Re:It probably wasn't that bad of an idea
on
Nuke-Lobbing
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· Score: 1
Uhhh... I believe the tests were done in unpopulated areas. I think there will be a slight difference when 2000 detonations are done in highly populated areas with the objective to cause as much harm as possible. Sure it won't be the end of the world, I guess that makes it OK. As long as it is NIMBY, huh?
...this is totally consistent with the appointment of Daniel Pipes to the board of United States Institute of Peace. Recall that Pipes is the famous guy who initiated the Campus-Watch campaign not long ago, a campaign to blacklist professors who show sympathy for the Muslims. Kinda like appointing a wolf to herd the sheeps.
I can't believe that TamMan2000 got a 2 for a simple and correct explanation of the phenomenon, and a couple of guys for a 4 and 5 for spewing some "I heard something dunno what really but it makes sense". Says a lot about the ability of the moderators to detect bullshit, huh? Strangely sad...
Winners are CEOs, those who already have money and make the decisions. The other 90% of the lower paid workers may gain or lose, but it will be purely incidental.
Suppose the nanites were to grab hold of each other to form small clusters of more substantial wing-like objects? Also, if a nanite could change its shape at all, then it could grab hold of adjacent nanites and mimic muscle contraction.
And the collective surface area for solar enerygy conversion for a tightly packed bunch of nanobots would be...?
Wouldn't the same argument apply - if they worked together while the energy output of an individual wouldn't be much they might have a cumulative effect.
I think Dyson is talking about the problem of energy input.
Yes, the drag decreases with size, but the drag per unit cross-sectional area increases as size decrease. Let's work an estimation.
At such small size, the drag force on a particle is approximated by what is known as Stokes' drag, which you can look up in any undergrad book on fluid mechanics. Stokes drag for a small sphere is
F = 6 * pi * dynamic viscosity * radius * velocity = 6 * PI * DV * R * V
For other shape, the difference is not great, definitely within an order of m
agnitude. So, yes, as the radius R gets smaller, the drag force decrease. howe
ver, the pressure increases:
P = drag force / area = F / A
For a sphere, the cross sectional area is:
A = PI * R^2
So, combining the equation:
P = F / A = 6 * DV * V / R
Now, the radius (size) is the denominator (bottom)! So, as R gets smaller, p
ressure P increases! A particle ten times as small needs to preduce ten times as much pressure to stay at the same velocity! This is considering size in terms
of linear scale. Real objects are 3D, so if it is 10 times smaller in 1 length
scale, then it is 1000 times smaller in volume. Assuming constant density, when you shrink a nanobot by 10 times linearly, you have to produce 1000*10 times more pressure per unit mass of nanobot to fly at the same velocity!!!!
I worked out a rough estimate of a red blood cell size particle at standard atmospheric conditions:
R = 0.5 * 10^(-5) m
V = 5 m/s (almost a sprint)
DV = 2 * 10^(-5) Newton * s/m^2
You get a pressure of 120 Newton/m^2 !!! What does this mean? This mean that a single layer of nanobots, lining the bottom of a 12kg piece of wood that is 1m by 1m, and levitating it! Now, go to K-Mart and buy a fan that can produce that much force
After reading through the posts so far, it seems like the discussion is more or less centered around nationalism, which is often confused/intermixed with racism. I suppose I'll throw in my $0.02 in that bin.
I am a foreign student in the US from Malaysia, and I can only give you my personal perspective, but I think many foreigners from third world countries can find some agreement in my experiences.
The golden goose is the US academic research. Here is the 10000ft view: People come to US to do research for three main reasons, very good economic standard of living, amazing varieties/opportunities in research, and in a lesser sense, some personal freedom. This is a great deal for the US. How? Well, the foreign countries pay (not just money wise!) for the education up to about 20 years old, then US reap the reward. Not only does US get to pick the best that those countries have to offer, she also gets them at the most productive age of 20-30. There can be no better deal than what the US is getting. Anyone who thinks that US is disadvantaged by admitting so many foreign students is mistaken.
This is one of the main reasons USA can maintain her supremacy.
Recently, things are changing for the worse for US. It will probably hurt US if this dumb nationalism continues for a long time. How are things changing? It is changing in the sense that it is getting harder for foreigners and students to come in. Things have been getting progressively worse over the years, usually after an attack on US like the Kenya US embassy bombing. However, it got a _lot_ worse after 9/11, _and_ after the INS had been creamed in the press for issuing a VISA to one of the dead 9/11 hijackers.
What happened is that INS went into paranoia/PR overdrive. Before that, the attitude is just arrogance "you gonna stay illegally and steal a piece of our hard earned economic pie!!" Now, it is arrogance with paranoia "you freedom-hating terrorists gonna kill us freedom loving people!!!!!!"
I must clarify that this arrogance I only detect at the US embassy in my country and at the LAX immigration line. I will give more specific examples.
Going to the US embassy in my country to get a VISA pretty much means that you will have to swallow your pride completely (and pass it out through the rear orifice), lower yourself to the social level of a diseased pariah dog on the street, and prepare to beg for a VISA. The experience is completely humiliating. Does it make one angry? Hell, yes. This is not good. My sister is still peeved that she was denied a VISA to come to visit me (this was before 9/11). For those knee-jerks who are about to say "why come to US then? we don't need you": your wisdom and understanding is beyond reproach, so just can it.
As for the LAX immigration check point experience that I had, this asshole was asking me for a certain piece of document that I did not need to have, I said I didn't have it and I didn't know at that time that I did not need to have it (my H1-B employer had it), and he kept asking me where it was! WTF? He let me through anyway (because I did not need to have that document, and he damn well knew it), but needless to say it was not a fun experience for me. WTF? WTF? Why generate this ill will? (This was before 9/11 also.)
Not all people associated with INS is anal like that! Not at all! Remember that anthrax incident? Well, I happened to send in my passport for VISA renewal at that time, and lady luck hated me because my passport arrived at the huge government mail sorting center the day anthrax was discovered in one of the 10^6 letters. My passport, along with a lot of other letters, went nto a black hole and "should be considered lost." During this time, the INS peeple that contacted me were very, very courteous. Although they couldn't do much--I think they have no control over the documents anymore, probably something like FBI is doing the "disinfecting." But the INS people were surprisingly pleasant given the circumstances.
Anyway, about the current state of affairs with INS... The numbers of rules that are being released from that tower is amazing. Every month there is a new rule. The problem is that the rules are pretty much useless. It is trying to treat the symptoms of terrorism, like shooting at anything that seem to move, in complete darkness. In fact, I would guess that it is excabating the situation by brewing ill-will. Last year, 150 returning students were denied VISAs, from my country alone. It used to be that getting a VISA, besides the humiliation, was just a three day wait (before that, it was a half-day wait). Now, it will take over a month. Few would want to return home for month long breaks because you might not return in time for the next semester, if at all. Is this helping anything in any sense? Besides, the airlines is losing your business.:-)
After all that, guess what happened to me? I requested for a transfer of status from H1-B to F1 because I was going back to school to finish what I started 10 years ago, and the transfer was stalled with a request for more information. Even though I had given all the info that was normally requested, INS requested for more info. To show the level of intelligence that was behind my case, one of the questions I had to answer was "how do you plan to go to school 3000 miles away in state B when you are in state A (where I was working under H1-B then)." Dunno, I suppose I had to quit my job if I didn't want to commute and/or work illegally after the termination of my H1-B? 8^) Anyway, after screwing a few things up for me and giving me some heart warming reassurances that my future is up in the air, my request for transfer was just approved. One semester late. And they totally left out my surname (last name to you Americans) in the approving document. LOL. So they are "screening" with that level of competence? Good luck catching anything real, and try not to shotgun too many innocents in the process.:-)
Completing the circle... It is getting harder for a foreigner to come here as student. Remember the golden goose? I suppose that means it is being harassed more and more. So what is happening now is probably not good for the USA. Will it affect US competitiveness in the future? Maybe, maybe not. Maybe if this gets much worse, or continues much longer (I think we are talking about decades time frame for any measurable effects), US will suffer. Maybe not. But I think it doesn't solve or help in the problem of terrorism. I think the problem lies else where and is much more complicated. So in conclusion I think this is just a lot of pain for hardly any gain, fueled by an INS with eggs in her face, and sustained by various factors (general paranoia, ignorance, and un-wisdom).
As a side note:
For those people who keep harping about the "Golden Rule: He who holds the gold makes the rule." This statement is only used to explain reality, don't mistake it as a moral justification (unless that's the level of your morality). Why? Just because a person has the upper hand and can make the rules, doesn't mean he will make a good rule. Also, you might have to go deeper to ask how did he get the upper hand in the first place? Is he making good rules? Are people squirming under him? Is he thinking for everyones best interest? Or is he just maintaining the status quo at the expense of general improvement? Don't be unwise.
I find it amusing that after you have several pies in your face, for being lazy, tried a face save by saying that there are already pies in your face. Heh. You deserve more pies in your face. Here's another. Take it like a man.
Boy, some apologists for the Judeo-Christian diety
on
Google vs. Evil
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· Score: 1
Amazing how some people can justify a genocidal maniac. Check out the Old Testamant. As a sample, here's a little snippet:
Deuteronomy 20:11-16:
11 And it shall be, if it make thee answer of peace, and open unto thee, then it shall be, that all the people that is found therein shall be tributaries unto thee, and they shall serve thee. 12 And if it will make no peace with thee, but will make war against thee, then thou shalt besiege it: 13 And when the LORD thy God hath delivered it into thine hands, thou shalt smite every male thereof with the edge of the sword: 14 But the women, and the little ones, and the cattle, and all that is in the city, even all the spoil thereof, shalt thou take unto thyself; and thou shalt eat the spoil of thine enemies, which the LORD thy God hath given thee. 15 Thus shalt thou do unto all the cities which are very far off from thee, which are not of the cities of these nations. 16 But of the cities of these people, which the LORD thy God doth give thee for an inheritance, thou shalt save alive nothing that breatheth:
I was a devout Christian once, with strong burning for the Lord, so to speak. But the more I read the bible, the more things seemed askew. It became irreconcilable how can a loving God do those kinds of things! In order to be honest to myself (I am useless to anyone otherwise!), I had to take leave from Jesus & Co. And now when I read those same verses again, they make my blood boil. Slavery, murder, paranoia, blind self-righteousness, horrible self-justification.
Can anyone who is honest and unbiased imagine any society/leader that holds those attitudes (and does those things) today without being deemed evil if not outright inhuman?
The quote is out of context? What context should it be interpreted under? Safety?...do unto all the cities which are very far off from thee...? I suppose they had to, after their God-commanded actions, I am sure a few neighbors are pissed off. The best that can be said about God and His people is that they are no better than anyone else.
Yeah, but God is now loving? What? He saw the error of His former ways? Those people are too far gone? Even babies? For goodnesssake, even cattles must be eradicated?...thou shalt save alive nothing that breatheth... My God....
I went with Telocity (before they got bought up by DirecTV). The deal was really good. Free modem use. DHCP set up (with explicit support for non-MS and non-Apple OSes), static IP, no restriction about hosting your own server, 1.5Mbps down, $39.95/mo.
After DirecTV, the main change was bumping up the monthly to $49.95, otherwise it was the same.
There goes another decent CLEC, and that's unfortunate.
After I moved to a region where DirecTV was not available, I shopped for broadband providers. It was sad how Verizon is providing the competition access to their local loop:
You have the choice of complete Verizon DSL service for $45/mo, or you can go with a third party, which then you will still have to pay Verizon for their local loop of ~$40, in addition to the ~$25 third party ISP internet service. For the same speed. It is clear that Verizon is screwing the third party ISP because they can get away with it.
Are you saying that it is better to not do anything because someone might say that he is a good boy or that he is doing it out of self-interest? Or are you saying that he is actually doing it out of self-interest? Or are you saying anything at all?
It could be that the action is sincere, or it could be that the action is taken for personal advantage under the pretext of fighting for the common good. But you are throwing dirt without giving any evidence beyond some hearsay.
Someone does something, and won some acclaim for that (deserved or not), then that someone must be doing it for his own good only, according to your logic? This kind of tenuous accusation will only work on people who don't use their whole reasoning faculty to examine real evidence and instead jump to conclusion easily (especially if the insinuation is inline with their preconceived idea of How Things Should Be (TM)). Unfortunately, that describes way too many people.
Or maybe I just need some sleep.:-) But, anyway...
...99.99% of the vendor and user uses the same kernel.
When do we really see the _same_ kernel? Probably on all Dell
Dimension L337. And you betcha that those Dimension L337 will have the
same BIOS as well. Now, let's say that Dell also has Dimension K3WL,
with a different BIOS of course, since BIOS are specific to the hardware.
Well, guess what, you can also betcha that the K3WL will have a
different kernel than the L337. If you are going to argue that they
are the same kernel, then I will argue that they are the same BIOS,
from Pheonix BIOS. What? Just because a kernel has the same set of
(unused) modules means that they are the same? It is just the opposite!
The modules exist because it is obvious that each computer is different!
If they are the same, why not just a monolitic chunk, why the modules?
So I submit to you the idea that the kernel varies much more than
the BIOS. So I will challenge your claim that 99.99% of all (linux)
kernels are the same.
After reading your post... wow! What happened there?
...a BIOS is not like an operating system... that can be said to
about everything under the sun. Also, I can make the counter point:
a BIOS is somewhat like an OS, and that would seem sensible as well.
Unfortunately, a XXX is somewhat like a YYY is just as bogus as
a XXX is not like a YYY.
Of course, you tried to qualify that with more unsustainable stuff.
99.99% of the vendors and users DO NOT use the same exact version, they
use the kernel that is specific to their system. It could have been
monolitically compiled, or it could be modular, but 99.99% of the kernel
out there are not the same. Even the sources are not the same.
The Red Hat 2.4.18 has different diffs than Linus' tree, so I claim that
that is distinguishing Red Hat. So, a BIOS can be very similar to a
kernel, with all kinds of drivers available but not necessarily built
into a specific version. So your claim of a BIOS being different from
a kernel is not holding so much water now.
As for vendor distinguishing their BIOS, what is to prevent them from
modifying the BIOS? Unless you mean that they will lose their labor?
So they can profit but not share for real? That is bogus and that is
not GPL. There are other BIOS out there that they can buy/license if they
have super secret that cannot be given away. But that is bogus as well.
What is hightech superduper today, will be hoohum next year--the hardware
is out there, the BIOS is out there, people can see and figure out what
it does. Unless you are a proponent of DCMA. Even without reverse
engineering, people see a neat piece of BIOS feature, and they say,
Hey! That's neat! and they will come up with an alternate way of doing
the same thing, or better. Unless you also want to use patents to lock
down everything.
So there is nothing really much to gain in keeping it super secret.
Beside, if the competitor doesn't have your hardware, then what is the
use of the special BIOS to them? If the competitor has similar hardware,
then the BIOS is becoming more and more like a generic OS/SW isn't it?
So, MS took the BSD TCP/IP stack, and who gained from it? We the
people? I guess so, huh? We paid for stabler Windows, right? That is
your idea of free-er? Com'n! Why not release MS' enhancements so that
we all can get stabler everything?
If you consider a requirement to share the same thing that you have
been shared with a constraint or special obligations, well, that
is sad. And, yes, GPL is not for you. There are other licenses that
you can use. The LinuxBIOS people want to share and want other people to
share, that is why they choose GPL. They don't want their code co-opted.
Asking why the LinuxBIOS is not on a free-er license is, well,:-), bogus, and seems a little insulting to the LinuxBIOS people.
GPL is less free is bogus. You attempt to justify code un-sharing is
bogus. Your suggestion that the LinuxBIOS people don't know why they
choose GPL, and that another license is better because you know what
they want better than they themselves, is bogus. It is sad, but you
don't have a leg to stand on here.
You are missing the point, Brett. They license it under GPL is
exactly so that the code will remain free. If you don't want to
share, well, you can't use this BIOS. That is GPL. To say that GPL is
less free than the MIT or Artistic or the BSD License is really bogus.
I will claim just the opposite--that GPL is in fact more free than those,
because GPL ensures that the code is free for the most people, not just
some small group of people/corporation.
You have been around, so I am sure that you have heard that before.
I don't know why you say that the GPL is less free. I think that is
very misleading.
LeDuc said it is fairer to charge researchers for the articles they use than to charge taxpayers for the cost of running a Web site that makes them available for free.
Translate: LeDuc said that it is better to make him and his employers rich than to make knowledge freely available, and that it doesn't matter if any of the research (lots of it, if not most of it) were funded by the government, i.e., funded by the public.
What research have LeDuc and his friends funded lately? Sad.
Not for money: There is not much monetary value to gain from MS suing anyone in particular.
Not for technical advantage: There is hardly anything from MS that can be regarded as technilcally superior.
Sue for PR: The strongest reason would be to sue for PR. Look at all the lawsuits, most of the time the biggest
fanfare is when you see headlines XXX, Co. sues YYY, Inc. And usually the result (which ever way it goes,
unless the settlement is an enormous sum) of the lawsuit is normally treated with less fanfare, especially if the defendent
is found innocent. People in general remember the lawsuit, but not the result. That way you can tarnish the image
of the defendent, unless the defendent spends a significant amount of resources to publicize its innocent. With that
in mind, MS will probably sue the most visible symbol of linux, Red Hat, or sue the top 10 linux distros. Just to
tarnish linux's image, create FUD in customers' (small) minds. MS doesn't have to win--just need to create enough FUD.
OS X, 1 architecture and 2 sound cards to support.
Linux, bazillion architecture and gazillion sound cards to support.
That troll exaggerated the difficulty of installing ALSA on DEBIAN, misrepresenting it as enabling sound on Linux in general. Then he oversimplified OS X. So he is either a flamebait (half-truths and lies, like a politician) or a really dumbass.
Isn't Apple going to release OS X for x86? Well, wait till that happens, then ask that troll/dumbass to run OS X on X86. And I can tell you what is going to happen--he'll have to buy his hardware according to an "approved HW list" published by Apple, and you can bet there are going to be an amazing choice of 3 motherboards and 4 soundcards on that list.
There is nothing insightful or interesting about that post.
Slashdot Mirror
Uhhh... I believe the tests were done in unpopulated areas. I think there will be a slight difference when 2000 detonations are done in highly populated areas with the objective to cause as much harm as possible. Sure it won't be the end of the world, I guess that makes it OK. As long as it is NIMBY, huh?
Cheers, or not,
e.
it is 42, of course.
...this is totally consistent with the appointment of Daniel Pipes to the board of United States Institute of Peace. Recall that Pipes is the famous guy who initiated the Campus-Watch campaign not long ago, a campaign to blacklist professors who show sympathy for the Muslims. Kinda like appointing a wolf to herd the sheeps.
Beautiful, ain't it?
Cheers,
e.
I can't believe that TamMan2000 got a 2 for a simple and correct explanation of the phenomenon, and a couple of guys for a 4 and 5 for spewing some "I heard something dunno what really but it makes sense". Says a lot about the ability of the moderators to detect bullshit, huh? Strangely sad...
Cheers,
e.
Let's see this simple ficticious scenario:
3 possible votes.
2 votes were cast.
2/3 = 33.3333333%
Conclusion: WTF? Which moron cast the fractional vote?
Go back to school and pay attention in class this time.
Cheers,
e.
Who wins? Who loses?
Winners are CEOs, those who already have money and make the decisions. The other 90% of the lower paid workers may gain or lose, but it will be purely incidental.
Cheers,
e.
Suppose the nanites were to grab hold of each other to form small clusters of more substantial wing-like objects? Also, if a nanite could change its shape at all, then it could grab hold of adjacent nanites and mimic muscle contraction.
And the collective surface area for solar enerygy conversion for a tightly packed bunch of nanobots would be...?
Wouldn't the same argument apply - if they worked together while the energy output of an individual wouldn't be much they might have a cumulative effect.
I think Dyson is talking about the problem of energy input.
Cheers,
e.
Yes, the drag decreases with size, but the drag per unit cross-sectional area increases as size decrease. Let's work an estimation.
At such small size, the drag force on a particle is approximated by what is known as Stokes' drag, which you can look up in any undergrad book on fluid mechanics. Stokes drag for a small sphere is
F = 6 * pi * dynamic viscosity * radius * velocity = 6 * PI * DV * R * V
For other shape, the difference is not great, definitely within an order of m agnitude. So, yes, as the radius R gets smaller, the drag force decrease. howe ver, the pressure increases:
P = drag force / area = F / A
For a sphere, the cross sectional area is:
A = PI * R^2
So, combining the equation:
P = F / A = 6 * DV * V / R
Now, the radius (size) is the denominator (bottom)! So, as R gets smaller, p ressure P increases! A particle ten times as small needs to preduce ten times as much pressure to stay at the same velocity! This is considering size in terms of linear scale. Real objects are 3D, so if it is 10 times smaller in 1 length scale, then it is 1000 times smaller in volume. Assuming constant density, when you shrink a nanobot by 10 times linearly, you have to produce 1000*10 times more pressure per unit mass of nanobot to fly at the same velocity!!!!
I worked out a rough estimate of a red blood cell size particle at standard atmospheric conditions:
R = 0.5 * 10^(-5) m
V = 5 m/s (almost a sprint)
DV = 2 * 10^(-5) Newton * s/m^2
You get a pressure of 120 Newton/m^2 !!! What does this mean? This mean that a single layer of nanobots, lining the bottom of a 12kg piece of wood that is 1m by 1m, and levitating it! Now, go to K-Mart and buy a fan that can produce that much force
Cheers,
e.
Just saw the scanning originating from my friend's Windows machine. So at least it is not Linux only, if at all.
Cheers,
e.
After reading through the posts so far, it seems like the discussion is more or less centered around nationalism, which is often confused/intermixed with racism. I suppose I'll throw in my $0.02 in that bin.
I am a foreign student in the US from Malaysia, and I can only give you my personal perspective, but I think many foreigners from third world countries can find some agreement in my experiences.
The golden goose is the US academic research. Here is the 10000ft view: People come to US to do research for three main reasons, very good economic standard of living, amazing varieties/opportunities in research, and in a lesser sense, some personal freedom. This is a great deal for the US. How? Well, the foreign countries pay (not just money wise!) for the education up to about 20 years old, then US reap the reward. Not only does US get to pick the best that those countries have to offer, she also gets them at the most productive age of 20-30. There can be no better deal than what the US is getting. Anyone who thinks that US is disadvantaged by admitting so many foreign students is mistaken.
This is one of the main reasons USA can maintain her supremacy.
Recently, things are changing for the worse for US. It will probably hurt US if this dumb nationalism continues for a long time. How are things changing? It is changing in the sense that it is getting harder for foreigners and students to come in. Things have been getting progressively worse over the years, usually after an attack on US like the Kenya US embassy bombing. However, it got a _lot_ worse after 9/11, _and_ after the INS had been creamed in the press for issuing a VISA to one of the dead 9/11 hijackers.
What happened is that INS went into paranoia/PR overdrive. Before that, the attitude is just arrogance "you gonna stay illegally and steal a piece of our hard earned economic pie!!" Now, it is arrogance with paranoia "you freedom-hating terrorists gonna kill us freedom loving people!!!!!!"
I must clarify that this arrogance I only detect at the US embassy in my country and at the LAX immigration line. I will give more specific examples.
Going to the US embassy in my country to get a VISA pretty much means that you will have to swallow your pride completely (and pass it out through the rear orifice), lower yourself to the social level of a diseased pariah dog on the street, and prepare to beg for a VISA. The experience is completely humiliating. Does it make one angry? Hell, yes. This is not good. My sister is still peeved that she was denied a VISA to come to visit me (this was before 9/11). For those knee-jerks who are about to say "why come to US then? we don't need you": your wisdom and understanding is beyond reproach, so just can it.
As for the LAX immigration check point experience that I had, this asshole was asking me for a certain piece of document that I did not need to have, I said I didn't have it and I didn't know at that time that I did not need to have it (my H1-B employer had it), and he kept asking me where it was! WTF? He let me through anyway (because I did not need to have that document, and he damn well knew it), but needless to say it was not a fun experience for me. WTF? WTF? Why generate this ill will? (This was before 9/11 also.)
Not all people associated with INS is anal like that! Not at all! Remember that anthrax incident? Well, I happened to send in my passport for VISA renewal at that time, and lady luck hated me because my passport arrived at the huge government mail sorting center the day anthrax was discovered in one of the 10^6 letters. My passport, along with a lot of other letters, went nto a black hole and "should be considered lost." During this time, the INS peeple that contacted me were very, very courteous. Although they couldn't do much--I think they have no control over the documents anymore, probably something like FBI is doing the "disinfecting." But the INS people were surprisingly pleasant given the circumstances.
Anyway, about the current state of affairs with INS... The numbers of rules that are being released from that tower is amazing. Every month there is a new rule. The problem is that the rules are pretty much useless. It is trying to treat the symptoms of terrorism, like shooting at anything that seem to move, in complete darkness. In fact, I would guess that it is excabating the situation by brewing ill-will. Last year, 150 returning students were denied VISAs, from my country alone. It used to be that getting a VISA, besides the humiliation, was just a three day wait (before that, it was a half-day wait). Now, it will take over a month. Few would want to return home for month long breaks because you might not return in time for the next semester, if at all. Is this helping anything in any sense? Besides, the airlines is losing your business. :-)
After all that, guess what happened to me? I requested for a transfer of status from H1-B to F1 because I was going back to school to finish what I started 10 years ago, and the transfer was stalled with a request for more information. Even though I had given all the info that was normally requested, INS requested for more info. To show the level of intelligence that was behind my case, one of the questions I had to answer was "how do you plan to go to school 3000 miles away in state B when you are in state A (where I was working under H1-B then)." Dunno, I suppose I had to quit my job if I didn't want to commute and/or work illegally after the termination of my H1-B? 8^) Anyway, after screwing a few things up for me and giving me some heart warming reassurances that my future is up in the air, my request for transfer was just approved. One semester late. And they totally left out my surname (last name to you Americans) in the approving document. LOL. So they are "screening" with that level of competence? Good luck catching anything real, and try not to shotgun too many innocents in the process. :-)
Completing the circle... It is getting harder for a foreigner to come here as student. Remember the golden goose? I suppose that means it is being harassed more and more. So what is happening now is probably not good for the USA. Will it affect US competitiveness in the future? Maybe, maybe not. Maybe if this gets much worse, or continues much longer (I think we are talking about decades time frame for any measurable effects), US will suffer. Maybe not. But I think it doesn't solve or help in the problem of terrorism. I think the problem lies else where and is much more complicated. So in conclusion I think this is just a lot of pain for hardly any gain, fueled by an INS with eggs in her face, and sustained by various factors (general paranoia, ignorance, and un-wisdom).
As a side note:
For those people who keep harping about the "Golden Rule: He who holds the gold makes the rule." This statement is only used to explain reality, don't mistake it as a moral justification (unless that's the level of your morality). Why? Just because a person has the upper hand and can make the rules, doesn't mean he will make a good rule. Also, you might have to go deeper to ask how did he get the upper hand in the first place? Is he making good rules? Are people squirming under him? Is he thinking for everyones best interest? Or is he just maintaining the status quo at the expense of general improvement? Don't be unwise.
Cheers,
e.
I find it amusing that after you have several pies in your face, for being lazy, tried a face save by saying that there are already pies in your face. Heh. You deserve more pies in your face. Here's another. Take it like a man.
Cheers,
e.
You did say it was right:
Spoils of war are not stealing.
You are too lame to make a stand.
Cheers anyway,
e.
Amazing how some people can justify a genocidal maniac. Check out the Old Testamant. As a sample, here's a little snippet:
Deuteronomy 20:11-16:
11 And it shall be, if it make thee answer of peace, and open unto thee, then it shall be, that all the people that is found therein shall be tributaries unto thee, and they shall serve thee.
12 And if it will make no peace with thee, but will make war against thee, then thou shalt besiege it:
13 And when the LORD thy God hath delivered it into thine hands, thou shalt smite every male thereof with the edge of the sword:
14 But the women, and the little ones, and the cattle, and all that is in the city, even all the spoil thereof, shalt thou take unto thyself; and thou shalt eat the spoil of thine enemies, which the LORD thy God hath given thee.
15 Thus shalt thou do unto all the cities which are very far off from thee, which are not of the cities of these nations.
16 But of the cities of these people, which the LORD thy God doth give thee for an inheritance, thou shalt save alive nothing that breatheth:
I was a devout Christian once, with strong burning for the Lord, so to speak. But the more I read the bible, the more things seemed askew. It became irreconcilable how can a loving God do those kinds of things! In order to be honest to myself (I am useless to anyone otherwise!), I had to take leave from Jesus & Co. And now when I read those same verses again, they make my blood boil. Slavery, murder, paranoia, blind self-righteousness, horrible self-justification.
Can anyone who is honest and unbiased imagine any society/leader that holds those attitudes (and does those things) today without being deemed evil if not outright inhuman?
The quote is out of context? What context should it be interpreted under? Safety? ...do unto all the cities which are very far off from thee...? I suppose they had to, after their God-commanded actions, I am sure a few neighbors are pissed off. The best that can be said about God and His people is that they are no better than anyone else.
Yeah, but God is now loving? What? He saw the error of His former ways? Those people are too far gone? Even babies? For goodnesssake, even cattles must be eradicated? ...thou shalt save alive nothing that breatheth... My God....
Cheers,
e.
I went with Telocity (before they got bought up by DirecTV). The deal was really good. Free modem use. DHCP set up (with explicit support for non-MS and non-Apple OSes), static IP, no restriction about hosting your own server, 1.5Mbps down, $39.95/mo.
After DirecTV, the main change was bumping up the monthly to $49.95, otherwise it was the same.
There goes another decent CLEC, and that's unfortunate.
After I moved to a region where DirecTV was not available, I shopped for broadband providers. It was sad how Verizon is providing the competition access to their local loop:
You have the choice of complete Verizon DSL service for $45/mo, or you can go with a third party, which then you will still have to pay Verizon for their local loop of ~$40, in addition to the ~$25 third party ISP internet service. For the same speed. It is clear that Verizon is screwing the third party ISP because they can get away with it.
Cheers,
e.
Are you saying that it is better to not do anything because someone might say that he is a good boy or that he is doing it out of self-interest? Or are you saying that he is actually doing it out of self-interest? Or are you saying anything at all?
It could be that the action is sincere, or it could be that the action is taken for personal advantage under the pretext of fighting for the common good. But you are throwing dirt without giving any evidence beyond some hearsay.
Someone does something, and won some acclaim for that (deserved or not), then that someone must be doing it for his own good only, according to your logic? This kind of tenuous accusation will only work on people who don't use their whole reasoning faculty to examine real evidence and instead jump to conclusion easily (especially if the insinuation is inline with their preconceived idea of How Things Should Be (TM)). Unfortunately, that describes way too many people.
Cheers,
e.
Or maybe I just need some sleep. :-) But, anyway...
When do we really see the _same_ kernel? Probably on all Dell Dimension L337. And you betcha that those Dimension L337 will have the same BIOS as well. Now, let's say that Dell also has Dimension K3WL, with a different BIOS of course, since BIOS are specific to the hardware. Well, guess what, you can also betcha that the K3WL will have a different kernel than the L337. If you are going to argue that they are the same kernel, then I will argue that they are the same BIOS, from Pheonix BIOS. What? Just because a kernel has the same set of (unused) modules means that they are the same? It is just the opposite! The modules exist because it is obvious that each computer is different! If they are the same, why not just a monolitic chunk, why the modules?
So I submit to you the idea that the kernel varies much more than the BIOS. So I will challenge your claim that 99.99% of all (linux) kernels are the same.
Cheers,
e.
After reading your post... wow! What happened there?
Of course, you tried to qualify that with more unsustainable stuff. 99.99% of the vendors and users DO NOT use the same exact version, they use the kernel that is specific to their system. It could have been monolitically compiled, or it could be modular, but 99.99% of the kernel out there are not the same. Even the sources are not the same. The Red Hat 2.4.18 has different diffs than Linus' tree, so I claim that that is distinguishing Red Hat. So, a BIOS can be very similar to a kernel, with all kinds of drivers available but not necessarily built into a specific version. So your claim of a BIOS being different from a kernel is not holding so much water now.
As for vendor distinguishing their BIOS, what is to prevent them from modifying the BIOS? Unless you mean that they will lose their labor? So they can profit but not share for real? That is bogus and that is not GPL. There are other BIOS out there that they can buy/license if they have super secret that cannot be given away. But that is bogus as well. What is hightech superduper today, will be hoohum next year--the hardware is out there, the BIOS is out there, people can see and figure out what it does. Unless you are a proponent of DCMA. Even without reverse engineering, people see a neat piece of BIOS feature, and they say, Hey! That's neat! and they will come up with an alternate way of doing the same thing, or better. Unless you also want to use patents to lock down everything.
So there is nothing really much to gain in keeping it super secret. Beside, if the competitor doesn't have your hardware, then what is the use of the special BIOS to them? If the competitor has similar hardware, then the BIOS is becoming more and more like a generic OS/SW isn't it?
So, MS took the BSD TCP/IP stack, and who gained from it? We the people? I guess so, huh? We paid for stabler Windows, right? That is your idea of free-er? Com'n! Why not release MS' enhancements so that we all can get stabler everything?
If you consider a requirement to share the same thing that you have been shared with a constraint or special obligations, well, that is sad. And, yes, GPL is not for you. There are other licenses that you can use. The LinuxBIOS people want to share and want other people to share, that is why they choose GPL. They don't want their code co-opted. Asking why the LinuxBIOS is not on a free-er license is, well, :-), bogus, and seems a little insulting to the LinuxBIOS people.
GPL is less free is bogus. You attempt to justify code un-sharing is bogus. Your suggestion that the LinuxBIOS people don't know why they choose GPL, and that another license is better because you know what they want better than they themselves, is bogus. It is sad, but you don't have a leg to stand on here.
Cheers,
e.
You are missing the point, Brett. They license it under GPL is exactly so that the code will remain free. If you don't want to share, well, you can't use this BIOS. That is GPL. To say that GPL is less free than the MIT or Artistic or the BSD License is really bogus. I will claim just the opposite--that GPL is in fact more free than those, because GPL ensures that the code is free for the most people, not just some small group of people/corporation.
You have been around, so I am sure that you have heard that before. I don't know why you say that the GPL is less free. I think that is very misleading.
Cheers,
e.
What a guy! I am impressed with your logic and human decency!
Cheers,
e.
You are giving Hemos too much credit.
Cheers,
e.
At least deserves a +2 Funny. Where is your sense of humor? gone in the way of Hemos' command of English?
Cheers,
e.
Cheers,
e.
Uh, you missed the double speak of this...
LeDuc said it is fairer to charge researchers for the articles they use than to charge taxpayers for the cost of running a Web site that makes them available for free.
Translate: LeDuc said that it is better to make him and his employers rich than to make knowledge freely available, and that it doesn't matter if any of the research (lots of it, if not most of it) were funded by the government, i.e., funded by the public.
What research have LeDuc and his friends funded lately? Sad.
Cheers,
e.
Not for money: There is not much monetary value to gain from MS suing anyone in particular.
Not for technical advantage: There is hardly anything from MS that can be regarded as technilcally superior.
Sue for PR: The strongest reason would be to sue for PR. Look at all the lawsuits, most of the time the biggest fanfare is when you see headlines XXX, Co. sues YYY, Inc. And usually the result (which ever way it goes, unless the settlement is an enormous sum) of the lawsuit is normally treated with less fanfare, especially if the defendent is found innocent. People in general remember the lawsuit, but not the result. That way you can tarnish the image of the defendent, unless the defendent spends a significant amount of resources to publicize its innocent. With that in mind, MS will probably sue the most visible symbol of linux, Red Hat, or sue the top 10 linux distros. Just to tarnish linux's image, create FUD in customers' (small) minds. MS doesn't have to win--just need to create enough FUD.
Cheers,
e.
...or else that guy is extremely dull.
That troll exaggerated the difficulty of installing ALSA on DEBIAN, misrepresenting it as enabling sound on Linux in general. Then he oversimplified OS X. So he is either a flamebait (half-truths and lies, like a politician) or a really dumbass.
Isn't Apple going to release OS X for x86? Well, wait till that happens, then ask that troll/dumbass to run OS X on X86. And I can tell you what is going to happen--he'll have to buy his hardware according to an "approved HW list" published by Apple, and you can bet there are going to be an amazing choice of 3 motherboards and 4 soundcards on that list.
There is nothing insightful or interesting about that post.
Cheers,
e.