With the surging popularity of the internet, I do not see why bands cannot emerge simply from the internet it self.
Websites like myspace and ruckus already help to promote little known bands. I have a few friends who are into that kind of stuff and I know i have listened to all of their albums on some website that promotes small time bands, cant recall the site name.
In short, bands can gain popularity by selling themselves on the internet. As Amazon has learned, selling things in the internet is A WHOLE LOT CHEAPER.
Selling music on the internet is A WHOLE LOT CHEAPER. People like to stay home and surf the web for music, not go out and buy it.
Now if you offer music for free on the web, do you not think that people will listen in droves?
Mainstream exposure (such as a major record label promoting you) will be analogous to being on the front page of WWW.SICKMUSIC.COM... there is your exposure.. problem solved??
I cannot provide proof for the reasoning behind it, just the common idea that in an almost infinitely large universe the probability of another earth like planet is almost guaranteed. Your post just stated it in a neat way I felt. Its more a matter of opinion the way I am describing it. I am sure it could be expanded upon and has been many times over.
I do not see how finding life on Mars would provide more solid proof since it could have been just as easily ejected from earth and landed on the martian surface.
If the life found on Mars did have different signatures due to atmospheric differences/mineral composition and the like, could we be sure that it was not ejected from earth millions of years ago and subsequently went extinct here? I am just thinking out loud, I can think of a few flaws to the line of reasoning... I just dont see how finding life on mars could be a sure indicator of life forming on other planets. Much like an earth like planet existing. Which one is more likely though remains distinct.
In regards to a meteor striking earth and killing all its inhabitants, I agree. A meteor is the least of our worries. However, when i said that we must avoid eradication I was thinking along the same lines as you. I am no expert, but would a gamma ray burst, no matter the size, have to be directed onto a said location to provide the levels of radiation and energy that would be lethal instantaneously if not crippling the atmosphere of the said planet?
Going way into the future, if we did start to inhabit different galaxies the only thing I could see wiping out civilization would be either itself or the big crunch at the end of time as we understand it. If we ever do spread out to this unimaginable magnitude, we will be able to predict almost all phenomena in the universe with as much certainty as they allow. Even the precise moment when the inevitable will occur...
In light of the discussion of having two data points to infer an absolute about the nature of the galaxy...
I must say that the deductive reasoning put into use by terjeber does away with the need for such a pair of data points all together.
To add to the point of life being omnipresent we can look to our own limited experience on earth.If we have learned anything from studying the harshest climates on earth (relatively speaking) it is that life will flourish anywhere that there is matter (and the universe is not short on that) for it to arise from. In general, nothing lasts but nothing is lost.
To me, life in the galaxy is just common sense. I had never heard of quote such as Asimov on the nature of the universe (Once, never, or infinity) but simply found this to be common sense when one considers the size of the galaxy and its basic properties.
Ultimately, I feel like the discovery of life on Mars would be most useful in convincing the religious fanatics among us that life exists elsewhere in the universe and they can start to get over themselves as the single most important being in the universe. Which would be a breath of fresh air, lemme tell ya!
Maybe then, we can take steps towards preventing humanity from suffering the fate of the countless races that came before us, eradication.
People call for an end to "anonymous" slander without actually thinking through things rationally.
Jeez, I really do not know where to start on this one. This is going to turn into a rant but I hope to, by the end of it, reach somewhere sensible. Lets start with the most prominent point.
Nothing said on an online message board ( ESPECIALLY BY AN ANON.) means anything in the real world. If you say you are going to rape and murder a bunch of people on a message board it is more likely that you will not do it. You would not be posting about it, but instead be out raping and murdering except you are too much of a computer nerd to step out into the sun muchless kill someone. Certain forums will have different views on this. A forum for law students is clearly not a good place to do this as opposed to a place like off topic. That is where he made his first mistake. Law students would be the ones to take this stuff way too serious.
If the police started arresting everyone who makes a threat in a flame war half of us would be in jail. Hell I would have quite a few counts against myself. Who really means the shit they say on a message board when making a flame??
Thats just part of the "fun" you can have on the internet. Hell you do not even need to be anon, people just take shit too seriously. Once you log off, thats it. Things on an EZ board are only as real as you make them.
Once people realize that internet message boards are not to be taken seriously, they will probably increase their life spans by a few years from the stress reduction. People act as if getting flammed on the internet is going to ruin their lives, it means nothing. It means nothing to those who "get" the internet. Not everyone "gets" the internet. I thought most slashdotters understood this. But from the majority of responses they are talking about the legal implications of such threats. I see hundreds of said threats on message boards everyday followed by a LOL STFU NOOB ILL RAPE YOUR MOM AND BURN URE HOUSE DOWN. Insults continue to be thrown until the godwin rule kicks in. Everyone knows its just the internet that lets you say those dirty things. Its been going on for over a decade. Now the internet has reached critical mass and we have people like mom and dad using the internet that think every infomercial(read:flame bait) is the "real deal"
Do you honestly think he was going to rape her? I do not. These girls just got really mad that they had people bad mouthing them on an internet forum that means nothing. They most likely got rejected by some law firm because of their lack of qualifications and just convinced themselves the recruiter saw this post and took it to be truth.
Now, lets say the recruiter for these lost "prestigious jobs" sees this message board. If he reads this message whole and by the end of it decides that he does not want to hire her, he has failed on several critical levels.
I would go so far as to say I would not want to work with a company that displays such ignorance in their recruiting practices. The messages are firstly anonymous, so that is a red flag 1. The content and mode of discussion is not only untrusted and one sided, but clearly not professional. Red flag 2. Claiming to sodomize someone over the internet? Clearly a flame attempt to get attention. Red flag 3.
This again ties into the fact that people actually take flames written on message boards as truth. There is a skill we all learn growing up. The exact term fails me at the moment, but that is essentially filtering out what is untrue. If you assume everything you read to be true in this world, you should have about 500 products that will give you rock hard abs in just 3 minutes a week.
The same rules apply to the internet. They claim that the internet has evolved faster than the courts can clamor to moderate and control it. I believe this not to be true. The courts are making rapid advancement where money is at stake thes
Excuse me while I actually discuss a topic related to the article it self, yes shame on me.
He essentially claims that students, based on cognitive research , fail to gain "expert" status over material and the ability to self analyze one's thought process concerning a matter of average complexity.
I learned this first hand when i was in the second grade trying to get a hold on division and multiplication. It turns out that study and practice makes you better.
This principle applies to college courses as well. The preview for my engineering undergrad stressed that practice and thoughtful study was the key to success. 2 hours devoted for every hour in class was the rule of thumb.
Now, maybe this is simply because I attend a Tier 1 university (I can say with certainty, from experience, that my friends at lesser schools rarely even buy their textbooks or bother to study while passing) but studying is where you develop this "expert" status.
The only part of this article that has any bearing on the university as I see it is that professors have increasingly demanding positions as the grant getters. The increasing demands on the professors to take part in time consuming research can certainly degrade the quality of teaching to a degree. How far this goes is mostly dependent on the professor himself and is hard to gauge.
Reforming junior high and grade school is a whole different beast. I couldnt imagine even trying to go into the horror that the system is.
Take an amazing studio that makes high quality games that please the hardcore audience.
Buy that company out and start taking away all of the aspects of the game that appeal to the loyal fan base of said original company.
Streamline the development process and features of the game to maximize profits in the mainstream market for PC MMOs.
Ensure the destruction of said franchise before it even hits the door.
Well, to be fair, this has not happened YET with EA. But for those of us in the know on the MMO scene, warhammer is this exact scenario (same people who made DAOC the great game it was, bought out by EA midway through the development cycle)
Yup, I am REAL excited for any game that EA gets its greedy little hands on. Really, I am... so... excited... cant contain....
Otter just served up a nice slice of absolute and universal truth which applies to the world we live in today.
You can see this trend clearly in all types of cases.
As an extreme and totally made up example...
Prosecution cant prove that those dead bodies you dumped on the side of the road are actually your family, or maybe just evil clones sent from a parallel universe?
Well , luckily for you, regardless of what they are, its a felony punishable by up to 20 years in jail for dumping hazardous waste within 10 miles of a nuclear storage facility!
Stuff like this happens all too often when the public wants a modern day lynching.
Strange, I passed the test with a 4 by sleeping in class all day and not knowing a specific detail about a specific name or date. I do not even know when the constitution was signed, early 1800s?
The test does a great job of not grading for rote memorization but rather of understanding of the fundamental historical trends.
Sure you have to remember some terms and events to pass but no details really at all. Even in physics you must remember what variable means what and what F means depending on your course.
A lot of these laws seem to stem from the fact that more than half of the people drafting them do not even use the internet on a regular basis or at an advanced level beyond that of a 14 year old.
These people are just out of their league. Old people just do not understand the internet since they did not grow up with it.
Enforcing a kind of law like this would be like trying to stop all of the drugs from getting into America... hehe
This will make me think twice about camping the grave yard in Area 52.
I might just kill an emo kid one too many times and bam... **Loading please wait**...You have entered Federal Prison
That's a very good point actually. While there's no question that the production of child porn should be illegal (afterall a child had to be abused in the making of it) Unfortunately, this will not be entirely true in the near future.
Soon you will be a felon for creating child porn in which NO children were actually abused.
Hell, why stop there, lets just make ANY picture that we don't agree with on a moral basis ILLEGAL and have a hefty jail sentence for it. I was thinking something along the lines of a law against putting government officials in an unfavorable light, what do you guys think?
Yes, welcome to the end of the world, enjoy your stay and make sure to thank the children as well as your local representative.
This is the first comment I read. I do not need to go any further before saying that you are not only right, but have put forth the truth in such an eloquent manner.
History does repeat itself, or so they say. 1700-1900 is NOT that long of a time span at all in the grand scheme of things. Now consider all of the world changing events we saw in just two hundred years. The change saw are almost unimaginable by even the most creative of minds. What will another 200 years and scarce resources bring?
I do not think even the most intellectual of us can fathom what the world will look like in a hundred years. If it comes down to it, the police state WILL be enforced if deemed necessary, and it will all be already in place ready to go...
We think we are so different from those before us, but are you so naive to think that they did not feel the same way about their previous generations?
It really is time to get up and do something if you live in the UK. This kind of stuff makes me feel good to be in the US... for once.
And don't give me that crap about hurting others. That would be true in some place where you had no choice but to go,but now the owner of the building can't even decide for himself if he wants to cater to smokers,WTF? I do see where you are coming from with the hurting others parts. In many cases people cry about hurting others when it is really not true. I must disagree in this situation however.
Second hand smoke kills... I am not sure if I can give an equivalent example for second hand obesity however.
And do NOT even begin to bring up the fact that people can just go to other places if they want a non smoking environment. There are way too many variables involved to hold up that argument.
The *average* person will not go 5 extra blocks to get a smoothie just to avoid some passive second hand smoke. Thus being harmed in the process.
Here you are, there is just one of BILLIONS of examples of why this make sense, and why there is a big difference between the two.
Oh and in case you were wondering, Dick and Bush have nothing to do with any of these companies getting billion dollar contracts. Anyone who tells you that is a democratic heathen.
Reminds me of that great game titled Deus Ex (~1999). Anyone ever play it?
The gameplay was great, but it was the story line that was truly impressive.
The world as I see it moves closer and closer to this story world every day...
Soon we will have an autonomous AI filtering every single packet of data sent over the internet resulting in a sentient being that knows every piece of information about every person on the globe in the name of justice/security.
It is easy to tailor ones argument over issues as open ended as this one. If you have an end in mind, you can certainly reach it through a variety of logical routes such as the "free press" indoctrinating the masses. Of course the free press is going to do this. People do not watch the news to not believe it in ANY country. They take bits and pieces of it, some people take more than others.
I strongly believe that while one can turn on the television and be disheartened by Faux news, the fact that information is out there that is readily available sets America apart from countries such as Russia and China. None of us can really relate to how life must be in a country such as N. Korea. Drawing parallels from these countries to America is a bit cynical, no? Is it not belittling the extreme censorship they endure?
You cant expect the masses to get it, thats why they have their title as the masses. While one could argue that the masses control who gets elected, I think it is just as easy to argue that the masses do not know what they are getting in a representative.
Long gone are the days where candidates actually take meaningful stances on issues. Even campaign promises can quickly be broken due to "unexpected" budget cuts.
I believe our founding fathers were quite familiar with this idea, and hence decided that we should not govern our selves directly, since we clearly do not know what is best for us.
Now whether the people making the decisions in America... that is a whole different nut to crack...
If you can make a reasonable, unfounded, and simply ignorant link to terrorists on any basis, it is perfectly alright to circumvent the constitution.
I think if the constitution needs to be trampled on to stop terrorists, then we are lucky to have this emboldened administration down on all fours playing twister on it.
I find it somewhat sad that features on one OS are disabled due to legal restrictions on another OS.
Can the companies not focus on creating innovative content instead of having bid wars over who gets to use what in their products which are all essentially the same?
Slashdot Mirror
Probably the best post I have seen in a WoW "news" topic.
I usually read them to laugh at the ignorant people ranting about many of the things you just made them look stupid for saying ;)
With the surging popularity of the internet, I do not see why bands cannot emerge simply from the internet it self.
Websites like myspace and ruckus already help to promote little known bands. I have a few friends who are into that kind of stuff and I know i have listened to all of their albums on some website that promotes small time bands, cant recall the site name.
In short, bands can gain popularity by selling themselves on the internet. As Amazon has learned, selling things in the internet is A WHOLE LOT CHEAPER.
Selling music on the internet is A WHOLE LOT CHEAPER. People like to stay home and surf the web for music, not go out and buy it.
Now if you offer music for free on the web, do you not think that people will listen in droves?
Mainstream exposure (such as a major record label promoting you) will be analogous to being on the front page of WWW.SICKMUSIC.COM... there is your exposure.. problem solved??
After reading your post, which is in it self quite arrogant ironically enough. You fail to realize a simple alternative.
Allowing this man to create an email has nothing to do with engineering an entirely new obscenity filter.
Once he called Verizon and explained his situation, an "administrator" could have logged on and created the account while bypassing the filter.
If there was no method to do this, I am sure a computer tech could have made this happen with relative ease.
Its called customer service, something that is rapidly disappearing in light of a .... monopoly ;). I said the M word, oh no!
Ah forgot to mention in my previous post, I love that bit on the universe being created by a retarded or an insanely evil creator.
I will try this out on some of my religious friends, should make for a good discussion.
I cannot provide proof for the reasoning behind it, just the common idea that in an almost infinitely large universe the probability of another earth like planet is almost guaranteed. Your post just stated it in a neat way I felt. Its more a matter of opinion the way I am describing it. I am sure it could be expanded upon and has been many times over.
I do not see how finding life on Mars would provide more solid proof since it could have been just as easily ejected from earth and landed on the martian surface.
If the life found on Mars did have different signatures due to atmospheric differences/mineral composition and the like, could we be sure that it was not ejected from earth millions of years ago and subsequently went extinct here? I am just thinking out loud, I can think of a few flaws to the line of reasoning... I just dont see how finding life on mars could be a sure indicator of life forming on other planets. Much like an earth like planet existing. Which one is more likely though remains distinct.
In regards to a meteor striking earth and killing all its inhabitants, I agree. A meteor is the least of our worries. However, when i said that we must avoid eradication I was thinking along the same lines as you. I am no expert, but would a gamma ray burst, no matter the size, have to be directed onto a said location to provide the levels of radiation and energy that would be lethal instantaneously if not crippling the atmosphere of the said planet?
Several groups of physicists have shown that the odds of a GRB eradicating life on earth is zero due to the spiral nature of our galaxy.
http://physicsworld.com/cws/article/news/24692
Going way into the future, if we did start to inhabit different galaxies the only thing I could see wiping out civilization would be either itself or the big crunch at the end of time as we understand it. If we ever do spread out to this unimaginable magnitude, we will be able to predict almost all phenomena in the universe with as much certainty as they allow. Even the precise moment when the inevitable will occur...
In light of the discussion of having two data points to infer an absolute about the nature of the galaxy...
I must say that the deductive reasoning put into use by terjeber does away with the need for such a pair of data points all together.
To add to the point of life being omnipresent we can look to our own limited experience on earth.If we have learned anything from studying the harshest climates on earth (relatively speaking) it is that life will flourish anywhere that there is matter (and the universe is not short on that) for it to arise from. In general, nothing lasts but nothing is lost.
To me, life in the galaxy is just common sense. I had never heard of quote such as Asimov on the nature of the universe (Once, never, or infinity) but simply found this to be common sense when one considers the size of the galaxy and its basic properties.
Ultimately, I feel like the discovery of life on Mars would be most useful in convincing the religious fanatics among us that life exists elsewhere in the universe and they can start to get over themselves as the single most important being in the universe. Which would be a breath of fresh air, lemme tell ya!
Maybe then, we can take steps towards preventing humanity from suffering the fate of the countless races that came before us, eradication.
how real of a threat this poster really was.
People call for an end to "anonymous" slander without actually thinking through things rationally.
Jeez, I really do not know where to start on this one. This is going to turn into a rant but I hope to, by the end of it, reach somewhere sensible. Lets start with the most prominent point.
Nothing said on an online message board ( ESPECIALLY BY AN ANON.) means anything in the real world. If you say you are going to rape and murder a bunch of people on a message board it is more likely that you will not do it. You would not be posting about it, but instead be out raping and murdering except you are too much of a computer nerd to step out into the sun muchless kill someone. Certain forums will have different views on this. A forum for law students is clearly not a good place to do this as opposed to a place like off topic. That is where he made his first mistake. Law students would be the ones to take this stuff way too serious.
If the police started arresting everyone who makes a threat in a flame war half of us would be in jail. Hell I would have quite a few counts against myself. Who really means the shit they say on a message board when making a flame??
Thats just part of the "fun" you can have on the internet. Hell you do not even need to be anon, people just take shit too seriously. Once you log off, thats it. Things on an EZ board are only as real as you make them.
Once people realize that internet message boards are not to be taken seriously, they will probably increase their life spans by a few years from the stress reduction. People act as if getting flammed on the internet is going to ruin their lives, it means nothing. It means nothing to those who "get" the internet. Not everyone "gets" the internet. I thought most slashdotters understood this. But from the majority of responses they are talking about the legal implications of such threats. I see hundreds of said threats on message boards everyday followed by a LOL STFU NOOB ILL RAPE YOUR MOM AND BURN URE HOUSE DOWN. Insults continue to be thrown until the godwin rule kicks in. Everyone knows its just the internet that lets you say those dirty things. Its been going on for over a decade. Now the internet has reached critical mass and we have people like mom and dad using the internet that think every infomercial(read:flame bait) is the "real deal"
Do you honestly think he was going to rape her? I do not. These girls just got really mad that they had people bad mouthing them on an internet forum that means nothing. They most likely got rejected by some law firm because of their lack of qualifications and just convinced themselves the recruiter saw this post and took it to be truth.
Now, lets say the recruiter for these lost "prestigious jobs" sees this message board. If he reads this message whole and by the end of it decides that he does not want to hire her, he has failed on several critical levels.
I would go so far as to say I would not want to work with a company that displays such ignorance in their recruiting practices. The messages are firstly anonymous, so that is a red flag 1. The content and mode of discussion is not only untrusted and one sided, but clearly not professional. Red flag 2. Claiming to sodomize someone over the internet? Clearly a flame attempt to get attention. Red flag 3.
This again ties into the fact that people actually take flames written on message boards as truth. There is a skill we all learn growing up. The exact term fails me at the moment, but that is essentially filtering out what is untrue. If you assume everything you read to be true in this world, you should have about 500 products that will give you rock hard abs in just 3 minutes a week.
The same rules apply to the internet. They claim that the internet has evolved faster than the courts can clamor to moderate and control it. I believe this not to be true. The courts are making rapid advancement where money is at stake thes
to be one of the central points of his argument.
Excuse me while I actually discuss a topic related to the article it self, yes shame on me.
He essentially claims that students, based on cognitive research , fail to gain "expert" status over material and the ability to self analyze one's thought process concerning a matter of average complexity.
I learned this first hand when i was in the second grade trying to get a hold on division and multiplication. It turns out that study and practice makes you better.
This principle applies to college courses as well. The preview for my engineering undergrad stressed that practice and thoughtful study was the key to success. 2 hours devoted for every hour in class was the rule of thumb.
Now, maybe this is simply because I attend a Tier 1 university (I can say with certainty, from experience, that my friends at lesser schools rarely even buy their textbooks or bother to study while passing) but studying is where you develop this "expert" status.
The only part of this article that has any bearing on the university as I see it is that professors have increasingly demanding positions as the grant getters. The increasing demands on the professors to take part in time consuming research can certainly degrade the quality of teaching to a degree. How far this goes is mostly dependent on the professor himself and is hard to gauge.
Reforming junior high and grade school is a whole different beast. I couldnt imagine even trying to go into the horror that the system is.
Take an amazing studio that makes high quality games that please the hardcore audience.
Buy that company out and start taking away all of the aspects of the game that appeal to the loyal fan base of said original company.
Streamline the development process and features of the game to maximize profits in the mainstream market for PC MMOs.
Ensure the destruction of said franchise before it even hits the door.
Well, to be fair, this has not happened YET with EA. But for those of us in the know on the MMO scene, warhammer is this exact scenario (same people who made DAOC the great game it was, bought out by EA midway through the development cycle)
Yup, I am REAL excited for any game that EA gets its greedy little hands on. Really, I am... so... excited... cant contain ....
The website linked is www.gametrailers.com...
I loled
Ok pack it up guys, discussion is over.
Otter just served up a nice slice of absolute and universal truth which applies to the world we live in today.
You can see this trend clearly in all types of cases.
As an extreme and totally made up example...
Prosecution cant prove that those dead bodies you dumped on the side of the road are actually your family, or maybe just evil clones sent from a parallel universe?
Well , luckily for you, regardless of what they are, its a felony punishable by up to 20 years in jail for dumping hazardous waste within 10 miles of a nuclear storage facility!
Stuff like this happens all too often when the public wants a modern day lynching.
Strange, I passed the test with a 4 by sleeping in class all day and not knowing a specific detail about a specific name or date. I do not even know when the constitution was signed, early 1800s?
The test does a great job of not grading for rote memorization but rather of understanding of the fundamental historical trends.
Sure you have to remember some terms and events to pass but no details really at all. Even in physics you must remember what variable means what and what F means depending on your course.
Prove to me that you are not a minority and I will consider what you have said.
;))
So far you have proven otherwise (by being a slashdot poster
A lot of these laws seem to stem from the fact that more than half of the people drafting them do not even use the internet on a regular basis or at an advanced level beyond that of a 14 year old.
... **Loading please wait** ...You have entered Federal Prison
These people are just out of their league. Old people just do not understand the internet since they did not grow up with it.
Enforcing a kind of law like this would be like trying to stop all of the drugs from getting into America... hehe
This will make me think twice about camping the grave yard in Area 52.
I might just kill an emo kid one too many times and bam
God bless America.
Not only do I have to be afraid of spiders laying eggs on my brain, now I have to worry about robots taking over my skull.
"There is no cure, and nearly every banana scientist says..."
Anyone else burst out laughing after reading the title of banana scientist? This picture came to mind...
http://www.zenbutoh.com/charactergallery/images/gorilla-bananas.jpg
http://yro.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/05/16/1836246
Soon you will be a felon for creating child porn in which NO children were actually abused.
Hell, why stop there, lets just make ANY picture that we don't agree with on a moral basis ILLEGAL and have a hefty jail sentence for it. I was thinking something along the lines of a law against putting government officials in an unfavorable light, what do you guys think?
Yes, welcome to the end of the world, enjoy your stay and make sure to thank the children as well as your local representative.
This is the first comment I read. I do not need to go any further before saying that you are not only right, but have put forth the truth in such an eloquent manner.
History does repeat itself, or so they say.
1700-1900 is NOT that long of a time span at all in the grand scheme of things. Now consider all of the world changing events we saw in just two hundred years. The change saw are almost unimaginable by even the most creative of minds. What will another 200 years and scarce resources bring?
I do not think even the most intellectual of us can fathom what the world will look like in a hundred years. If it comes down to it, the police state WILL be enforced if deemed necessary, and it will all be already in place ready to go...
We think we are so different from those before us, but are you so naive to think that they did not feel the same way about their previous generations?
It really is time to get up and do something if you live in the UK. This kind of stuff makes me feel good to be in the US... for once.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passive_smoking
Second hand smoke kills... I am not sure if I can give an equivalent example for second hand obesity however.
And do NOT even begin to bring up the fact that people can just go to other places if they want a non smoking environment. There are way too many variables involved to hold up that argument.
The *average* person will not go 5 extra blocks to get a smoothie just to avoid some passive second hand smoke. Thus being harmed in the process.
Your reply brings up some valid points. Let me help you tie it up in a nice neat little package that will bring you back to your last question.
http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/121004A.shtml
Here you are, there is just one of BILLIONS of examples of why this make sense, and why there is a big difference between the two.
Oh and in case you were wondering, Dick and Bush have nothing to do with any of these companies getting billion dollar contracts. Anyone who tells you that is a democratic heathen.
Reminds me of that great game titled Deus Ex (~1999). Anyone ever play it?
The gameplay was great, but it was the story line that was truly impressive.
The world as I see it moves closer and closer to this story world every day...
Soon we will have an autonomous AI filtering every single packet of data sent over the internet resulting in a sentient being that knows every piece of information about every person on the globe in the name of justice/security.
I cant wait guys, can you??
It is easy to tailor ones argument over issues as open ended as this one. If you have an end in mind, you can certainly reach it through a variety of logical routes such as the "free press" indoctrinating the masses. Of course the free press is going to do this. People do not watch the news to not believe it in ANY country. They take bits and pieces of it, some people take more than others.
I strongly believe that while one can turn on the television and be disheartened by Faux news, the fact that information is out there that is readily available sets America apart from countries such as Russia and China. None of us can really relate to how life must be in a country such as N. Korea. Drawing parallels from these countries to America is a bit cynical, no? Is it not belittling the extreme censorship they endure?
You cant expect the masses to get it, thats why they have their title as the masses. While one could argue that the masses control who gets elected, I think it is just as easy to argue that the masses do not know what they are getting in a representative.
Long gone are the days where candidates actually take meaningful stances on issues. Even campaign promises can quickly be broken due to "unexpected" budget cuts.
I believe our founding fathers were quite familiar with this idea, and hence decided that we should not govern our selves directly, since we clearly do not know what is best for us.
Now whether the people making the decisions in America... that is a whole different nut to crack...
It makes sense to me.
If you can make a reasonable, unfounded, and simply ignorant link to terrorists on any basis, it is perfectly alright to circumvent the constitution.
I think if the constitution needs to be trampled on to stop terrorists, then we are lucky to have this emboldened administration down on all fours playing twister on it.
Cards that turn off? That sounds like something a government employee would think up.
I can see the headlines now about secure RFID cards that are only turned on when signaled to at checkout counters.
Step 1 ) Turn on card.
Step 2 ) Hack card.
I find it somewhat sad that features on one OS are disabled due to legal restrictions on another OS.
Can the companies not focus on creating innovative content instead of having bid wars over who gets to use what in their products which are all essentially the same?