There is already a legally simple way to decide this. Was there a door involved? If you enter a business and walk down an open hallway towards the back of the building, assuming that there are no "Keep Out" or "Employees Only" signs, then it is legally not a B&E. However, if you must open a closed door to enter that hallway, even if that door is unlocked, then you have broken the law. Since User/Pass prompts are analogous to doors, passing through one without authorization is (and should be) illegal.
How would you feel if you found someone in your living room, and the police couldn't arrest him because he found a key to your front door? Should everyone blame you and suggest better deadbolts?
Hmmm...would I ever want to abandon Earth, home to several billion too many members of humanity, and all of its elitist mountain getaways, polluted oceans, and clear-cut forests to go live on an unexplored virgin planet with limitless possibilities? In a heartbeat.
It's all a matter of point of view. I'm willing to forgoe the comforts and safety of civilization to lay my eyes on things never before seen by mankind. I'm willing to break my back building a new world, just so I can sit back at the end of the day and say "Wow! I did that!" It's the same thing that makes me climb mountains and take up eco-treks...only on a much grander scale:)
Excuse me? Read that tagline up top again "News for Nerds. Stuff that matters". Id Software helped launch a gaming revolution that has had a signifigant impact on the computer graphics industry and which has brought many new people into the field. I personally know several programmers and web application developers who got their start by coding mods or putting together fan pages for the Doom and Quake series of games. Id Software is a company that many 'nerds' are interested in, and therefore news about them is 'News for Nerds'. While this isn't a gaming site and I'd probably get upset if they started reporting on every new mod release and.plan comment made by one of the Id employees, Slashdot is entirely within its scope when it reports on 'out of the ordinary' happenings withing the company. Selling off an Origin 2000 supercomputer that played a hand in developing two of their most popular games definitely qualifies as 'out of the ordinary'. Besides, there are no rules outlining what IS and ISN'T acceptable content here. If Taco wants to post a story about his cats furry butt, he has that right. If the other members of the/. team don't see reason to censure him, then he can go on posting whatever he sees fit. You aren't paying for this service, so why are you complaining about it? If you don't like it, find somewhere else to post. If you really want to express your opinion, or think you could do a better job, go download the source code and build your own site.
Er...no. I AM a Silicon Valley native so I probably know a little bit more about this than you. I grew up in Cupertino (and my wife grew up in Fremont) back in the days before the average person even knew what a computer was. I remember when there actually used to be ranches and farmland between the towns, and people were friendly to each other. The South Bay used to be one of the most beautiful semi-suburban areas I've ever seen, and nobody wanted that to change.
So what happened? The military contractors pulled out in the late 80's and early 90's. The city and county governments, over the LOUD objections of the residents, basically went on a no holds barred campaign to attract new industry to the region. When they realized that they had a fledgling industry right under their own noses, they latched onto it and did their best to support and expand it. And the result? The Silicon Valley land boom of the early to mid 90's. People attracted to the industry moved here, and they needed to build new homes. The government did EVERYTHING they could to support this, despite what their constituents wanted. Heck, a guy I went to high shool with used to live on a large ranch off of 85 just south of town (well, back then anyway). His family had owned the land since the late 1800's, but modern development moved up to the edge of the property and builders really wanted to get a hold of it. When he refused to sell the county did something that floors me to this day...they declared imminent domain on his land so that they could build a school and park on it. After the county had claimed the land and deeded it to the city they convieniently realized that they didn't have the money to build a school or park, and put the land up for sale. Today tract homes cover the land that we used to ride horses and hunt frogs on. Of course, here's the most disgusting thing: Nine years ago they were paid $400,000 for three acres of land that is worth several hundred million today.
Now please don't tell me that people wanted this. The Silicon Valley has an ugly history that most new residents don't want to hear about, and it was all ushered in by fairly corrupt government officials. And me? I went into programming and made quite a bit of money, which I used to move over to the Central Valley. That's not home for me anymore...it's an ugly megalopolis full of never ending strip malls and people who profess their faith for protecting nature, while never acknowledging what they helped destroy. Don't get me wrong...I don't begrudge the people who live there today, it's just kind of sad to see what's happened to the area.
I know many people who feel the same way. The line of reasoning goes something like this: "If the guy's a criminal, he's a drag on society. Society as a whole should not have to deal with people contantly trying to destroy their work. If a person lives his life by stealing the hard work of others, then eliminating that life provides a large benefit to society, without any loss. Therefore the police and courts should be able to step in and end the lives of these people".
It's a little harsh, but there's just enough reason in there to make many people stop and think. Many weeds survive by choking the life out of flowers and beneficial plants, so when we get weeds in our garden we rip them out of the ground and destroy them so that the flowers can thrive. If people decide that they want to be societies weeds, why not do the same thing?
I don't totally subscribe to this line of thought because of the potential for abuse, but I can somewhat understand the reasoning of people who do. Not all human life is "special".
Are our elected representatives really that stupid, or do they just work on this type of stuff to pass the time? I mean, think about it...if passed this would blatantly censor the free flow of public domain information. It would also directly violate constitutionally guranteed due process laws. Now, my fourth grade niece could tell you what's going to happen if this gets passed: the first time someone gets a website shut down, or someone gets charged with distributing "illegal information" (I don't even like the sound of the term), this will end up in the Supreme Court which will declare this thing unconstitutional in a few microseconds. So what are they thinking? That maybe if they try enough times the Supreme Court will accidentally let one slip by? There is NO WAY that any American with an IQ over 80 could seriously entertain the belief that this thing has any chance of becoming (and staying) law.
Vote getting PR bulls***, that's all this is. And the truly sad thing about the whole situation is that the average American probably wouldn't even give a damn. "What? It's going to help end the drug problem? Great! What are the fourth and fifth amendments anyway?" It's unfortunate that there isn't anywhere else much better.
Hey, I've been out of school over ten years...you can't expect me to get all the details correct;) I did break out my old history books though, and you are indeed correct. For a period of time the Arabic scholars were the sole source of ancient Greek texts, but that is no longer true today. I guess I should stick to code and quit quoting history:)
Note to moderators: If there are any moderators still reading this discussion, please feel free to moderate my original post back down to 2. While I appreciate the occasional karma point or four, I really don't deserve points for a factually incorrect comment, no matter how well written it might have been. Chris Lovell and Nicomachus probably deserve a couple points themselves for setting the record straight.
Many ancient Greek writings would be lost to history if not for Arab scholars. Because there were no printing presses a few thousand years ago, maintaining the writings of Hippocrates, Archimedes, and other ancient Greeks required that their texts be rewritten by hand from time to time. Once the Greek civilization began it's decline there simply wasn't anyone with the time, inclination, or resources to devote to the maintenance of these great texts. Luckily for us today many of these texts were taken to the Middle East, where Arab scholars recognized their lasting value and maintained them for centuries.
By the time historical interest in ancient Greece began to resurface (a few hundred years ago), the Arab copies were the only sizeable collection of ancient Greek literature left in existence. Because of that, practically all of the Greek literature we read today has gone through several langage translations which can, unfortunately, distort the original meaning of the texts(eg. Greek>Arab>Latin>English).
Finding an original Greek text (or Greek language copy) is a GREAT find for historians because it will allow us to examine the writings without worrying about misinterpretations and other unintentional distortions.
The bill of rights is for INDIVIDUALS ONLY. You and I can speak freely, but corporations can be restricted in whatever way the government wants to because as I said they have no protection granted by the bill of rights because it is specificaly a bill-of-rights-for-the-individual
Wow, I don't know who filled your head with that garbage, but I'd like to suggest READING the Constitution before spouting off. I've got a copy hanging on the wall in front of me, and no matter how hard I look I can't seem to find the line that says "FOR INDIVIDUALS ONLY!" On the contrary, most of the first ten amendments don't single out any entity or group for the rights being described, and only a few refer to "the people". Since "the people" is a general term to refer to all legal entities within the nation, I would argue that these amendments do protect corporations.
You know, I usually consider it a Bad Sign when I'm looking forward to the end of a movie before it's half over. Don't get me wrong, I'm a HUGE fan of the Matrix but this thing just bites. Bad acting, an awful script, and pathetically misguided attempts at humor added up to a 49 minute yawnfest.
If you're bored witless and are looking for a way to blow the better part of an hour, go ahead and watch the film. But if you're a Matrix fan looking for a quality spoof, or a comedy fan looking for a good laugh, I'd suggest skipping this one. I definitely give it two thumbs down.
Aww c'mon. I've got four 6.5Gb Bigfoots spinning away in my file server right now. Besides the fact that my old ESDI's had a better seek time, they work great!
Neither the Tungusta blast (probably a cometary fragment) nor Arizona's Meteor Crater impact were extinction level events, but both devastated the surrounding regions for hundreds of square miles. Satellite imagery has turned up hundreds of craters on the Earth that we never knew were there, which indicates that these types of impacts are much more common than previously thought. A Meteor Crater level event on any of the major landmasses today would probably kill several thousand people if it fell in a rural area, or several million if it fell in an urban center...not quite a threat to the existence of humanity but a major disaster in anybodys book.
I think a healthey sense of urgency is entirely justifiable.
Re:This is a Big Blow to the Astronomic community
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Iridium Saved?
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Ah, but let's not forget about visual astronomy. Ever seen an Iridium flare? Ever seen an Iridium flare through a telescope? It's so bright it's painful:\
No shit! My 6020i was a piece of junk from the day I bought it, and I'm glad to know I can get at least part of my money back. I dunno if I've got the receipts any more, but if HP wants to argue the point with me I'd be more than willing to pull the drive out of my bottom drawer and mail the damned thing back to them.:)
Too true. A few months back I was explaining some of the basics of the Internet to some prospective clients when one of them asked me how long I'd been using it. I told him that I'd first used the Internet in 1989 and that I'd used the Web since mid-1994. Out of nowhere one of the clients looked at me and said "You're lying, the Internet wasn't even invented until 1995!"
I was honestly to stunned to even reply for a good 30 seconds. When I did try to correct him, he immediately got defensive and insinuated that I was trying to pull something over on them. When I finally chuckled and said "And I'll bet you think Microsoft invented the Internet", he looked at me in all seriousness and said "No. AOL did."
Needless to say, I didn't get the contract. In retrospect, that was probably a good thing:)
Uh...no. The Earth has a diameter of 12,753 km, a mass of 6.5e21 tons, and a density of 5.5. Mars has a diameter of 6,794 km, a density of 3.9, and its mass is only 7.15e20 tons. Last time I checked, that means the Earth is almost twice as big as Mars:)
More likely is the possibility that ancient humans also found dinosaur bones. Think about this: Your primitive band of 10,000 BC humans is looking for a new cave when the group stumbles across a semi-complete T.Rex skeleton exposed in a streambed by last winters rains. Everybody recognizes it as a skeleton of a huge fearsome beast, but your primitive tribe has know way of knowing that it's millions of years old. You all move on, but for the rest of your lives tell the story of the great dragonmonster skeleton you found beside the stream. Your children tell their children, and after a few generations it becomes the story of the time their great ancestors victoriously defeated the evil dragon which was trying to keep them from reaching their new home.
When I first went to work in the Silicon Valley in the early 90's the cost of living wasn't nearly as bad. I had a $65,000 a year job and lived pretty damned well on that. I owned 3 bedroom house in Mountain View that I'd paid $190,000 for and thought I was on top of the world. Then the 'boom' began and everything changed for the worse. In the period of only a couple years I became the poorest person on my block. I thought I'd hit easy street when a job change catapulted me into a $110,000 a year position coding backend web apps (C) but even at that salary I quickly found myself stetching to make my paychecks last due to the increased cost of living. Couple this with the fact that the serious increase in traffic and increasing time at the office were keeping me away from my home for more than 15 hours a day and you can probably see why I began to get burned out on the whole 'Silicon Valley' mystique.
Like many people in this business I had always assumed that all of the 'good' jobs were located in the Silicon Valley, and that the rest of the country was a technological waste of time. Doing quick salary comparisons seemed to confirm this when I found that no other area of the US offered competitive salaries to the SV companies for someone with my skills and experience. Also, since I'm a Nothern California native, I wasn't exactly eager to move far:) Two years ago however, I decided that enough was enough. I sold my home for $600,000 and moved to Elk Grove. I found a job with a Sacramento based application development company that pays $70,000 a year in TWO DAYS.
I know all of you Silicon Valley residents are probably saying "$70k? That sucks!", but you cannot forget the lower cost of living and the intangibles that go with living out here. $70k in the Sacramento Valley probably lasts as long as $200k in the Silicon Valley once cost of living adjustments are made (I paid $225,000 for a 5000sq foot 4 bedroom home with a REAL YARD!). When you factor in things like a commute of less than 20 minutes, actual friendly neighbors, lower gas and utility prices, and weekend entertainment that wont break the bank, the move becomes TOTALLY worth it.
The point? All of you Silicon Valley techies that are complaining about the high cost of living over there should MOVE. Contrary to popular belief, there are good jobs elsewhere that you guys could be taking. I realize that I will probably never get rich on stock options from the latest startup, but I'm happy now...and enjoying your life is the only thing that really matters in the end.
Re:Cool... is this the modernized Amiga?
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Funny, I thought the key phrase there was UNIX-like, something that Win2K most definitely is NOT.
I would strongly disagree. Locked in a trunk in my dads attic is a bloodstained Nazi flag complete with five bullet holes, sitting next to a box containing a Purple Heart. You want to know why that Nazi flag is important to me? In December of 1944 my grandfather and his unit were tied up in some intensive fighting in France. One day his unit was crossing some fields when they were ambushed by several armored Nazi units. Although they were seriously outgunned they fought back hard and suceeded in destroying five of the units before the rest pulled back. Afterwards my grandfather climbed on top of one of the wrecked vehicles and pulled down the Nazi flag to keep as a momento...with the five bulletholes already added. Two days later his unit was entering a small French village when they were attacked by snipers, and my grandfather was shot in the neck within the first few minutes of fighting. His buddy, looking for something to staunch the bloodflow, found the Nazi flag, pushed it into the wound, and held it there until a medic could arrive to help him...probably saving his life.
To me, that Nazi flag is a symbol of the hell my grandfather went through to make sure we would continue to live in a free society, and of the suffering he endured because of it.
So please don't call it trash...to some of us it is much more. I would hate to think that we are entering a world where such an important momento to my family could be made illegal because it offends somebody. I would never consider selling the flag, but allowing governments to regulate momentos like this is a step in that direction.
Exactly. I have several family members in the US military, and between them and their military friends I've picked something up. Soldiers in our military consider the Constitution to be more important than whatever government is currently in power. If Congress and the President were to order a police state tomorrow, most of our soldiers would be fighting against them, not for them.
While our military may look unified and formidable, it's important to remember that most soldiers are normal Americans, just like you or I. The few who might actually follow the governments orders would quickly find themselves outgunned:)
Sorry to hear about your experiences, but backups are a wise idea. One of my development machines in my home office runs NT workstation, and currently contains just over 30GB of applications and data. Installed into that machine is a 24GB DAT backup, which I faithfully run twice a week, wasting two tapes and many hours of an otherwide useful day. Am I wasting my time? About a month ago I had a client project due in two days. I come into my office, flip on the computer, and what do I see...the good old NT Bomb On Boot syndrome. The NTFS partition corrupted after two more attempts to boot the machine. What would I have done without backups? I'd have been f***ed, that's what. As it was, I just wiped the partitions, booted from my rescue disk, and was fully operational again within two hours. DAT rules:)
Oh. Wow. Yet another press release expounding the miraculous abilities of some upcoming piece of hardware that has yet to see the light of day. I am so impressed. Maybe, just because I am sooo totally impressed by this, I'll put off buying that GeForce now. But then again, I'm sure we'll have some new announcement a few months after that telling us about the next great achievement in hardware. At this rate, I'll be stuck with this EGA card for the next 20 years!
Seriously, I wish that Slashdot and all of the other sites that repost on computer hardware would start dropping crap like this in the trashbin. Post reviews of released products, post reviews of soon to be released products, but if I never see another review of a product that only exists on paper, I'll still have seen too many. Posting this kind of stuff just encourages these hardware companies to write more of it.
Kind of reminds me of me when I was younger:) IIRC that was one of Tom Hanks first movies...he couldn't have been more than 17 or 18 when it was filmed. Unfortunately I also seem to remember my parents seeing it, and afterwards setting me down for a long talk on why "roleplaying games are evil" and how I should always avoid that "awful Dungeons And Dragons game" bacause it was satanic.
The funny thing is, I really don't think she ever put two and two together...she actually used to make my friends and I lunch when we had our weekend-long "DND" games:) She thought "DND" was a creative storytelling game that promoted imagination and creativity, but Dungeons And Dragons was a devil worshippers game full of evil incantations and brainwashing. If she only knew...
Yep, you can, but the built in protection is that you can't gain karma that way. When granted moderator access, a person could log out, post, log in, and moderate himself up, but there's not much point to it. You're wasting your moderator points, and if the post was really stupid in the first place it'll just end up getting moderated back down.
Slashdot Mirror
There is already a legally simple way to decide this. Was there a door involved? If you enter a business and walk down an open hallway towards the back of the building, assuming that there are no "Keep Out" or "Employees Only" signs, then it is legally not a B&E. However, if you must open a closed door to enter that hallway, even if that door is unlocked, then you have broken the law. Since User/Pass prompts are analogous to doors, passing through one without authorization is (and should be) illegal.
How would you feel if you found someone in your living room, and the police couldn't arrest him because he found a key to your front door? Should everyone blame you and suggest better deadbolts?
Hmmm...would I ever want to abandon Earth, home to several billion too many members of humanity, and all of its elitist mountain getaways, polluted oceans, and clear-cut forests to go live on an unexplored virgin planet with limitless possibilities? In a heartbeat.
:)
It's all a matter of point of view. I'm willing to forgoe the comforts and safety of civilization to lay my eyes on things never before seen by mankind. I'm willing to break my back building a new world, just so I can sit back at the end of the day and say "Wow! I did that!" It's the same thing that makes me climb mountains and take up eco-treks...only on a much grander scale
Excuse me? Read that tagline up top again "News for Nerds. Stuff that matters". Id Software helped launch a gaming revolution that has had a signifigant impact on the computer graphics industry and which has brought many new people into the field. I personally know several programmers and web application developers who got their start by coding mods or putting together fan pages for the Doom and Quake series of games. Id Software is a company that many 'nerds' are interested in, and therefore news about them is 'News for Nerds'. While this isn't a gaming site and I'd probably get upset if they started reporting on every new mod release and .plan comment made by one of the Id employees, Slashdot is entirely within its scope when it reports on 'out of the ordinary' happenings withing the company. Selling off an Origin 2000 supercomputer that played a hand in developing two of their most popular games definitely qualifies as 'out of the ordinary'. Besides, there are no rules outlining what IS and ISN'T acceptable content here. If Taco wants to post a story about his cats furry butt, he has that right. If the other members of the /. team don't see reason to censure him, then he can go on posting whatever he sees fit. You aren't paying for this service, so why are you complaining about it? If you don't like it, find somewhere else to post. If you really want to express your opinion, or think you could do a better job, go download the source code and build your own site.
Er...no. I AM a Silicon Valley native so I probably know a little bit more about this than you. I grew up in Cupertino (and my wife grew up in Fremont) back in the days before the average person even knew what a computer was. I remember when there actually used to be ranches and farmland between the towns, and people were friendly to each other. The South Bay used to be one of the most beautiful semi-suburban areas I've ever seen, and nobody wanted that to change.
So what happened? The military contractors pulled out in the late 80's and early 90's. The city and county governments, over the LOUD objections of the residents, basically went on a no holds barred campaign to attract new industry to the region. When they realized that they had a fledgling industry right under their own noses, they latched onto it and did their best to support and expand it. And the result? The Silicon Valley land boom of the early to mid 90's. People attracted to the industry moved here, and they needed to build new homes. The government did EVERYTHING they could to support this, despite what their constituents wanted. Heck, a guy I went to high shool with used to live on a large ranch off of 85 just south of town (well, back then anyway). His family had owned the land since the late 1800's, but modern development moved up to the edge of the property and builders really wanted to get a hold of it. When he refused to sell the county did something that floors me to this day...they declared imminent domain on his land so that they could build a school and park on it. After the county had claimed the land and deeded it to the city they convieniently realized that they didn't have the money to build a school or park, and put the land up for sale. Today tract homes cover the land that we used to ride horses and hunt frogs on. Of course, here's the most disgusting thing: Nine years ago they were paid $400,000 for three acres of land that is worth several hundred million today.
Now please don't tell me that people wanted this. The Silicon Valley has an ugly history that most new residents don't want to hear about, and it was all ushered in by fairly corrupt government officials. And me? I went into programming and made quite a bit of money, which I used to move over to the Central Valley. That's not home for me anymore...it's an ugly megalopolis full of never ending strip malls and people who profess their faith for protecting nature, while never acknowledging what they helped destroy. Don't get me wrong...I don't begrudge the people who live there today, it's just kind of sad to see what's happened to the area.
I know many people who feel the same way. The line of reasoning goes something like this: "If the guy's a criminal, he's a drag on society. Society as a whole should not have to deal with people contantly trying to destroy their work. If a person lives his life by stealing the hard work of others, then eliminating that life provides a large benefit to society, without any loss. Therefore the police and courts should be able to step in and end the lives of these people".
It's a little harsh, but there's just enough reason in there to make many people stop and think. Many weeds survive by choking the life out of flowers and beneficial plants, so when we get weeds in our garden we rip them out of the ground and destroy them so that the flowers can thrive. If people decide that they want to be societies weeds, why not do the same thing?
I don't totally subscribe to this line of thought because of the potential for abuse, but I can somewhat understand the reasoning of people who do. Not all human life is "special".
Are our elected representatives really that stupid, or do they just work on this type of stuff to pass the time? I mean, think about it...if passed this would blatantly censor the free flow of public domain information. It would also directly violate constitutionally guranteed due process laws. Now, my fourth grade niece could tell you what's going to happen if this gets passed: the first time someone gets a website shut down, or someone gets charged with distributing "illegal information" (I don't even like the sound of the term), this will end up in the Supreme Court which will declare this thing unconstitutional in a few microseconds. So what are they thinking? That maybe if they try enough times the Supreme Court will accidentally let one slip by? There is NO WAY that any American with an IQ over 80 could seriously entertain the belief that this thing has any chance of becoming (and staying) law.
Vote getting PR bulls***, that's all this is. And the truly sad thing about the whole situation is that the average American probably wouldn't even give a damn. "What? It's going to help end the drug problem? Great! What are the fourth and fifth amendments anyway?" It's unfortunate that there isn't anywhere else much better.
Hey, I've been out of school over ten years...you can't expect me to get all the details correct ;) I did break out my old history books though, and you are indeed correct. For a period of time the Arabic scholars were the sole source of ancient Greek texts, but that is no longer true today. I guess I should stick to code and quit quoting history :)
Note to moderators: If there are any moderators still reading this discussion, please feel free to moderate my original post back down to 2. While I appreciate the occasional karma point or four, I really don't deserve points for a factually incorrect comment, no matter how well written it might have been. Chris Lovell and Nicomachus probably deserve a couple points themselves for setting the record straight.
Many ancient Greek writings would be lost to history if not for Arab scholars. Because there were no printing presses a few thousand years ago, maintaining the writings of Hippocrates, Archimedes, and other ancient Greeks required that their texts be rewritten by hand from time to time. Once the Greek civilization began it's decline there simply wasn't anyone with the time, inclination, or resources to devote to the maintenance of these great texts. Luckily for us today many of these texts were taken to the Middle East, where Arab scholars recognized their lasting value and maintained them for centuries.
By the time historical interest in ancient Greece began to resurface (a few hundred years ago), the Arab copies were the only sizeable collection of ancient Greek literature left in existence. Because of that, practically all of the Greek literature we read today has gone through several langage translations which can, unfortunately, distort the original meaning of the texts(eg. Greek>Arab>Latin>English).
Finding an original Greek text (or Greek language copy) is a GREAT find for historians because it will allow us to examine the writings without worrying about misinterpretations and other unintentional distortions.
The bill of rights is for INDIVIDUALS ONLY. You and I can speak freely, but corporations can be restricted in whatever way the government wants to because as I said they have no protection granted by the bill of rights because it is specificaly a bill-of-rights-for-the-individual
Wow, I don't know who filled your head with that garbage, but I'd like to suggest READING the Constitution before spouting off. I've got a copy hanging on the wall in front of me, and no matter how hard I look I can't seem to find the line that says "FOR INDIVIDUALS ONLY!" On the contrary, most of the first ten amendments don't single out any entity or group for the rights being described, and only a few refer to "the people". Since "the people" is a general term to refer to all legal entities within the nation, I would argue that these amendments do protect corporations.
You know, I usually consider it a Bad Sign when I'm looking forward to the end of a movie before it's half over. Don't get me wrong, I'm a HUGE fan of the Matrix but this thing just bites. Bad acting, an awful script, and pathetically misguided attempts at humor added up to a 49 minute yawnfest.
:)
If you're bored witless and are looking for a way to blow the better part of an hour, go ahead and watch the film. But if you're a Matrix fan looking for a quality spoof, or a comedy fan looking for a good laugh, I'd suggest skipping this one. I definitely give it two thumbs down.
Then again, this is just my opinion
Aww c'mon. I've got four 6.5Gb Bigfoots spinning away in my file server right now. Besides the fact that my old ESDI's had a better seek time, they work great!
Neither the Tungusta blast (probably a cometary fragment) nor Arizona's Meteor Crater impact were extinction level events, but both devastated the surrounding regions for hundreds of square miles. Satellite imagery has turned up hundreds of craters on the Earth that we never knew were there, which indicates that these types of impacts are much more common than previously thought. A Meteor Crater level event on any of the major landmasses today would probably kill several thousand people if it fell in a rural area, or several million if it fell in an urban center...not quite a threat to the existence of humanity but a major disaster in anybodys book.
I think a healthey sense of urgency is entirely justifiable.
Ah, but let's not forget about visual astronomy. Ever seen an Iridium flare? Ever seen an Iridium flare through a telescope? It's so bright it's painful :\
No shit! My 6020i was a piece of junk from the day I bought it, and I'm glad to know I can get at least part of my money back. I dunno if I've got the receipts any more, but if HP wants to argue the point with me I'd be more than willing to pull the drive out of my bottom drawer and mail the damned thing back to them. :)
Too true. A few months back I was explaining some of the basics of the Internet to some prospective clients when one of them asked me how long I'd been using it. I told him that I'd first used the Internet in 1989 and that I'd used the Web since mid-1994. Out of nowhere one of the clients looked at me and said "You're lying, the Internet wasn't even invented until 1995!"
:)
I was honestly to stunned to even reply for a good 30 seconds. When I did try to correct him, he immediately got defensive and insinuated that I was trying to pull something over on them. When I finally chuckled and said "And I'll bet you think Microsoft invented the Internet", he looked at me in all seriousness and said "No. AOL did."
Needless to say, I didn't get the contract. In retrospect, that was probably a good thing
Uh...no. The Earth has a diameter of 12,753 km, a mass of 6.5e21 tons, and a density of 5.5. Mars has a diameter of 6,794 km, a density of 3.9, and its mass is only 7.15e20 tons. Last time I checked, that means the Earth is almost twice as big as Mars :)
More likely is the possibility that ancient humans also found dinosaur bones. Think about this: Your primitive band of 10,000 BC humans is looking for a new cave when the group stumbles across a semi-complete T.Rex skeleton exposed in a streambed by last winters rains. Everybody recognizes it as a skeleton of a huge fearsome beast, but your primitive tribe has know way of knowing that it's millions of years old. You all move on, but for the rest of your lives tell the story of the great dragonmonster skeleton you found beside the stream. Your children tell their children, and after a few generations it becomes the story of the time their great ancestors victoriously defeated the evil dragon which was trying to keep them from reaching their new home.
:)
That's how legends start, after all
When I first went to work in the Silicon Valley in the early 90's the cost of living wasn't nearly as bad. I had a $65,000 a year job and lived pretty damned well on that. I owned 3 bedroom house in Mountain View that I'd paid $190,000 for and thought I was on top of the world. Then the 'boom' began and everything changed for the worse. In the period of only a couple years I became the poorest person on my block. I thought I'd hit easy street when a job change catapulted me into a $110,000 a year position coding backend web apps (C) but even at that salary I quickly found myself stetching to make my paychecks last due to the increased cost of living. Couple this with the fact that the serious increase in traffic and increasing time at the office were keeping me away from my home for more than 15 hours a day and you can probably see why I began to get burned out on the whole 'Silicon Valley' mystique.
:) Two years ago however, I decided that enough was enough. I sold my home for $600,000 and moved to Elk Grove. I found a job with a Sacramento based application development company that pays $70,000 a year in TWO DAYS.
Like many people in this business I had always assumed that all of the 'good' jobs were located in the Silicon Valley, and that the rest of the country was a technological waste of time. Doing quick salary comparisons seemed to confirm this when I found that no other area of the US offered competitive salaries to the SV companies for someone with my skills and experience. Also, since I'm a Nothern California native, I wasn't exactly eager to move far
I know all of you Silicon Valley residents are probably saying "$70k? That sucks!", but you cannot forget the lower cost of living and the intangibles that go with living out here. $70k in the Sacramento Valley probably lasts as long as $200k in the Silicon Valley once cost of living adjustments are made (I paid $225,000 for a 5000sq foot 4 bedroom home with a REAL YARD!). When you factor in things like a commute of less than 20 minutes, actual friendly neighbors, lower gas and utility prices, and weekend entertainment that wont break the bank, the move becomes TOTALLY worth it.
The point? All of you Silicon Valley techies that are complaining about the high cost of living over there should MOVE. Contrary to popular belief, there are good jobs elsewhere that you guys could be taking. I realize that I will probably never get rich on stock options from the latest startup, but I'm happy now...and enjoying your life is the only thing that really matters in the end.
Funny, I thought the key phrase there was UNIX-like, something that Win2K most definitely is NOT.
But that doesn't mean it isn't trash.
I would strongly disagree. Locked in a trunk in my dads attic is a bloodstained Nazi flag complete with five bullet holes, sitting next to a box containing a Purple Heart. You want to know why that Nazi flag is important to me? In December of 1944 my grandfather and his unit were tied up in some intensive fighting in France. One day his unit was crossing some fields when they were ambushed by several armored Nazi units. Although they were seriously outgunned they fought back hard and suceeded in destroying five of the units before the rest pulled back. Afterwards my grandfather climbed on top of one of the wrecked vehicles and pulled down the Nazi flag to keep as a momento...with the five bulletholes already added. Two days later his unit was entering a small French village when they were attacked by snipers, and my grandfather was shot in the neck within the first few minutes of fighting. His buddy, looking for something to staunch the bloodflow, found the Nazi flag, pushed it into the wound, and held it there until a medic could arrive to help him...probably saving his life.
To me, that Nazi flag is a symbol of the hell my grandfather went through to make sure we would continue to live in a free society, and of the suffering he endured because of it.
So please don't call it trash...to some of us it is much more. I would hate to think that we are entering a world where such an important momento to my family could be made illegal because it offends somebody. I would never consider selling the flag, but allowing governments to regulate momentos like this is a step in that direction.
Exactly. I have several family members in the US military, and between them and their military friends I've picked something up. Soldiers in our military consider the Constitution to be more important than whatever government is currently in power. If Congress and the President were to order a police state tomorrow, most of our soldiers would be fighting against them, not for them.
:)
While our military may look unified and formidable, it's important to remember that most soldiers are normal Americans, just like you or I. The few who might actually follow the governments orders would quickly find themselves outgunned
Sorry to hear about your experiences, but backups are a wise idea. One of my development machines in my home office runs NT workstation, and currently contains just over 30GB of applications and data. Installed into that machine is a 24GB DAT backup, which I faithfully run twice a week, wasting two tapes and many hours of an otherwide useful day. Am I wasting my time? About a month ago I had a client project due in two days. I come into my office, flip on the computer, and what do I see...the good old NT Bomb On Boot syndrome. The NTFS partition corrupted after two more attempts to boot the machine. What would I have done without backups? I'd have been f***ed, that's what. As it was, I just wiped the partitions, booted from my rescue disk, and was fully operational again within two hours. DAT rules :)
Oh. Wow. Yet another press release expounding the miraculous abilities of some upcoming piece of hardware that has yet to see the light of day. I am so impressed. Maybe, just because I am sooo totally impressed by this, I'll put off buying that GeForce now. But then again, I'm sure we'll have some new announcement a few months after that telling us about the next great achievement in hardware. At this rate, I'll be stuck with this EGA card for the next 20 years!
Seriously, I wish that Slashdot and all of the other sites that repost on computer hardware would start dropping crap like this in the trashbin. Post reviews of released products, post reviews of soon to be released products, but if I never see another review of a product that only exists on paper, I'll still have seen too many. Posting this kind of stuff just encourages these hardware companies to write more of it.
Kind of reminds me of me when I was younger :) IIRC that was one of Tom Hanks first movies...he couldn't have been more than 17 or 18 when it was filmed. Unfortunately I also seem to remember my parents seeing it, and afterwards setting me down for a long talk on why "roleplaying games are evil" and how I should always avoid that "awful Dungeons And Dragons game" bacause it was satanic.
:) She thought "DND" was a creative storytelling game that promoted imagination and creativity, but Dungeons And Dragons was a devil worshippers game full of evil incantations and brainwashing. If she only knew...
The funny thing is, I really don't think she ever put two and two together...she actually used to make my friends and I lunch when we had our weekend-long "DND" games
Yep, you can, but the built in protection is that you can't gain karma that way. When granted moderator access, a person could log out, post, log in, and moderate himself up, but there's not much point to it. You're wasting your moderator points, and if the post was really stupid in the first place it'll just end up getting moderated back down.