"Microsoft sells you software. You buy it, they're happy,"
OBVIOUSLY, you haven't read a EULA from Microsoft in the past - ohhhh - 30 years. YOU BUY NOTHING!!! You don't even lease or rent it. You merely pay for their permission to use it. And, if you change your hardware, you're supposed to pay them again, for more permission. Change your legal name, pay again. Change your underwear, pay again. Why do you think Microsoft geeks spend so much time in their mama's basements? They can't afford to change their underwear, socks, hardware, software, place of residence, or anything else!
Get a clue, dude. If you're going to be fanboi, you should at least know as much about their EULAs as most slashdotters know.
I questioned the USPS on that recently. Tracking tells me that my package has been accepted, then processed, then it leaves point of origin - then it's in limbo for 1 - 6 days. Suddenly, the package has arrived in destination city, and it's out for delivery.
The story is, the package is processed, then it goes into a bin. That bin goes into a truck, and the truck travels without ever having that bin scanned again, until it is offloaded in the destination sorting facility. At that point, it MIGHT be scanned, letting me know that it has arrived in Texarkana. Most often, it's not scanned at that sorting facility, but simply sorted and shipped to my post office. My post office actually scans everything, at which point I learn that it has arrived at my local post office, usually around 6:50 AM, and that I can expect it to arrive at my house around 2:00 PM.
Seems a crummy system. Why have tracking, if the tracking only works at origin and destination?
Correct. I've found recently that FedEx and UPS are taking packages from shippers, bringing them to my part of Outback, Nowhere, then handing the packages off to the USPS. This seems odd, and maybe wrong. They are apparently undercutting the USPS on sales at the point of origin, then tasking USPS with final delivery. No, I haven't really checked into this, it may be a good money making arrangement for the USPS, but I doubt it.
What I think is, the USPS needs to be rethought, at all levels, and restructured. But, that's what TFA suggests might be happening . . .
Agreed. Sometimes, it seems that the judge in this case or that is a tired old fart without a clue about technology. All the smartass young lawyers come in, talk over the judge's head, and argue asinine bullshit that the judge might only understand if an impartial third party spent months explaining to him. It's about time some judges cut through all the bullshit, and put the lawyers in their place.
"Stop squabbling, children, I WILL DECIDE what is important, and what is not. Sit down, shut up, and OBEY ME!!!"
That said, we need several judges to get a clue about software patents, and to rule the whole damned system as null and void, ruling that software is not and never should have been patentable.
That would still leave a lot of potential for exploitation in copyright laws, but at least the trolls would lose one of their favorite tools.
Few companies have the capacity to advance open source, and at the same time work for the shareholders. Seems pretty obvious to me that Oracle isn't one of those companies. Maybe they should have looked at Redhat for pointers?
Ahhh, wait. I re-read my own post, and your post. Sorry, I've contradicted myself. In the first post, I was talking about priorities. The priority is to get men off the earth, and the robots are much lower priority - they are tools to be used to achieve the top priority item.
In your post, you discuss timing - which should come first, the robot, or the man?
I have no problem with the robots going first. Put robots into any and every hazardous environment ahead of men and women, I have no problem with the "first" part. My problem with the original post was, "remove the human factor". I read that as, "men don't need to go, shouldn't go, and we aren't going to send them". There is where my argument comes from.
If we sent robots to the furthest reaches of the universe, and they documented everything there is to be documented, but no men went beyond our own atmosphere, I'd have to say, "Big freaking deal - now try doing something USEFUL!"
"we could remove the human factor altogether, and rely on teleoperated machines"
NEIN! NYECHT! NEVER!! NO WAY!!!
Robots and teleoperated automatic machinery has it's place. Right behind the men and women who are going to start colonizing the moon, Mars, and the rest of the solar system. Everything comes behind the expansion of mankind's livable habitat - everything.
Perhaps you didn't really read about the downfall of H B Gary Federal?
Planned - check. Professional - check. Sophisticated - check.
I'll admit that the professional and sophisticated parts might be subjective, but they pass muster with me. On the other hand, real sophisticated professionals should have figured out that they were vulnerable, and closed the doors against Anonymous. That goes for HB Gary and Sony.
"Personally, as long as it reads my card, provides access to my account, and returns my card when finished, why on earth would I care what OS it ran?"
First, you're assuming that the transaction has been handled in a secure manner. Meaning, you just might care what OS was running, if you should make a large deposit that never makes it into your account.
Second, if the machine is blue screened, that sort of hobbles the machine's ability to perform the functions you've asked it to do. At least a little bit, don't you think?
Now, before someone cries about Microsoft bashing - what is the main selling point for Linux on servers? Some silly catchword about five nines, right? And, so many people are happy to chime in with choruses of "That's only important to servers, home users don't give a damn about five nines!" But, when you're stuck a long way from home on some dark rainy night, and you NEED ten or twenty bucks to get you home, and all you can see is that blue screen, you'll sure wish the bank could boast five nines!
I call bullshit. Creating jobs in which people can productively earn a decent wage is as much a contribution to society as you can ask of any individual or corporaition. I'll have to admit that creating such jobs is more than I have managed to contribute to society. Your attitude is elitest, and ignores all the little people you depend on for your food, your health care, your financial transactions, your transportation, your - EVERYTHING. Building ships, yachts, and boats is enough contribution to society to justify anyone's presence on the earth.
I just can't figure why anyone would build such a huge ass yacht, with no deck guns. He better not sail that thing around Somalia!
No, I didn't know that. I'll make an assumption, though, that our local banks probably don't have that feature. Out here in Backwoods, Nowhere, they don't keep up with the rest of the world. I'll look around me though, and see what's available.
I've diddled with OS2 and eCommstation - I'm not thrilled with them, but they are alright. They might be a better alternative than Microsoft though. Personally, I would prefer a Unix-like OS.
In my area, I know of one branch of one bank that opens at 8:00, a couple that open at 8:30, and all the rest open at 9:00.
Closing time for most of them is 3:00, 3:30, or 4:00. But, a different branch of the same bank that opens at 8:00 stays open til 5:00. I guess it's up the individual manager how early and how late they stay open. On Fridays, of course, they all stay open later - some as late as 6:00. Of all the banks around me, only two have Saturday hours, which I love because I don't have to worry about getting off work late on a Friday.
Banker's hours have never been what I would call convenient. The wife used to cash her check and mine at the grocery store, because it was to much hassle to get to the bank. For many years, almost all our deposits were made through the night deposit slot. Only in the past five years or so have these various branches used the times that I've outlined above.
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I just run AdBlock Plus. The newer versions include anti-XSS. A guy can load Firefox with to many addons, after all.
What was that? Your sarcasm just dripped off the page, I didn't read it in time.
"provided information", full stop right there. No qualifiers, no quantifiers needed, period.
IT'S MY COMPUTER! IF I DON'T INTEND FOR IT TO COMMUNICATE IT WILL NOT COMMUNICATE!!
Now, which part of that do you not understand? If any, please let me refer you to your community college for a course in "Reading Comprehension 101".
"corporate version of the STASI"
Godwined already . . .
"Microsoft sells you software. You buy it, they're happy,"
OBVIOUSLY, you haven't read a EULA from Microsoft in the past - ohhhh - 30 years. YOU BUY NOTHING!!! You don't even lease or rent it. You merely pay for their permission to use it. And, if you change your hardware, you're supposed to pay them again, for more permission. Change your legal name, pay again. Change your underwear, pay again. Why do you think Microsoft geeks spend so much time in their mama's basements? They can't afford to change their underwear, socks, hardware, software, place of residence, or anything else!
Get a clue, dude. If you're going to be fanboi, you should at least know as much about their EULAs as most slashdotters know.
Cute. She looks embarrassed about something, or she has some of those red-faced lushes in her ancestry . . .
Right on. Keep preaching, I'll sit here in the choir!
I questioned the USPS on that recently. Tracking tells me that my package has been accepted, then processed, then it leaves point of origin - then it's in limbo for 1 - 6 days. Suddenly, the package has arrived in destination city, and it's out for delivery.
The story is, the package is processed, then it goes into a bin. That bin goes into a truck, and the truck travels without ever having that bin scanned again, until it is offloaded in the destination sorting facility. At that point, it MIGHT be scanned, letting me know that it has arrived in Texarkana. Most often, it's not scanned at that sorting facility, but simply sorted and shipped to my post office. My post office actually scans everything, at which point I learn that it has arrived at my local post office, usually around 6:50 AM, and that I can expect it to arrive at my house around 2:00 PM.
Seems a crummy system. Why have tracking, if the tracking only works at origin and destination?
Correct. I've found recently that FedEx and UPS are taking packages from shippers, bringing them to my part of Outback, Nowhere, then handing the packages off to the USPS. This seems odd, and maybe wrong. They are apparently undercutting the USPS on sales at the point of origin, then tasking USPS with final delivery. No, I haven't really checked into this, it may be a good money making arrangement for the USPS, but I doubt it.
What I think is, the USPS needs to be rethought, at all levels, and restructured. But, that's what TFA suggests might be happening . . .
Yes, I actually DID RTFA. Perhaps the fact that I was translating from legal speak into something that makes sense to me went right over your head.
"so the Court selected these figures based on its own views and experience"
That single line pretty much says, "We're going to do this MY way, little bitches, now shut up, and sit down, pay attention!"
Agreed. Sometimes, it seems that the judge in this case or that is a tired old fart without a clue about technology. All the smartass young lawyers come in, talk over the judge's head, and argue asinine bullshit that the judge might only understand if an impartial third party spent months explaining to him. It's about time some judges cut through all the bullshit, and put the lawyers in their place.
"Stop squabbling, children, I WILL DECIDE what is important, and what is not. Sit down, shut up, and OBEY ME!!!"
That said, we need several judges to get a clue about software patents, and to rule the whole damned system as null and void, ruling that software is not and never should have been patentable.
That would still leave a lot of potential for exploitation in copyright laws, but at least the trolls would lose one of their favorite tools.
AHHHH-HAAAA! Had you RTFA, you would know that was one of the questions that Mozilla asked DHS! Gotcha!
Welcome to the cloud. You're meant to be lost. All your data are belong to us now, don't worry!
"geared at making at as hard as possible to understand what's going on."
Bingo. You've hit on the problem, as well as the motivation for the problem. Don't you just love Microsoft?
Few companies have the capacity to advance open source, and at the same time work for the shareholders. Seems pretty obvious to me that Oracle isn't one of those companies. Maybe they should have looked at Redhat for pointers?
Ahhh, wait. I re-read my own post, and your post. Sorry, I've contradicted myself. In the first post, I was talking about priorities. The priority is to get men off the earth, and the robots are much lower priority - they are tools to be used to achieve the top priority item.
In your post, you discuss timing - which should come first, the robot, or the man?
Sorry for the sloppy use of language.
I have no problem with the robots going first. Put robots into any and every hazardous environment ahead of men and women, I have no problem with the "first" part. My problem with the original post was, "remove the human factor". I read that as, "men don't need to go, shouldn't go, and we aren't going to send them". There is where my argument comes from.
If we sent robots to the furthest reaches of the universe, and they documented everything there is to be documented, but no men went beyond our own atmosphere, I'd have to say, "Big freaking deal - now try doing something USEFUL!"
"we could remove the human factor altogether, and rely on teleoperated machines"
NEIN! NYECHT! NEVER!! NO WAY!!!
Robots and teleoperated automatic machinery has it's place. Right behind the men and women who are going to start colonizing the moon, Mars, and the rest of the solar system. Everything comes behind the expansion of mankind's livable habitat - everything.
Let's hope they manage to make decent steel before they start on all the alloys needed in spacecraft and mining equipment . . .
Perhaps you didn't really read about the downfall of H B Gary Federal?
Planned - check.
Professional - check.
Sophisticated - check.
I'll admit that the professional and sophisticated parts might be subjective, but they pass muster with me. On the other hand, real sophisticated professionals should have figured out that they were vulnerable, and closed the doors against Anonymous. That goes for HB Gary and Sony.
"Personally, as long as it reads my card, provides access to my account, and returns my card when finished, why on earth would I care what OS it ran?"
First, you're assuming that the transaction has been handled in a secure manner. Meaning, you just might care what OS was running, if you should make a large deposit that never makes it into your account.
Second, if the machine is blue screened, that sort of hobbles the machine's ability to perform the functions you've asked it to do. At least a little bit, don't you think?
Now, before someone cries about Microsoft bashing - what is the main selling point for Linux on servers? Some silly catchword about five nines, right? And, so many people are happy to chime in with choruses of "That's only important to servers, home users don't give a damn about five nines!" But, when you're stuck a long way from home on some dark rainy night, and you NEED ten or twenty bucks to get you home, and all you can see is that blue screen, you'll sure wish the bank could boast five nines!
I call bullshit. Creating jobs in which people can productively earn a decent wage is as much a contribution to society as you can ask of any individual or corporaition. I'll have to admit that creating such jobs is more than I have managed to contribute to society. Your attitude is elitest, and ignores all the little people you depend on for your food, your health care, your financial transactions, your transportation, your - EVERYTHING. Building ships, yachts, and boats is enough contribution to society to justify anyone's presence on the earth.
I just can't figure why anyone would build such a huge ass yacht, with no deck guns. He better not sail that thing around Somalia!
No, I didn't know that. I'll make an assumption, though, that our local banks probably don't have that feature. Out here in Backwoods, Nowhere, they don't keep up with the rest of the world. I'll look around me though, and see what's available.
I've diddled with OS2 and eCommstation - I'm not thrilled with them, but they are alright. They might be a better alternative than Microsoft though. Personally, I would prefer a Unix-like OS.
In my area, I know of one branch of one bank that opens at 8:00, a couple that open at 8:30, and all the rest open at 9:00.
Closing time for most of them is 3:00, 3:30, or 4:00. But, a different branch of the same bank that opens at 8:00 stays open til 5:00. I guess it's up the individual manager how early and how late they stay open. On Fridays, of course, they all stay open later - some as late as 6:00. Of all the banks around me, only two have Saturday hours, which I love because I don't have to worry about getting off work late on a Friday.
Banker's hours have never been what I would call convenient. The wife used to cash her check and mine at the grocery store, because it was to much hassle to get to the bank. For many years, almost all our deposits were made through the night deposit slot. Only in the past five years or so have these various branches used the times that I've outlined above.