Over time we've seen our business model eroding as other open source projects produce free versions of the same extensions and utilities that are our bread and butter
I consider open source software to be more valuable than closed source. I think the problem is that a working business model is not yet in place. I think a working model may look Red Hat, or Codeweavers -- but probably will be better. There is a business model out there, it will just take some more experimentation to find.
Why do I consider open source more valuable? Because I know it has a better chance of continuity and survival than closed source. Take something like Windows 2000: a good, simple and reliable operating system. Windows 2k has been obsoleted and is no longer supported -- and will stay that way. Try arguing with Microsoft on that one.
Take features and options... DX10 took how long to be available on XP? Only after a lot of complaints did microsoft back-port. Look at Linux kernel 2.4... Still has active support somewhere, and while not all features from 2.6 can be backported to 2.4 easily -- most of them _could_ be if the money and desire was there. That is what I call ongoing support.
I pay for open source where I can so that it keeps being developed, to keep the authors and people behind the software working on it. They show me value, I show them money.
If you watch all four parts, it seems that once the generator reaches a certain speed, it does not slow down when he cuts power to the system. Instead the two coils are still generating electricity from the magnets flying by them
Actually, he never does cut power to the induction motor. He shorts or re-connects the electromagnet coils (that are part of the generator assembly).
What he demonstrates is that for the same or less power (Volts*Amps) of input to the motor driving the generator, he can cause the whole assembly to accelerate while using less power.
That is the interesting part (one more time): He can cause acceleration of the motor, while under a constant load, using less power.
Not a perpetual machine, but rather a really unusual way to get higher efficiency from a motor-generator assembly.
My concern is that in one of video parts (three I think), he shows a graph describing what he is doing in his experiments, and he shows a chart that has the constant speed/power line, a decelerating line (disconnected electromagnets) and the exponential acceleration line. He never tests it far enough -- and in the last part (or second last) he shows a plain split-phase induction motor and puts a small set of permanent magnets next to it. Notice that when he puts the small magnets next to the shaft of the motor it accelerates, but he keeps shutting the motor off to "prevent the shaft from getting magnetized". That may be the ultimate problem here, it might just be a short-lived affect from magnets. Once the whole assembly is magnetized, you don't gain any more from this effect.
I'm going to offer a slightly different angle from my experience.
hard science, comp sci, or engineering degree demonstrates you're intelligent--an IT or business IS degree suggests, at best, that you preferred to party and didn't really give a shit about your education. (There is some value to a business degree, but it's almost always preferable to get an undergraduate degree in a legitimate area of study and, if necessary, an MBA later on.)
True, but there is a hitch. In my case, I took the most challenging program I could find that interested me. And it was challenging and worthwhile, the one little problem was that as a result of _really_ challenging myself: I ended up with slightly lower grades than are ideal to get into an MBA, LLB or whatever other program you want. My grades weren't low, they were just average. Not something that grad-schools want.
Therefore, if you are smart and work hard (have taken IB or Advanced Placement in high school and did well) and have the ability to take a challenging program and truly excel -- take the harder program.
If you are of more average smarts and work hard, you can still take the harder program, but be prepared for average grades that MBA programs will turn their collective noses at.
Ironically, completing a hard/challenging degree with average grades may _not_ be the best thing if you want 'future expansion' capability. Maybe take a slightly easier program and excel at it (I know of people who did exactly this and they are now in law school -- whereas people with true difficult bachelor degrees couldn't get it).
Yeah it's almost 2 hours long, but it will blow your mind!
yawn, so will Dr. Greer's new book "Hidden Truth". Apparently, he can invite aliens to visit where ever he is on earth by Transcendental Meditation. Hell, he's been abducted by them too.
Crackpot central! Religious Agenda!
Don't believe me? Read the first two chapters here
And darn it, I thought Disclosure Project was for real. Turns out too good to be true.
As a university (Engineering school) graduate, I can say that employers today (with the exception of a handful of big utility companies) want employees trained on: the exact technology they will be working on, the latest and up to date tools and projects using specific technology. The whole thinking aspect or training employees on something specific -- hiring proven generalists such as those produced by engineering schools (someone trained for a career) is something from a time past.
From the employer side, competition these days is as bad as it ever was, particularly from overseas, and justifies the need to think short term (someone who can fill a particular position NOW, rather than someone who can fill it a little later but arguably might be a better long term investment for the company).
This is not putting down trade-type training, and to those thinking of being critical of my stance... Consider this: Would you want a high school graduate fresh out of school installing the electrical wiring in your house? Wouldn't you want a trade with some education doing it? Wouldn't you want a well educated doctor operating on you that has had an additional two years of specialty training in some obscure area rather than a GP? Would you rather have someone who is trained to think in terms of more basic principles and math rather than someone educated only on the latest technology and gizmos?
The answer is that it ultimately depends on need: if a tradesperson will do, don't hire an engineer! And if you need to look beyond the current technology but need some serious thinking, don't hire a tradeperson!
All that these people are looking for is a little respect and politeness.
Yes, but... As a lawyer, he specializes in answering these questions in court for clients. You, and the rest of us (most of the rest of us) slashdot types are not clients, therefore, he has no need to provide answers for specific questions. He is not obligated, and we are not paying him.
In addition, why should he reveal his argument lines here? I thought it is fairly well known that RIAA lawyers did read slashdot during at least one of the Napster/Kazaa/whatever vs. music industry lawsuits. Is it even in his best interest, or to potential clients, to show off all his techniques so the RIAA can have a good look at them prior to the court case (and perhaps devise defenses)?
If you want answers that perhaps you could use in court, I guess you should pay him. Sounds fair to me. That is how he makes his living.
They say that children desperately need 'real play (as opposed to sedentary, screen-based entertainment), first-hand experience of the world they live in'.
Children desperately need good, competent parenting. Alcohol, drugs, video games and TV have all been around for many years. The form of technology or abuse may change but the results do not. If you don't raise your kids someone or something else will and the results may not be something you like.
on the heals of...Games that never got made
on
More Worst Videogame Ads
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
How about the "Worth 1000: Beta Busts 5" Games that never got made, photoshop games box competition... This one had me laughing so hard I was crying... Check out the "World Cup Hooligans" entry or "Halo Kitty".
I am a Ham, but I've been out of hamming for a few years.
Let me answer some questions that weren't specifically in the title article, but that I went through in the same process (as I was getting ready to get rid of radio gear I hadn't used in years).
Practical use? - Commmunications when commercial options are non-existent, suck or unavailable, such as major storms, hurricanes, terrorist attacks, the boonies. These darn radios will work fine during nasty storms, over hundreds of miles no problem. You'd be pretty shocked at the distance you can get even from a basic hand-held fraction-of-a-watt power transceiver. And at VHF frequencies, you don't even need line of site, it goes around hills somewhat. - Stand-by option at best in more civilized and populated areas.
Cost? - Low to none. Study, write exam, get license ($50-60), buy transceiver (used for $100, new and fancy $200 up to thousands). Here in Canada they did away with needing to renew your basic ham license in 2002 (? +/- a year or two) -- used to be it cost $20/year to have one. If you want to use a repeater, you should become a member with the group that runs the repeaters, but they won't mind if you try it out for a while as a beginner.
Why use ham, learn ham? - Talk to friends - Hobby, satillite comms, radio interest, general knowledge - Backup reliable communication method
Downsides? - Cannot discuss personal, business or non-public info over ham. Everything has to be clean. This, to me, limits its usefulness majorly. Everything can be heard by anyone (completely legal in these frequencies), and there is no expectation of privacy. Cannot encrypt any data traffic while using HAM frequencies. - Can be kindof boring unless you have friends on HAM as well - Personally, I don't care for 'chewing the rag', or BSing because you can. Talking for hours about nothing with people on the radio just because, and you aren't even allowed to gosip or swear. Better alternatives are IM, email or VOIP now-a-days. - Not many women using it, just guys (same as early internet)
Upsides? - Cheap - If you like to talk and BS, you will find lots friends
Antibacterial soaps are a marketing ploy and nothing more
Bzzt. Wrong.
Many antibacterial soaps contain additives such as triclosan or triclocarbon. Both the AMA and the CDC have recommended against the use of antibacterial soaps vs. regular soaps. The antibacterial soaps themselves don't seem to save you from any cough, colds and flus as at least one study published in Annals of internal medicine shows.
As for just being marketting, manufacturers would be at risk of false advertising, violations of which are the domain of the FTC
These particular antibiotic additives are effective in controlled settings (eg. hospitals) with proper application, but indescriminate use at home doesn't seem provide benefits, and in fact raises concerns about the development of resistant strains of bacteria.
I have Shaw internet, I also have subscribed to their QOS enhancement (as per this discussion), and I use wholesale VOIP (rather than Vonage). I'm actually thinking of cancelling the QOS for technical rather than ideological (*emotional* -- as per this story) reasons.
The QOS enhancement was hidden away inside of the Shaw website, and most of the customer service people I talked to had no clue what it was. This was about 4 months ago when I first signed up for it. I finally did find someone who knew what it was. They said: - It enhanced service for internet. They didn't really say how much or what I would notice - Shaw's internet phone uses a separate network or channel, and does not use their regular internet channels - The QOS enhancement is only applicable to their internet service, and does not put your VOIP traffic over their separate network for Shaw internet phone. - Cable modems on shaw (at least mine) support DOCSIS 2.0, and apparently (I'm not an expert) it has QOS capability along with the rest of their network outlay.
QOS - This QOS thing is technically possible from the Shaw end, but the question of performance is a large one - I haven't really noticed either a degredation or improvement in voip... But then I haven't been monitoring carefully - I think the time when I need it most -- when Shaw's network is otherwise saturated -- is when it will pay, but I suspect those times are rare.
The two big problems I see: - The biggest problem I can see is that the QOS enhancement is only valid over Shaw's network, and if your voip provider doesn't peer directly with shaw, your voip packets will be at some other carrier's mercy once they leave shaw - The second biggest problem is ping times. Some of my VOIP providers are 13 hops from where I am (and three network peering points away), and even with QOS there is no way to keep round trip delay to less than 100 milliseconds -- at which point the lag is noticable and gets irritating. No amount of QOS from shaw will fix the number of hops.
Conclusion The lesson to learn is that QOS is useful if you are on a saturated part of the shaw network, you call during busy times of the day AND (this is important) your voip provider is a short number of hops from you AND ON THE SHAW NETWORK!
Otherwise save your money. Oh yeah, and write letters to the CRTC to get them to stop Shaw, Bell and Telus from doing this two tier internet garbage!
Nuclear power plants keep their waste in shielded rooms deep inside the plant, which are then sealed up and stored so the waste doesn't get released.
No so fast there. That is not true.
From Here Are there routine emissions from a nuclear power reactor such as Seabrook Station? Yes, the release of radioactivity into our air, water, and soil is not strictly limited to an accident at a nuclear power plant. All it takes is the plant's everyday routine operation, and federal regulations permit these radioactive releases as long as they contain "permissible" levels of contamination. Legally permissible does not mean safe. Radioactive releases from a nuclear power reactor's routine operation often are not fully detected or reported. Accidental releases may not be completely verified or documented.
Most nuclear plants DO vent gases and radioactive by-products from their processes -- not just clean steam. They do careful monitoring, but they are allowed to actually release a certain amount of radioactive water and gas into the environment. The monitoring is just "metering", if they exceed a certain amount of radioactive release, it becomes a big deal, but some in every day operations is A-OKAY!
Instead it spread across several miles of nearby area and found its way into the water table. Some of it was carried by winds, but this really wasn't anything different than the hundreds of nuclear bomb tests that had been done in decades past.
Actually, people living in Bavaria (West Germany) and Czech Republic are supposed to have any mushrooms they pick in the forest tested for radioactivity. There are offices in most small towns that will do this service for free (or a small cost).
Which is one of the reasons we need serious campaign finance reform. No, the general population have to stop acting like peasants with high school education. The problem is in the grassroots, not the campaigns. Kindof like treating the symptoms while ignoring the underlying problem.
Corporate donations should be out, as should corporate lobbying. Lobbying, corruption, kickbacks, family or hell friends -- these will ALWAYS influence politics. They always have. Lobbying is just a modern incarnation of some sort. Outlawing just makes the lobbists find another way to let the politicians know what they (and their clients) want.
Imagine what THAT would do to corporations. It would strip their power to screw over the average citizen. Then, perhaps, politicians might actually have to listen to their home base, instead of big oil or big media.
I don't like big corporations either -- but I will call you on this. The average citizen can only be screwed over if they allow it. You can only be made to feel inferior with your permission. Here is a thought -- Don't give it!
Back to the problem of grassroots not acting like grassroots, but placing blind faith in both the (a) the system, (b) the people who sell you things -- marketers, salesman and politicians and (c) that the government or "free market" will fix things. Its the individuals in the market, and if they don't think and act in a reasonable manner the system will be broken.
If the community asked him to step down, would he?
Step down from what? The FSF? He created it, he runs it, and it is his baby. Yes, thats right, you have him to thank for GNU. All the versions.
Even so, you should recognize that that puts you farther outside the mainstream, and it's much harder to change the mainstream when you're 1,000 miles away.
And the alternative? Mediocrity? Let me ask you this... Who is pushing back from the other side? Sony, BMG.. The big music and movie studios. What do they want? They want file sharing outlawed, and every grandmother and 12 year old who shares behind bars. Is that outside of mainstream? Who is pushing back against their crap drm and p2p illegalization? Certainly not yourself, or even the mainstream. Have you forgotten about Disney and Senator Orin Hatch? What about the DMCA, or the son of the DMCA (being rewritten again for the 10th time likely).
Give these corporate monsters an inch and they will take a mile. Sorry, but we need our own crazies to balance and fight back the FUD, spin and lobbying that comes out of Sony, BMG, et al.
The GPL was meant to turn copyright on its ear, and this perhaps does go slightly beyond abusing copyright for open source purposes, but based on what I have seen emerging from the RIAA and MPAA, I don't think it is unreasonable.
Sorry, but there is nothing good about DRM, and I don't like how you would give in and give up to DRM and those who are pushing it.
I guess that's what happens when one lives in the good 'old U.C.A (United Corporations of America).
But what do you expect? Socialism?
Isn't capitalism all about the capital and who controls it? It is a democracy one day every four years or so, but the rest of the time, capitalism rules the roost.
From the FA: "...The cost of employing one chemist or engineer in the United States is equal to about five chemists in China and 11 engineers in India."
And how exactly will increasing the number of chemists, engineers and scientists graduating each year increase the appeal of this career to students currently choosing careers in business and law?
My thesis is that in increasing the amounts of graduates in sciences and "lowering prices" they will fail to actually improve the situation.
Microeconomics (oh yeah... THAT natural law) says that increasing the supply of these graduates will DECREASE the price they cost -- in other words by training more... they get cheaper!
College kids are choosing business and law because (a) there are more jobs and (b) they pay better. Decreasing the pay chemists and engineers receive won't improve employment in this area. Why are there less computer scientists these days. Oh yeah, no jobs.
Hence I posit that: Decreasing the cost of engineering and chemists will do nothing to increase the United States' competitiveness in these scientific endeavors
Slashdot Mirror
Over time we've seen our business model eroding as other open source projects produce free versions of the same extensions and utilities that are our bread and butter
I consider open source software to be more valuable than closed source. I think the problem is that a working business model is not yet in place. I think a working model may look Red Hat, or Codeweavers -- but probably will be better. There is a business model out there, it will just take some more experimentation to find.
Why do I consider open source more valuable? Because I know it has a better chance of continuity and survival than closed source. Take something like Windows 2000: a good, simple and reliable operating system. Windows 2k has been obsoleted and is no longer supported -- and will stay that way. Try arguing with Microsoft on that one.
Take features and options... DX10 took how long to be available on XP? Only after a lot of complaints did microsoft back-port. Look at Linux kernel 2.4... Still has active support somewhere, and while not all features from 2.6 can be backported to 2.4 easily -- most of them _could_ be if the money and desire was there. That is what I call ongoing support.
I pay for open source where I can so that it keeps being developed, to keep the authors and people behind the software working on it. They show me value, I show them money.
Allow me to furnish you an answer:
Marketing Perspective
Slashdot is merely broadening it's marketing strategy to appeal to a greater number of users
Cynical "get off my lawn" Perspective
The dumb young ones click on more banner ads!
If you watch all four parts, it seems that once the generator reaches a certain speed, it does not slow down when he cuts power to the system. Instead the two coils are still generating electricity from the magnets flying by them
Actually, he never does cut power to the induction motor. He shorts or re-connects the electromagnet coils (that are part of the generator assembly).
What he demonstrates is that for the same or less power (Volts*Amps) of input to the motor driving the generator, he can cause the whole assembly to accelerate while using less power.
That is the interesting part (one more time): He can cause acceleration of the motor, while under a constant load, using less power.
Not a perpetual machine, but rather a really unusual way to get higher efficiency from a motor-generator assembly.
My concern is that in one of video parts (three I think), he shows a graph describing what he is doing in his experiments, and he shows a chart that has the constant speed/power line, a decelerating line (disconnected electromagnets) and the exponential acceleration line. He never tests it far enough -- and in the last part (or second last) he shows a plain split-phase induction motor and puts a small set of permanent magnets next to it. Notice that when he puts the small magnets next to the shaft of the motor it accelerates, but he keeps shutting the motor off to "prevent the shaft from getting magnetized". That may be the ultimate problem here, it might just be a short-lived affect from magnets. Once the whole assembly is magnetized, you don't gain any more from this effect.
I'm going to offer a slightly different angle from my experience.
hard science, comp sci, or engineering degree demonstrates you're intelligent--an IT or business IS degree suggests, at best, that you preferred to party and didn't really give a shit about your education. (There is some value to a business degree, but it's almost always preferable to get an undergraduate degree in a legitimate area of study and, if necessary, an MBA later on.)
True, but there is a hitch. In my case, I took the most challenging program I could find that interested me. And it was challenging and worthwhile, the one little problem was that as a result of _really_ challenging myself: I ended up with slightly lower grades than are ideal to get into an MBA, LLB or whatever other program you want. My grades weren't low, they were just average. Not something that grad-schools want.
Therefore, if you are smart and work hard (have taken IB or Advanced Placement in high school and did well) and have the ability to take a challenging program and truly excel -- take the harder program.
If you are of more average smarts and work hard, you can still take the harder program, but be prepared for average grades that MBA programs will turn their collective noses at.
Ironically, completing a hard/challenging degree with average grades may _not_ be the best thing if you want 'future expansion' capability. Maybe take a slightly easier program and excel at it (I know of people who did exactly this and they are now in law school -- whereas people with true difficult bachelor degrees couldn't get it).
Not fair, but thats how it works.
Yeah it's almost 2 hours long, but it will blow your mind!
yawn, so will Dr. Greer's new book "Hidden Truth". Apparently, he can invite aliens to visit where ever he is on earth by Transcendental Meditation. Hell, he's been abducted by them too.
Crackpot central! Religious Agenda!
Don't believe me? Read the first two chapters here
And darn it, I thought Disclosure Project was for real. Turns out too good to be true.
Arrgghh!!
Thats right!
Sicko should have to be fair and balanced the way that "Fox News" is "Fair and Balanced" (apologies to all non-neo-cons, emphasis on double quotes)
As a university (Engineering school) graduate, I can say that employers today (with the exception of a handful of big utility companies) want employees trained on: the exact technology they will be working on, the latest and up to date tools and projects using specific technology. The whole thinking aspect or training employees on something specific -- hiring proven generalists such as those produced by engineering schools (someone trained for a career) is something from a time past.
From the employer side, competition these days is as bad as it ever was, particularly from overseas, and justifies the need to think short term (someone who can fill a particular position NOW, rather than someone who can fill it a little later but arguably might be a better long term investment for the company).
This is not putting down trade-type training, and to those thinking of being critical of my stance... Consider this: Would you want a high school graduate fresh out of school installing the electrical wiring in your house? Wouldn't you want a trade with some education doing it? Wouldn't you want a well educated doctor operating on you that has had an additional two years of specialty training in some obscure area rather than a GP? Would you rather have someone who is trained to think in terms of more basic principles and math rather than someone educated only on the latest technology and gizmos?
The answer is that it ultimately depends on need: if a tradesperson will do, don't hire an engineer! And if you need to look beyond the current technology but need some serious thinking, don't hire a tradeperson!
Duh!
Microsoft is a foreign corporation as far the EU is concerned. I would expect favoritism of local interests over foreign.
... It can be lobbied, and will listen if its elected representatives are donated to appropriately.
But the EU is like any other merchant state
No surprises here.
All that these people are looking for is a little respect and politeness.
Yes, but... As a lawyer, he specializes in answering these questions in court for clients. You, and the rest of us (most of the rest of us) slashdot types are not clients, therefore, he has no need to provide answers for specific questions. He is not obligated, and we are not paying him.
In addition, why should he reveal his argument lines here? I thought it is fairly well known that RIAA lawyers did read slashdot during at least one of the Napster/Kazaa/whatever vs. music industry lawsuits. Is it even in his best interest, or to potential clients, to show off all his techniques so the RIAA can have a good look at them prior to the court case (and perhaps devise defenses)?
If you want answers that perhaps you could use in court, I guess you should pay him. Sounds fair to me. That is how he makes his living.
They say that children desperately need 'real play (as opposed to sedentary, screen-based entertainment), first-hand experience of the world they live in'.
Children desperately need good, competent parenting. Alcohol, drugs, video games and TV have all been around for many years. The form of technology or abuse may change but the results do not. If you don't raise your kids someone or something else will and the results may not be something you like.
How about the "Worth 1000: Beta Busts 5" Games that never got made, photoshop games box competition... This one had me laughing so hard I was crying... Check out the "World Cup Hooligans" entry or "Halo Kitty".
Worth 1000: Beta Busts 5
I am a Ham, but I've been out of hamming for a few years.
Let me answer some questions that weren't specifically in the title article, but that I went through in the same process (as I was getting ready to get rid of radio gear I hadn't used in years).
Practical use?
- Commmunications when commercial options are non-existent, suck or unavailable, such as major storms, hurricanes, terrorist attacks, the boonies. These darn radios will work fine during nasty storms, over hundreds of miles no problem. You'd be pretty shocked at the distance you can get even from a basic hand-held fraction-of-a-watt power transceiver. And at VHF frequencies, you don't even need line of site, it goes around hills somewhat.
- Stand-by option at best in more civilized and populated areas.
Cost?
- Low to none. Study, write exam, get license ($50-60), buy transceiver (used for $100, new and fancy $200 up to thousands). Here in Canada they did away with needing to renew your basic ham license in 2002 (? +/- a year or two) -- used to be it cost $20/year to have one. If you want to use a repeater, you should become a member with the group that runs the repeaters, but they won't mind if you try it out for a while as a beginner.
Why use ham, learn ham?
- Talk to friends
- Hobby, satillite comms, radio interest, general knowledge
- Backup reliable communication method
Downsides?
- Cannot discuss personal, business or non-public info over ham. Everything has to be clean. This, to me, limits its usefulness majorly. Everything can be heard by anyone (completely legal in these frequencies), and there is no expectation of privacy. Cannot encrypt any data traffic while using HAM frequencies.
- Can be kindof boring unless you have friends on HAM as well
- Personally, I don't care for 'chewing the rag', or BSing because you can. Talking for hours about nothing with people on the radio just because, and you aren't even allowed to gosip or swear. Better alternatives are IM, email or VOIP now-a-days.
- Not many women using it, just guys (same as early internet)
Upsides?
- Cheap
- If you like to talk and BS, you will find lots friends
Antibacterial soaps are a marketing ploy and nothing more
Bzzt. Wrong.
Many antibacterial soaps contain additives such as triclosan or triclocarbon. Both the AMA and the CDC have recommended against the use of antibacterial soaps vs. regular soaps. The antibacterial soaps themselves don't seem to save you from any cough, colds and flus as at least one study published in Annals of internal medicine shows.
As for just being marketting, manufacturers would be at risk of false advertising, violations of which are the domain of the FTC
These particular antibiotic additives are effective in controlled settings (eg. hospitals) with proper application, but indescriminate use at home doesn't seem provide benefits, and in fact raises concerns about the development of resistant strains of bacteria.
that it is not even wrong. Its just in the wrong ballpark.
+5,Bull$hit
Isn't this just a contract dispute?
Slow news day?
I have Shaw internet, I also have subscribed to their QOS enhancement (as per this discussion), and I use wholesale VOIP (rather than Vonage). I'm actually thinking of cancelling the QOS for technical rather than ideological (*emotional* -- as per this story) reasons.
The QOS enhancement was hidden away inside of the Shaw website, and most of the customer service people I talked to had no clue what it was. This was about 4 months ago when I first signed up for it. I finally did find someone who knew what it was. They said:
- It enhanced service for internet. They didn't really say how much or what I would notice
- Shaw's internet phone uses a separate network or channel, and does not use their regular internet channels
- The QOS enhancement is only applicable to their internet service, and does not put your VOIP traffic over their separate network for Shaw internet phone.
- Cable modems on shaw (at least mine) support DOCSIS 2.0, and apparently (I'm not an expert) it has QOS capability along with the rest of their network outlay.
QOS
- This QOS thing is technically possible from the Shaw end, but the question of performance is a large one
- I haven't really noticed either a degredation or improvement in voip... But then I haven't been monitoring carefully
- I think the time when I need it most -- when Shaw's network is otherwise saturated -- is when it will pay, but I suspect those times are rare.
The two big problems I see:
- The biggest problem I can see is that the QOS enhancement is only valid over Shaw's network, and if your voip provider doesn't peer directly with shaw, your voip packets will be at some other carrier's mercy once they leave shaw
- The second biggest problem is ping times. Some of my VOIP providers are 13 hops from where I am (and three network peering points away), and even with QOS there is no way to keep round trip delay to less than 100 milliseconds -- at which point the lag is noticable and gets irritating. No amount of QOS from shaw will fix the number of hops.
Conclusion
The lesson to learn is that QOS is useful if you are on a saturated part of the shaw network, you call during busy times of the day AND (this is important) your voip provider is a short number of hops from you AND ON THE SHAW NETWORK!
Otherwise save your money. Oh yeah, and write letters to the CRTC to get them to stop Shaw, Bell and Telus from doing this two tier internet garbage!
Nuclear power plants keep their waste in shielded rooms deep inside the plant, which are then sealed up and stored so the waste doesn't get released.
No so fast there. That is not true.
From Here
Are there routine emissions from a nuclear power reactor such as Seabrook Station? Yes, the release of radioactivity into our air, water, and soil is not strictly limited to an accident at a nuclear power plant. All it takes is the plant's everyday routine operation, and federal regulations permit these radioactive releases as long as they contain "permissible" levels of contamination. Legally permissible does not mean safe. Radioactive releases from a nuclear power reactor's routine operation often are not fully detected or reported. Accidental releases may not be completely verified or documented.
Most nuclear plants DO vent gases and radioactive by-products from their processes -- not just clean steam. They do careful monitoring, but they are allowed to actually release a certain amount of radioactive water and gas into the environment. The monitoring is just "metering", if they exceed a certain amount of radioactive release, it becomes a big deal, but some in every day operations is A-OKAY!
Show your work:
Routine radioactive releases
Fission gas by-products released to atmosphere after 60 days
Instead it spread across several miles of nearby area and found its way into the water table. Some of it was carried by winds, but this really wasn't anything different than the hundreds of nuclear bomb tests that had been done in decades past.
7 590&navID=33&lID=2
Actually, people living in Bavaria (West Germany) and Czech Republic are supposed to have any mushrooms they pick in the forest tested for radioactivity. There are offices in most small towns that will do this service for free (or a small cost).
Here is my supporting research:
http://www.racerocks.com/fungi/fungrad.htm
http://www.chernobyl.info/index.php?userhash=1155
I'm going to disagree here.
Which is one of the reasons we need serious campaign finance reform.
No, the general population have to stop acting like peasants with high school education. The problem is in the grassroots, not the campaigns. Kindof like treating the symptoms while ignoring the underlying problem.
Corporate donations should be out, as should corporate lobbying.
Lobbying, corruption, kickbacks, family or hell friends -- these will ALWAYS influence politics. They always have. Lobbying is just a modern incarnation of some sort. Outlawing just makes the lobbists find another way to let the politicians know what they (and their clients) want.
Imagine what THAT would do to corporations. It would strip their power to screw over the average citizen. Then, perhaps, politicians might actually have to listen to their home base, instead of big oil or big media.
I don't like big corporations either -- but I will call you on this. The average citizen can only be screwed over if they allow it. You can only be made to feel inferior with your permission. Here is a thought -- Don't give it!
Back to the problem of grassroots not acting like grassroots, but placing blind faith in both the (a) the system, (b) the people who sell you things -- marketers, salesman and politicians and (c) that the government or "free market" will fix things. Its the individuals in the market, and if they don't think and act in a reasonable manner the system will be broken.
But you can patent it! (at least in the US)
I disagree with some of your points:
If the community asked him to step down, would he?
Step down from what? The FSF? He created it, he runs it, and it is his baby. Yes, thats right, you have him to thank for GNU. All the versions.
Even so, you should recognize that that puts you farther outside the mainstream, and it's much harder to change the mainstream when you're 1,000 miles away.
And the alternative? Mediocrity? Let me ask you this... Who is pushing back from the other side? Sony, BMG.. The big music and movie studios. What do they want? They want file sharing outlawed, and every grandmother and 12 year old who shares behind bars. Is that outside of mainstream? Who is pushing back against their crap drm and p2p illegalization? Certainly not yourself, or even the mainstream. Have you forgotten about Disney and Senator Orin Hatch? What about the DMCA, or the son of the DMCA (being rewritten again for the 10th time likely).
Give these corporate monsters an inch and they will take a mile. Sorry, but we need our own crazies to balance and fight back the FUD, spin and lobbying that comes out of Sony, BMG, et al.
The GPL was meant to turn copyright on its ear, and this perhaps does go slightly beyond abusing copyright for open source purposes, but based on what I have seen emerging from the RIAA and MPAA, I don't think it is unreasonable.
Sorry, but there is nothing good about DRM, and I don't like how you would give in and give up to DRM and those who are pushing it.
I mean, OSDL and whoever funds OSDL... IBM and friends. Maybe they don't want GPLv3? Follow the money.
I guess that's what happens when one lives in the good 'old U.C.A (United Corporations of America).
But what do you expect? Socialism?
Isn't capitalism all about the capital and who controls it? It is a democracy one day every four years or so, but the rest of the time, capitalism rules the roost.
of Mithril, yes from... JRR Tolkiens now (in)famous EPIC (Lord of the rings... for those who haven't had coffee this morning yet).
From the pedia... "...It is a precious silvery metal, stronger than steel but much lighter in weight..."
And brought to us by none other than Dr. Elvin.
What will the elves think of next!
From the FA:
"...The cost of employing one chemist or engineer in the United States is equal to about five chemists in China and 11 engineers in India."
And how exactly will increasing the number of chemists, engineers and scientists graduating each year increase the appeal of this career to students currently choosing careers in business and law?
My thesis is that in increasing the amounts of graduates in sciences and "lowering prices" they will fail to actually improve the situation.
Microeconomics (oh yeah... THAT natural law) says that increasing the supply of these graduates will DECREASE the price they cost -- in other words by training more... they get cheaper!
College kids are choosing business and law because (a) there are more jobs and (b) they pay better. Decreasing the pay chemists and engineers receive won't improve employment in this area. Why are there less computer scientists these days. Oh yeah, no jobs.
Hence I posit that: Decreasing the cost of engineering and chemists will do nothing to increase the United States' competitiveness in these scientific endeavors
m