Go and look at the timestamps on 'em on ftp.kernel.org. Some of the sub-versions are just a few days apart. How the hell are end-users supposed to know when the kernel is ACTUALLY useable, if there are THIRTY SEVEN bug-fix releases?
The people that go to kernel.org to choose a kernel to download and compile hardly qualify for what most people will call a "user".
What Linus is calling "unexpected stability" is probably due to the distros intermediating between the kernel devs and the actual users. To put it another way, what's really happened is that the "stable" kernel is now being maintained by the likes of RedHat and Debian, while the "unstable" kernel is what you find at kernel.org.
We'll see how this plays out - but for the real world, this leaves Linus doing what he does best - develop and oversee cool developments - while the more rank-and-file organizations lead by the distros intermediate for the end users.
I've been using CentOS and Fedora Core, it's been at least 5 or 6 years since I felt the need to go to kernel.org!
This is the kind of thing that is going to strain the Internet's fabric at the seams. Up until now, your typical 1337 torrent freak was pretty uncommon among the general public, so the Internet has coped for the most part. But when the general public starts downloading several gigabytes of video every night, the whole equation will change.
Do you have any idea how many times the Internet was supposed to collapse/implode/crash/overload/burn up? I remember reading comments much like yours about streaming audio, then video games, then youtube. I remember when over 50% of the traffic on the Internet was Email. And I remember when over 50% of the Internet traffic was based around ONE SINGLE FREAKIN' BIT TORRENT SITE.
Sorry, buddy. The Internet has been around the block a few times, mmmkay? It was originally built to be a robust network, and damned if it hasn't worked out that way!
I strongly suspect you will see bit capacities on all ISPs very shortly if they don't have them already.
We solved this one a LONG time ago. It's called a proxy server
So... I don't know whether this is a positive or a negative change, but I'm guessing for a lot of peering points and a lot of overloaded switch fabrics, this is a deal breaker.
Most assuredly, Netflix is using a distributed system like Akamai to minimize peer load and overall Internet congestion. In any event, the money's on this working, so it will.
Drinking too much water is a non obvious danger. But the radio station is the one who should perform the due dilligance.
And this may be the currently accepted social expectation. That doesn't make it RIGHT, just the law, as it sits today. Why should the radio station be performing due dilligence?
Just because we happen to know that water can be dangerous doesn't mean other people do. And certainly expecting a mother of 3 doing a 'contest' that sounds like something fun and silly to expect any danger from the contest is unreasonable.
And I argue that expecting a radio station to know that doing a "Wee for Wii" contest (that sounds fun and silly) could result in a death is equally unreasonable.
Perhaps the most important thing to remember is that generally people, rightly or wrongly, trust people in charge. Think of the Milgram Experiment as an extreme example. Even though the objectives of the experiment are different, it shows the same underlying principle: people generally listen to people they think are athority figures. And in this case, the contest holders are the athority figures.
A tendency which is an unintended consequence to public education. I argue that public education indoctrinates this tendency in people. I see much more skepticism amongs home-schooled children.
Beyond the lawsuit, I would not be shocked to see criminal charges against the people who ran the contest. Their actions directly led to the death of another person.
Just because somebody died doesn't mean a crime was committed! If that were the case, doctors would go to jail anytime they tried their best, and honest accidents would never happen.
I really feel for the 3 kids in this family. But I don't believe in a society and culture that expects my ass to be wiped from birth to death. My life is my own, thank you!
The Grameen foundation is, for all intents and purposes, a "noncommercial bank". They manage all the loans, they take care of everything.
You *can* get more involved, but you don't have to. They kick out reports periodically to indicate the average size of loan, the amount of money loaned, ROI, etc.
And it's a good thing, too. I don't have time to review loan candidates, what with running my business as partner/CTO, taking pilot lessons, and being husband and father of 5.
My wife is also involved with an educational program in Haiti - a mere $150/year will educate several kids for a year. Yes, the cost of a single college textbook.
What is actually *hard* to understand is that in the United States, we have difficulty actually understanding what "poor" really can be. It's so easy to make a good life living off the discarded scraps of others because the wealth here is just so pervasive.
The hardest part about understanding the poor is understanding just how far down there is to go. It's why international aid has been so consistently blown and so universally ineffective.
But recently, I've gotten involved with the Grameen Foundation funding micro-credit loans. These are small, (frequently $50 or less, sometimes just $5 is all it takes) loans used to finance small businesses in areas of poverty. It's simply incredible how much difference such a piddling amount of wealth can make in their lives.
People in these dire situations buy a hammer, a shovel, a bag of reeds, and turn around with their economic weapon and make life better.
And it's simply shocking to me that something like a hammer, a shovel, or a bag of reeds would be both so useful to the person, and at the same time so difficult to get that they have to go thru the loan process to get it!
No, I don't profit from the Grameen Foundation. But it's the charity I'm donating to, because it's the charity that just might make its goal of ending global poverty.
The aviation industry began making real safety improvements when they stopped regarding "pilot error" as the end of the story and began to fix ergonomics so that pilots weren't led into error.
As a student pilot (I should have my license by Feb/March) I've read quite a number of crash analysis reports, as well as a large number of articles reporting "near misses", all in General Aviation. (lightweight, personal planes)
It's just amazing to me how many of these incidents are caused by things like the pilot shutting off the gas while in the air inadvertently.
I mean, what f--king retard puts a "kill gas" switch in easy reach of a pilot in the air? Can you name *ANY* scenario where it is an advantage to kill the fuel flow while in the air?
Another one: the stall. Why is it that the stall horn isn't rigged to the yoke, so that when you're about to stall (and potentially die, esp. during takeoff/landing) the yoke has pressure applied to it so that you have to actually try to stall the plane?
And, why not do something similar to put some pressure on the yoke the other way when you are getting close to maximum speed? (Vne)
Just stupid shiat that really, really, REALLY annoys me as a software engineer. How much of my time do I spend trying to anticipate the insane stupids done by my users?!?!? If I'm aware of a problem caused just twice by a stupid from a user DESPITE OBVIOUS WARNINGS, I change the button or something so I don't get the calls anymore.
Now, if somebody's life was on the line, don't you think they'd hide the damned "kill gas" switch, or at least make it require a concerted effort to turn it off? (think: automatic transmissions in most modern cars, which require you to push a button or something to get it out of drive into reverse or park)
It'd be nice if small plane designers thought about safety just a tad more.
Re:With the introduction of AppleTV...
on
The Home Server Cometh
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· Score: 1, Interesting
It's clear that Microsoft is winning the war for the home market.
Not clear at all. We use a Dish DVR. It's basically an embedded , Linux-based tivo-like appliance. It saves all the shows we want, plays them anytime I want on either of my TVs, and it's ridiculously easy to use. Only two features should be added:
1) Ability to stream saved shows over my local LAN.
2) Ability to save videos from other sources to the DVR over the LAN.
Microsoft has Windows Media Center which, in its Vista iteration will provide support for HDTV recording, CableCard support, and downloadable content (much like iTunes). Then add in Xbox 360 which can do much of the same along with IPTV (just announced), extend Windows Media Center, and also play games. The online part (Xbox Live) is a great addition to all that.
That just sounds.... complicated. When my grandfather can use it, it'll sell. BTW, our local cable company now has an IP DVR that lets you stream quite a selection of shows on demand...
Apple's AppleTV product is kind of lame, and I was rather disappointed in it. It only plays items from iTunes and locks you in further. Doesn't play Divx, doesn't record anything -- it's more of an 'extender' than anything else. And if the sales Linksys shows anything in regards to how well extenders do, we know we can write it off for the die-hard Mac fans.
OK....
That said... I love Apple and the way they innovate. Some products are hits (iPhone) and some are misses (AppleTV). Time will tell either way, but Microsoft is definitely gearing up to be the dominant force in the living room.
I see - their product SUCKS, doesn't do anything that I'd like, but I like how they come up with stuff I like...(???)
I don't get it. Come back when you have a clear point to make.
Seems a little expensive. Could someone build one of these printers and then print the printer itself and mail it to me? I promise to duplicate it as well and give some to my friends. Seriously though, if I owned a manufacturing company of any any kind I would be scared of this thing. In 30 years you might witness the end of large scale production of small consumer goods. Throwing a party? Print up the plates and forks and chairs and tables you need. Need a gift? Print up some Barbie dolls. In 50 years the only thing that might actually be sold are the plans needed to fabricate something and the "ink" for this thing. If I was very cynical I would say this could end capitalism itself:)
Yeah, just like printers have made bookstores and magazines obsolete.
I think it's more basic than that. Why aren't more devices made using a standard power source?
I think that for small devices, USB should be a standardized charge option.
It's present on all laptops, many palm tops, and iPod chargers show that the idea is quite feasible.
I have a cell phone that uses a combination charger/data cable plug on the bottom of it. The plug is a mini-USB plug. I can plug the phone into the charger, and it charges, 12 volts. I can plug the phone into a USB data cable on my Linux laptop, and it charges. But strangely, not if I'm running Windows or OSX. Also, I can't charge it using an iPod charger - it specifically says "unauthorized charger".
1) Off-site backups - that's why you back up offsite! Set up a backups-server (it doesn't need to be fast, it will be I/O bound) with a pile of cheap, big, slow HDD. Set up as RAID 5 or RAID 1 - your preference.
It's automatic. It's off-site. It works with good-sized data sets. (I'm managing just over a TB these days, a number that's growing fast. I'm able to do unattended offsite backups every 24 hours, and I have several months worth of backups on file that I can access instantly)
2) Rotating thru tapes - tools like Backup Buddy and/or BackupPC take care of that, too! Assume you have 200 GB of "Enterprise Data" to backup. So you get a TB or so in your backup array, (say, 4 350 GB disks, RAID 5) and use one of the above tools. You'll see months worth of backups out of that.
Without swapping tapes, hiring anybody to take them "off site" and for just a few hundred bucks in cheap, IDE disks. Can tape do that, too?
With a mouth like that, I pity your son's odds of maintaining his image if he should ever decide to do anything, uhm, classy in his life.
See, as a father of five, I think that it's important to teach my children manners and behavior that will allow them to get along in any strata of life. Very few people have a problem with reasonable manners unless they're overdone or condescending. But a single slip of the "F" word in the wrong context can make or break a deal. (and therefore, success)
Don't teach children that "THE R144 is TEH 3V11", if you can teach them about the corruptive nature of power - it's much more useful because it's the truth, and explains WHY the RIAA is teh 3v1L.
A few WEEKS?? I've gone from booting from the Windows installation CD to back in full operation in a day, including patches, application installation, and data restoration.
IMHO, it usually takes a few weeks to get all the kinks worked out. But let me ask you this:
1) Are you migrating Email accounts from a dozen (or more) users on that system?
2) Data includes the likes of quickbooks? (Many Windows applications do NOT keep their data in your user home folder! This is much less common for *nix apps)
3) Are things like desktop backgrounds, E-Mail filters and the like preserved through O/S upgrades?
Thanks to Fedora Legacy I'm happily running FC 3 and had no plans to reinstall. But now I think I'll have to look seriously at CentOS (RHEL repackaged without the copyrighted material like logos and such).
Why?
Even after 6 years of using Linux, it still amazes me how little impact an O/S upgrade typically is. Unlike Windows, where it takes a few weeks to get everything downloaded and installed, and where you always have to put up with a significant amount of data loss, Linux O/S upgrades are relatively painless. Here's my rough procedure:
1) I typically have my HDD partitioned into/home,/boot, and / partitions. So I copy over/etc,/root, and maybe/var/spool over to a subdir on/home, such as/home/xfer/etc...
2) Install the new O/S on top of the / directory partition. Blow away/var, and leave/home alone.
3) copy over any settings from the/home/xfer directory that I find useful. EG: ntp settings, cron jobs, etc.
4) copy over the/root directory stuff.
And that's pretty much it! I can do it all in an afternoon, and have all my settings, configs, and stuff ready to go. I've been using the same/home file system and directories like this since RedHat 6.2. Currently, I'm running FC 6, before that FC 3, FC1, RH 9, RH 7.2, and RH 6.2.
Settings from KMail, Mozilla bookmarks, etc. have survived every single upgrade with very little upset.
Additionally, when I need to swap a hard disk around, it usually takes me less than an hour. For example, I had to ship in my laptop a while back. I popped the drive out and installed it into a desktop machine, It wasn't even 15 minutes before I was up and running with full video, sound, network, etc!
It's true that "weird" hardware common on laptops can cause some troubles with getting everything working on Linux, and Wifi can still be spotty, but it's also amazing how much hassle and fuss I DON'T have to go through when things go wrong!
Oh, well, it's 6:00, wife is calling, it's time to enjoy New Year's Eve!
I don't know if I should do this - releasing secrets from the FBI like this commonly leads to life in Gitmo Bay - but information wants to be free!
The "numbers" stations only exist to confuse people. On Wednesdays, we have "beer" day, where you are entitled to a beer from the cooler if the number 12725 comes out.
So we had one day, last year, where somebody (I think it was the Chinese) hacked our main server, and made it broadcast 12725 continuously all day. So there we were, plastered out of our mind, when 270 Lbs of fissionable material was stolen from our floor. The investigation is due to be completed sometime around 2021 - we don't talk about that very much.
So far Microsoft hasn't tried to stop me using Linux.
Don't confuse covert action with inaction. Microsoft has definitely tried to stop you from using Linux. They've done everything that they could possibly get away with to prevent you from using ANYTHING but Microsoft products on your PC.
But it was covert - you didn't witness the exclusive deals, threats and haggles yourself, your vendor(s) did.
You might remember a certain antitrust trial, in which Microsoft played one of the sides? Perhaps you were sleeping under a rock or something...?
I also want my flying car that I was promised 35 years ago.
As a private pilot in training, I can assure you that the flying car deficiency is less about the car and more about the driver, eh, pilot.
See, it's not all that hard to get something to fly - we've had reliable flying machines for 75 years. It's only modestly difficult to make something that flies with wings that fold up to something like a car. But getting people to understand everything it takes to fly safely is surprisingly difficult.
Some of the things you have to know:
1) The difference between true North and magnetic north,
2) How to calculate the rought height of cloud based on knowing dewpoint, ambient temperature, and current altitude. Knowing these things allow you to avoid areas where clouds are likely to form.
3) Knowing all the different altitudes: true, absolute, density, pressure, and indicated.
4) Knowing the difference between nautical miles and statutory miles
5) Knowing how to read a RADAR weather chart, and knowing what it does and does not show.
6) Knowing how to calculate the effect of a crosswind on your actual traveling speed.
7) Knowing the difference between true speed, indicated airspeed, and actual airspeed.
8) Knowing what altitude to fly at under what conditions based on heading and flight rules.
9) Knowing how to pull out of a stall or a tailspin reliably.
and on and on and on. The above is but a small sample. All of these things matter; if you don't understand these things, you end up flying into icing conditions, other airplanes, or mountainsides or running out of fuel or whatever. It's not as simple as it sounds!
Remember that not long ago, it was widely agreed that "UNIX IS DEAD". And now, with Linux, it's rebirthed and marketshare is growing once again.
Good ideas have a "zombie effect" - they tend to stick around and pop back up. Remember the (now totally defunct) NextSTEP guys? Well, they tried to make a user-friendly OS based on Unix and failed... sorta. The company went belly-up, and what they did eventually became OSX - a highly successful, stable, unix-for-grandmothers Operating System.
No, Amiga is not much of a force today - but if the code can be "kept alive" and can evolve fast enough to meet the new challenges (EG: USB) that come out, it can very easily resuscitate and become a viable contender once again, just as UNIX has come back at Windows with a vengeance with both OSX and Linux chipping at its heels.
Due to its simple power, I belive that UNIX will smash Windows over the next 10 years. But, it's quite concievable that Amiga OS will "merge" with UNIX and become a frankenOS, with trats from both, and that it just might kick some serious ass again. Someday.
I don't get it - Intel has a well-supported, open-source project that they've sponsored for their chipsets - when I recently bought a Dell laptop, I purposefully bought it with the Intel 3945d chipset, and used the RPMs found at their SourceForge project site to get it working on Fedora Core 6.
You were non-specific by saying "I'm against the current US' copyright laws" without qualifying your statement. That implies very strongly that you don't agree with any part of it.
Despite the fact that US copyright laws generally work rather well, far better than patents.
Had you been more specific, as in "I'm against the current US' copyright terms - 100+ years is ridiculous!", this never would have happened.
But you didn't, implying that
A) There was no part of the US copyright law that you found tasteful, and
B) By lack of statement, that you weren't particularly against US patent and/or trademark systems.
As a copyright holder with significant copyright assetts, I can attest that copyright laws as they currently stand are quite useful and have provided me both a decent living as well as encouragement to continue my endeavors creating commercially useful copyrighted works. It's a simple idea that works well. I do not agree that copyrighted works should *ever* have the terms of their protection changed after the fact. I feel that even if copyright laws change, that works created PRIOR to the change should be considered as protected by the laws as they stood at the time of origination - this backdating copyright law is a form of legitimized pilfering of the commons.
But, you've stated that you are "against" the US copyright laws, and that your primary reason for this is the 100 year term. What is RIGHT about us copyright laws, and is the 100 year term the only thing wrong with this?
Unfortunately, you're wrong. Copyright law in the US does not say that what you write is yours.
Sure it does.
More often than not, what you write belongs to the publisher. That's why you see musicians complaining bitterly that "the band owns none of its work" (quoted directly from that article).
Only because you sold what you wrote to the publisher. If it wasn't yours, how could you cede those rights in a commercial contract?
The United States has a strong right to contract - you can sell just about anything if you make it a contract. If I have an iPod, and it's mine, I can sell it to you. That's a contract. I can even sell you the iPod before I even have it. And that's what your artists have done - rather than go thru the hassle of promoting their own band w/o the RIAA, they've signed into contracts with said RIAA selling the rights to their works.
I urge you to take a long hard look at the implications of a society such as the US where copyrights in practice do not belong to the artists.
Since, as a software engineer, I make my (healthy) living through the implications of copyrights, I can assure you that I've taken a long, hard look at what copyrights really mean in the United States.
If you sit down and write something on a piece of paper with a stubby pencil, it's yours. And, since it's yours, and really yours, you can sell the rights to that henscratch on that piece of paper. You can oblige yourself to write stuff on paper with stubby pencils before you do it. It's called a "contract". And, as a result, you need to be damned careful about what you agree to, because agreements (contracts) are binding.
But none of this is really about copyrights, it's about people who haven't done their due dilligence confusing the rights to copy (copyrights) and the rights to contract.
Granted, I'm against the US' current copyright laws, but the simple fact is that China IS rampant with copyright violation that does nothing but make the illegal publishers rich.
What? Are you retarded? Other than the 100-ish year lifespan, copyright law is the one (of three) branches of "Intellectual Property" that actually gets it right!
All copyright says is that whatever you right is yours, from the moment of inception. Simple and easy. What about that are you against?
If you want to be "against" anything, try patents (which make an idea that you might legitimately and independently arrive at owned by some other guy who came to the same or similar idea by whatever means before you) or trademarks (which all but cancel copyrights in some cases, because while the copyrights of a work might have expired, trademarks do not, so even if/when the Disney "Steamboat Willie" movie is no longer copyrighted, the trademarks of Mickey Mouse remain intact preventing "unauthorized" reproduction...)
Pick your fights, and fight about something where you might do some good. Alternatively, take the time to figure out what you're talking about before being "against" something....
Seriously. I have like 5 email accounts, and I doubt that's a lot compared to some people who use e-mail more than me.
That's about how many I actively use, what with my various domain names, servers, and all.
Three of which I will drop at a moments notice. The other two I consider untouchable. They are whitelisted. You want to get to my good ones? You gotta go through the other three. Then, and only then, will you get to my inner e-mail sanctum.
Sounds like you're putting out a lot of effort out for... wait for it... E-Mail! (Do you have 5 phone numbers, three for telemarketers and two for "special"?)
So bots and spam and worms and identity phishers don't get to me.
Putting out that kind of effort, looks like they already have!
Part of the reason is that I simply don't pay attention to e-mails from unsolicited sources.
You mean, the three "throwaway" accounts that you maintain, or the two "untouchable" ones?
That's half the reason cyber crime works at all: people are idiots when it comes to computers. Odds are you know someone who sees a pop-up disguised to look like an authentic Windows message box and clicks on the buttons thinking they are actually talking to Windows and not some porn-site-based phisher and thief.
Finally getting somewhere - why do we have a system so insecure that clicking on a mis-labelled button compromises it?
Odds are you know someone who thinks those e-mails are from someone with an actual product instead of a phishing scam, like a second chance offer from www.ebay.cra.cz or something similar.
Have you seen these? They are quite good. I've almost been fooled once or twice.
These criminals are simply separating stupid people and their money. I know, I know, it's a harsh perspective.
If you think it's "stupid" people that get their money separated, it's you that are myopic in perspective. Everybody has their area of competence - don't think that just because theirs and yours don't align, that it's a problem on *THEIR* fault. Are you a competent attorney? Tax accountant? Automotive Mechanic? Manufacturing supervisor? Medical doctor?
What would you think if professionals in these various areas figured you were a moron because you did a stupid in their field of expertise?
You know somebody who got nailed so you want to mod me down because I called your friend stupid. Well, hopefully they learned. The saying goes, fool me once, shame on you, fool me twice, shame on me. It's true.
The stupid isn't the guy who got suckered - the stupid is the guys that were supposed to provide a solid system (EG: Microsoft) who failed utterly at their task.
Ask yourself - what if a doctor gave you a lightweight antibiotic to treat pneumonia? Well, it happened to my wife - and I don't blame my wife for not knowing the different kinds of antibiotics. Computer technology is, for most users, not much different. And the computer industry as a whole is generally lacking in professional competetence in providing reasonable security measures, and the leader of the pack is Microsoft.
I don't think you realize how protected YOU are from fraud and the like by an active legal system and rather strict laws (that vary from state to state) on the subject of "merchantability". When a store takes back something you purchased in the last 30 days, it's partly because IT IS ILLEGAL TO SELL SOMETHING as "new" and refuse to take it back if the customer isn't happy within 30 days of the sale. (In California)
Slashdot Mirror
Don't you hate it when you forget to close a tag?
Arghghg!
(Cue three lame comments about "Preview"...)
Go and look at the timestamps on 'em on ftp.kernel.org. Some of the sub-versions are just a few days apart. How the hell are end-users supposed to know when the kernel is ACTUALLY useable, if there are THIRTY SEVEN bug-fix releases?
The people that go to kernel.org to choose a kernel to download and compile hardly qualify for what most people will call a "user".
What Linus is calling "unexpected stability" is probably due to the distros intermediating between the kernel devs and the actual users. To put it another way, what's really happened is that the "stable" kernel is now being maintained by the likes of RedHat and Debian, while the "unstable" kernel is what you find at kernel.org.
We'll see how this plays out - but for the real world, this leaves Linus doing what he does best - develop and oversee cool developments - while the more rank-and-file organizations lead by the distros intermediate for the end users.
I've been using CentOS and Fedora Core, it's been at least 5 or 6 years since I felt the need to go to kernel.org!
This is the kind of thing that is going to strain the Internet's fabric at the seams. Up until now, your typical 1337 torrent freak was pretty uncommon among the general public, so the Internet has coped for the most part. But when the general public starts downloading several gigabytes of video every night, the whole equation will change.
Do you have any idea how many times the Internet was supposed to collapse/implode/crash/overload/burn up? I remember reading comments much like yours about streaming audio, then video games, then youtube. I remember when over 50% of the traffic on the Internet was Email. And I remember when over 50% of the Internet traffic was based around ONE SINGLE FREAKIN' BIT TORRENT SITE.
Sorry, buddy. The Internet has been around the block a few times, mmmkay? It was originally built to be a robust network, and damned if it hasn't worked out that way!
I strongly suspect you will see bit capacities on all ISPs very shortly if they don't have them already.
We solved this one a LONG time ago. It's called a proxy server
So... I don't know whether this is a positive or a negative change, but I'm guessing for a lot of peering points and a lot of overloaded switch fabrics, this is a deal breaker.
Most assuredly, Netflix is using a distributed system like Akamai to minimize peer load and overall Internet congestion. In any event, the money's on this working, so it will.
Drinking too much water is a non obvious danger. But the radio station is the one who should perform the due dilligance.
And this may be the currently accepted social expectation. That doesn't make it RIGHT, just the law, as it sits today. Why should the radio station be performing due dilligence?
Just because we happen to know that water can be dangerous doesn't mean other people do. And certainly expecting a mother of 3 doing a 'contest' that sounds like something fun and silly to expect any danger from the contest is unreasonable.
And I argue that expecting a radio station to know that doing a "Wee for Wii" contest (that sounds fun and silly) could result in a death is equally unreasonable.
Perhaps the most important thing to remember is that generally people, rightly or wrongly, trust people in charge. Think of the Milgram Experiment as an extreme example. Even though the objectives of the experiment are different, it shows the same underlying principle: people generally listen to people they think are athority figures. And in this case, the contest holders are the athority figures.
A tendency which is an unintended consequence to public education. I argue that public education indoctrinates this tendency in people. I see much more skepticism amongs home-schooled children.
Beyond the lawsuit, I would not be shocked to see criminal charges against the people who ran the contest. Their actions directly led to the death of another person.
Just because somebody died doesn't mean a crime was committed! If that were the case, doctors would go to jail anytime they tried their best, and honest accidents would never happen.
I really feel for the 3 kids in this family. But I don't believe in a society and culture that expects my ass to be wiped from birth to death. My life is my own, thank you!
The Grameen foundation is, for all intents and purposes, a "noncommercial bank". They manage all the loans, they take care of everything.
You *can* get more involved, but you don't have to. They kick out reports periodically to indicate the average size of loan, the amount of money loaned, ROI, etc.
And it's a good thing, too. I don't have time to review loan candidates, what with running my business as partner/CTO, taking pilot lessons, and being husband and father of 5.
My wife is also involved with an educational program in Haiti - a mere $150/year will educate several kids for a year. Yes, the cost of a single college textbook.
God, I wish I had mod points!
What is actually *hard* to understand is that in the United States, we have difficulty actually understanding what "poor" really can be. It's so easy to make a good life living off the discarded scraps of others because the wealth here is just so pervasive.
The hardest part about understanding the poor is understanding just how far down there is to go. It's why international aid has been so consistently blown and so universally ineffective.
But recently, I've gotten involved with the Grameen Foundation funding micro-credit loans. These are small, (frequently $50 or less, sometimes just $5 is all it takes) loans used to finance small businesses in areas of poverty. It's simply incredible how much difference such a piddling amount of wealth can make in their lives.
People in these dire situations buy a hammer, a shovel, a bag of reeds, and turn around with their economic weapon and make life better.
And it's simply shocking to me that something like a hammer, a shovel, or a bag of reeds would be both so useful to the person, and at the same time so difficult to get that they have to go thru the loan process to get it!
No, I don't profit from the Grameen Foundation. But it's the charity I'm donating to, because it's the charity that just might make its goal of ending global poverty.
I can't seem to find the video on youtube (was it taken down?) but you can buy a good intro here
The aviation industry began making real safety improvements when they stopped regarding "pilot error" as the end of the story and began to fix ergonomics so that pilots weren't led into error.
As a student pilot (I should have my license by Feb/March) I've read quite a number of crash analysis reports, as well as a large number of articles reporting "near misses", all in General Aviation. (lightweight, personal planes)
It's just amazing to me how many of these incidents are caused by things like the pilot shutting off the gas while in the air inadvertently.
I mean, what f--king retard puts a "kill gas" switch in easy reach of a pilot in the air? Can you name *ANY* scenario where it is an advantage to kill the fuel flow while in the air?
Another one: the stall. Why is it that the stall horn isn't rigged to the yoke, so that when you're about to stall (and potentially die, esp. during takeoff/landing) the yoke has pressure applied to it so that you have to actually try to stall the plane?
And, why not do something similar to put some pressure on the yoke the other way when you are getting close to maximum speed? (Vne)
Just stupid shiat that really, really, REALLY annoys me as a software engineer. How much of my time do I spend trying to anticipate the insane stupids done by my users?!?!? If I'm aware of a problem caused just twice by a stupid from a user DESPITE OBVIOUS WARNINGS, I change the button or something so I don't get the calls anymore.
Now, if somebody's life was on the line, don't you think they'd hide the damned "kill gas" switch, or at least make it require a concerted effort to turn it off? (think: automatic transmissions in most modern cars, which require you to push a button or something to get it out of drive into reverse or park)
It'd be nice if small plane designers thought about safety just a tad more.
It's clear that Microsoft is winning the war for the home market.
Not clear at all. We use a Dish DVR. It's basically an embedded , Linux-based tivo-like appliance. It saves all the shows we want, plays them anytime I want on either of my TVs, and it's ridiculously easy to use. Only two features should be added:
1) Ability to stream saved shows over my local LAN.
2) Ability to save videos from other sources to the DVR over the LAN.
Microsoft has Windows Media Center which, in its Vista iteration will provide support for HDTV recording, CableCard support, and downloadable content (much like iTunes). Then add in Xbox 360 which can do much of the same along with IPTV (just announced), extend Windows Media Center, and also play games. The online part (Xbox Live) is a great addition to all that.
That just sounds.... complicated. When my grandfather can use it, it'll sell. BTW, our local cable company now has an IP DVR that lets you stream quite a selection of shows on demand...
Apple's AppleTV product is kind of lame, and I was rather disappointed in it. It only plays items from iTunes and locks you in further. Doesn't play Divx, doesn't record anything -- it's more of an 'extender' than anything else. And if the sales Linksys shows anything in regards to how well extenders do, we know we can write it off for the die-hard Mac fans.
OK....
That said... I love Apple and the way they innovate. Some products are hits (iPhone) and some are misses (AppleTV). Time will tell either way, but Microsoft is definitely gearing up to be the dominant force in the living room.
I see - their product SUCKS, doesn't do anything that I'd like, but I like how they come up with stuff I like...(???)
I don't get it. Come back when you have a clear point to make.
Seems a little expensive. Could someone build one of these printers and then print the printer itself and mail it to me? I promise to duplicate it as well and give some to my friends. Seriously though, if I owned a manufacturing company of any any kind I would be scared of this thing. In 30 years you might witness the end of large scale production of small consumer goods. Throwing a party? Print up the plates and forks and chairs and tables you need. Need a gift? Print up some Barbie dolls. In 50 years the only thing that might actually be sold are the plans needed to fabricate something and the "ink" for this thing. If I was very cynical I would say this could end capitalism itself :)
Yeah, just like printers have made bookstores and magazines obsolete.
Oh wait...
I think it's more basic than that. Why aren't more devices made using a standard power source?
I think that for small devices, USB should be a standardized charge option.
It's present on all laptops, many palm tops, and iPod chargers show that the idea is quite feasible.
I have a cell phone that uses a combination charger/data cable plug on the bottom of it. The plug is a mini-USB plug. I can plug the phone into the charger, and it charges, 12 volts. I can plug the phone into a USB data cable on my Linux laptop, and it charges. But strangely, not if I'm running Windows or OSX. Also, I can't charge it using an iPod charger - it specifically says "unauthorized charger".
WTF? Why would they do this?
Emoticons are stupid--better for people to say what they mean and stick with that.
Emoticons exist to clarify what is being said. Therefore, it's part of what's being said.
Addressing both issues:
1) Off-site backups - that's why you back up offsite! Set up a backups-server (it doesn't need to be fast, it will be I/O bound) with a pile of cheap, big, slow HDD. Set up as RAID 5 or RAID 1 - your preference.
Then use a tool like Backup Buddy or Backup PC to back up the files.
It's automatic. It's off-site. It works with good-sized data sets. (I'm managing just over a TB these days, a number that's growing fast. I'm able to do unattended offsite backups every 24 hours, and I have several months worth of backups on file that I can access instantly)
2) Rotating thru tapes - tools like Backup Buddy and/or BackupPC take care of that, too! Assume you have 200 GB of "Enterprise Data" to backup. So you get a TB or so in your backup array, (say, 4 350 GB disks, RAID 5) and use one of the above tools. You'll see months worth of backups out of that.
Without swapping tapes, hiring anybody to take them "off site" and for just a few hundred bucks in cheap, IDE disks. Can tape do that, too?
Fill the trap with cooking oil - it will stop the smell and will not evaporate as quickly as water would.
Sure! That will stop the smell - until the oil goes rancid. Ever smell bad vegetable oil? Trust me - YOU DON'T WANT TO.
Maybe mineral oil would be ok, but cooking oil is a BAD IDEA...
Wow.
With a mouth like that, I pity your son's odds of maintaining his image if he should ever decide to do anything, uhm, classy in his life.
See, as a father of five, I think that it's important to teach my children manners and behavior that will allow them to get along in any strata of life. Very few people have a problem with reasonable manners unless they're overdone or condescending. But a single slip of the "F" word in the wrong context can make or break a deal. (and therefore, success)
Don't teach children that "THE R144 is TEH 3V11", if you can teach them about the corruptive nature of power - it's much more useful because it's the truth, and explains WHY the RIAA is teh 3v1L.
A few WEEKS?? I've gone from booting from the Windows installation CD to back in full operation in a day, including patches, application installation, and data restoration.
IMHO, it usually takes a few weeks to get all the kinks worked out. But let me ask you this:
1) Are you migrating Email accounts from a dozen (or more) users on that system?
2) Data includes the likes of quickbooks? (Many Windows applications do NOT keep their data in your user home folder! This is much less common for *nix apps)
3) Are things like desktop backgrounds, E-Mail filters and the like preserved through O/S upgrades?
I didn't think so...
Thanks to Fedora Legacy I'm happily running FC 3 and had no plans to reinstall. But now I think I'll have to look seriously at CentOS (RHEL repackaged without the copyrighted material like logos and such).
/home, /boot, and / partitions. So I copy over /etc, /root, and maybe /var/spool over to a subdir on /home, such as /home/xfer/etc...
/var, and leave /home alone.
/home/xfer directory that I find useful. EG: ntp settings, cron jobs, etc.
/root directory stuff.
/home file system and directories like this since RedHat 6.2. Currently, I'm running FC 6, before that FC 3, FC1, RH 9, RH 7.2, and RH 6.2.
Why?
Even after 6 years of using Linux, it still amazes me how little impact an O/S upgrade typically is. Unlike Windows, where it takes a few weeks to get everything downloaded and installed, and where you always have to put up with a significant amount of data loss, Linux O/S upgrades are relatively painless. Here's my rough procedure:
1) I typically have my HDD partitioned into
2) Install the new O/S on top of the / directory partition. Blow away
3) copy over any settings from the
4) copy over the
And that's pretty much it! I can do it all in an afternoon, and have all my settings, configs, and stuff ready to go. I've been using the same
Settings from KMail, Mozilla bookmarks, etc. have survived every single upgrade with very little upset.
Additionally, when I need to swap a hard disk around, it usually takes me less than an hour. For example, I had to ship in my laptop a while back. I popped the drive out and installed it into a desktop machine, It wasn't even 15 minutes before I was up and running with full video, sound, network, etc!
It's true that "weird" hardware common on laptops can cause some troubles with getting everything working on Linux, and Wifi can still be spotty, but it's also amazing how much hassle and fuss I DON'T have to go through when things go wrong!
Oh, well, it's 6:00, wife is calling, it's time to enjoy New Year's Eve!
The "numbers" stations only exist to confuse people. On Wednesdays, we have "beer" day, where you are entitled to a beer from the cooler if the number 12725 comes out.
So we had one day, last year, where somebody (I think it was the Chinese) hacked our main server, and made it broadcast 12725 continuously all day. So there we were, plastered out of our mind, when 270 Lbs of fissionable material was stolen from our floor. The investigation is due to be completed sometime around 2021 - we don't talk about that very much.
Anyway, here's the source code: Information wants to be free!
So far Microsoft hasn't tried to stop me using Linux.
Don't confuse covert action with inaction. Microsoft has definitely tried to stop you from using Linux. They've done everything that they could possibly get away with to prevent you from using ANYTHING but Microsoft products on your PC.
But it was covert - you didn't witness the exclusive deals, threats and haggles yourself, your vendor(s) did.
You might remember a certain antitrust trial, in which Microsoft played one of the sides? Perhaps you were sleeping under a rock or something...?
I also want my flying car that I was promised 35 years ago.
As a private pilot in training, I can assure you that the flying car deficiency is less about the car and more about the driver, eh, pilot.
See, it's not all that hard to get something to fly - we've had reliable flying machines for 75 years. It's only modestly difficult to make something that flies with wings that fold up to something like a car. But getting people to understand everything it takes to fly safely is surprisingly difficult.
Some of the things you have to know:
1) The difference between true North and magnetic north,
2) How to calculate the rought height of cloud based on knowing dewpoint, ambient temperature, and current altitude. Knowing these things allow you to avoid areas where clouds are likely to form.
3) Knowing all the different altitudes: true, absolute, density, pressure, and indicated.
4) Knowing the difference between nautical miles and statutory miles
5) Knowing how to read a RADAR weather chart, and knowing what it does and does not show.
6) Knowing how to calculate the effect of a crosswind on your actual traveling speed.
7) Knowing the difference between true speed, indicated airspeed, and actual airspeed.
8) Knowing what altitude to fly at under what conditions based on heading and flight rules.
9) Knowing how to pull out of a stall or a tailspin reliably.
and on and on and on. The above is but a small sample. All of these things matter; if you don't understand these things, you end up flying into icing conditions, other airplanes, or mountainsides or running out of fuel or whatever. It's not as simple as it sounds!
Remember that not long ago, it was widely agreed that "UNIX IS DEAD". And now, with Linux, it's rebirthed and marketshare is growing once again.
Good ideas have a "zombie effect" - they tend to stick around and pop back up. Remember the (now totally defunct) NextSTEP guys? Well, they tried to make a user-friendly OS based on Unix and failed... sorta. The company went belly-up, and what they did eventually became OSX - a highly successful, stable, unix-for-grandmothers Operating System.
No, Amiga is not much of a force today - but if the code can be "kept alive" and can evolve fast enough to meet the new challenges (EG: USB) that come out, it can very easily resuscitate and become a viable contender once again, just as UNIX has come back at Windows with a vengeance with both OSX and Linux chipping at its heels.
Due to its simple power, I belive that UNIX will smash Windows over the next 10 years. But, it's quite concievable that Amiga OS will "merge" with UNIX and become a frankenOS, with trats from both, and that it just might kick some serious ass again. Someday.
I don't get it - Intel has a well-supported, open-source project that they've sponsored for their chipsets - when I recently bought a Dell laptop, I purposefully bought it with the Intel 3945d chipset, and used the RPMs found at their SourceForge project site to get it working on Fedora Core 6.
Why aren't they getting credit for this?
I'm the "tool" of which you speak.
You were non-specific by saying "I'm against the current US' copyright laws" without qualifying your statement. That implies very strongly that you don't agree with any part of it.
Despite the fact that US copyright laws generally work rather well, far better than patents.
Had you been more specific, as in "I'm against the current US' copyright terms - 100+ years is ridiculous!", this never would have happened.
But you didn't, implying that
A) There was no part of the US copyright law that you found tasteful, and
B) By lack of statement, that you weren't particularly against US patent and/or trademark systems.
As a copyright holder with significant copyright assetts, I can attest that copyright laws as they currently stand are quite useful and have provided me both a decent living as well as encouragement to continue my endeavors creating commercially useful copyrighted works. It's a simple idea that works well. I do not agree that copyrighted works should *ever* have the terms of their protection changed after the fact. I feel that even if copyright laws change, that works created PRIOR to the change should be considered as protected by the laws as they stood at the time of origination - this backdating copyright law is a form of legitimized pilfering of the commons.
But, you've stated that you are "against" the US copyright laws, and that your primary reason for this is the 100 year term. What is RIGHT about us copyright laws, and is the 100 year term the only thing wrong with this?
Unfortunately, you're wrong. Copyright law in the US does not say that what you write is yours.
Sure it does.
More often than not, what you write belongs to the publisher. That's why you see musicians complaining bitterly that "the band owns none of its work" (quoted directly from that article).
Only because you sold what you wrote to the publisher. If it wasn't yours, how could you cede those rights in a commercial contract?
The United States has a strong right to contract - you can sell just about anything if you make it a contract. If I have an iPod, and it's mine, I can sell it to you. That's a contract. I can even sell you the iPod before I even have it. And that's what your artists have done - rather than go thru the hassle of promoting their own band w/o the RIAA, they've signed into contracts with said RIAA selling the rights to their works.
I urge you to take a long hard look at the implications of a society such as the US where copyrights in practice do not belong to the artists.
Since, as a software engineer, I make my (healthy) living through the implications of copyrights, I can assure you that I've taken a long, hard look at what copyrights really mean in the United States.
If you sit down and write something on a piece of paper with a stubby pencil, it's yours. And, since it's yours, and really yours, you can sell the rights to that henscratch on that piece of paper. You can oblige yourself to write stuff on paper with stubby pencils before you do it. It's called a "contract". And, as a result, you need to be damned careful about what you agree to, because agreements (contracts) are binding.
But none of this is really about copyrights, it's about people who haven't done their due dilligence confusing the rights to copy (copyrights) and the rights to contract.
Granted, I'm against the US' current copyright laws, but the simple fact is that China IS rampant with copyright violation that does nothing but make the illegal publishers rich.
What? Are you retarded? Other than the 100-ish year lifespan, copyright law is the one (of three) branches of "Intellectual Property" that actually gets it right!
All copyright says is that whatever you right is yours, from the moment of inception. Simple and easy. What about that are you against?
If you want to be "against" anything, try patents (which make an idea that you might legitimately and independently arrive at owned by some other guy who came to the same or similar idea by whatever means before you) or trademarks (which all but cancel copyrights in some cases, because while the copyrights of a work might have expired, trademarks do not, so even if/when the Disney "Steamboat Willie" movie is no longer copyrighted, the trademarks of Mickey Mouse remain intact preventing "unauthorized" reproduction...)
Pick your fights, and fight about something where you might do some good. Alternatively, take the time to figure out what you're talking about before being "against" something....
What would you think if professionals in these various areas figured you were a moron because you did a stupid in their field of expertise? The stupid isn't the guy who got suckered - the stupid is the guys that were supposed to provide a solid system (EG: Microsoft) who failed utterly at their task.
Ask yourself - what if a doctor gave you a lightweight antibiotic to treat pneumonia? Well, it happened to my wife - and I don't blame my wife for not knowing the different kinds of antibiotics. Computer technology is, for most users, not much different. And the computer industry as a whole is generally lacking in professional competetence in providing reasonable security measures, and the leader of the pack is Microsoft.
I don't think you realize how protected YOU are from fraud and the like by an active legal system and rather strict laws (that vary from state to state) on the subject of "merchantability". When a store takes back something you purchased in the last 30 days, it's partly because IT IS ILLEGAL TO SELL SOMETHING as "new" and refuse to take it back if the customer isn't happy within 30 days of the sale. (In California)