How, exactly, do you "protect" without catching criminals? You ignore them, instead?
In this case, it's pretty safe to assume that someone who steals the bait car has stolen cars before. But this is not always the case when police bait for crimes. Say a cop approaches someone who has never bought drugs in his life, and offers him some. If the sale is made, that cop has just created a criminal for the purpose of busting him.
You are also grouping humanity into two categories: "criminals" and "non-criminals". I assume you classify yourself as a non-criminal. Yet the world isn't this black and white. Ever coasted through a stop sign? Ever bought a used car and declared less than it's value when paying the tax? We have all done _something_ that's against the law. So when you say the police's job is to go out and "catch criminals" you may be asking for them to catch you, too.
What on earth does victimless crimes have to do with catching car thieves? Car theft is not a victimless crime, it's one of the most serious non-violent crimes you can commmit, and for a good reason.
Stealing a dummy car whose only purpose is to get stolen, is a victimless crime.
Oh, and, BTW, another job of the police is to deter crime, which this does nicely.
I'm not arguing that. I agree that another job of the police is to deter crime, and these bait cars certainly do. But I'm against the method of deterring crime, when that method involves staging crimes for the sake of busting them.
That's a good point. If there were enough "bait" cars around to make it statistically probable enough to make a thief think twice, that's great.
But I think that along with myself, the (grand)parent poster is concerned with the tone of the Washington Post article. The focus is CLEARLY on "catching the perp" rather than "serving and protecting" which, if you take a realistic look at policework today, is exactly what cops are doing more and more.
I am also personally against the practice of officers offering drugs for sale and posing as prostitutes--just my opinion of course. If your conscience permits you to lock people up without even a victim, hey it's your world--I just live in it.
I would ask cops whom my taxes pay to clean up real crimes, rather than providing criminals with more opportunities.
The theft of our "dummy" car is a victimless crime. No one suffers when it is stolen. Not all "criminals" cause damage to "innocents".
I pay the police through my tax dollars because they are a reasonably strong deterrant to criminals who would otherwise harm me. I don't pay them to encourage a crime so they can swoop in and bust (and make $$$ from) the perps.
There's no way video editing will drive anything. How many people do you know _that are not geeks_ who want any kind of video editing, let alone "quality" video editing?
Video editing will always be a niche app, because the raw output from cameras is good enough for 99% of the people out there, who only want to film weddings and their kid's birthday parties.
You might expect employees to clock in in the morning, think and do nothing but work, have no stray thoughts, don't get up to eat, drink, or talk, and then clock out at night, without any second wasted... It's called a robot. Look in to hiring one instead of a human being.
I don't think I've ever met a collegue that could perform up to that standard.
You need distractions every once in a while to maintain your creativity.
"Do you accept this download?" If the consumer clicks "Yes," an application is automatically installed.
This clutter has created a haven for pop-up downloads because consumers find it hard to determine the ad's origin.
Gator isn't the only software maker using this tactic to add consumers.
"Consumers want control of their PCs," Gator President Jeff McFadden said in a statement.
Why am I a consumer just because I am accessing the Internet? The problem here is not the pop-up technology, but the unwritten assumption (perpetuated by the author of the report) that we are all just mindless "consumers of product" that need to be targeted by ads.
Only when this mindset is abandoned will we see an end to attention grabbing and demographic gathering.
X-Windows - This program was a real disappointment, and then AOL invented the internet and I was able to get my pr0n from lots of places, so I didn't need it anymore.
Why is it that everyone who comes out with hardware with some kind of video recording ability, they tout it as "tivo functionality"? I'm not a big fan of how some companies abuse trademark law, but if I were tivo, I'd crack down on this misleading nonsense.
Just because you have hardware that records MPEGs, doesn't mean you have anything even remotely close to what tivo and tivo-like systems provide.
And to answer your question about if there are any good alternative software out there that "more or less" makes something of a decent tivo clone, I don't know of any. There are bits and pieces here and there that record and playback video, set up timed tasks, and I believe, even read program guide information, but AFAIK there is no freely downloadable software that does everything and has a nice interface.
Most video games I've played had a pretty simple AI algorithm:
Easy - Computer player doesn't cheat Medium - Computer cheats and always knows where you are or what you are doing Hard - Computer cheats and is allowed to break the rules.
If game programmers spent more time writing smart (as opposed to cheating) computer opponents and less time trying to get 10 million more polygons on the screen, todays games might actually be worth buying.
In other news, Pioneer 10 is still going strong. It seems the more complicated and sophisticated we try to make things, the more prone to breakage they become.
As for the color, does anyone know if you can actually see any difference there ? I mean - 24 bit color is 16M colors ?
It's not about the number of colors, or whether you can see the difference. You want more bits of color precision for handling multiple lighting/shading/blending/etc. ops that happen throughout the rendering pipe, before the end result's precision is scaled down and displayed.
For example, when adding more and more lights to a scene, you will eventually start clipping against those 24 bits of precision.
I'd like to see 128 bpp internal rendering pipes and 128 bit Z buffers. It would take a lot to exhaust that kind of precision.
A better analogie is: People don't normally steal a pack of gum, since it is pretty cheap and easy to just walk into the store and buy one.
Today's DRM gum would make you have to sign license documents when buying the gum, agree to pay royalties on the gum if you resell it, and a device physically attached to the gum that reports back to the store every time a piece is removed to chew.
It's a pain in the butt, thwarts customers, and in the end it's easier to steal than buy.
This is where you have to stop and think "Hey... if Slashdot DOES go down because of a lack of profits, where will I turn?"
Here's where I will turn: I will turn my computer off, walk outside (that open space with the big bright white thing in the sky) and relish the fact that I am no longer compelled to sit there hitting reload waiting to first post.
What does this article have to do with the RIAA? What does anything have to do with the RIAA? Slashdot is starting to remind me of Walter's character in "The Big Lebowski" who would turn anything and everything into a Vietnam issue. Get a grip!!
It's more profitable to make batteries you have to throw away and re-buy. No research goes into making batteries last longer, since that cuts down on the amount of battery buying that pays for the research!
If you can reliably disable and enable a user's software remotely, you can charge them a fee every year/month/day to re-activate. Refer to Microsoft's activation system.
Most people will just happily bend over for this, but there will always be people out there to find a way around these schemes.
Nope. At this point it's just raving paranoia. But look at the trends, and what other software houses are doing. Everyone is looking for ways to remotely shut down users. When you've already become filthy rich selling software, the next logical step is to become richer by holding your users hostage.
Slashdot Mirror
How, exactly, do you "protect" without catching criminals? You ignore them, instead?
In this case, it's pretty safe to assume that someone who steals the bait car has stolen cars before. But this is not always the case when police bait for crimes. Say a cop approaches someone who has never bought drugs in his life, and offers him some. If the sale is made, that cop has just created a criminal for the purpose of busting him.
You are also grouping humanity into two categories: "criminals" and "non-criminals". I assume you classify yourself as a non-criminal. Yet the world isn't this black and white. Ever coasted through a stop sign? Ever bought a used car and declared less than it's value when paying the tax? We have all done _something_ that's against the law. So when you say the police's job is to go out and "catch criminals" you may be asking for them to catch you, too.
What on earth does victimless crimes have to do with catching car thieves? Car theft is not a victimless crime, it's one of the most serious non-violent crimes you can commmit, and for a good reason.
Stealing a dummy car whose only purpose is to get stolen, is a victimless crime.
Oh, and, BTW, another job of the police is to deter crime, which this does nicely.
I'm not arguing that. I agree that another job of the police is to deter crime, and these bait cars certainly do. But I'm against the method of deterring crime, when that method involves staging crimes for the sake of busting them.
That's a good point. If there were enough "bait" cars around to make it statistically probable enough to make a thief think twice, that's great.
But I think that along with myself, the (grand)parent poster is concerned with the tone of the Washington Post article. The focus is CLEARLY on "catching the perp" rather than "serving and protecting" which, if you take a realistic look at policework today, is exactly what cops are doing more and more.
I am also personally against the practice of officers offering drugs for sale and posing as prostitutes--just my opinion of course. If your conscience permits you to lock people up without even a victim, hey it's your world--I just live in it.
I would ask cops whom my taxes pay to clean up real crimes, rather than providing criminals with more opportunities.
In this case there is a BIG difference.
The theft of our "dummy" car is a victimless crime. No one suffers when it is stolen. Not all "criminals" cause damage to "innocents".
I pay the police through my tax dollars because they are a reasonably strong deterrant to criminals who would otherwise harm me. I don't pay them to encourage a crime so they can swoop in and bust (and make $$$ from) the perps.
This behavior is disgusting.
There's no way video editing will drive anything. How many people do you know _that are not geeks_ who want any kind of video editing, let alone "quality" video editing?
Video editing will always be a niche app, because the raw output from cameras is good enough for 99% of the people out there, who only want to film weddings and their kid's birthday parties.
Excellent troll. You got all the way up to +5 thanks to the crack-smoking moderators. I salute you sir.
That's a slippery slope...
You might expect employees to clock in in the morning, think and do nothing but work, have no stray thoughts, don't get up to eat, drink, or talk, and then clock out at night, without any second wasted... It's called a robot. Look in to hiring one instead of a human being.
I don't think I've ever met a collegue that could perform up to that standard.
You need distractions every once in a while to maintain your creativity.
Even a smart consumer could get tricked.
...or even a smart customer.
"Do you accept this download?" If the consumer clicks "Yes," an application is automatically installed.
This clutter has created a haven for pop-up downloads because consumers find it hard to determine the ad's origin.
Gator isn't the only software maker using this tactic to add consumers.
"Consumers want control of their PCs," Gator President Jeff McFadden said in a statement.
Why am I a consumer just because I am accessing the Internet? The problem here is not the pop-up technology, but the unwritten assumption (perpetuated by the author of the report) that we are all just mindless "consumers of product" that need to be targeted by ads.
Only when this mindset is abandoned will we see an end to attention grabbing and demographic gathering.
Notice on the "slide show" they have Arizona labled "COLORADO".
You'd think a site about photographing the various states of the USA, that they could get the state names right.
X-Windows - This program was a real disappointment, and then AOL invented the internet and I was able to get my pr0n from lots of places, so I didn't need it anymore.
It's actually called "The X Window System".
Agreed.
Why is it that everyone who comes out with hardware with some kind of video recording ability, they tout it as "tivo functionality"? I'm not a big fan of how some companies abuse trademark law, but if I were tivo, I'd crack down on this misleading nonsense.
Just because you have hardware that records MPEGs, doesn't mean you have anything even remotely close to what tivo and tivo-like systems provide.
And to answer your question about if there are any good alternative software out there that "more or less" makes something of a decent tivo clone, I don't know of any. There are bits and pieces here and there that record and playback video, set up timed tasks, and I believe, even read program guide information, but AFAIK there is no freely downloadable software that does everything and has a nice interface.
Most video games I've played had a pretty simple AI algorithm:
Easy - Computer player doesn't cheat
Medium - Computer cheats and always knows where you are or what you are doing
Hard - Computer cheats and is allowed to break the rules.
If game programmers spent more time writing smart (as opposed to cheating) computer opponents and less time trying to get 10 million more polygons on the screen, todays games might actually be worth buying.
In other news, Pioneer 10 is still going strong. It seems the more complicated and sophisticated we try to make things, the more prone to breakage they become.
Hmm... It might be cheaper, but...
PJRC Dension
Look at them again...
PJRC Dension
Which one would you rather put in your CAR?
As for the color, does anyone know if you can actually see any difference there ? I mean - 24 bit color is 16M colors ?
It's not about the number of colors, or whether you can see the difference. You want more bits of color precision for handling multiple lighting/shading/blending/etc. ops that happen throughout the rendering pipe, before the end result's precision is scaled down and displayed.
For example, when adding more and more lights to a scene, you will eventually start clipping against those 24 bits of precision.
I'd like to see 128 bpp internal rendering pipes and 128 bit Z buffers. It would take a lot to exhaust that kind of precision.
A better analogie is: People don't normally steal a pack of gum, since it is pretty cheap and easy to just walk into the store and buy one.
Today's DRM gum would make you have to sign license documents when buying the gum, agree to pay royalties on the gum if you resell it, and a device physically attached to the gum that reports back to the store every time a piece is removed to chew.
It's a pain in the butt, thwarts customers, and in the end it's easier to steal than buy.
This is where you have to stop and think "Hey... if Slashdot DOES go down because of a lack of profits, where will I turn?"
Here's where I will turn: I will turn my computer off, walk outside (that open space with the big bright white thing in the sky) and relish the fact that I am no longer compelled to sit there hitting reload waiting to first post.
A glad day it will be indeed.
JMendl asks: Do people on the street ever recognize you? And if they do, what do they usually say?
[snip...]
"First Post"
What does this article have to do with the RIAA? What does anything have to do with the RIAA? Slashdot is starting to remind me of Walter's character in "The Big Lebowski" who would turn anything and everything into a Vietnam issue. Get a grip!!
It's more profitable to make batteries you have to throw away and re-buy. No research goes into making batteries last longer, since that cuts down on the amount of battery buying that pays for the research!
A NY Times [free reg., blah, blah] story
Ironic that this appears on what's slowly becoming a pay site...
"This would destroy Windows desktop operating systems as a stable and consistent development platform"
! !
AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!
(let me take a breath and calm down)
...
...
(sputter)
...
BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH!
LOL
If you can reliably disable and enable a user's software remotely, you can charge them a fee every year/month/day to re-activate. Refer to Microsoft's activation system.
Most people will just happily bend over for this, but there will always be people out there to find a way around these schemes.
Linux is on my desktop, and it hasn't failed me yet!
Nope. At this point it's just raving paranoia. But look at the trends, and what other software houses are doing. Everyone is looking for ways to remotely shut down users. When you've already become filthy rich selling software, the next logical step is to become richer by holding your users hostage.