Like I said, while there's no direct causation proof, correlational studies are a strong indicator of the success of specific advertisements. Correlation is also a strong idicator of success of advertisements in general--which was what the original poster was questioning. I don't know about you, but if I was given statistics saying that when I advertise using X method I sell x percent more product than when I don't advertise at all, I would be pretty sure that advertising was effective. Whether or not there is a true causational link is, obviously, still up for debate, but it makes good business sense not to go against years and years of correlational studies.
. I never ever bought anything because of a commercial...
Hmm.. maybe you've never bought anything because of a commercial, but it's highly doubtful. Even if you never had the conscious thoughts "hey, that commercial makes me want to go buy product X," there is a very good chance that, for example, after seeing years and years of Sony commercials, you subconsciously have been effected. Now, when you walk into a store and have the choice of purchasing a Sony Discman or a BrandX Diskman for the same price, chances are you're going to buy the Sony because you view it as the more "established" and more "trust-worthy" brand because you've been hearing about it for such a long time and it's been around for such a long time.
the execs will never know that the ads they spend so much money on are simply not effective.
Advertising executives do know the level of efficieny of their advertisements. While there is no way for them to find out exactly how many viewers of a particular show are actually absorbing the information in their particular ad, they are able to tell whether or not sales are increasing in response to specific ads. While without a way to find out exactly how many people are watching their ads there is no way to prove a direct causational link between advertising and sales, there is a strong correlation between using advertisements that have been rated highly by focus groups and increased sales. Correlation over years and years is enough (and I would hope would be enough for you too) to assume that advertisements are effective if properly executed.
Out of curiousity I visited FreePC's site, and it mentioned that as a part of their going out of business, they were going to "destroy [users'] credit card information" and "transfer the titles" of the PCs.
What reason did FreePC have for having recipients of their free machines' credit card numbers? Did they threaten to charge people who were able to evade the advertising software? If so, did they ever charge people? And what exactly was the company able to do by owning the title of the PC? Recall it if they found someone evading?
Is it just me, or does it seem much easier to just take a vitamin than to actually eat one of these things? Vitamins seem superior in almost every aspect in terms of utility.
First, price. Since the burritos are relavitevly costly, I can't imagine them being any more expensive than vitamins.
Second, preparation. You need a microwave or some sort of oven for the burritos. All you need for a vitamin is a glass of water (or, maybe not even that, if you're brave enough to swallow one without any help).
Third, taste. Vitamins don't taste bad. If you get Flintstones vitamins, they taste good. With the burritos you have to deal with frozen vegetables and all sorts of weird pastes.
Fourth, opportunity costs. After eating a burrito, chances are you're going to be at least relatively full and you'll have to forego eating some good-tasting food. If you take a vitamin, however, you can still eat yummy food. And you get all your nutrients.
1. Username/password authentication is a standard authentication scheme. Just dont let 400 people use the account at once.
Yes, username/password authentication is usually a good way of preventing unauthorized users from using other people's accounts. This system only works, however, when the legitamate users have an incentive to keep their accounts private. For example, I'm definitely not going to give a large group of people my unix shell account password, for obvious reasons. When I lose nothing by letting everyone else have my password, however (as is the case with my.mp3.com), then the password authentication becomes useless for limiting access. Users might even have incentive for giving their passwords out ("I'll give you my password if you authenticate 20 CDs that I don't already have...").
The only possible solution to this--and one that has been suggested--is to threaten revoking access to accounts that are obviously being used by numerous people. Various "adult" verification companies (e.g., Adultcheck) do this, but I'm not quite sure how efficient their systems are. I suppose MACs or IP addresses that my.mp3.com are collecting could be useful for this purpose.
I agree that there is no "problem" per se if women are choosing to not major in CS due to personal preferences, enticements of other markets, or a lack of interest.
There is a problem, however, if women are choosing not to go into CS for reasons besides these. These include being discouraged due to knowledge of discrimination, training earlier in life that is not comprable to that that men receive, or psychological reasons (e.g., being apprehensive about investing one's time in a field where one feels there are societal forces working against one). If there indeed are societal forces which are causing women of equal ability as men to join the CS field, then these are issues which need to be addressed. While a woman may tell you she is "not interested" in CS and because of this is not majoring in it, there may be things to blame other than personal preferences.
I'd be interested in hearing what majors, if any, are being boosted by the drop in the CS major.. or, more simply... where are the women going?
This isn't necessarily a problem with the CS field itself, it could be that opportunities in other fields are starting to become more inviting to women. When looked at compared to some fields, like Business, CS hasn't exactly been extremely hostile to females in the past. Maybe less hostile environments in other areas are emerging, and that is causing a levelling-off of female CS majors?
How would the software treat CDR copies of CDs? Would it be able to detect that the CDR was not an "original"? Is there anything on the CDRs themselves that marks them as unique?
I know it doesn't sound very practical, because if a friend has a CD he could just as easily let you borrow it and "beam" it yourself, but what about on a larger scale? One could purchase CDRs on the black market and then beam them.. this would seem to hurt the industry more than even borrowing a friend's CD and beaming it.
Any ideas about whether CDRs would be authenticated?
Since my first post I actually tried this with two scratched CDs. One of them won't let me listen to 3 of the 16 songs on the track. That one was authenticated perfectly the first time. The other has skips on every song and you could probably describe it less as scratched than as "blotched" (it has pretty big stains on the back from dried coffee, I think). That one wouldn't authenticate. Looks like it'll work out some of the time at least.
Something I haven't heard mentioned before that might be another incentive to use the service: The ability to once again listen to damaged tracks.
Imagine, for example, that your CD is scratched in such a way that certain tracks are unlistenable. If you were to use the Beam-it software, and the verification process wasn't hampered by the scratches, you could regain the ability to listen to those "lost" songs. I'm not sure how much of the CD is randomly checked in the verification process, but most likely after a few tries you would be able to have a scratched CD verified.
First of all, this is not in any way in support of Mills' theory, but you have a few things wrong. First, obviously, is the fact that H has 1 electron. Second, your logic is faulty. You cannot argue against him by stating what you believe to be "laws of physics / chemistry," because his argument is that those "laws" are exactly what are different from how they are normally believed to be. Your method of argument would be the equivalent of the following: Mills: Cars don't actually need gas, it's just a conspiracy. You: But you're wrong! Cars need gas, everyone knows that! See what I mean? Your argument basically is the equivalent of saying "You're wrong! Because."
Slashdot Mirror
Like I said, while there's no direct causation proof, correlational studies are a strong indicator of the success of specific advertisements. Correlation is also a strong idicator of success of advertisements in general--which was what the original poster was questioning. I don't know about you, but if I was given statistics saying that when I advertise using X method I sell x percent more product than when I don't advertise at all, I would be pretty sure that advertising was effective. Whether or not there is a true causational link is, obviously, still up for debate, but it makes good business sense not to go against years and years of correlational studies.
Hmm.. maybe you've never bought anything because of a commercial, but it's highly doubtful. Even if you never had the conscious thoughts "hey, that commercial makes me want to go buy product X," there is a very good chance that, for example, after seeing years and years of Sony commercials, you subconsciously have been effected. Now, when you walk into a store and have the choice of purchasing a Sony Discman or a BrandX Diskman for the same price, chances are you're going to buy the Sony because you view it as the more "established" and more "trust-worthy" brand because you've been hearing about it for such a long time and it's been around for such a long time.
That page has a few executables for removing the ad software from the machines.
Advertising executives do know the level of efficieny of their advertisements. While there is no way for them to find out exactly how many viewers of a particular show are actually absorbing the information in their particular ad, they are able to tell whether or not sales are increasing in response to specific ads. While without a way to find out exactly how many people are watching their ads there is no way to prove a direct causational link between advertising and sales, there is a strong correlation between using advertisements that have been rated highly by focus groups and increased sales. Correlation over years and years is enough (and I would hope would be enough for you too) to assume that advertisements are effective if properly executed.
What reason did FreePC have for having recipients of their free machines' credit card numbers? Did they threaten to charge people who were able to evade the advertising software? If so, did they ever charge people? And what exactly was the company able to do by owning the title of the PC? Recall it if they found someone evading?
First, price. Since the burritos are relavitevly costly, I can't imagine them being any more expensive than vitamins.
Second, preparation. You need a microwave or some sort of oven for the burritos. All you need for a vitamin is a glass of water (or, maybe not even that, if you're brave enough to swallow one without any help).
Third, taste. Vitamins don't taste bad. If you get Flintstones vitamins, they taste good. With the burritos you have to deal with frozen vegetables and all sorts of weird pastes.
Fourth, opportunity costs. After eating a burrito, chances are you're going to be at least relatively full and you'll have to forego eating some good-tasting food. If you take a vitamin, however, you can still eat yummy food. And you get all your nutrients.
Yes, username/password authentication is usually a good way of preventing unauthorized users from using other people's accounts. This system only works, however, when the legitamate users have an incentive to keep their accounts private. For example, I'm definitely not going to give a large group of people my unix shell account password, for obvious reasons. When I lose nothing by letting everyone else have my password, however (as is the case with my.mp3.com), then the password authentication becomes useless for limiting access. Users might even have incentive for giving their passwords out ("I'll give you my password if you authenticate 20 CDs that I don't already have...").
The only possible solution to this--and one that has been suggested--is to threaten revoking access to accounts that are obviously being used by numerous people. Various "adult" verification companies (e.g., Adultcheck) do this, but I'm not quite sure how efficient their systems are. I suppose MACs or IP addresses that my.mp3.com are collecting could be useful for this purpose.
There is a problem, however, if women are choosing not to go into CS for reasons besides these. These include being discouraged due to knowledge of discrimination, training earlier in life that is not comprable to that that men receive, or psychological reasons (e.g., being apprehensive about investing one's time in a field where one feels there are societal forces working against one). If there indeed are societal forces which are causing women of equal ability as men to join the CS field, then these are issues which need to be addressed. While a woman may tell you she is "not interested" in CS and because of this is not majoring in it, there may be things to blame other than personal preferences.
This isn't necessarily a problem with the CS field itself, it could be that opportunities in other fields are starting to become more inviting to women. When looked at compared to some fields, like Business, CS hasn't exactly been extremely hostile to females in the past. Maybe less hostile environments in other areas are emerging, and that is causing a levelling-off of female CS majors?
I know it doesn't sound very practical, because if a friend has a CD he could just as easily let you borrow it and "beam" it yourself, but what about on a larger scale? One could purchase CDRs on the black market and then beam them.. this would seem to hurt the industry more than even borrowing a friend's CD and beaming it.
Any ideas about whether CDRs would be authenticated?
Since my first post I actually tried this with two scratched CDs. One of them won't let me listen to 3 of the 16 songs on the track. That one was authenticated perfectly the first time. The other has skips on every song and you could probably describe it less as scratched than as "blotched" (it has pretty big stains on the back from dried coffee, I think). That one wouldn't authenticate. Looks like it'll work out some of the time at least.
Imagine, for example, that your CD is scratched in such a way that certain tracks are unlistenable. If you were to use the Beam-it software, and the verification process wasn't hampered by the scratches, you could regain the ability to listen to those "lost" songs. I'm not sure how much of the CD is randomly checked in the verification process, but most likely after a few tries you would be able to have a scratched CD verified.
First of all, this is not in any way in support of Mills' theory, but you have a few things wrong. First, obviously, is the fact that H has 1 electron. Second, your logic is faulty. You cannot argue against him by stating what you believe to be "laws of physics / chemistry," because his argument is that those "laws" are exactly what are different from how they are normally believed to be. Your method of argument would be the equivalent of the following: Mills: Cars don't actually need gas, it's just a conspiracy. You: But you're wrong! Cars need gas, everyone knows that! See what I mean? Your argument basically is the equivalent of saying "You're wrong! Because."