Ah youth. It was the phone company too. What's more, they only came in one style, modern ugly, and you didn't own it. Which made it, incidentally, actually illegal to turn the bell off (since you had to open the case and hack the hardware to accomplish this). Don't like it? Go to another phone company. (Please look up "Hobson's Choice").
At least you could paint your Ford any color you wanted after you bought it. (Although the Stanley Bros. would get livid if you did this to a Steamer)
Why, in the old days all we had to do to change the interface was get out the soldering iron and reconfigure some bistable multivibrators around. Then just drill a few new holes in the panel, add some blinken lights, and Presto!
But can you get a drop in bolt on the kill switch that can only be removed with dynamite these days? Nooooooooooooo! Can't even get a bloody Molly Guard for the things. Any damned kid can just walk right up and reboot the thing over and over again to their sticky little heart's delight.
"Daddy, what are you working on?" Boot.
Arrrrgh!
It's unseemly. Kids don't know how good things used to be.
As it happens I *do* place function before form when it comes to my house. Then I make sure that the function is performed in an asthetically pleasing fashion, without upsetting the function.
Thus my house is pleasant to live in AND look at, while being cheaper than the "standard" house to build and own and will be in good enough condition to hand down to my grand kids.
I configure my computer interface, as much as I can, in the same manner.
A salt box is practical and may conform to current fashion trends, but has continued to look classically good for nearly 400 years. Although a bit dour for some the Scottish Castle on the Moor has continued to asthetically please for a thousand years, and people will spend millions just to possess one.
It'll will still look good a thousand years hence, and perhaps will even still be standing.
Whereas today's "good looking" interface will simply look "Oh so early 21st century" five years from now.
Get a Cord L29. Nobody's built a better looking car in 75 years.
The only thing you have to configure when you register is your registration information.
Most people don't register because they *don't want to register.* Just as they don't register for the NYT. It's an anonimity issue, not an interface one. ( Ok, some of them don't register because they want to be jackasses, that's still an anonimity issue. And some who register don't seem to be put off about being jackasses at all).
I'd agree that most people don't change the defaults *much,* but you might be surprised over how adamant they can get about being able to make their few and minor changes.
The problem is that everyone's "can't live without" change is different.
For me it's background color ( who at MS thought that "teal vomit" was an attractive color?) and trashcan location (lower right, always. Period.)And every time I see something labeled "My" something or other I nuke that bastard as fast as I can. ..*IF* the interface allows me to. What's left continues to irritate to all eternity.
For you it might be a "start" menu. Me, I think Apple got it right the first time with a drop down menu bar, but I'll cope.
There's always some little thing about an interface that is just going to drive some people stark raving bugfuck. There's no reason they shouldn't be able to change these things.
Otherwise offices across the world are just going be to full of people shouting "Arrrrrrrrrrgh!" All day.
It should be stripped down to only those features that I like, arranged in a manner that helps me work the way I want to. Nothing more, nothing less.
How that effects *you* is *your* problem.
(Please note that the above is not the opinion of managment and is a piece written by the author with his tounge planted a bit in his cheek as an illustrative example of the essential problem in a reductio absurdum sort of way and vaguely following somewhat unclear tenets of the Scoratic Method. It has come to our attention that the Socratic Method may be prohibited by law in Athens, so we advise our Athenian compatriots to don their helms of wisdom and avoid reading the above lest they fall into coruption and dissolution. Hail Athena! Sparta must die! Oh, sorry, got carried away a bit there.)
Ah, therein lies part of the problem. "Pro-government" is a fashion, and changes with the tide, phase of the moon and every election.
Nothing is safe comrade. Nothing.
I think Jame Fennimore Cooper is fairly safe under any concievable future, but Twain is right out. ( If you can stomach Cooper, see Twain. Oh the irony).
Because this is indicative of Bill's personal attitude toward his product and customers.
Nor is there any overt evidence that this attitude has changed.
It isn't merely a mistake in prediction, nor does it having anything to do with a *particular* product so it doesn't matter how many products have been introduced since. It could be a thousand of them. It doesn't matter.
Nor does this statement stand on its own. It's just one more in a long line of prognostications, statements, threats and temper tantrums that show an essential disdain, not just for his customers, but for other people in general.
There is a presumption that the burgler has no right to be there in the first place.The analogy does not stand. The students have every right to use the network. They've even payed for the right.
If you rent an apartment to a hot girl, do you have a right to install a peephole in her shower?
You are incorrect. Einstein's Special Theory of Relativity is a fundamental "Law" of motion just as observable as Newton's, and in fact makes up a refinment of those "laws."
Newton's Law is nothing more than special case of Einstein's Theory.
You may assume anything you wish, but I was refering to Relativity, not Evolution.
The Theory of evolution should not be taught as a law for the same reason Relativity should not be taught as a law.
Yes, we should, and in fact, in reality if not in practice, we already have.
No scientist with half a head on his shoulders really thinks of laws as "laws" any more. They're observations of behaviour reduced to a mathmatical form for the purposes of understanding and prediction.
That is why it's Eintstein's *Theory* of Special Relativity, even though it is an even more accurate rendering of Newton's "Law." We gave up laws a century or so ago.
While at times language changes distressingly fast there are times when it seems impossible to change at all.
This is one of those times.
I'm afraid the resulting confussion, allowing President's to say dumb shit like "It's only a theory," may well never subside.
Imagine that the fuel pump in your car breaks down. You need to get somewhere and don't have the parts to fix the fuel pump, but you do a good stock of odd stuff lying about. So you take a bottle, some hose, and a coat hanger, fill the bottle with gasoline, run the hose into it and hang the lot from your dome light, allowing gravity to feed fuel to the carb. (Yes, I've actally done this. It's a real world example).
Or, your boat has a hole in the hull, so you dive overboard, throw some canvas and underwater putty over it, and go on your way.
Your car and boat are still broken and require repairs of their fundamental structure, but, for the moment, can be considered as functioning normally.
One can kludge software in a like manner at times.
My parents use webmail all the time. They're travel writers and webmail allows them to send and receive mail from anywhere in the world they can gain web access.
For such people webmail can be the difference between having email and not.
That said I'm with you on text mode for mail. It's resource friendly and easy to read. After a few obligitory years of going gaa gaa over WYSIWYG, fonts and white backgrounds I've discovered that, oddly enough, text mode is the ideal method of handly pure text.
The flaw is in the protocol. OpenSSL has produce a security patch in *their implimentation* that protects the hole in the protocol, but the flaw in the protocol remains.
All other implimentations that have not been so patched remain vulnerable.
No. The issue at stake here isn't free speach, although that might be a little hard to understand.
The issue is who is *liable* for the speach.
This law, in essence, says that the theater owner is responsible for *preventing* anyone from yelling "fire" ilegally, and so if someone does it is the theater owner who can be prosocuted.
The actual legality of so yelling stands as a seperate issue.
Slashdot Mirror
I know, that's why I joined in, in kind. :)
KFG
Ah youth. It was the phone company too. What's more, they only came in one style, modern ugly, and you didn't own it. Which made it, incidentally, actually illegal to turn the bell off (since you had to open the case and hack the hardware to accomplish this). Don't like it? Go to another phone company. (Please look up "Hobson's Choice").
At least you could paint your Ford any color you wanted after you bought it. (Although the Stanley Bros. would get livid if you did this to a Steamer)
Those were the good old days.
KFG
Why, in the old days all we had to do to change the interface was get out the soldering iron and reconfigure some bistable multivibrators around. Then just drill a few new holes in the panel, add some blinken lights, and Presto!
But can you get a drop in bolt on the kill switch that can only be removed with dynamite these days? Nooooooooooooo! Can't even get a bloody Molly Guard for the things. Any damned kid can just walk right up and reboot the thing over and over again to their sticky little heart's delight.
"Daddy, what are you working on?" Boot.
Arrrrgh!
It's unseemly. Kids don't know how good things used to be.
KFG
As it happens I *do* place function before form when it comes to my house. Then I make sure that the function is performed in an asthetically pleasing fashion, without upsetting the function.
Thus my house is pleasant to live in AND look at, while being cheaper than the "standard" house to build and own and will be in good enough condition to hand down to my grand kids.
I configure my computer interface, as much as I can, in the same manner.
A salt box is practical and may conform to current fashion trends, but has continued to look classically good for nearly 400 years. Although a bit dour for some the Scottish Castle on the Moor has continued to asthetically please for a thousand years, and people will spend millions just to possess one.
It'll will still look good a thousand years hence, and perhaps will even still be standing.
Whereas today's "good looking" interface will simply look "Oh so early 21st century" five years from now.
Get a Cord L29. Nobody's built a better looking car in 75 years.
KFG
The only thing you have to configure when you register is your registration information.
.*IF* the interface allows me to. What's left continues to irritate to all eternity.
Most people don't register because they *don't want to register.* Just as they don't register for the NYT. It's an anonimity issue, not an interface one. ( Ok, some of them don't register because they want to be jackasses, that's still an anonimity issue. And some who register don't seem to be put off about being jackasses at all).
I'd agree that most people don't change the defaults *much,* but you might be surprised over how adamant they can get about being able to make their few and minor changes.
The problem is that everyone's "can't live without" change is different.
For me it's background color ( who at MS thought that "teal vomit" was an attractive color?) and trashcan location (lower right, always. Period.)And every time I see something labeled "My" something or other I nuke that bastard as fast as I can. .
For you it might be a "start" menu. Me, I think Apple got it right the first time with a drop down menu bar, but I'll cope.
There's always some little thing about an interface that is just going to drive some people stark raving bugfuck. There's no reason they shouldn't be able to change these things.
Otherwise offices across the world are just going be to full of people shouting "Arrrrrrrrrrgh!" All day.
KFG
It should be stripped down to only those features that I like, arranged in a manner that helps me work the way I want to. Nothing more, nothing less.
How that effects *you* is *your* problem.
(Please note that the above is not the opinion of managment and is a piece written by the author with his tounge planted a bit in his cheek as an illustrative example of the essential problem in a reductio absurdum sort of way and vaguely following somewhat unclear tenets of the Scoratic Method. It has come to our attention that the Socratic Method may be prohibited by law in Athens, so we advise our Athenian compatriots to don their helms of wisdom and avoid reading the above lest they fall into coruption and dissolution. Hail Athena! Sparta must die! Oh, sorry, got carried away a bit there.)
KFG
Ah, therein lies part of the problem. "Pro-government" is a fashion, and changes with the tide, phase of the moon and every election.
Nothing is safe comrade. Nothing.
I think Jame Fennimore Cooper is fairly safe under any concievable future, but Twain is right out. ( If you can stomach Cooper, see Twain. Oh the irony).
KFG
your rights.
It was to preserve your way of life. You wouldn't mind giving up your constitutional rights to preserve your freedom, now would you.
Otherwise the terrorists win you see.
SIEG HI.... cough. Er, excuse me. Reflex.
KFG
It's not just you.
But what about Mien Kampf, or anything by Engels or Marx? How about the Koran, or Civil Disobedience?
Or Farenheit 451.
Should we also have to be so careful about reading these?
How's your memory?
KFG
"Because it gives a new level of control over the hardware, it's also of interest to digital rights management and security designers."
So basically what we have here is combined BIOS/Boot track that Turbo Tax has explicit *permission* to write to, but perhaps you don't?
Oh, gee, goody. Just what I had asked Santa for.
KFG
Because this is indicative of Bill's personal attitude toward his product and customers.
Nor is there any overt evidence that this attitude has changed.
It isn't merely a mistake in prediction, nor does it having anything to do with a *particular* product so it doesn't matter how many products have been introduced since. It could be a thousand of them. It doesn't matter.
Nor does this statement stand on its own. It's just one more in a long line of prognostications, statements, threats and temper tantrums that show an essential disdain, not just for his customers, but for other people in general.
It isn't about MS. It's about Bill. As a person.
KFG
There is a presumption that the burgler has no right to be there in the first place.The analogy does not stand. The students have every right to use the network. They've even payed for the right.
If you rent an apartment to a hot girl, do you have a right to install a peephole in her shower?
I mean, it's YOUR property, right?
KFG
Yeah, that's what I told the guys at Motel 6, but they had the paperwork to prove I was wrong,
Go figure.
You can enforce the copyright on three bits, if each of those bits has a descrete meaning.
My Sweet Lord/He's so Fine
KFG
That'll just 'em a date with the Prof.
KFG
"Yo! Surfacant. Wurd bitch!"
KFG
You are incorrect. Einstein's Special Theory of Relativity is a fundamental "Law" of motion just as observable as Newton's, and in fact makes up a refinment of those "laws."
Newton's Law is nothing more than special case of Einstein's Theory.
You may assume anything you wish, but I was refering to Relativity, not Evolution.
The Theory of evolution should not be taught as a law for the same reason Relativity should not be taught as a law.
There are *no* laws. Only observation and theory.
KFG
You don't use the Linux command line, do you? :)
KFG
It isn't a speculation because it was based on observation, and the fact that the factor would change over time was included.
It isn't a theorem, again because it was based on observation. It isn't provable.
So either observation or theory would have been appropriate.
We like our little "Laws" though ( such as Murphy's), so, like it or not, law it is, and law it shall remain.
Law's are so comforting to the masses, don'cha know. They eliminate all the messy conditional shit real life is made up of.
KFG
Yes, we should, and in fact, in reality if not in practice, we already have.
No scientist with half a head on his shoulders really thinks of laws as "laws" any more. They're observations of behaviour reduced to a mathmatical form for the purposes of understanding and prediction.
That is why it's Eintstein's *Theory* of Special Relativity, even though it is an even more accurate rendering of Newton's "Law." We gave up laws a century or so ago.
While at times language changes distressingly fast there are times when it seems impossible to change at all.
This is one of those times.
I'm afraid the resulting confussion, allowing President's to say dumb shit like "It's only a theory," may well never subside.
KFG
What, you didn't know what gaa stood for?
KFG
:) I was wondering if perhaps I was being a bit too subtle there for the masses. Glad to know someone "got" it.
Rather amusingly too.
KFG
Imagine that the fuel pump in your car breaks down. You need to get somewhere and don't have the parts to fix the fuel pump, but you do a good stock of odd stuff lying about. So you take a bottle, some hose, and a coat hanger, fill the bottle with gasoline, run the hose into it and hang the lot from your dome light, allowing gravity to feed fuel to the carb. (Yes, I've actally done this. It's a real world example).
Or, your boat has a hole in the hull, so you dive overboard, throw some canvas and underwater putty over it, and go on your way.
Your car and boat are still broken and require repairs of their fundamental structure, but, for the moment, can be considered as functioning normally.
One can kludge software in a like manner at times.
This is one of those times.
KFG
My parents use webmail all the time. They're travel writers and webmail allows them to send and receive mail from anywhere in the world they can gain web access.
For such people webmail can be the difference between having email and not.
That said I'm with you on text mode for mail. It's resource friendly and easy to read. After a few obligitory years of going gaa gaa over WYSIWYG, fonts and white backgrounds I've discovered that, oddly enough, text mode is the ideal method of handly pure text.
Go figure.
KFG
Wait, your *both* right.
The flaw is in the protocol. OpenSSL has produce a security patch in *their implimentation* that protects the hole in the protocol, but the flaw in the protocol remains.
All other implimentations that have not been so patched remain vulnerable.
KFG
No. The issue at stake here isn't free speach, although that might be a little hard to understand.
The issue is who is *liable* for the speach.
This law, in essence, says that the theater owner is responsible for *preventing* anyone from yelling "fire" ilegally, and so if someone does it is the theater owner who can be prosocuted.
The actual legality of so yelling stands as a seperate issue.
KFG