because it would 'cut into profits'. I am sickened by the extent to which society has become obsessed with obtaining money, no matter what has to be sacrificed to achieve these ends. People should think of the greater good, and work towards that, rather than selfishly striving to better their own conitions, no matter who they have to exploit to achieve it.
why in the fucking world should i spend three years writing an app just so some lazy jerkoff can say "but, DOOd, i'm poor and underprivileged, but i really have to have the latest version of your program.
That is exactly what the members of the Free Software comunity do. If you read the GNU Manifesto, that is exactly what the aim of the community is. The Free Software community do not look for profits, the reward we get from writing software is the knowledge that we are making the world a better place. Many people, such as Richard Stallman, have devoted their life to this cause. There is more to life than collecting large amounts of green paper.
We have the ability to easily provide everybody on Earth (that has a computer) with every piece of software ever written. Don't you see this as a wonderful thing? Copyright laws were written with hard-goods in mind, not easily-reproducible intellectual property - the extension of these laws to IP was seen as natural, but is it?
You state that IP laws restrict the distribution of software, so we shouldn't distribute it. But are these laws rational? I don't think so. They extend the right to restrict distribution of goods that was imposed on solid hard-goods to IP, as if it was a natural thing to do, but there are a growing number of people who see the flaw in this logic. You can see many essays on this subject at www.gnu.org. What we must consider is whether existing property rights should apply to IP, or whether we need an entirely new set of laws. Personally, I think that IP laws are wrong, and that is why I cannot condemn software 'piracy'. Libraries were established so everybody has the right to read, but is the right to use software any less of a right?
Slashdot Mirror
The Chinese government put up a web site for one of their servicemen who was killed by an American spy. I can't see a problem with this.
I agree totally... the only sites that have been affected by Australia's laws (as far as I know) are kiddy porn sites, and I don't have a problem with them being censored (in fact I think they should be censored).
I wish the Internet community would get their facts right on the Australian censorship laws. Things really haven't changed since they were brought in, all that has happened is a few sickos have had their sites shut down (and apparently they promptly re-opened them offshore).
At least our public libraries don't use internet filtering, unlike some other countries.
We've seen the same type of thing coming from the draconian content regulation of the leftist Australian government.
The Australian government is anything but leftist. The "Conservative Coalition" that is currently in power is pretty much the Australian equivalent of the Republican party - it's platform is based on family values, helping business and promoting free trade. The Labor party (the leftist party of Australian politics) hasn't been in power since the early 90's.
when you step in and censor gun-rights Web pages and basically anything that does not come from the anti-gun zealots, you're crossing a fine line between protecting your society and oppressing them.
It would would be illegal for the Australain government to censor "gun-rights Web pages", unless they contained some sort of graphic violence or anti-semitism. If you can point out any cases where gun-rights web-sites have been censored, I would like to know so I can consult my local Member of Parliament about it.
If Australia thinks that its filtering policies will stop gun advocates from learning the correct information about guns (such as crime rates that have not been doctored by the government), then they are wrong.
If the Australian Bureau of Statistics (the government funded data-gathering organisation) did in fact alter figures, then this would be a violation of the "Australian Bureau of Statistics Act 1975", and would be a serious offence indeed. It would probably result in a massive inquiry and dismissals of any MPs even thought to be involved in the doctoring. If you have any evidence of this, please pass it on.
I would be surprised if any of the claims you made above were more than rumour, as Australia has a cut-throat parliament, and the Opposition Parties would be happy to reveal any evidence of the Government breaking Australian law. In fact, there is a political party (with several senate seats), the Australian Democrats, whose creed is "keep the bastards honest", i.e. they act as a watchdog on the two primary parties - and have never been shy in revealing breaches of Australian law before.
* Australian voter turnout is 99.8%, compare that to the USA.
* Student politics is a vibrant, and crucial area of studies, much more so than in the US.
* Most Australians are overworked, the burn-out rate (and suicide rate) is the highest in the world.
So, I can't see how your comment about Australians being lazy is justified.
When I read stupid comments like these from Americans, I wonder if a lot of schizophrenia genes got spread about as a result of the country being founded by religious freaks.
Face it, your government is rapidly becoming the laughing stock of the internet
Australia is only becoming a laughing stock because people make a big deal about these stories which would go unnoticed if they were about any other country. For example, the "illegal e-mail forwarding" story was a beat-up about a clueless article in a tabloid newspaper (and it has since been confirmed to be false by the Australian Attorney General). And if the Internet Censorship law was ever actually enacted, I sure haven't noticed... looking around the public library I'm sitting in now, half the people using the Web are looking at hard-core porn.
Most people I talk to see the US as the laughing stock... people can't believe the stupidity of the DMCA, and the Napster decision is baffling (what's next - banning FTP bacause you can get mp3s on it?).
Basically, I'm saying that while I can't wait for the Conservative Coalition to be beaten at the next election, Australia's track record on the Internet really isn't as bad as Americans pretend it is. From what I've heard, you can't get hard-core porn via the Internet in American public libararies :-)
The Kyoto protocol is flawed and is designed to punish succesful countries
Excuse me if I'm wrong, but if a group of countries with less than 30% of the world's population use 90% of the world's resources (which are depleting at a rapid rate), then don't they deserve to be "punished" (where being punished is actually just being told to decrease their resource use)?
According to conservative estimates, we have thirty years to halve the world's resource use, otherwise we will descend into an ecological nightmare.
Basing you pollution credits on population is fundamentally flawed
This is incorrect, basing pollution credits on GNP is the only way to do it. The "North" (First World countries) was the one pushing for these measures, and in order to convince the reluctant "South" (developing nations) that the measures are reasonable, they will have to live with far smaller per-capita resource consumption. Could you imagine convincing a country like India that despite its' massive population, it has to live with a pollution quota smaller than that of the US because it has a low GNP? This would make industrial development impossible (because of the low pollution quota), and would result in India slipping even further behind the nations of the "North".
As an example of the vast difference between resource consumption in the "North" and "South", the resource consumption of an average German is ten times that of an average Argentinean. Basing the pollution quotas on population will cause the wasteful nations of the "North" to invest in resource-efficient solutions, and it may be possible to avoid an environmental disaster.
If you think that resource-efficiency on this scale isn't possible, I suggest you read "Factor Four", a report by the Club of Rome, it clearly demonstrates that fourfold increases in resource productivity are both possible and profitable.
Also, just to clear up a final point, you talk about socialist third world countries. This is a common mistake: First World countries are allied with the North-America/Europe/Japan bloc, Second World countries are those allied with the ever-shrinking Communist bloc, and Third world countries are those that are neutral. Thus, you should have said socialist second world countries.
Sorry this is getting off-topic, but I wanted to point out the flaws in the above post.
I would call America an empire, personally. A rather well-behaved one, but still an empire.
I suggest you read some of the works of Noam Chomsky, especially the book Rogue States, they might make you re-evaluate your statement that America is well behaved.
The polar lander crashed. It was given up for dead. Have some respect for it.
There are several good reasons to find out if the lander really did crash as people had thought up until now, or if some other failure caused it to lose contact with NASA. Firstly, if it did land correctly, NASA would know that their design is sound, and they don't have to spend millions of dollars re-inventing a new landing system. They can just re-use the same technology from the polar lander. Secondly, if it lost contact for some other reason, surely it would be a good idea to find out what that reason is (to avoid wasting resources in creating a new lander that fails in exactly the same way).
this is not the first weird law all weapons in australlia have been confiscated soon they will be a communist country
Wow, I didn't realize that the confiscation of guns (which only happened with military-grade weapons) had anything to do with the proletariat taking over the means of production. Thanks for pointing this out to me.
P.S. I'm being sarcastic.
What the hell is going on down there in Australia?
What happened is that this whole story is false. Like most of the Australian-related Slashdot stories.
USA was a penal colony too.
At least I won't get shot by the Australian "prisoners", but I will by the American "prisoners" and bible-bashers.
About 90% of us Australians approved the firearms laws. Public approval of the Government soared after their introduction. We're not all violent, stupid gun-nuts like you Americans.
P.S. Most stories about Australia are exaggerated (like this one - in fact this story is just plain false). The Internet censorship laws have been made redundant and useless by a new amendment - but we didn't hear about this on Slashdot.
P.S. You Americans have stupid laws too... we could all say "how stupid are you guys for letting the RIAA win against Napster... and that DMCA thing is pathetic, ROFL, you Americans are stupid" - and this is exactly what the rest of the world is doing.
Australia is definitely near the top of the list if you're comparing to Equatorial Guinea, Nauru, Kyrgyzstan, and Surinam. Otherwise I think you're suffering from a wee bit of myopia.
I think what he was saying was Australia is one of the biggest contributors per capita. For a country with only the population of the greater New York area, a lot of massive developments have come out of it. There would be no Samba without Australia, and no Enlightenment. (Say what you want about E, but Rasterman initiated the radical change from old-style FVWM window managers, to the new Desktop environments, like E, Gnome, and KDE).
A lot of Gnome developments have come out of Australia, and many Debian gurus are Australian (including the Release Manager, I think). Much of the cutting-edge Linux kernel/file-system experimentation is done in Australian universities, and quite a lot of miscellaneous network development is done by Aussies. Overall, Australia's contributions to Free Software can't be disregarded.
I agree with you, many European countries have made larger contributions than are generally recognised, especially Germany (which is where many KDE developers are from, IIRC). This is the point the earlier poster was making: the U.S. Government shouldn't try to restrict Free Software, because it is a global movement, not just one based in the USA.
If you want a coutry thats had a revolution pal there are plenty to choose from around the world. Go live in one of them though you might find your standard of living becomes somewhat lower.
What, like the USA? Didn't you revolt against the British?If this happens, there is no money to pay programmers. As a result, intelligent people such as myself, who could command 6 figure salaries in any profession will take different career paths.
Well, if the only reason you're programming is for the money, then good riddance. I would be a coder even if I was only paid $20,000/year. I code because I love to, I don't do it for the money. I bet your coding is inferior to that of people who are passionate coders. I would rethink a career change if I were you, and do something you enjoy.
Unfortunatly or fortunatly as the case may be unions just DO NOT have a place in todays modern working world. ... Use your own free will, you do not like your working conditions. QUIT. You do not like your payscale? BETTER YOURSELF and get a better job.
This may be fine from your youthful perspective with your whole life ahead of you, but I will share a story from my own perspective.
In the small city where I live, the main industry was a large steelworks (a series of smelters that produce steel). Unfortunately, the steelworks decided to shut down its local operations, because they were no longer viable - with local coal deposits being exhaused, and environmentalists taking a stand against the gross pollution of their outdated smelters.
The workers at the steelworks - about 15% of the city's population - were out of work. Most of them were in their 40s and 50s, and had no choice but to retrain, there were no jobs for them - as their skills with outdated smelter technologies were useless in today's high-tech world. Many motivated individuals decided to retrain in Information Technology, after hearing about the desperate need for workers in the industry. Unfortunately, they found that no companies wanted to hire 50 year old workers with no experience in the IT industry. They wanted young graduates, or workers with years of experience.
Luckily, the steelworks was largely unionized. The Union stepped in, and staged a large campaign to find jobs for the thousands of retrenched workers. Individually, these aged workers stood no chance of finding work in a new career, but together, they were a large force, determined to find work for every last one of the workers. The Union organized university courses and retraining for the younger workers, and tirelessly campaigned to find jobs for the others.
During this difficult time, the Union rallied support from the larger community to support these workers. Those workers that ran into financial difficulty were supported by others, and fundraisers supported their efforts. The 'Union spirit' carried these workers through this turbulent time, and now, four years later, nearly all of them have found work, or formed their own companies - with financial backing organized by the Union. What could have been a massive tragedy for thousands of workers has been averted, and turned into a testament to human compassion and co-operation.
This is why I do not think unions have outlived their purpose. The concept of a large group of workers co-operating for the good of the whole is as relevant today as ever. Many unions have collapsed into autocracy, and the original spirit of unionism has been forgotten by them, but despite these failures, events such as those I descibed above renew my passion for the concept of a group of workers uniting for the good of all.
In the youthful IT industry, the young professional workers take it for granted that changing careers is easy, but this is not so for older workers, with experience in outdated fields of work. Today's young IT workers will discover this as they get older. Information technology unions need not have collective bargaining as their primary goal, but the concept of a union that provides training and employment services for their members is one that could work well. As people relocate from job to job, one thing can stay constant - the Union, and the training, social interaction, and worker advocacy it provides. It would provide a stable lifeline in the tumult of the IT industry
What most people don't seem to understand is that E is meant to be run *without* Gnome. You can add Gnome to it, but it's designed to be a "graphical shell" in itself, so relying on Gnome for bacground management would go against this goal.
So, having a background selector is a good idea for people like me who don't use Gnome (I use a P133, so Gnome is a bit slow). The background selector is there for people who use E by itself, the way it was intended, so it *shouldn't* be removed at all.
I can't sign up to the 'no junk-mail list' because I don't live in the USA. So, for me, this story isn't stupid, it is quite insightful.
Yes! Libertarianism... If I understand it correctly, it's motto is "who cares about everyone else, what's in it for me?". If you're born with a disability, and cannot work, then there is no welfare, because the Libertarians say "I'm a rich bourgeois pig, I don't need welfare, so let's not have it". Libertarians look at people starving on the streets and say "oh well, it's the natural order of things, too bad".
Let's embrace Libertarianism, and let the rich get richer and the poor get poorer, because, after all, we're rich Slashdotters, and we don't care about the plight of the poor. We all know that for the rich to exist, there must be poor. So we wouldn't want to help them. Their miserable existence supports our own decadence.
Yeah, you really need a high-powered automatic rifle to defend yourself. The right to own a shotgun is OK, you could argue defense. But I can't see why you need to own military-grade weapons - including automatic, and semi-automatic guns, as well as SLRs. Gun-control laws shouldn't be about controlling gun ownership, but controlling what types of guns are owned.
Since Australia restricted the types of guns owned, gun-related deaths have dropped by about 80%, and gun-related crimes are almost non-existent. I wouldn't feel safe in the USA, knowing that any person on the street could legally be carrying a semi-automatic handgun.
Yup. Say what you will about what happened during our election fiasco - most nations would have had people shooting at each other in the streets, or hacking each other up with machetes.
The Australian 1975 election was much like the recent United States one, and I don't remember people "shooting at each other in the streets, or hacking each other up with machetes". The US is not the only civilised country in the world. There are many others, like Australia, Britain, or Canada that are just as stable. Not all countries outside the US are war-torn or led by vicious dictators.
Has Microsoft taken away your right to form a militia? Has Pepsi told you what religion to practice? Has Exxon tried to force you to harbor soldiers against your will? Which basic rights have the corporations take away from you? However, I believe you'll be hard pressed to find one. Exactly what rights are looking for?
Well,I don't know about Microsoft, Pepsi, and Exxon, but McDonalds have done so. They have tried to steal the mother of all rights, Free Speech. Go to McSpotlight.org and find out about it - before McDonalds shuts them down.
I agree. The USA is not as free as most people believe it is. In most countries in the "Western World", you could openly criticise anyone, including rich corporations, or wealthy businessmen, and you would be protected by your right to Free Speech. In the USA, you are likely to get sued. "freedom of speech" has been replaced with "freedom of speech, as long as you don't criticise someone with too much money".
Plus, with the Bible Belt, swearing, and religious statements which do not conform to the norm, are not allowed. Where I come from (Australia), it is not surprising to hear a DJ on the radio commenting on a song by saying "That was a fucking great song, I really enjoy it". Our chat shows are full of swearing and irreverence (especially towards corporations). That is why I'm surprised when I see American talk show hosts (e.g. Oprah) gasping in shock when someone says "crap".
Most people outside the USA view the United States as being much like Stalinist Russia, except, instead of not being able to criticise the Government, you cannot criticise the rich. We see it as a land where you must tread carefully, or you will be sued (or have a heavily-muscled man wearing sun-glasses and a black suit smash your knee-caps). So, I would like to reinforce the comment above that the statement that the USA isn't free is a known fact, and doesn't surprise anyone.
once you start copying the stupid bread, you've taken away the shopkeeper's ability to profit
So, you would reject a solution to world hunger, just because it would reduce ability for shopkeepers to make massive profits? This is ridiculous. If this is the way most of the world thinks, I want out. You must have been sent mad with greed if this is the way you think, you obviously don't put things in perspective. Let me propose a question - which is a more evil thing: a few grocery stores going out of business, or rejecting a solution to world hunger because it would 'cut into profits'. I am sickened by the extent to which society has become obsessed with obtaining money, no matter what has to be sacrificed to achieve these ends. People should think of the greater good, and work towards that, rather than selfishly striving to better their own conitions, no matter who they have to exploit to achieve it.
why in the fucking world should i spend three years writing an app just so some lazy jerkoff can say "but, DOOd, i'm poor and underprivileged, but i really have to have the latest version of your program.
That is exactly what the members of the Free Software comunity do. If you read the GNU Manifesto, that is exactly what the aim of the community is. The Free Software community do not look for profits, the reward we get from writing software is the knowledge that we are making the world a better place. Many people, such as Richard Stallman, have devoted their life to this cause. There is more to life than collecting large amounts of green paper.
We have the ability to easily provide everybody on Earth (that has a computer) with every piece of software ever written. Don't you see this as a wonderful thing? Copyright laws were written with hard-goods in mind, not easily-reproducible intellectual property - the extension of these laws to IP was seen as natural, but is it?
You state that IP laws restrict the distribution of software, so we shouldn't distribute it. But are these laws rational? I don't think so. They extend the right to restrict distribution of goods that was imposed on solid hard-goods to IP, as if it was a natural thing to do, but there are a growing number of people who see the flaw in this logic. You can see many essays on this subject at www.gnu.org. What we must consider is whether existing property rights should apply to IP, or whether we need an entirely new set of laws. Personally, I think that IP laws are wrong, and that is why I cannot condemn software 'piracy'. Libraries were established so everybody has the right to read, but is the right to use software any less of a right?