As much I would not like to see or support sites that use Windows Media shite, its still really nice to have this option.
Is that me or are the two clauses in that section contradictory? You don't want to support, or even see sites that use windows media player, but you still think it's "really nice" to have it...
The fact is they're still dumb. They saw that the internet was popular, and their kneejerk reaction was to try to think up a way to capitalize financially on that. They're still doing it.
Analysts come up with figures: x% of internet users will be going wireless by 200y. So they just pump millions of dollars into creating infrastructure, never bothering to look at those figures with any intelligence. How did some guy in a little office downtown come up with these figures? Surveys? Estimations? Listening to wireless company executives' pipe dreams?
Look at interactive TV. For YEARS they've been churning out one failed interactive TV venture after another. They've managed to convince themselves that people want to talk to their TV, and it doesn't matter how many times it fails, they're still lining up to make the next doomed platform.
Not everything can be commoditized, and it's a sad statement on our current culture when the first question that pops into some greedy, inept "entrepreneur" is how much can I make?
Piro put it very simply and clearly; just because people like something doesn't mean they're going to pay for it, especially if they used to get it for free (it was a nice change from his usual rants, which usually run along the lines of "this strip has sucked any enjoyment out of my life, and I now live in a constant hell of fatigue and despair. I'm so very, very tired..." Wish the poor guy would realize we don't mind if a strip is a few days late.)
Crypto experts? Don't you realize the average slashdot poster is an expert on all technical and mathematical subjects, no matter how esoteric? Come on, get with the program...
* Powerful enough to take over the entire world, eh? Something tells me Russia, Europe (collectively, and several contries individually (not France)), China, and a few other countries might disagree with that assessment. And we're not exactly building new forces here--we're restoring what President Clinton cut.
It's a ridiculous, overblown defense budget. Who the hell do we need all those defenses for? Afghanistan? We used a small fraction of our military there (Clinton's military, by the way), and it was OVERKILL. A national missile defense plan? That's the pipe dream of those fully out-of-touch with reality; it doesn't work. Even if it DID work nobody's going to be lobbing missiles at us, they're going to smuggle them in to the country instead. But we have a Republican administration, so it's time to open the checkbook and start giving money to all those defense companies so they'll be given cushy positions on the board of directors when their terms are up. Typical Republican operations; spend more money than any previous administration, then whine about how the Democrats spend too much.
As any half-competent economics professor can tell you, cutting taxes results in an increase in tax revenues. No liberal would ever admit it, because the *percentage* of GNP pilfered by the government is lower (i.e. they have less control over the subject^H^H^H^H^H^H^Hcitizens), but in terms of absolute dollars, cutting taxes ends up in higher revenues. For an explanation of this phenomenon, consult any economics textbook, professor, or probably most TA's. Short answer: more money --> more investment --> more business --> more spending --> more tax revenue.
Ahh, "half-competent" meaning they agree with your reactionary, lackwit economic philosophy. It's a circular argument. Perhaps you should have gone beyond economics 101 and actually taken some courses with more sophistication.
As far as his "sophistication" goes, I for one am sick and tired of the "sophistication" of politics, and I find it most refreshing to have a politician who says what he means, and means what he says.
Oh, like how he promised billions in aid to New York City, and has now changed his mind? Or like he promised to support C02 emissions restrictions during his campaign, then broke his promise after being elected? How about how he dismissed his own drug-using past, but felt no compunction about signing laws that harshly punished other people who did the same thing (crimes in their case, "youthful indiscretions" in his)?
And as for the picture, well, I'm sure you've never tripped in your life, so it's perfectly acceptable for you to mock the rest of us, who are not so perfect.
If Bush had rebounded from "tripping" on his own, I could respect him, but he's been propped up and coddled by his father's political and business friends his entire life. Failing at business several times, but getting bailed out each time. Letting his father's connections get him elected as governor then president. He never had to do a damn thing for himself in his life.
perhaps my favorite part of your little rant: your ad hominem [dictionary.com] attack on President Bush.
And this is different from your ad hominem attack on the poster you're responding to...how?
The thing that annoys me is that they don't even seem to read the stuff that I submit anymore. My last story submission was rejected in about 2 minutes (I was keeping track). What happened to all these hundreds of story submissions that they claim overwhelm them? Can't be that many if you have a 2 minute turnaround time...
I could understand it if I constantly spammed them and they were just sick of dealing with me, but I average maybe a single story submission every 2 months or so. If they aren't even reading them, then just let me know so I won't even waste that 5 minutes every 2 months...
All they have to do is sell a single copy for any amount of money, and they're doing better than when they were giving it out for free. At this point they probably aren't even planning on breaking even, they just want to minimize the loss.
Spellcheck story submissions? What do you think this is, a large-scale commercial website with full-time editors and a large company backing it? Oh, wait...
What don't they "get"? They tried giving away something to compete against MS Office. It didn't work. Rather than get nothing for it, why not charge for it, and maybe get a few bucks.
normal person: How can you make money giving away software?
Try Tenchi Muyo (the OAV, not the TV show or Tenchi in Tokyo version). If you don't like that, and you don't like Bebop, then you probably won't like anything else, because they're pretty much the best anime around.
Democrats are SOCIALISTS? That's just hilarious. If you think the Democratic party is socialist, you're so far to the right as to beyond the reach of simple facts.
The Republicans tend to spend a lot more than the Democrats, but because it's on military use they think it doesn't count as government spending. You want to talk about WASTE, check out how the Pentagon works. The deficit grew at an astounding rate under Reagan and Bush. Under Clinton we had budget surpluses. Now, since we're back in Republican hands, we're increasing the deficit.
Republicans are not known for buying votes - but they are known for reducing government waste [cagw.org].
Were you awake during last year's Presidential campaign? The corporations bought Bush with campaign donations, then Bush tried to buy votes with harebrained tax cuts. When the election was in contention, the Republicans PAID people to travel to Florida and protest.
Don't get me wrong, I'm a Dexter's Laboratory fan, but with the possible exception of Samurai Jack they're all pretty light, airy, SHORT, humorous things. I was thinking more of a full-length series. But you're right, I had forgotten about Samurai Jack, which I don't really watch, but can appreciate the innovative stylistic elements in it.
Most american cartoons on saturday morning seem to be cookie-cutter rip-offs of the same crap thats been on the air for 20 years. Mostly good-guys with no flaws looking beautiful fighting ugly badguys that are robots or aliens so there's no problem with "destroying them". I guess this goes back at target audience and censorship.
You know, I don't think you can blame all of this on censorship or audience targetting. Even with the young audience and network restrictions on content, they have plenty of room to maneuver, creatively speaking. Blame the writers and producers, who follow the same tired cliches over and over and over again; the hokey moral issues, the predictable villainous plots, the 2-dimensional stock characters.
Anime feels more Artistic (just an opinion, its probably commercialized to death over in japan) than the american stuff, it almost seem to enjoy creating the images they produce. I just don't get that feeling when watching any current cartoons or even tv shows.
Well, I think what Japanese animation has that American animation lacks is range. There's plenty of commercialized, cookie-cutter anime made in Japan--but there's also enough truly creative stuff to balance it out. In America you only get the cookie-cutter stuff.
I'd really like to see HBO pick up these kinds of shows, and air them unedited with no commercial breaks. Hell, I think we're almost at the point where a premium anime/animation network could be self-supporting...
Of course, I am not quite sure where all the animosity comes from.
Because he represents the worst in 21st century culture. It's not the money we mind; look at the last space tourist, few people here begrudged him his trip. I liked his going up, because it was nice to have someone besides the all-American square-haircut aeronautical engineer types actually getting to go up there.
If they're going up into space it matters. Hell, we're the ones who grew up on science fiction, we deserve to get up there before some bubble gum pop singer does...
Slashdot Mirror
Hey, if they can't figure out how to get in, then they shouldn't bother coming in...
As much I would not like to see or support sites that use Windows Media shite, its still really nice to have this option.
Is that me or are the two clauses in that section contradictory? You don't want to support, or even see sites that use windows media player, but you still think it's "really nice" to have it...
The fact is they're still dumb. They saw that the internet was popular, and their kneejerk reaction was to try to think up a way to capitalize financially on that. They're still doing it.
Analysts come up with figures: x% of internet users will be going wireless by 200y. So they just pump millions of dollars into creating infrastructure, never bothering to look at those figures with any intelligence. How did some guy in a little office downtown come up with these figures? Surveys? Estimations? Listening to wireless company executives' pipe dreams?
Look at interactive TV. For YEARS they've been churning out one failed interactive TV venture after another. They've managed to convince themselves that people want to talk to their TV, and it doesn't matter how many times it fails, they're still lining up to make the next doomed platform.
Not everything can be commoditized, and it's a sad statement on our current culture when the first question that pops into some greedy, inept "entrepreneur" is how much can I make? Piro put it very simply and clearly; just because people like something doesn't mean they're going to pay for it, especially if they used to get it for free (it was a nice change from his usual rants, which usually run along the lines of "this strip has sucked any enjoyment out of my life, and I now live in a constant hell of fatigue and despair. I'm so very, very tired..." Wish the poor guy would realize we don't mind if a strip is a few days late.)
At least back before government took over building roads, the only people who paid for them were the ones that used them.
Uhhh..the government's always built roads. Hell, they're still using roads built by the ancient Roman government...
NYC would be easy, they wouldn't have to work hard on collision sensors if they want them to blend in with the rest of the taxis...
I remember one time when the bus I was in cut off a taxi during a turn. The cab driver was so angry he actually backed up, then rammed into us.
If there are no jobs, there are no jobs. How is making yourself better qualified for jobs that don't exist helpful?
Crypto experts? Don't you realize the average slashdot poster is an expert on all technical and mathematical subjects, no matter how esoteric? Come on, get with the program...
All that happened was the editors chose to draw attention away from these posts.
"It was on display in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying 'Beware of the Leopard'."
--HHGTG
So what alternative do you propose?
Why do politicians and authorities always come to solutions that never work out in the end.
Wow, you can see into the future.
You have to make it easy for people or they won't do it.
So offer an alternative solution. What should they do?
* Powerful enough to take over the entire world, eh? Something tells me Russia, Europe (collectively, and several contries individually (not France)), China, and a few other countries might disagree with that assessment. And we're not exactly building new forces here--we're restoring what President Clinton cut.
It's a ridiculous, overblown defense budget. Who the hell do we need all those defenses for? Afghanistan? We used a small fraction of our military there (Clinton's military, by the way), and it was OVERKILL. A national missile defense plan? That's the pipe dream of those fully out-of-touch with reality; it doesn't work. Even if it DID work nobody's going to be lobbing missiles at us, they're going to smuggle them in to the country instead. But we have a Republican administration, so it's time to open the checkbook and start giving money to all those defense companies so they'll be given cushy positions on the board of directors when their terms are up. Typical Republican operations; spend more money than any previous administration, then whine about how the Democrats spend too much.
As any half-competent economics professor can tell you, cutting taxes results in an increase in tax revenues. No liberal would ever admit it, because the *percentage* of GNP pilfered by the government is lower (i.e. they have less control over the subject^H^H^H^H^H^H^Hcitizens), but in terms of absolute dollars, cutting taxes ends up in higher revenues. For an explanation of this phenomenon, consult any economics textbook, professor, or probably most TA's. Short answer: more money --> more investment --> more business --> more spending --> more tax revenue.
Ahh, "half-competent" meaning they agree with your reactionary, lackwit economic philosophy. It's a circular argument. Perhaps you should have gone beyond economics 101 and actually taken some courses with more sophistication.
As far as his "sophistication" goes, I for one am sick and tired of the "sophistication" of politics, and I find it most refreshing to have a politician who says what he means, and means what he says.
Oh, like how he promised billions in aid to New York City, and has now changed his mind? Or like he promised to support C02 emissions restrictions during his campaign, then broke his promise after being elected? How about how he dismissed his own drug-using past, but felt no compunction about signing laws that harshly punished other people who did the same thing (crimes in their case, "youthful indiscretions" in his)?
And as for the picture, well, I'm sure you've never tripped in your life, so it's perfectly acceptable for you to mock the rest of us, who are not so perfect.
If Bush had rebounded from "tripping" on his own, I could respect him, but he's been propped up and coddled by his father's political and business friends his entire life. Failing at business several times, but getting bailed out each time. Letting his father's connections get him elected as governor then president. He never had to do a damn thing for himself in his life.
perhaps my favorite part of your little rant: your ad hominem [dictionary.com] attack on President Bush.
And this is different from your ad hominem attack on the poster you're responding to...how?
Here's a definition for you...
The thing that annoys me is that they don't even seem to read the stuff that I submit anymore. My last story submission was rejected in about 2 minutes (I was keeping track). What happened to all these hundreds of story submissions that they claim overwhelm them? Can't be that many if you have a 2 minute turnaround time...
I could understand it if I constantly spammed them and they were just sick of dealing with me, but I average maybe a single story submission every 2 months or so. If they aren't even reading them, then just let me know so I won't even waste that 5 minutes every 2 months...
All they have to do is sell a single copy for any amount of money, and they're doing better than when they were giving it out for free. At this point they probably aren't even planning on breaking even, they just want to minimize the loss.
Spellcheck story submissions? What do you think this is, a large-scale commercial website with full-time editors and a large company backing it? Oh, wait...
They speak Farsi in Iran and Aimaq, Tajiki, Ashkun, Azerbaijani, Balochi, Brahui, Darwazi, Farsi, Gawar-Bati, Gujari, Hazaragi, Jakati, Kamviri, Karakalpak, Kazakh, Kirghiz, Malakhel, Mogholi, Pashto, Pashayi, Sanglechi-Ishkashimi, Tanshewi, Tatar, Tirahi, Turkmen, Uyghur, Uzbek, Waigali, Wakhi, Warduji, and Wotapuri-Katarqalai in Afghanistan.
I wonder why Afghan culture is so fragmented...
What don't they "get"? They tried giving away something to compete against MS Office. It didn't work. Rather than get nothing for it, why not charge for it, and maybe get a few bucks.
normal person: How can you make money giving away software?
Open Source advocate: Volume.
Try Tenchi Muyo (the OAV, not the TV show or Tenchi in Tokyo version). If you don't like that, and you don't like Bebop, then you probably won't like anything else, because they're pretty much the best anime around.
Heeeey...maybe you're on to something there. Maybe the wretched quality of television is intentional, to prevent people from copying it.
Democrats are SOCIALISTS? That's just hilarious. If you think the Democratic party is socialist, you're so far to the right as to beyond the reach of simple facts.
The Republicans tend to spend a lot more than the Democrats, but because it's on military use they think it doesn't count as government spending. You want to talk about WASTE, check out how the Pentagon works. The deficit grew at an astounding rate under Reagan and Bush. Under Clinton we had budget surpluses. Now, since we're back in Republican hands, we're increasing the deficit.
Republicans are not known for buying votes - but they are known for reducing government waste [cagw.org].
Were you awake during last year's Presidential campaign? The corporations bought Bush with campaign donations, then Bush tried to buy votes with harebrained tax cuts. When the election was in contention, the Republicans PAID people to travel to Florida and protest.
Don't get me wrong, I'm a Dexter's Laboratory fan, but with the possible exception of Samurai Jack they're all pretty light, airy, SHORT, humorous things. I was thinking more of a full-length series. But you're right, I had forgotten about Samurai Jack, which I don't really watch, but can appreciate the innovative stylistic elements in it.
Most american cartoons on saturday morning seem to be cookie-cutter rip-offs of the same crap thats been on the air for 20 years. Mostly good-guys with no flaws looking beautiful fighting ugly badguys that are robots or aliens so there's no problem with "destroying them". I guess this goes back at target audience and censorship.
You know, I don't think you can blame all of this on censorship or audience targetting. Even with the young audience and network restrictions on content, they have plenty of room to maneuver, creatively speaking. Blame the writers and producers, who follow the same tired cliches over and over and over again; the hokey moral issues, the predictable villainous plots, the 2-dimensional stock characters.
Anime feels more Artistic (just an opinion, its probably commercialized to death over in japan) than the american stuff, it almost seem to enjoy creating the images they produce. I just don't get that feeling when watching any current cartoons or even tv shows.
Well, I think what Japanese animation has that American animation lacks is range. There's plenty of commercialized, cookie-cutter anime made in Japan--but there's also enough truly creative stuff to balance it out. In America you only get the cookie-cutter stuff.
I'd really like to see HBO pick up these kinds of shows, and air them unedited with no commercial breaks. Hell, I think we're almost at the point where a premium anime/animation network could be self-supporting...
we have all kinds of great animation in the US
Well, no we don't. We have the Simpsons and we have Futurama and that's pretty much it.
Of course, I am not quite sure where all the animosity comes from.
Because he represents the worst in 21st century culture. It's not the money we mind; look at the last space tourist, few people here begrudged him his trip. I liked his going up, because it was nice to have someone besides the all-American square-haircut aeronautical engineer types actually getting to go up there.
But a pop singer? Come on...
If they're going up into space it matters. Hell, we're the ones who grew up on science fiction, we deserve to get up there before some bubble gum pop singer does...