A great book for anyone interested in reading up on this is The Little LISPer, by Daniel P. Friedman. The entire book is a dialog, consisting of questions down one side of the page, and answers down the other. It starts with the basic concepts, (ie, What is an atom?), and just builds and builds. This is easily one of the most compelling computer instruction books I've ever read. Probably not that great as a quick reference, but if there were more language books like this, I'd learn more languages.
You have to imagine that a lot of the cost here gets passed on to the poor undergrads at the universities where all this research is taking place.
Subscriptions to journals can cost up into the thousands, and any particular discipline can have multiple journals. If you're studying nuclear fusion, you need to read Physical Review D, maybe Physical Review C (or A or B, who knows?), Physical Review Letters, journals on low temperature physics, superconductivity, high energy microwaves, or whatever, all of which costs your research library a ton of money to subscribe to.
And then there's the cost of actually keeping them around -- I once spent most of a summer reorganizing a research library at MIT, moving hundreds of journals from one room to another. A single journal like Phys Rev D can publish something like 5 feet of shit a year. And when you need to search it all, there's so much information that you have to do it online, sometimes on a pay service like DIALOG.
All the costs we're talking about here -- whether it's the scientists paying to publish, the librarians keeping all this crap under control, or the subscriptions themselves -- ultimately comes from the university who pays the researchers, librarians, and journals.
When the university budget tightens, they're just as likely to increase revenue as cut back on prestigious research. So the people who might have a lot to lose here are the undergrads, many of whom are actually paying cash or taking out loans to finance their education.
It seems like the univerities themselves should step in here and insist that they be allowed to save money by doing all this online.
You're right, my comment about "lack of bass" doesn't do justice to most electrostats. It's certainly there, but not at the levels most people expect, particularly fans of amplified music. Martin-logan uses a hybrid electrostat/cone design to combat the problem. I've heard quads (a '70s vintage design) have particularly good bass response for electrostats.
Funny that you mention the position-sensitivity of the magnapans -- a friend in college had a pair, and spent hours trying to position them to get the ideal sound. When he finally got it right, they sounded phenomenal. I think he finally got rid of them after frying the tweeter ribbons a few times and then moving to a tiny apartment in Manhattan.
This sounds a little like electrostatic speakers, but cheaper. There are a lot of high-end electrostats out there now (martin-logan, magnapan, quad, etc.), which have use a vibrating mylar film or ribbon suspended between metal grills or plates, or something along those lines. I've heard examples that sound phenomenal, aside from the lack of bass, but require serious amplification.
These sound like they'll require a lot less power, but will have even more trouble moving the amount of air necessary to make real bass or to actually get loud. I mean, how much air can something like this actually move? I'd have to guess not much.
If the cable is really a honeycomb, with light passing through a small mirrored channel, does that make it more delicate than, say, copper? Or normal fiber? It sounds like an outstanding idea, but I'd have to imagine that a cable like this could be a little delicate. Anyone have any info?
I had an email/phone exchange with Phil G last year after flaming aD here on/. He basically admitted that every premise he founded the company was wrong (he might have used "incorrect" or "under reevaluation"), and that he had brought in outside management and capital purely because he wasn't personally qualified to run such a large organizaton.
Phillip seems like an outstanding guy, he has accomplished a lot of laudable stuff, and I think his motivations are relatively pure, but I'd hardly say that this is a case of evil vc's vs. the good engineers. He's been made very wealthy by this whole deal, and legal tug of wars with VCs are to be expected if you're trying to make power plays. Maybe there's more going on than that, who knows.
My personal experiences with arsDigita, which have been repeatedly confirmed by friends, indicate that they can really have their heads up their collective ass sometimes. Probably less so than most "internet solutions" companies, but I still don't think I'd hire them or want to work there.
There are a number of companies, including dmod (covered on/. here), that have watermarking or encryption systems that work on a proprietary mp3 player or plugin to an existing one. I've seen the dmod system first-hand, but don't know about the architecture in detail. It works, and has been in development for a few years, but it's unclear exactly how robust it is from a security perspective.
People I know at dmod claim to have been in contact with napster/bertlesman to use dmod technology. I'm sure napster's talking to other people as well.
In his books The Visual Display of Quantitative Information and Envisioning Information, Edward Tufte does a great analysis of how the layout of the information passed from the engineers at Morton Thiokol (company who made the boosters) to NASA administrators failed to demonstrate a trend of increasing O-ring failures as temperature dropped. O-rings had failed previously at *much* higher temps, but none had burned all the way through. The Thiokol engineers used a couple of diagrams that didn't display the trend they were trying to point out -- dropping temperatures = increased failures. In their docs, the failures look unconnected. Tufte argues that if the Thiokol engineers had been able to represent their argument in a more compelling graphical manner, the NASA administrators would have immediately understood the problem.
Hindsight is 20/20, but it's a fascinating read... any/.er with an interest in design or gui should read Tufte's books... bad design can kill!
I just started reading jef raskin's book, the Humane Interfrace. Raskin is one of the early apple guys -- it's worth checking out. He's got a series of rules derived from I, Robot: First, an Interface should never harm user input or allow it to come to harm.
I wish all the current OSes I use would follow that one...
Deregulating industries that, by necessity, have physical infrastructure based monopolies has the potential to bring *some* price breaks to consumers. But it doesn't guarantee a greater quality of service.
In fact, the increased complexity often works counter to that end.
Indeed. Think of cable tv -- i can now choose from two providers, but both have horrible customer service and the same bad QOS.
In electricty, so much of the cost is wrapped up in the transmission and infrastructure that it's difficult to save much money. You can pay more to have renewable energy, but that's about it.
But with natural gas, on the other hand, you can save a lot. I'm not sure why -- this could be due to lower maintainence costs of the infrastructure. anyone?
this has already happened in California, New York, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania and a handful of other states for gas and electricity. (see energyguide) it's generally a good idea, but there are a few questionable issues, namely grid maintenance and expansion -- typically, the grid has remained in the hands of the utilities. is this this case in the UK?
the other issue is that ownership of the delivery system and power supply are being split up, kind of like telecom deregulation. in lots of US states, you can choose an electricity or gas provider (see energyguide.com to check if you're deregulated) that's greener or cheaper, but there's a big question as to whether deregulation is always good for us. the traditional utilities still maintain the lines, but who is responsible when there's not enough juice on the grid?
I probably shouldn't pick fights here, but how exactly is overpopulation a problem?
At some point the resource consumption of the population overwhelms the resources of the planet. This idea was stated by a guy named malthus in the eighteenth century. Or maybe ninteenth. This is known as the malthusian dillema -- more people = good in some dimensions, catastrophic in others.
So the fact that they're fucking with mitnick is no reflection on his rights, the conditions of his supervised release, or anything like that. They're probably just being petty and playing games with him because he's high-profile.
On closer reading, the article seems to suggest that this originates with the judge. It would be interesting to know whether she issued some kind of judgement or just let it be known that she was displeased. If it's the latter, he has some legal recourse because it's her own dumb fault for not specifically including lecturing as a prohibited activity. It's my understanding that unless the feds violate you, the conditions of release are somewhat binding.
There is no justice inside those bars, man, regular social rules DO NOT apply. Don't make those kind of assumptions.
I'm speaking from experience.
Obnoxious geeks who act disrespectful towards all the other dumb fucks in federal prison get beat down. I can't speak for the state joints, which can be more violent, but if you keep to yourself in a federal prison (maximum security aside) the odds of getting smacked in the face with a telephone handset are pretty low.
1. Mitnick is on supervised release, not probation. The difference? Part of it is semantic, but the idea is that you have served 85% of your sentence (minus 15% revocable 'good time' for not misbehaving) and are actually relased rather than paroled.
2. Your restrictions while on supervised release are specified at the time of sentencing, and to amend them (technically) requires a violation hearing in front of a judge.
3. I say technically because the US Office of Probation (note that their name hasn't been updated to reflect the new laws) tends to do whatever they want. I'm speaking from experience -- i'm 6 months into a 36 month supervised release period, and I've ended up with a parole officer who's busting my balls. He's "not thrilled" that I'm sitting here at a pre-ipo internet startup coding my ass off and making more than he is, but he's got no choice because the judge specifically stated that I could continue working with computers, with certain restrictions.
So the fact that they're fucking with mitnick is no reflection on his rights, the conditions of his supervised release, or anything like that. They're probably just being petty and playing games with him because he's high-profile.
and i've never met the guy, but the way he got his ass kicked in prison makes me think he's might be obnoxious and disrespectful. that doesn't help with the feds. has anyone here met him?
I know that convicted felons no longer have the right to vote or to own firearms
The right to vote varies from state to state. Fifteen states allow felons to vote, and one, Massachusetts, even allows prisoners to vote. In others, there's a movement afoot to repeal the laws disenfranchising felons because it affects a dispropotionate number of black males.
We reviewed arsdigita recently to do a commercial site for our company. I met phil's brother harry, ceasar brea, and some of their tech guys. Not only were they arrogant, but they were unable to propose reasonable solutions to some of the problems we posed to them, and in some cases didn't seem to understand the scope of some of the issues we were discussing. Other shops doing similar things for similar amounts of money are much more flexible because their solutions aren't just a series of hacks being used over and over.
I couldn't help thinking about how the million dollars they wanted to charge us was going to go directly into stuff like the aeron chairs we were sitting on, the rooms full of sgi flat screen displays, and the ferrari out front.
Still, I'll admit that they do some great work on a very specific class of problems.
First, this was a great article: the politically naive geeks take on the evil corporate drones and score a few hits.
The important thing to remember, as katz points out briefly, is that the problem of snitching is endemic throughout the justice system. If you're prosecuted by the feds (I'm speaking from experience here) you're offered substantial time off for ratting out your co-conspirators. Whoever's first in line gets the break. And we're talking about cutting your time in half, in some cases. The math works out great because there are so many sentence ehancements at the federal level when you're deemd to have 'conspired' with someone.
When they prosecute these big mafia cases, the wiseguys trip over each other to be first in line to rat. When you're facing 20 to life, you'd be a fool not to. It's that philosophy 101 case -- the prisoner's dilemma, but with the deck stacked completely against you. In my case, the time (12-18 months, no co-conspirators etc.) was small enough that it wouldn't have really mattered, but I'd hate to be in the position to have to decide.
So this shit with pinkerton is one symptom of a disease that's coming straight from the top. cc your senators and reps on your hatemail to those motherfuckers.
Interesting point, but it's hard to believe that the rise of electronic communiction will have any stabilizing effect on the english language. In just a few years the net has introduced new words, idioms, phrasings, forms of punctuation, etc., and allowed them to spread instantly all over the planet. There doesn't seem to be any evidence, historical precedent and academic theories aside, that changes in the English language have slowed or will continue to slow.
I think the important point is that the problem of data obselesence goes way beyond the drives, formats, or what have you, into problems of materials and the relevance of the information itself.
Slashdot Mirror
A great book for anyone interested in reading up on this is The Little LISPer, by Daniel P. Friedman. The entire book is a dialog, consisting of questions down one side of the page, and answers down the other. It starts with the basic concepts, (ie, What is an atom?), and just builds and builds. This is easily one of the most compelling computer instruction books I've ever read. Probably not that great as a quick reference, but if there were more language books like this, I'd learn more languages.
Subscriptions to journals can cost up into the thousands, and any particular discipline can have multiple journals. If you're studying nuclear fusion, you need to read Physical Review D, maybe Physical Review C (or A or B, who knows?), Physical Review Letters, journals on low temperature physics, superconductivity, high energy microwaves, or whatever, all of which costs your research library a ton of money to subscribe to.
And then there's the cost of actually keeping them around -- I once spent most of a summer reorganizing a research library at MIT, moving hundreds of journals from one room to another. A single journal like Phys Rev D can publish something like 5 feet of shit a year. And when you need to search it all, there's so much information that you have to do it online, sometimes on a pay service like DIALOG.
All the costs we're talking about here -- whether it's the scientists paying to publish, the librarians keeping all this crap under control, or the subscriptions themselves -- ultimately comes from the university who pays the researchers, librarians, and journals.
When the university budget tightens, they're just as likely to increase revenue as cut back on prestigious research. So the people who might have a lot to lose here are the undergrads, many of whom are actually paying cash or taking out loans to finance their education.
It seems like the univerities themselves should step in here and insist that they be allowed to save money by doing all this online.
Funny that you mention the position-sensitivity of the magnapans -- a friend in college had a pair, and spent hours trying to position them to get the ideal sound. When he finally got it right, they sounded phenomenal. I think he finally got rid of them after frying the tweeter ribbons a few times and then moving to a tiny apartment in Manhattan.
This sounds a little like electrostatic speakers, but cheaper. There are a lot of high-end electrostats out there now (martin-logan, magnapan, quad, etc.), which have use a vibrating mylar film or ribbon suspended between metal grills or plates, or something along those lines. I've heard examples that sound phenomenal, aside from the lack of bass, but require serious amplification.
These sound like they'll require a lot less power, but will have even more trouble moving the amount of air necessary to make real bass or to actually get loud. I mean, how much air can something like this actually move? I'd have to guess not much.
If the cable is really a honeycomb, with light passing through a small mirrored channel, does that make it more delicate than, say, copper? Or normal fiber? It sounds like an outstanding idea, but I'd have to imagine that a cable like this could be a little delicate. Anyone have any info?
I had an email/phone exchange with Phil G last year after flaming aD here on /. He basically admitted that every premise he founded the company was wrong (he might have used "incorrect" or "under reevaluation"), and that he had brought in outside management and capital purely because he wasn't personally qualified to run such a large organizaton.
Phillip seems like an outstanding guy, he has accomplished a lot of laudable stuff, and I think his motivations are relatively pure, but I'd hardly say that this is a case of evil vc's vs. the good engineers. He's been made very wealthy by this whole deal, and legal tug of wars with VCs are to be expected if you're trying to make power plays. Maybe there's more going on than that, who knows.
My personal experiences with arsDigita, which have been repeatedly confirmed by friends, indicate that they can really have their heads up their collective ass sometimes. Probably less so than most "internet solutions" companies, but I still don't think I'd hire them or want to work there.
People I know at dmod claim to have been in contact with napster/bertlesman to use dmod technology. I'm sure napster's talking to other people as well.
Hindsight is 20/20, but it's a fascinating read... any /.er with an interest in design or gui should read Tufte's books... bad design can kill!
try this to skip the login
I bet it's for the Addidas Samba sneaker....
I wish all the current OSes I use would follow that one...
get the article here
In fact, the increased complexity often works counter to that end.
Indeed. Think of cable tv -- i can now choose from two providers, but both have horrible customer service and the same bad QOS.
In electricty, so much of the cost is wrapped up in the transmission and infrastructure that it's difficult to save much money. You can pay more to have renewable energy, but that's about it.
But with natural gas, on the other hand, you can save a lot. I'm not sure why -- this could be due to lower maintainence costs of the infrastructure. anyone?
this has already happened in California, New York, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania and a handful of other states for gas and electricity. (see energyguide) it's generally a good idea, but there are a few questionable issues, namely grid maintenance and expansion -- typically, the grid has remained in the hands of the utilities. is this this case in the UK?
the other issue is that ownership of the delivery system and power supply are being split up, kind of like telecom deregulation. in lots of US states, you can choose an electricity or gas provider (see energyguide.com to check if you're deregulated) that's greener or cheaper, but there's a big question as to whether deregulation is always good for us. the traditional utilities still maintain the lines, but who is responsible when there's not enough juice on the grid?
Does this mean Metallica is answering questions, or that their publicist and/or lawyer is going to do all the talking?
At some point the resource consumption of the population overwhelms the resources of the planet. This idea was stated by a guy named malthus in the eighteenth century. Or maybe ninteenth. This is known as the malthusian dillema -- more people = good in some dimensions, catastrophic in others.
On closer reading, the article seems to suggest that this originates with the judge. It would be interesting to know whether she issued some kind of judgement or just let it be known that she was displeased. If it's the latter, he has some legal recourse because it's her own dumb fault for not specifically including lecturing as a prohibited activity. It's my understanding that unless the feds violate you, the conditions of release are somewhat binding.
I'm speaking from experience.
Obnoxious geeks who act disrespectful towards all the other dumb fucks in federal prison get beat down. I can't speak for the state joints, which can be more violent, but if you keep to yourself in a federal prison (maximum security aside) the odds of getting smacked in the face with a telephone handset are pretty low.
2. Your restrictions while on supervised release are specified at the time of sentencing, and to amend them (technically) requires a violation hearing in front of a judge.
3. I say technically because the US Office of Probation (note that their name hasn't been updated to reflect the new laws) tends to do whatever they want. I'm speaking from experience -- i'm 6 months into a 36 month supervised release period, and I've ended up with a parole officer who's busting my balls. He's "not thrilled" that I'm sitting here at a pre-ipo internet startup coding my ass off and making more than he is, but he's got no choice because the judge specifically stated that I could continue working with computers, with certain restrictions.
So the fact that they're fucking with mitnick is no reflection on his rights, the conditions of his supervised release, or anything like that. They're probably just being petty and playing games with him because he's high-profile.
and i've never met the guy, but the way he got his ass kicked in prison makes me think he's might be obnoxious and disrespectful. that doesn't help with the feds. has anyone here met him?
The right to vote varies from state to state. Fifteen states allow felons to vote, and one, Massachusetts, even allows prisoners to vote. In others, there's a movement afoot to repeal the laws disenfranchising felons because it affects a dispropotionate number of black males.
I couldn't help thinking about how the million dollars they wanted to charge us was going to go directly into stuff like the aeron chairs we were sitting on, the rooms full of sgi flat screen displays, and the ferrari out front.
Still, I'll admit that they do some great work on a very specific class of problems.
would snow, hail, or a hard rain disrupt this?
The important thing to remember, as katz points out briefly, is that the problem of snitching is endemic throughout the justice system. If you're prosecuted by the feds (I'm speaking from experience here) you're offered substantial time off for ratting out your co-conspirators. Whoever's first in line gets the break. And we're talking about cutting your time in half, in some cases. The math works out great because there are so many sentence ehancements at the federal level when you're deemd to have 'conspired' with someone.
When they prosecute these big mafia cases, the wiseguys trip over each other to be first in line to rat. When you're facing 20 to life, you'd be a fool not to. It's that philosophy 101 case -- the prisoner's dilemma, but with the deck stacked completely against you. In my case, the time (12-18 months, no co-conspirators etc.) was small enough that it wouldn't have really mattered, but I'd hate to be in the position to have to decide.
So this shit with pinkerton is one symptom of a disease that's coming straight from the top. cc your senators and reps on your hatemail to those motherfuckers.
I think the important point is that the problem of data obselesence goes way beyond the drives, formats, or what have you, into problems of materials and the relevance of the information itself.