I thought with the departure of Jacqui smith, this diabolical scheme was being abolished?
Nah, it is being combined with passports. The passport service is now "The UK Identity and Passport Service". The fight against ID cards was always about the National ID Register, Britain's version of the Stasi record system. The NIR is not going anywhere, just being rebranded into a more "acceptable" form.
It wasn't just Jacqui Smith that wanted this, you see!
It seems the "stupid patent formula" has been updated. It used to be "$X, but on the Internet". As in, "I've reinvented the wheel! But this time, it's connected to the Internet!"
The new "stupid patent formula" seems to be "$X, but using XML". As in, "I've invented fire! But this time, it uses eXtensible Markup Language!"
Since XML was the solution to all possible problems about ten years ago, we can probably guess at where the "stupid patent formula" will be in a decade's time. No doubt it will involve something like "$X, but using Javascript on a Web 2.0 social networking site that's accessed using a smartphone with a touch screen".
Generally I agree, and commitment is sacrifice (the good sort). However -
"What will you / she do if the partner has an affair - are either of you the jealous type."
Don't say that! Affairs don't happen randomly - they happen by choice. If you plan a "disaster recovery strategy" for an affair, then you are telling your wife that you have no faith in the relationship, which is the worst thing you can say to her! Never plan for divorce or any other marriage-ending event. Assume it will last forever and make it so.
There is no stock "off the shelf" marriage; every marriage is self-built, like Linux kernel 0.01.
You must learn to modify the source to fix problems that come up. There is no manual, and although there is a large user community, all of them have different systems, and consequently may give you bad advice. At least you have a co-author to help you.
Here is one piece of advice. Neither of you should play timesink online games, such as MMOs, unless you do it together or set clear boundaries about the times when you will play. Otherwise you or your wife will use those games to escape the marriage when it becomes difficult, and avoiding problems will make them worse.
Orwell noticed something about the intellectuals who surrounded him. Like him, they advocated Socialism, but unlike him, they saw the ends as more important than the means. They were willing to accept loss of liberty and loss of democracy for the greater good, even to the point of accepting the Socialism of the Soviet Union.
His book is a warning about that - "1984" is not the utopia that Socialists hope for, but it is the end result when liberty is abandoned in pursuit of the utopian society. I think this is particularly relevant to present-day politics. It is terrible that Orwell's message has been effectively reinterpreted by those who don't want to see a denunciation of their religion.
I have read it many times. I am aware that my sig makes me look like an idiot amongst those who truly believe that Socialism can remain democratic and does not necessarily involve the repression of free thought. However, I am also aware that Socialism has caused a move towards an authoritarian dictatorship in every country where it has been implemented, most famously in the Soviet Union, but also in Britain where I live. I believe that Orwell was trying to warn us about this and feel strongly that it is worth drawing attention to that fact. Even if that makes me look like an idiot. Thanks for your concern. I guess.
I would partly agree, particularly about the scale between liberty and authoritarianism. But I say that our interpretations of both the term "Socialism" and the book are quite different. Your interpretation is very common, but with respect, I also think it is wrong.
I was going to write a long reply on this subject, but it would be very Off Topic. I'd be better off putting it on a web page and linking to it from the sig, so that anyone who happens to be interested can read about it, which is what I will (eventually) do.
That's a fair point. And in fact it might be news for nerds if Wine was an officially supported platform, or if there was a native Linux version... but there isn't.
I mostly agree. The detention without charge thing is a great example of New Labour's disrespect for civil liberties, in itself much worse than TFA. However, really widespread problems can go ignored, perhaps even contribute to the descent into authoritarianism. The chavs are one such problem, and if we were only prepared to think of the problem in a different way, maybe we could help them out of the poverty trap and towards better lives.
My point is not that the chavs should be starving in the streets. My point is that they should help themselves.
For example. We know that it feels good to send aid to help starving guys in Africa. But it's even better to help them get their economy started so that they don't need any more aid. Same with the chavs. By sending them aid, we actively discourage them from getting their lives together.
We should be doing something other than giving them money. They're misspending it, and now we are apparently saying that we need to check up on them constantly, 1984-style. It would be better to not give them any money in the first place.
The story may be bollocks, but it's believable bollocks from New Labour given the other things they've done. Incidentally, I'm not a Tory, the Tories are left-wing "progressives" now and basically agree with New Labour on every matter. Also, you should be aware that the scale of the chav problem certainly changes in response to welfare payments. When it doesn't make economic sense to work, hey presto, people stop working.
I disagree with your first point. Without the welfare state, they would have to work, because the alternative would be worse for them. If they couldn't afford beer, Sky, fags and takeaway, they would do something about it. Feel the power of capitalism, the only effective system for redistribution of wealth:).
But I agree with your second point. Welfare won't ever be scrapped in Britain, but it does need reform. Unless you are a highly skilled worker, you actually take a cut in income when you move from benefits to a job! This is partly because British people who live below the poverty line still pay taxes when they work. Economically speaking, it actually isn't worth getting a job.
I live in Britain and I hate those white-trash types. "Chavs", we call them. Funded by state benefits, which become generous when you include the free housing that they live in, the chavs do no work other than producing children, who then live chaotic and deeply miserable lives. Sometimes these children appear in the media, normally when they've been murdered (Baby P) or kidnapped (Shannon Matthews) by their own families; or perhaps when they're a bit older and have entered the petty crime lifestyles of their parents. There is no escape from the chav ghetto.
I always remind people that the welfare state created this problem. By taking away the need to work, the need for self-improvement, it locked these people into their lifestyle. The purpose of welfare is to keep the poor poor, and thus ensure that there will always be jobs for Socialist politicians, who can offer to solve the problem. Not in an 1830s Poor Law sense, i.e. "There are no benefits-- get a job or go in the workhouse", but in the Soviet style, with surveillance technology to keep them in line.
It has to start somewhere. There's a short step between a welfare state and a totalitarian state, because eventually the state has to control who gets benefits and how they are spent. First they came for the chavs. The rest of us are next.
Isn't that what I said? But the comparison with FX!32 is very interesting, and next time I hear of this "Windows for ARM" business, I will mention that as a counterexample.
A binary translator would be used to dynamically recompile x86 code as ARM code, taking care of "legacy" x86 applications. Only the OS kernel would need to be native. Eventually, software makers would produce Mac-style "fat binaries" with support for both architectures, but the binary translator would be used in the meantime.
In the *best* case, you could expect performance on your ARM netbook similar to running PPC code on an Intel Mac. However, if you could run your desktop apps on an ARM, natively or with perfect translation, you would discover that there is a big performance difference between ARM CPUs and Intel CPUs.
This is my personal theory about why ARM hasn't already come up with an x86 instruction frontend for their CPUs, like the Jazelle decoder for Java bytecodes. It would invite direct comparison between Intel designs and ARM designs, and that comparison would not be favourable because Intel would emphasise the performance difference. There's nothing magical about the ARM ISA that gives them both "low power" and "high performance". The ISA is only slightly cleaner than x86. Currently, the ARM mystique is maintained by the fact that only embedded systems engineers and iPhone hackers really use ARM properly. If you invite every Windows luser to the party as x86 support would, then you can expect a lot of "ARM sux!" chatter on teh intarwebs.
Pretend your brain has been erased and you are now a mindless vegetable. Stare at the ceiling, etc. Wait for the other guy to freak out, then leap up and say "Gotcha!"
Or, alternatively, say "DISK BOOT ERROR. INSERT BOOTABLE MEDIA IN DRIVE A:". Unless you're that way inclined, be sure to say "Gotcha" before he actually attempts to access "drive A:".
I have heard the word before, I just don't like it, because it is a partisan word with unpleasant connotations that seem to be deliberately chosen to shut down dissent and imply that one side is definitely "right" and the other side is definitely "wrong". Which isn't very scientific. Even if it is true. What's wrong with "skeptic"?
What a great word. What a lovely set of implications it has. Are the climate change "denialists" related to Holocaust deniers by any chance?
Seems to me, if climate change science were based on solid and irrefutable scientific evidence, then there would be no need to use verbal trickery to influence opinion. If you're so sure of yourself, then why the propaganda?
5. They wanted to create an experimental "mesh" networking system to get all the OLPCs online. This is at least as difficult as making an entirely new UI, perhaps more so.
6. They refused to leverage existing application software, preferring instead to reinvent every wheel for their Sugar system. This was an incredibly bad idea. Compatibility with existing Linux apps should have been a priority to make up for the things that the Sugar apps couldn't initially do.
7. Generally: the project ran on wishful thinking. They set crazily ambitious goals and totally underestimated the time, money and human effort required to achieve them. Intel and Microsoft didn't need to move to kill the project, it would have withered away anyway because of the vast discrepancy between Negroponte's dreams and his abilities. The fact that they tried anyway shows how well the PR machine worked. It was the only aspect of OLPC that was in any way successful. Unless OLPC can claim credit for the netbook revolution, which is doubtful to say the least.
Finally - I expect, if it had been ARM-based, then Microsoft would have been pushing WinCE. However, it is a myth that ARM CPUs are lower power than x86. The instruction set architecture has little or no relevance to power consumption. It's all about the materials used to build the CPU core.
A/V company in "mistake" shock, Film at 11. There have been many instances of false positives from antivirus software.
Although in this case, it's not a false positive. iTunes really is a virus, along with all Apple products. I don't think I'm infected. But I love Apple products and must buy more of them. Mmm, that iPhone certainly looks like a great deal. Oh yeah, I'd certainly sell my soul to buy one of those. And the new MacBook, gotta have it. Powered by BSD you know, bit like Linux except not free, in fact quite expensive. Get a Mac, get a Mac, get a Mac.
Slashdot Mirror
I thought with the departure of Jacqui smith, this diabolical scheme was being abolished?
Nah, it is being combined with passports. The passport service is now "The UK Identity and Passport Service". The fight against ID cards was always about the National ID Register, Britain's version of the Stasi record system. The NIR is not going anywhere, just being rebranded into a more "acceptable" form.
It wasn't just Jacqui Smith that wanted this, you see!
This.
It seems the "stupid patent formula" has been updated. It used to be "$X, but on the Internet". As in, "I've reinvented the wheel! But this time, it's connected to the Internet!"
The new "stupid patent formula" seems to be "$X, but using XML". As in, "I've invented fire! But this time, it uses eXtensible Markup Language!"
Since XML was the solution to all possible problems about ten years ago, we can probably guess at where the "stupid patent formula" will be in a decade's time. No doubt it will involve something like "$X, but using Javascript on a Web 2.0 social networking site that's accessed using a smartphone with a touch screen".
Generally I agree, and commitment is sacrifice (the good sort). However -
"What will you / she do if the partner has an affair - are either of you the jealous type."
Don't say that! Affairs don't happen randomly - they happen by choice. If you plan a "disaster recovery strategy" for an affair, then you are telling your wife that you have no faith in the relationship, which is the worst thing you can say to her! Never plan for divorce or any other marriage-ending event. Assume it will last forever and make it so.
There is no stock "off the shelf" marriage; every marriage is self-built, like Linux kernel 0.01.
You must learn to modify the source to fix problems that come up. There is no manual, and although there is a large user community, all of them have different systems, and consequently may give you bad advice. At least you have a co-author to help you.
Here is one piece of advice. Neither of you should play timesink online games, such as MMOs, unless you do it together or set clear boundaries about the times when you will play. Otherwise you or your wife will use those games to escape the marriage when it becomes difficult, and avoiding problems will make them worse.
Orwell noticed something about the intellectuals who surrounded him. Like him, they advocated Socialism, but unlike him, they saw the ends as more important than the means. They were willing to accept loss of liberty and loss of democracy for the greater good, even to the point of accepting the Socialism of the Soviet Union.
His book is a warning about that - "1984" is not the utopia that Socialists hope for, but it is the end result when liberty is abandoned in pursuit of the utopian society. I think this is particularly relevant to present-day politics. It is terrible that Orwell's message has been effectively reinterpreted by those who don't want to see a denunciation of their religion.
I have read it many times. I am aware that my sig makes me look like an idiot amongst those who truly believe that Socialism can remain democratic and does not necessarily involve the repression of free thought. However, I am also aware that Socialism has caused a move towards an authoritarian dictatorship in every country where it has been implemented, most famously in the Soviet Union, but also in Britain where I live. I believe that Orwell was trying to warn us about this and feel strongly that it is worth drawing attention to that fact. Even if that makes me look like an idiot. Thanks for your concern. I guess.
I would partly agree, particularly about the scale between liberty and authoritarianism. But I say that our interpretations of both the term "Socialism" and the book are quite different. Your interpretation is very common, but with respect, I also think it is wrong.
I was going to write a long reply on this subject, but it would be very Off Topic. I'd be better off putting it on a web page and linking to it from the sig, so that anyone who happens to be interested can read about it, which is what I will (eventually) do.
That's a fair point. And in fact it might be news for nerds if Wine was an officially supported platform, or if there was a native Linux version... but there isn't.
Yeah, I want to understand the "News for Nerds" angle here.
1. It runs on Linux or some unusual platform. (No, it doesn't.)
2. It's a really cool game. (No, it isn't.)
3. It's from an exciting game company. (No, it's from EA.)
4. It's a long-awaited game, like DNF. (No, nobody cares about yet another Sims game.)
5. It's being released in some sort of innovative way, e.g. no DRM, source code included, etc. (No. See #3.)
6. It's on the fucking iPhone. (No, not yet at any rate.)
So, yeah. Must be a slow news day.
I mostly agree. The detention without charge thing is a great example of New Labour's disrespect for civil liberties, in itself much worse than TFA. However, really widespread problems can go ignored, perhaps even contribute to the descent into authoritarianism. The chavs are one such problem, and if we were only prepared to think of the problem in a different way, maybe we could help them out of the poverty trap and towards better lives.
That's quite amusing :). Many people would agree with you, but I wonder if they have really thought about the issues involved.
My point is not that the chavs should be starving in the streets. My point is that they should help themselves.
For example. We know that it feels good to send aid to help starving guys in Africa. But it's even better to help them get their economy started so that they don't need any more aid. Same with the chavs. By sending them aid, we actively discourage them from getting their lives together.
We should be doing something other than giving them money. They're misspending it, and now we are apparently saying that we need to check up on them constantly, 1984-style. It would be better to not give them any money in the first place.
The story may be bollocks, but it's believable bollocks from New Labour given the other things they've done. Incidentally, I'm not a Tory, the Tories are left-wing "progressives" now and basically agree with New Labour on every matter. Also, you should be aware that the scale of the chav problem certainly changes in response to welfare payments. When it doesn't make economic sense to work, hey presto, people stop working.
I disagree with your first point. Without the welfare state, they would have to work, because the alternative would be worse for them. If they couldn't afford beer, Sky, fags and takeaway, they would do something about it. Feel the power of capitalism, the only effective system for redistribution of wealth :).
But I agree with your second point. Welfare won't ever be scrapped in Britain, but it does need reform. Unless you are a highly skilled worker, you actually take a cut in income when you move from benefits to a job! This is partly because British people who live below the poverty line still pay taxes when they work. Economically speaking, it actually isn't worth getting a job.
It has to start somewhere.
I live in Britain and I hate those white-trash types. "Chavs", we call them. Funded by state benefits, which become generous when you include the free housing that they live in, the chavs do no work other than producing children, who then live chaotic and deeply miserable lives. Sometimes these children appear in the media, normally when they've been murdered (Baby P) or kidnapped (Shannon Matthews) by their own families; or perhaps when they're a bit older and have entered the petty crime lifestyles of their parents. There is no escape from the chav ghetto.
I always remind people that the welfare state created this problem. By taking away the need to work, the need for self-improvement, it locked these people into their lifestyle. The purpose of welfare is to keep the poor poor, and thus ensure that there will always be jobs for Socialist politicians, who can offer to solve the problem. Not in an 1830s Poor Law sense, i.e. "There are no benefits-- get a job or go in the workhouse", but in the Soviet style, with surveillance technology to keep them in line.
It has to start somewhere. There's a short step between a welfare state and a totalitarian state, because eventually the state has to control who gets benefits and how they are spent. First they came for the chavs. The rest of us are next.
Nobody knows what Samuel L. Jackson's blood is made from, because he never bleeds.
I have, and while her reappearance in Aliens is quite sensible, her other appearances vary from "contrived" to "retarded".
This.
In the Alien franchise, only one character matters. It is big, black and has acid for blood.
There is no need to look for a way to bring Ripley into it, especially if it involves time travel, memory loss, or cloning again.
Maybe she needs some special "2D" glasses in which both of the eyes are "left". She wouldn't get the 3D effect, but at least things would look normal.
Isn't that what I said? But the comparison with FX!32 is very interesting, and next time I hear of this "Windows for ARM" business, I will mention that as a counterexample.
A binary translator would be used to dynamically recompile x86 code as ARM code, taking care of "legacy" x86 applications. Only the OS kernel would need to be native. Eventually, software makers would produce Mac-style "fat binaries" with support for both architectures, but the binary translator would be used in the meantime.
In the *best* case, you could expect performance on your ARM netbook similar to running PPC code on an Intel Mac. However, if you could run your desktop apps on an ARM, natively or with perfect translation, you would discover that there is a big performance difference between ARM CPUs and Intel CPUs.
This is my personal theory about why ARM hasn't already come up with an x86 instruction frontend for their CPUs, like the Jazelle decoder for Java bytecodes. It would invite direct comparison between Intel designs and ARM designs, and that comparison would not be favourable because Intel would emphasise the performance difference. There's nothing magical about the ARM ISA that gives them both "low power" and "high performance". The ISA is only slightly cleaner than x86. Currently, the ARM mystique is maintained by the fact that only embedded systems engineers and iPhone hackers really use ARM properly. If you invite every Windows luser to the party as x86 support would, then you can expect a lot of "ARM sux!" chatter on teh intarwebs.
Because there is also option 3.
Pretend your brain has been erased and you are now a mindless vegetable. Stare at the ceiling, etc. Wait for the other guy to freak out, then leap up and say "Gotcha!"
Or, alternatively, say "DISK BOOT ERROR. INSERT BOOTABLE MEDIA IN DRIVE A:". Unless you're that way inclined, be sure to say "Gotcha" before he actually attempts to access "drive A:".
I have heard the word before, I just don't like it, because it is a partisan word with unpleasant connotations that seem to be deliberately chosen to shut down dissent and imply that one side is definitely "right" and the other side is definitely "wrong". Which isn't very scientific. Even if it is true. What's wrong with "skeptic"?
"Denialists"
What a great word. What a lovely set of implications it has. Are the climate change "denialists" related to Holocaust deniers by any chance?
Seems to me, if climate change science were based on solid and irrefutable scientific evidence, then there would be no need to use verbal trickery to influence opinion. If you're so sure of yourself, then why the propaganda?
5. They wanted to create an experimental "mesh" networking system to get all the OLPCs online. This is at least as difficult as making an entirely new UI, perhaps more so.
6. They refused to leverage existing application software, preferring instead to reinvent every wheel for their Sugar system. This was an incredibly bad idea. Compatibility with existing Linux apps should have been a priority to make up for the things that the Sugar apps couldn't initially do.
7. Generally: the project ran on wishful thinking. They set crazily ambitious goals and totally underestimated the time, money and human effort required to achieve them. Intel and Microsoft didn't need to move to kill the project, it would have withered away anyway because of the vast discrepancy between Negroponte's dreams and his abilities. The fact that they tried anyway shows how well the PR machine worked. It was the only aspect of OLPC that was in any way successful. Unless OLPC can claim credit for the netbook revolution, which is doubtful to say the least.
Finally - I expect, if it had been ARM-based, then Microsoft would have been pushing WinCE. However, it is a myth that ARM CPUs are lower power than x86. The instruction set architecture has little or no relevance to power consumption. It's all about the materials used to build the CPU core.
A/V company in "mistake" shock, Film at 11. There have been many instances of false positives from antivirus software.
Although in this case, it's not a false positive. iTunes really is a virus, along with all Apple products. I don't think I'm infected. But I love Apple products and must buy more of them. Mmm, that iPhone certainly looks like a great deal. Oh yeah, I'd certainly sell my soul to buy one of those. And the new MacBook, gotta have it. Powered by BSD you know, bit like Linux except not free, in fact quite expensive. Get a Mac, get a Mac, get a Mac.