What amounts to poaching other people's resources works well right up until you drive that other party into the wall and force them to spend a crapload of money for which they receive nothing in return. That is, they don't receive any renumeration for the additional expense - but you do!
This is the base problem with all overcommitted services where the business model is predicated on fractional use of maximum possible resource consumption. When that model is violated costs go up dramatically. This is ok provided the person who has the cost also gets the revenue that is occasioned by the violation of the original model.
The entire argument hinges on the idea that Comcast's model of over-subscribing is falling down in the face of increased traffic.
But who in their right mind didn't realize that internet traffic was going to continue to grow? Frankly, I'm sure Comcast saw this coming. They had ample opportunity (and money) to make appropriate upgrades to their infrastructure; instead, they figured that they could simply keep the money, and then blame the users and other content providers for using "too much" bandwidth, passing the costs along to them.
Long story short, they COULD have kept the old model going (as other ISPs have, so far), but why would they? This strategy is more profitable, and no one is telling them they can't do it.
I have a hard time lending much credence to the "college is a bad investment half the time" school of thought, if only because it only looks at college graduates in aggregate, not by field of study.
I can pretty much guarantee that the person walking out of college with a degree in electrical engineering will probably have a MUCH better chance of a satisfactory return on investment than the person that leaves with a BA in English Lit.
However, this isn't to say that the english degree is necessarily a bad decision. To echo some of the posts above, the value of a college education isn't exclusively monetary, and as such, shouldn't be viewed merely as an "investment".
Technology can be a useful addition to a lecture, but it doesn't ALWAYS add value.
The most engaging, informative CS courses I ever took involved nothing more than the instructor using a blackboard. Some of the worst on the other hand, came as a result of poorly applied tech.
Suppose you were falling into a black hole, and you didn't get turned into spaghetti (as might be possible if you're approaching the event horizon of a supermassive black hole). Would the event horizon seem to retreat before you? I mean, light can't escape a black hole's event horizon as we see it, but if you're falling in, wouldn't you be able to see further into the black hole as you fall?
--PM
Well, since sight depends on light reflecting off of objects to work... No, as you approached the event horizon, you still wouldn't be able to see into the black hole, as no light would be escaping (hence no visual information conveyed).
As to other point, no, the event horizon would not appear to be receding. You would seem to be approaching it normally (from your perspective), however due to time dilation, the rest of the universe would seem to be aging quite rapidly compared to you.
Unfortunately, high school is the highest education the majority receive.
Sorry, but that doesn't mean that high school is the appropriate venue for that sort of discussion. In a high school science course, the aim of the curriculum is to provide a foundational education. Unfortunately, this does not include advanced evolutionary theory.
Right, but I don't hear anyone complaining when teachers say that we don't have a complete understanding of it either. Unfortunately, if a teacher were to say that there are things we don't understand about evolution, everyone gets in a tizzy and accuses the teacher of proselytizing impressionable young minds.
If this was all that teachers were required to say, then I'm perfectly comfortable with this. I am not comfortable, however, with the undue focus on evolution theory as flawed. It inaccurately characterizes evolution as a theory that is fundamentally contested, when in reality it is supported by a wealth of evidence from a variety of fields.
Ideas should NEVER be off the discussion table when it comes to science. Nor should any theory or even law be above challenge.
No one is say that evolution shouldn't be held up to the full rigor of scientific scrutiny. But there's a huge difference between criticizing hypothesized evolutionary mechanisms and criticizing the underlying theory.
In the scientific community, the fundamental principles of evolution have held up for a LONG time. This is what should be taught to school children. The extreme emphasis by certain groups on the "weaknesses" of evolutionary theory are meant to sow doubt in an otherwise uneducated audience (which kids are).
Should kids know that the specific details of evolution haven't been 100% sorted out yet? Yes. Should we go out of our way to spend time discussing these open questions? Sure. In an advanced setting. Not grade school. Not high school.
Frankly, we don't have a perfect understanding of how gravity works either. Yet somehow, I can't hear anyone screaming that our children must be educated on the "weaknesses" of that particular subject. I wonder why?
And like many of the comments in TFA, it didn't work for me (using 4.1.249.1064) once I completely closed out chrome.
It seems that the issue only affects certain versions of Chrome... I'm guessing this is an honest bug, but since it's google, everyone freaks the hell out.
Here is the first distinction that we have to make:
a) Services that publish private information
b) Services that do not publish private information
The problem is that there is little to stop companies from transitioning from group b) to group a).
I'm reasonably confident that Google won't actively screw me over right now. But ten years down the road? Who knows?
Frankly, the only reason I trust Google NOW is that they have an incentive to keep me happy. If at any point I get pissed off, I can pack up and move to Bing or some other competitor with a minimum of fuss.
However with Facebook, they have a locked-in market. Sure, you can quit and move to a new site. But Facebook's value is in its membership, which no other company is offering at the moment.
As it stands now, the relationship between the user and Google is much more balanced, which makes Google at least marginally interested in their customers. Facebook, barring a massive decline in membership, simply doesn't care.
So long as Google is being kept honest by the legitimate possibility of losing revenue, they'll stay in group b).
...To a large degree Apple has turned a blind eye to the jailbreak community. I hardly think Apple is trying to keep people from learning programming or doing cool new things.
Really?
You must be referring to an Apple I'm not familiar with.
Nearly every OS release for the iPhone has gone out of its way to un-jailbreak (re-jail?) its phones. Didn't look too hard, but wikipedia sums it up best with its "cat and mouse" description.
And then of course there's the legal case where Apple argues that jailbreaking phones should be flat-out illegal under the DMCA.
Seems to me that Apple has both eyes open on this one.
If you read the article, one of the images shows a keyboard dock. While the caption indicates that this is an "alternative" design, it still shows that convenient input is being considered
While I'm sure this will work on multiple platforms, it seems very complimentary to what we have seen of Chrome OS.
I doubt they expect to sway hardcore gamers with this, but certainly the casual, iPhone-esque gamers might be wooed.
And keeping it within Youtube makes sense; here at least they can exercise some degree of control over the user experience, as opposed to the myriad of Flash games out there currently.
I wasn't implying that they didn't have the RIGHT to such a copyright/trademark, I was simply trying to point out the underlying problems with trying to enforce such a copyright claim.
Given the especially litigious atmosphere surrounding IP and copyright these days, it seems to me that the the Papacy may have invited trouble unnecessarily.
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What amounts to poaching other people's resources works well right up until you drive that other party into the wall and force them to spend a crapload of money for which they receive nothing in return. That is, they don't receive any renumeration for the additional expense - but you do!
This is the base problem with all overcommitted services where the business model is predicated on fractional use of maximum possible resource consumption. When that model is violated costs go up dramatically. This is ok provided the person who has the cost also gets the revenue that is occasioned by the violation of the original model.
The entire argument hinges on the idea that Comcast's model of over-subscribing is falling down in the face of increased traffic.
But who in their right mind didn't realize that internet traffic was going to continue to grow? Frankly, I'm sure Comcast saw this coming. They had ample opportunity (and money) to make appropriate upgrades to their infrastructure; instead, they figured that they could simply keep the money, and then blame the users and other content providers for using "too much" bandwidth, passing the costs along to them.
Long story short, they COULD have kept the old model going (as other ISPs have, so far), but why would they? This strategy is more profitable, and no one is telling them they can't do it.
This. Is. Awesome. I'm really hoping that this becomes a reasonable DIY project...
He'll spend a lifetime in that county getting pulled over for crossing the yellow line and not signaling on lane changes.
Which still seems a helluva lot better than being convicted of a felony.
I have a hard time lending much credence to the "college is a bad investment half the time" school of thought, if only because it only looks at college graduates in aggregate, not by field of study.
I can pretty much guarantee that the person walking out of college with a degree in electrical engineering will probably have a MUCH better chance of a satisfactory return on investment than the person that leaves with a BA in English Lit.
However, this isn't to say that the english degree is necessarily a bad decision. To echo some of the posts above, the value of a college education isn't exclusively monetary, and as such, shouldn't be viewed merely as an "investment".
Come on. Just say 0 K.
Acknowledging the appropriate SI units only stings for a little while.
Improving upon current SSDs will require new technology! Isn't that sort of implied in the whole concept of, you know, progress?
I can't agree with this more strongly.
Technology can be a useful addition to a lecture, but it doesn't ALWAYS add value.
The most engaging, informative CS courses I ever took involved nothing more than the instructor using a blackboard. Some of the worst on the other hand, came as a result of poorly applied tech.
'conditional commitment' to provide a partial guarantee for a rumored $98.5 million loan
News, huh?
Hello,
Suppose you were falling into a black hole, and you didn't get turned into spaghetti (as might be possible if you're approaching the event horizon of a supermassive black hole). Would the event horizon seem to retreat before you? I mean, light can't escape a black hole's event horizon as we see it, but if you're falling in, wouldn't you be able to see further into the black hole as you fall?
--PM
Well, since sight depends on light reflecting off of objects to work... No, as you approached the event horizon, you still wouldn't be able to see into the black hole, as no light would be escaping (hence no visual information conveyed).
As to other point, no, the event horizon would not appear to be receding. You would seem to be approaching it normally (from your perspective), however due to time dilation, the rest of the universe would seem to be aging quite rapidly compared to you.
Unfortunately, high school is the highest education the majority receive.
Sorry, but that doesn't mean that high school is the appropriate venue for that sort of discussion. In a high school science course, the aim of the curriculum is to provide a foundational education. Unfortunately, this does not include advanced evolutionary theory.
Right, but I don't hear anyone complaining when teachers say that we don't have a complete understanding of it either. Unfortunately, if a teacher were to say that there are things we don't understand about evolution, everyone gets in a tizzy and accuses the teacher of proselytizing impressionable young minds.
If this was all that teachers were required to say, then I'm perfectly comfortable with this. I am not comfortable, however, with the undue focus on evolution theory as flawed. It inaccurately characterizes evolution as a theory that is fundamentally contested, when in reality it is supported by a wealth of evidence from a variety of fields.
Ideas should NEVER be off the discussion table when it comes to science. Nor should any theory or even law be above challenge.
No one is say that evolution shouldn't be held up to the full rigor of scientific scrutiny. But there's a huge difference between criticizing hypothesized evolutionary mechanisms and criticizing the underlying theory.
In the scientific community, the fundamental principles of evolution have held up for a LONG time. This is what should be taught to school children. The extreme emphasis by certain groups on the "weaknesses" of evolutionary theory are meant to sow doubt in an otherwise uneducated audience (which kids are).
Should kids know that the specific details of evolution haven't been 100% sorted out yet? Yes. Should we go out of our way to spend time discussing these open questions? Sure. In an advanced setting. Not grade school. Not high school.
Frankly, we don't have a perfect understanding of how gravity works either. Yet somehow, I can't hear anyone screaming that our children must be educated on the "weaknesses" of that particular subject. I wonder why?
Cue the unending stream of lobbyists, please. They're on next.
Seriously, how many people ACTUALLY think that this was anything more than Congress muscling the FCC aside to better suckle at the corporate teat?
Maybe I'm just being cynical, but I don't see Congress getting territorial over any issue that isn't backed by multi-billion dollar industries.
Don't bother, I have prior art for you.
..... I patented your mom last night.
they can only work with data you give them.
Not true, actually. They can also work with the information your "friends" give them.
And like many of the comments in TFA, it didn't work for me (using 4.1.249.1064) once I completely closed out chrome.
It seems that the issue only affects certain versions of Chrome... I'm guessing this is an honest bug, but since it's google, everyone freaks the hell out.
Here is the first distinction that we have to make:
a) Services that publish private information
b) Services that do not publish private information
The problem is that there is little to stop companies from transitioning from group b) to group a).
I'm reasonably confident that Google won't actively screw me over right now. But ten years down the road? Who knows?
Frankly, the only reason I trust Google NOW is that they have an incentive to keep me happy. If at any point I get pissed off, I can pack up and move to Bing or some other competitor with a minimum of fuss.
However with Facebook, they have a locked-in market. Sure, you can quit and move to a new site. But Facebook's value is in its membership, which no other company is offering at the moment.
As it stands now, the relationship between the user and Google is much more balanced, which makes Google at least marginally interested in their customers. Facebook, barring a massive decline in membership, simply doesn't care.
So long as Google is being kept honest by the legitimate possibility of losing revenue, they'll stay in group b).
This is slashdot sir. The odds of you successfully convincing a human female to accompany you to a beach at night are slim to none.
It's a bit on the nose, isn't it?
And it sucks to be Cambridge. There is no such thing as Englandium.
England could use noble gases, perhaps?
let me know when these can be surgically attached to sharks.
Really?
You must be referring to an Apple I'm not familiar with.
Nearly every OS release for the iPhone has gone out of its way to un-jailbreak (re-jail?) its phones. Didn't look too hard, but wikipedia sums it up best with its "cat and mouse" description.
And then of course there's the legal case where Apple argues that jailbreaking phones should be flat-out illegal under the DMCA.
Seems to me that Apple has both eyes open on this one.
If you read the article, one of the images shows a keyboard dock. While the caption indicates that this is an "alternative" design, it still shows that convenient input is being considered
Neurotransmitter consumption cycles? Come on, if you want the +5 Insightful, you really need to couch your hypotheticals in terms of cars.
While I'm sure this will work on multiple platforms, it seems very complimentary to what we have seen of Chrome OS.
I doubt they expect to sway hardcore gamers with this, but certainly the casual, iPhone-esque gamers might be wooed.
And keeping it within Youtube makes sense; here at least they can exercise some degree of control over the user experience, as opposed to the myriad of Flash games out there currently.
I wasn't implying that they didn't have the RIGHT to such a copyright/trademark, I was simply trying to point out the underlying problems with trying to enforce such a copyright claim. Given the especially litigious atmosphere surrounding IP and copyright these days, it seems to me that the the Papacy may have invited trouble unnecessarily.