My wife was in the market for a new computer and at the local Microcenter they had decent refurb machines for $300. Strangely the box I bought (an HP) came with XP Media Center Edition even though the PC itself was some bog standard HP office minitower with no media hardware (other than a lightscribe DVD RW drive and a xd/CF reader).
I don't know how the OS got chosen for this box; my guess was HP did the refurb and the box was actually a return or something from corporate client that had open licensing and HP just slapped on a media center XP license because they had extra. But I guess my point is, I don't doubt that a lot of boxes got media center licenses that were never really meant to be media center PCs.
At a certain point, I can't help but reach the conclusion that "computers are complicated and require intelligence and technical experience to maintain." Many average users lack intelligence and almost all lack any kind of technical experience at all.
And at a certain point, people who can't keep track of their system restore CDs and who don't maintain backups? That's not just lacking above average intelligence or experience, it's dumb along the lines of drinking and driving, buying something you can't afford, or having unprotected sex with a stranger.
I agree it is hell for regular users, but perhaps the acceptable standard for most computer users is a system restore once a year, unless they get smart enough to not get infected.
Right, and now you and everyone else with your Internet-approved, no-money-down, negative-equity, jumbo adjustable rate balloon mortgage is under water.
I think (1) makes a lot of sense, and I'd buy into the idea of the behind-the-wheel test involving a drive on real streets and highways for an extended distance (20 miles?). And why not it a re-test every 7 years after age 55?
The rest makes sense too, although radio controls on the steering wheel I think makes you MORE focused, not less, since you're not reaching for the controls.
Not paying attention while driving is even riskier. Do we really need to establish a new Federal law, complete with its own bureaucracy and enforcement regime to control (another) risky behavior?
If you can control their sex and their economics, they are at your disposal.
I will cut religion one small break, though. I think most cultures have rules regarding sexual behavior; the problem is, we're not living in 5th century Europe where the major provider of social order as long as anyone can remember, the Roman Empire, is collapsing and we need some rules to live by other than fucking anything you can get your hands on.
In an ancient civilization, the rules help keep the order. Unwanted offspring create succession problems (which in those civilizations is often a political problem, too), lack of sexual restraint can lead to your wife or daughter getting raped, and then there's the question of what to do with the women and the unwanted offspring.
The problem is they keep trying to enforce rules that maybe made sense in rural Europe in the 6th century in the 21st century when technology generally has solved the unwanted offspring problem and better socialization largely encourages people to not use violent means to satisfy their desires, sexual or otherwise.
I don't quite get it. Is the video some kind of training tool for people hired to actually host parties -- some weak, fake form of guerrilla marketing?
Or is *anybody* encouraged to host a Win 7 party and this video is part of that promotion?
Either way the video was so fucking phony I couldn't help but cringe; I'd cringe worse if it was to encourage people to have parties, but then again I cringe at the thought of being desperate enough to get paid to host parties for computer software.
And who are those 4 people, anyway? They're such a ridiculously deliberate mix of 'types' and you'd never see them together in real life. Sorry, but none of the 'senior' women I know give a shit about computers and they don't socialize with black men, either (this is meant to reflect how people really live, not to make any claims of rightness or wrongness). Cunty professional women pay someone else to use the computer. The dork lives in his mom's basement and wouldn't be in that kitchen at all unless it was his mom's.
IMHO, 3.1 is slightly flakier than 3.01 was, but only slightly.
I *have* noticed, though, that they have really cranked up voice compression. I had to ask a colleague if he had a cold or the flu as his voice started sounding funny. He laughed and said no and then I noticed that several other people sounded as if they had a similar "disorder". At that point I put 1+1 together and assumed AT&T was trying to shave a tiny bit of extra data off of every voice call to try to create some spare bandwidth for iPhone MMS, at least during the initial onslaught of "because I can" MMS transmission.
Can they control or limit the camera spin? It makes sense they can't right after the balloon bursts, but I would think there might be some kind of tricks they could do in the atmosphere on ascent and descent.
Lame as a function of market standing, not what the network can/cant do. Many biz pundits did pontificate about the Pre being as critical to Sprint's flagging market share as it was to Palm's future.
I'm kind of curious why AT&T hasn't bought out T-Mobile at this point; it would crush most customers' ability to bargain or play brinkmanship with AT&T since there would be no other US GSM carrier to turn to for a SIM swap, and they may get some marginal increase in tower density or coverage.
I agree about Verizon; decent network, really shitty phone choices. I left for an iPhone and don't really regret it. The AT&T rural coverage blows, but I spend most of my time in an area with decent AT&T 3G coverage so I don't really have any complaints.
I just hope whatever 4G turns out to be is supported by all the carriers so we can end this bullshit about what phone can be bought and by whom and on what network it will work.
Has anyone even begun to consider cracking water with the "excess" power produced by wind generation when the grid doesn't need the power?
A friend and I were driving past a large farm and noticed that almost none of the blades were turning; one or two were spinning well, so we knew there was good wind but assumed the grid didn't need the power.
With each of those big farm generators capable of quite a bit of power, I would think they would generate enough hydrogen in a year to do some kind of meaningful work.
But I can't make any money off that information now, and if someone else can in a way that is anonymized and not able to be tracked back to me personally, why would I care, seeing as how I can get all kinds of really cool services (email, calendar, phone services, etc) for free?
Is it merely the principal of anonymity, or am I missing something here? I know the key is in Google collecting the data in a way that I cannot be individually recognized or that the data can't be glued together in a way that it could be used to identify me, and maybe that's where the problem is.
You missed the part where it said "it runs Linux". At that point whatever stats it has you multiply by 911 to get the real stats. If comparing to the iPhone, you multiply by 911 *twice* to get the comparison stats.
I've always wondered that, too. I suspect if they have "compelling" evidence, they can submit a sealed motion requesting discovery without the "offending" businesses involvement at all, essentially a private, no-knock search warrant probably backed up by a couple of Sheriff's deputies to handle any unwanted dissent.
How exactly it would work at a bank, defense contractor, nuclear power plant or other institution that claimed superseding legal privilege and had the $$$, manpower and physical security to stop pretty much anything up to and including an armed assault. I doubt the Sheriff will be willing to call out SWAT to assist the discovery. My guess is the BSA just moves along to easier targets.
(I should have tacked this on to my other post...)
About 15 years ago I lived in an apartment in a generally good but transient urban area. One day while home from work, I heard a knock at the door, a muffled "maintenance" and someone start to key their way in.
I yelled "Who is it?" and grabbed my handgun and shoved it in the front of my jeans. The maintenance guy had stopped entering and said "maintenance" again. I grabbed the door and pulled it open and asked what he wanted. He was holding tools and said he needed to do some wiring for a new intercom.
At this point, he saw my gun and stepped back. I just turned around and walked back to the kitchen and said "Go ahead". He came and must have worked real fast, as he wasn't there more than 5 minutes. I suspect he just faked work and came back later when I was gone.
It was the last entry by maintenance I had in my apartment.
For a while it seemed everyone I knew had a RAZR, but the popularity of the phone added no value to the individual user.
Sure it did. It showed they were "cool" and knew what was popular. Remember, there are people who choose what to wear, drive, eat, etc based on whatever everyone else is doing, independent of the inherent value (or lack of value) the device has.
Not everyone drives a Mercedes because it's a really great car (Consumer Reports often begs to differ), but it is expensive and shows everyone you have "elite taste" (and a lot of money to spend).
Slashdot Mirror
My wife was in the market for a new computer and at the local Microcenter they had decent refurb machines for $300. Strangely the box I bought (an HP) came with XP Media Center Edition even though the PC itself was some bog standard HP office minitower with no media hardware (other than a lightscribe DVD RW drive and a xd/CF reader).
I don't know how the OS got chosen for this box; my guess was HP did the refurb and the box was actually a return or something from corporate client that had open licensing and HP just slapped on a media center XP license because they had extra. But I guess my point is, I don't doubt that a lot of boxes got media center licenses that were never really meant to be media center PCs.
At a certain point, I can't help but reach the conclusion that "computers are complicated and require intelligence and technical experience to maintain." Many average users lack intelligence and almost all lack any kind of technical experience at all.
And at a certain point, people who can't keep track of their system restore CDs and who don't maintain backups? That's not just lacking above average intelligence or experience, it's dumb along the lines of drinking and driving, buying something you can't afford, or having unprotected sex with a stranger.
I agree it is hell for regular users, but perhaps the acceptable standard for most computer users is a system restore once a year, unless they get smart enough to not get infected.
Right, and now you and everyone else with your Internet-approved, no-money-down, negative-equity, jumbo adjustable rate balloon mortgage is under water.
I think (1) makes a lot of sense, and I'd buy into the idea of the behind-the-wheel test involving a drive on real streets and highways for an extended distance (20 miles?). And why not it a re-test every 7 years after age 55?
The rest makes sense too, although radio controls on the steering wheel I think makes you MORE focused, not less, since you're not reaching for the controls.
Not paying attention while driving is even riskier. Do we really need to establish a new Federal law, complete with its own bureaucracy and enforcement regime to control (another) risky behavior?
At what point will people feel "safe"?
If you can control their sex and their economics, they are at your disposal.
I will cut religion one small break, though. I think most cultures have rules regarding sexual behavior; the problem is, we're not living in 5th century Europe where the major provider of social order as long as anyone can remember, the Roman Empire, is collapsing and we need some rules to live by other than fucking anything you can get your hands on.
In an ancient civilization, the rules help keep the order. Unwanted offspring create succession problems (which in those civilizations is often a political problem, too), lack of sexual restraint can lead to your wife or daughter getting raped, and then there's the question of what to do with the women and the unwanted offspring.
The problem is they keep trying to enforce rules that maybe made sense in rural Europe in the 6th century in the 21st century when technology generally has solved the unwanted offspring problem and better socialization largely encourages people to not use violent means to satisfy their desires, sexual or otherwise.
I don't quite get it. Is the video some kind of training tool for people hired to actually host parties -- some weak, fake form of guerrilla marketing?
Or is *anybody* encouraged to host a Win 7 party and this video is part of that promotion?
Either way the video was so fucking phony I couldn't help but cringe; I'd cringe worse if it was to encourage people to have parties, but then again I cringe at the thought of being desperate enough to get paid to host parties for computer software.
And who are those 4 people, anyway? They're such a ridiculously deliberate mix of 'types' and you'd never see them together in real life. Sorry, but none of the 'senior' women I know give a shit about computers and they don't socialize with black men, either (this is meant to reflect how people really live, not to make any claims of rightness or wrongness). Cunty professional women pay someone else to use the computer. The dork lives in his mom's basement and wouldn't be in that kitchen at all unless it was his mom's.
IMHO, 3.1 is slightly flakier than 3.01 was, but only slightly.
I *have* noticed, though, that they have really cranked up voice compression. I had to ask a colleague if he had a cold or the flu as his voice started sounding funny. He laughed and said no and then I noticed that several other people sounded as if they had a similar "disorder". At that point I put 1+1 together and assumed AT&T was trying to shave a tiny bit of extra data off of every voice call to try to create some spare bandwidth for iPhone MMS, at least during the initial onslaught of "because I can" MMS transmission.
Can they control or limit the camera spin? It makes sense they can't right after the balloon bursts, but I would think there might be some kind of tricks they could do in the atmosphere on ascent and descent.
Lame as a function of market standing, not what the network can/cant do. Many biz pundits did pontificate about the Pre being as critical to Sprint's flagging market share as it was to Palm's future.
I'm kind of curious why AT&T hasn't bought out T-Mobile at this point; it would crush most customers' ability to bargain or play brinkmanship with AT&T since there would be no other US GSM carrier to turn to for a SIM swap, and they may get some marginal increase in tower density or coverage.
I agree about Verizon; decent network, really shitty phone choices. I left for an iPhone and don't really regret it. The AT&T rural coverage blows, but I spend most of my time in an area with decent AT&T 3G coverage so I don't really have any complaints.
I just hope whatever 4G turns out to be is supported by all the carriers so we can end this bullshit about what phone can be bought and by whom and on what network it will work.
Because Sprint is a lame third place among cell carriers and they desperately need a "cool" phone that does something the iPhone doesn't?
Has anyone even begun to consider cracking water with the "excess" power produced by wind generation when the grid doesn't need the power?
A friend and I were driving past a large farm and noticed that almost none of the blades were turning; one or two were spinning well, so we knew there was good wind but assumed the grid didn't need the power.
With each of those big farm generators capable of quite a bit of power, I would think they would generate enough hydrogen in a year to do some kind of meaningful work.
Sure, I've been married for 10 years!
But I can't make any money off that information now, and if someone else can in a way that is anonymized and not able to be tracked back to me personally, why would I care, seeing as how I can get all kinds of really cool services (email, calendar, phone services, etc) for free?
Is it merely the principal of anonymity, or am I missing something here? I know the key is in Google collecting the data in a way that I cannot be individually recognized or that the data can't be glued together in a way that it could be used to identify me, and maybe that's where the problem is.
Heh, tether and send MMS, at least officially on AT&T in the US?
I also wish it had a "screen lock" mode where the touch screen (and optionally rotation) was locked but the display stayed on.
I find myself handing my phone to people to look at something and then they rotate/touch it and what I'm showing them gets changed.
So everybody should only have 1.5Mbit ethernet, because T1 speeds are some kind of standard outside the LAN?
Gig switches aren't fancy. The last one I bought was $50 and supported jumbo frames.
Why post anonymously? There's something to be afraid of trolling an open source nancy boy?
What state do you live in? Hawaii or Alaska? Is there a lower 48 with AT&T coverage that bad?
...shaped like a 12" black cock, so you can glide it gently in and out of your ass in the comfort of your parents' basement? Check.
I know where your next phone is going!
You missed the part where it said "it runs Linux". At that point whatever stats it has you multiply by 911 to get the real stats. If comparing to the iPhone, you multiply by 911 *twice* to get the comparison stats.
Act, Gary, act.
How many people did Hitler kill personally?
I'm thinking the bombardiers of the Dresden firebombing missions probably have a fair claim to the title.
I've always wondered that, too. I suspect if they have "compelling" evidence, they can submit a sealed motion requesting discovery without the "offending" businesses involvement at all, essentially a private, no-knock search warrant probably backed up by a couple of Sheriff's deputies to handle any unwanted dissent.
How exactly it would work at a bank, defense contractor, nuclear power plant or other institution that claimed superseding legal privilege and had the $$$, manpower and physical security to stop pretty much anything up to and including an armed assault. I doubt the Sheriff will be willing to call out SWAT to assist the discovery. My guess is the BSA just moves along to easier targets.
(I should have tacked this on to my other post...)
About 15 years ago I lived in an apartment in a generally good but transient urban area. One day while home from work, I heard a knock at the door, a muffled "maintenance" and someone start to key their way in.
I yelled "Who is it?" and grabbed my handgun and shoved it in the front of my jeans. The maintenance guy had stopped entering and said "maintenance" again. I grabbed the door and pulled it open and asked what he wanted. He was holding tools and said he needed to do some wiring for a new intercom.
At this point, he saw my gun and stepped back. I just turned around and walked back to the kitchen and said "Go ahead". He came and must have worked real fast, as he wasn't there more than 5 minutes. I suspect he just faked work and came back later when I was gone.
It was the last entry by maintenance I had in my apartment.
In "The Armed Citizen" in American Rifleman than on Slashdot.
For a while it seemed everyone I knew had a RAZR, but the popularity of the phone added no value to the individual user.
Sure it did. It showed they were "cool" and knew what was popular. Remember, there are people who choose what to wear, drive, eat, etc based on whatever everyone else is doing, independent of the inherent value (or lack of value) the device has.
Not everyone drives a Mercedes because it's a really great car (Consumer Reports often begs to differ), but it is expensive and shows everyone you have "elite taste" (and a lot of money to spend).