So, I'm no expert on signal analysis, but I understand the whole concept of Satellite Dish arrays and why we have those big fields of Giant Dishes pointed at the stars to read incoming data.
This article doesn't seem to point out any of the information that might be handy. How far apart do your antenna's need to be, how big exactly do they need to be, how many, all that good stuff.
For all I know, it might need a hundred of centimeter long antenna's spread across the entire length of my yard. Would THAT make a dish obsolete?
Doesn't the date just mean that the calendar rolls from "age" of the Myan calendar to the next? Sure, it's the transition from one to another, but isn't it more psychological than anything? After all, other than lining many IS people's pockets, wasn't 2000 relatively uneventful?
I partied like it was 1999, and I still had to go into work the following day....
For starters, Y2K was a big issue, though not as big as everyone made it out to be. It wasn't like there was going to be a glitch and launch every nuke, it would have been more like being unable to use your bank account for a week. The reason it was relatively uneventful was the blood sweat and tears of your IS people, and yes they did get rich off it, but not without actually working on it.
For the Ancient Mayans, this actually had signifigant effects on their culture, much like how we celebrate Christmas and Easter every year, except this would have been a much bigger reason to party. It'd be like Y2K New Years, Christmas, And Spring Break in Cancun all at once. They had much smaller cycles within their cycle (like our months to a year) and everytime one of those rolled around, they actually added on another teir to their temples. Those big Mayan Pyramids you see when you google "Mayan"? They're actually temples built on top of temples.
The whole thing about the Calendar being "The End" is an odd bit - because the Mayans had 2 ways to track the date, the short count and the long count. Kind of like if I said "Tuesday the 19th" you don't know where exactly that Tuesday falls into place. Could be this year, years from now, months from now, who knows. That's kind of how the Mayan short count works - you only know the date if it were anywhere within a 52 year cycle. When the Conquistadors came and burned all but 3 books for reasons of Heresey - a lot of history was lost and the ambiguation of dates really began. Does this stela mean Dec 21 2012 or does it mean Dec 21 2064? No one can really tell. Then you get into the incongruences between their calendar and the Gregorian calendar, like leap years - and it becomes a giant mess trying to figure it all out.
Well yes - thats usually what I meant by talks with the customer. The designer goes in, and asks what they need done. Once hearing the problem, they draft up a something on a whiteboard or napkin on the spot and then ask if thats what they are looking for, sometimes the customer will start brainstorming GUI's and stuff on their own to better help the designer get an idea for what they need.
I feel like I'm stumbling inside my head as I'm trying to figure out why you wouldn't think this holidy shopping season will be busy. It's been busy every year for as long as I can remember, why wouldn't this year be?
Oh it's no more their fault than it is anyone else's.
We're always going on about how they need to install a good antivirus and get their system checked out - so when the popup offers them a good antivirus and its "checking their system out" for free - of course they're going to click.
Industrialized hackers or non-industrialized hackers?
We recently had a run-in with a hacker, very recently, not this past Friday but the one before. Exploit because our Web Server wasn't patched up on Windows Updates (or so one expert tells us), we weren't more than a month behind. All that really seemed to occur is that the index.html file was overwritten by the hacker's web page. This has, of course, brought the spot light on IT and the CEO is now asking about our security practices.
This is the same CEO who insisted that we as IT staff dole out the passwords for users, make them simple enough to remember, and don't let them change. It is quite possibly the weakest password security I've ever seen and I have no doubts that this could have easily played a part in why there was a security breach. Reason being, sometimes a manager doesn't let us know of a person's dismissal till after they are gone - so their account is still fully active for a while. If they put in the request AFTER 5 on a Friday? Well lets hope we check our email when we get home and do it remotely. Just September we're dealing with the blow of someone leaving the company and taking contact information with them to their next job (I think that falls into trade secrets?), so theres a whole bunch of legal stuff around that, and of course people are asking if they were able to access this information after they left the company. Regardless, if someone puts in their 2 weeks - and they intend on taking it to their next job, they're going to grab what they can to take it off-site, and we have the worst policy regarding cell phones with data plans as well. Essentially if its not a blackberry, we set up the email forwarding, if it is a blackberry, we have an Enterprise server, and we can send the kill command to wipe all data from the blackberry including grandma's phone number... it's a pretty stupid policy, lets just leave it at that.
Basically, its going like this: The company went from small to medium pretty fast, and the plans are set to grow into a large company very quickly. All along the way, security was never that much of an issue, at least network wise. We had issues with people downloading movies and seemingly random attacks on the webserver, most of which have been dealt with by our firewall. All in all, the IT group is too small though, there's a team of 4 programmers to handle all the in-house applications we need, one of our critical systems is still on powerbuilder 5 or 6... Ontario just went from GST+PST to the Harmonized Sales Tax... Lets just say the Programmers are swamped. On the other side we've got 4 technicians and a manager. The manager contracts out our firewall setups to some guy who really doesn't seem any more competant than the rest of us, in fact he tries to keep us distracted while he does his work so we can't actually learn his job. I guess most contractors are probably like that though. But otherwise, its just 4 of us to handle ~800 PCs which is probably going to bump up to 1000 before December here, as we have roughly 5 new locations opening up.
So we're not equipped to handle hackers - and we've officially been hacked. What do we do? Turn to an industrialized hacker and hope we can pay more than our competitor's might pay? After all, it's a double edged sword. If we go looking for help on our security, it shows we have a weakness, and if we don't want to pay for his services he can go right next door and try and sell our goods with confidence. To me that sounds like a scenario where they can name just about any price they like. And with the current state of the company (growing) it would seem we have a lot of money to lose.
More devastating though, would be a hacker who ISN'T in it for the money. We get a lot of turn over here - and not just the summer student temps but in pretty much every division but IT and accounting. Someone who wants the company to fail and has a friend with expertise, or the expertise themselves, could easily bring this place down. I think we got lucky that we were hit by someone who seems to do nothing but self promotion of his abilities. Things aren't good right now, but they could be a lot worse.
No, I'm not a small minority, if I were, Jailbreaking an iPhone wouldn't even be a thing.
The fact that I and MANY OTHERS have to do something against Apple's wishes to use the device how we want to shows there is a fundamental flaw in the design and how users want to use the device.
It's in their best interest to keep the labels happy though. Sometimes the private jet, the pool, the mercedes, aren't actually owned by the musicians (though they'll say that they are on MTV Cribs) but are actually loaned out by the labels so that the band can live the high life while they're on their streak of popularity. You make the label money, they take care of their top money bags to keep them with the label. You fall off the charts? Want to switch labels? Well they're going to repo that car and give it to the next big shot in town.
So when the largest and most successful musicians seem to be slaming their FANS because they want to enjoy the music, it's because the record sales are keeping them in the Hollywood lifestyle. Perhaps you might be unaware of this, but sometimes when you sign up with a label, you can't actually go on tour without the labels permission. Then they've got you by the balls where you can't make money unless they let you.
What Apple does is come up with a nice design and have the technical people make it real. Most other companies have the techs make a product then have designers spray perfume on it.
Well what MOST companies do is have the designers talk to the customers to find out what it is they want, and then they take those specs to the Engineers and ask "How doable is this in this time frame, or what can you give me" - and then they both work on their respective parts from there.
I feel like Neither Microsoft Nor Apple has really pulled through on this regard. Microsoft Products seem to be able to do everything I want but never in an efficient manner, and Apple products just seem to frustrate me with how much they cater to how everyone else uses their product, and not how I want to use their product.
I wouldn't expect either companies to actually interface with their customers though. Ballmer's interaction with developers is scary enough and Job's is always just so full of himself.
What part? All he is trying to convey is that the claims of Zuckerberg being in it for the money from the start are not true. If that's the case for every website out there, it still makes the parents claim true.
And I think you are a little confused about it. Facebook wasn't designed with a "Let's be free to grow as fast as possible" scheme in mind. It didn't have financial incentive UNTIL it got big, but Amazon had financial incentive all along, but didn't invoke any of its plans until it got big. There is a difference.
It's worked in the past. Just look for a local female musician, photographer, make up artist, etc - and offer to build them a website over the weekend.
Sure Quake with it's actual 3d had something going for it, but Duke's engine was much more interactive and the graphics, though sprite based, still seemed to be higher in quality than Quake's at the time (considering that I was running Quake using the software renderer).
That also ties into the whole timeless classic where gameplay over compensated for graphics, like when people hail Dwarf Fortress or one of the Super Mario Bros titles.
Quake's graphics were actually pretty good at the time (I remember playing it without the software rendering necessary) - but the gameplay was definately not parallel to Duke 3D. Quake was more parellel to Doom, where it was more about getting the good guns and power ups and just rolling through opponents in a big bloody mess. Duke 3D was, in my opinion, far superior with its use of Pipebombs, holograms, Cameras/Screens, and all the little things about its gameplay, like being able to quickly look over your left and right shoulder while moving. It was less about getting the best gun for the level and owning it up and more about getting what weapons were best for your style of play - and owning it up.
And the single player - is there really any contest? Strippers make everything better.
I'm more interested in transporting this off of a multitouch device and putting it on a desktop I've got at home. That may sound odd at first (who has a touch interface desktop besides restaraunts?) but it's actually a fun project that's turned into more of a project I've got going.
I saw Johnny Lee's Wii Hack back in 2008 and fell in love with the idea of having that wall projected screen with interaction from the couch using just a pen or something of that nature. As such I took my desktop, went out and bought a wii-mote, and set it up. Johnny has said that he doesn't have enough time to port it to Linux but he created a Sourceforge project for it. Not many people have been interested in it though, and I can see why: it's a very niche product idea as it is right now.
But, if Ubuntu has a new multi-touch interface, then there might be such a demand for this. If the interface is too cumbersome for mobile devices, perhaps it can be better used on more TV like devices.
Imagine this: You've got a big screen TV or wall projector. You've got an Ubuntu Box set up to handle your Internet TV or Incoming Cable/Satellite. You don't need anything on the remote control besides the power button, and once everything is on you can access your TV, Movies, music, photos, and surf the web on your TV set using nothing but an infrared pen to click around while on the couch. You've got a wireless keyboard should you need to type anything in, and a second light pen for some multi touch gestures should you want to do anything intense.
I've got most of this set up with a Windows Box right now (minus the Cable/InternetTV) - and I really enjoy it minus the whole Windows Experience. I get enough Windows at work and doing hobby programming - I really do like Ubuntu for surfing the web and for family slide show get togethers and that sort of thing. I would be interested if this OS made it onto a desktop and then the Wiimote Whiteboard hack was ported.
That depends on what kind of Droid he has. Like if he has an R2 unit, that thing'll just plug right into the wall socket and edit the Employee Database so he is still on a paycheck!
Wowzers, you're still paying for telephone services WHILE paying for Internet?
The only reason I even HAVE a cell phone is for work and the occaisonal need to get a hold of people while on the run.
But seriously, if I ever need to talk to my friends and family, no matter what the geographic condition is, we've all been able to use Skype, or MSN messenger, or any of the other free video/audio/text chat applications available. I haven't made a long distance phone call in like 10 years.
But do you understand what Slim was trying to say there, it's easier for people to get a hold of you if you're on Facebook instead of relying on Email if that's what your friends and family are using? I mean - yes, my Mother could call up each and every one of us and ask us our Christmas gift wish lists and then redistribute them amongst the family - OR, she can start a facebook convo, with all of us involved, and say "Reminder, post your Christmas list or you'll get coal!" and we can all read each other's list without a lot of redundant conversation. And the added benefit is that Sibling A checks their facebook way more often than they check their email.
Whether they were 3 times as likely to have them removed or whether they were 3 times as likely to be healthy is irrelevant: the fact is that they were removed under reasoning of Appendicitus, which means they had to have at least correlated to the symptoms of Appendicitus - when the appendix could have been naturally healthy is the claim they are making.
Essentially, all they are saying is that statistically it could have been something besides Appendicitus but because they were Albanian they favoured that particular diagnosis, hence why I brought up my points about Doctors researching family history.
Not to mention that there is a lot of potential ability to recycle Rare Earth metals from electronics yet for whatever reason we keep shipping them off to China to be disassembled.
If you don't want China to have all the Rare Earth Metals... STOP GIVING IT BACK TO THEM.
I've always considered the Placebo Effect to be a good thing. If your mind affecting your biochemistry works as well as the actual drugs, that's less we need to give to people.
It is a BIG problem for big pharma...
Oh. OH. Problem for big pharmaceutical companies. They don't want people to cure their ailments unless its going to cost em.
In 2001, rumors were circulating in Greek hospitals that surgery residents, eager to rack up scalpel time, were falsely diagnosing hapless Albanian immigrants with appendicitis. At the University of Ioannina medical school’s teaching hospital, a newly minted doctor named Athina Tatsioni was discussing the rumors with colleagues when a professor who had overheard asked her if she’d like to try to prove whether they were true—he seemed to be almost daring her. She accepted the challenge and, with the professor’s and other colleagues’ help, eventually produced a formal study showing that, for whatever reason, the appendices removed from patients with Albanian names in six Greek hospitals were more than three times as likely to be perfectly healthy as those removed from patients with Greek names.
Okay - so I only bothered getting this far into TFA. Now - I'm no medical junkie, I didnt' even take Bio in high school, but I have occaisonally watched Scrubs and House and ER and a bunch of other medical dramas from time to time.
One thing that always seems to surface in these TV shows is the patients history, like their religion, nationality, where they work, etc. This leads me to believe that maybe - JUST MAYBE - there is actually some correlation between something in the Albanian culture and society that has an increased chance of appendicitis, and that its entirely possible that this pushes doctors towards diagnosing that when some of the symptoms appear. (Not that this is particularily the best course of action, but what else would you do? Run every test?)
But at the same time I know how incredibly innaccurate a lot of television can be about portraying a subject. However, the IT Crowd has basically mimicked my life, but thats another story for another time. Anyways, so if I'm absolutely and completely wrong, feel free to mod me down - but I just thought I'd interject.
Slashdot Mirror
So, I'm no expert on signal analysis, but I understand the whole concept of Satellite Dish arrays and why we have those big fields of Giant Dishes pointed at the stars to read incoming data.
This article doesn't seem to point out any of the information that might be handy. How far apart do your antenna's need to be, how big exactly do they need to be, how many, all that good stuff.
For all I know, it might need a hundred of centimeter long antenna's spread across the entire length of my yard. Would THAT make a dish obsolete?
Doesn't the date just mean that the calendar rolls from "age" of the Myan calendar to the next? Sure, it's the transition from one to another, but isn't it more psychological than anything? After all, other than lining many IS people's pockets, wasn't 2000 relatively uneventful?
I partied like it was 1999, and I still had to go into work the following day....
For starters, Y2K was a big issue, though not as big as everyone made it out to be. It wasn't like there was going to be a glitch and launch every nuke, it would have been more like being unable to use your bank account for a week. The reason it was relatively uneventful was the blood sweat and tears of your IS people, and yes they did get rich off it, but not without actually working on it.
For the Ancient Mayans, this actually had signifigant effects on their culture, much like how we celebrate Christmas and Easter every year, except this would have been a much bigger reason to party. It'd be like Y2K New Years, Christmas, And Spring Break in Cancun all at once. They had much smaller cycles within their cycle (like our months to a year) and everytime one of those rolled around, they actually added on another teir to their temples. Those big Mayan Pyramids you see when you google "Mayan"? They're actually temples built on top of temples.
The whole thing about the Calendar being "The End" is an odd bit - because the Mayans had 2 ways to track the date, the short count and the long count. Kind of like if I said "Tuesday the 19th" you don't know where exactly that Tuesday falls into place. Could be this year, years from now, months from now, who knows. That's kind of how the Mayan short count works - you only know the date if it were anywhere within a 52 year cycle. When the Conquistadors came and burned all but 3 books for reasons of Heresey - a lot of history was lost and the ambiguation of dates really began. Does this stela mean Dec 21 2012 or does it mean Dec 21 2064? No one can really tell. Then you get into the incongruences between their calendar and the Gregorian calendar, like leap years - and it becomes a giant mess trying to figure it all out.
Well yes - thats usually what I meant by talks with the customer. The designer goes in, and asks what they need done. Once hearing the problem, they draft up a something on a whiteboard or napkin on the spot and then ask if thats what they are looking for, sometimes the customer will start brainstorming GUI's and stuff on their own to better help the designer get an idea for what they need.
Haha, figured that'd be brought up.
I fear I've already given away enough already - that anyone with sufficient expertise might already figure it out.
...Why do you doubt that?
I feel like I'm stumbling inside my head as I'm trying to figure out why you wouldn't think this holidy shopping season will be busy. It's been busy every year for as long as I can remember, why wouldn't this year be?
Oh it's no more their fault than it is anyone else's.
We're always going on about how they need to install a good antivirus and get their system checked out - so when the popup offers them a good antivirus and its "checking their system out" for free - of course they're going to click.
Well yeah -
You think the guys boosting cars are the ones who want to own them?
Industrialized hackers or non-industrialized hackers?
We recently had a run-in with a hacker, very recently, not this past Friday but the one before. Exploit because our Web Server wasn't patched up on Windows Updates (or so one expert tells us), we weren't more than a month behind. All that really seemed to occur is that the index.html file was overwritten by the hacker's web page. This has, of course, brought the spot light on IT and the CEO is now asking about our security practices.
This is the same CEO who insisted that we as IT staff dole out the passwords for users, make them simple enough to remember, and don't let them change. It is quite possibly the weakest password security I've ever seen and I have no doubts that this could have easily played a part in why there was a security breach. Reason being, sometimes a manager doesn't let us know of a person's dismissal till after they are gone - so their account is still fully active for a while. If they put in the request AFTER 5 on a Friday? Well lets hope we check our email when we get home and do it remotely. Just September we're dealing with the blow of someone leaving the company and taking contact information with them to their next job (I think that falls into trade secrets?), so theres a whole bunch of legal stuff around that, and of course people are asking if they were able to access this information after they left the company. Regardless, if someone puts in their 2 weeks - and they intend on taking it to their next job, they're going to grab what they can to take it off-site, and we have the worst policy regarding cell phones with data plans as well. Essentially if its not a blackberry, we set up the email forwarding, if it is a blackberry, we have an Enterprise server, and we can send the kill command to wipe all data from the blackberry including grandma's phone number... it's a pretty stupid policy, lets just leave it at that.
Basically, its going like this: The company went from small to medium pretty fast, and the plans are set to grow into a large company very quickly. All along the way, security was never that much of an issue, at least network wise. We had issues with people downloading movies and seemingly random attacks on the webserver, most of which have been dealt with by our firewall. All in all, the IT group is too small though, there's a team of 4 programmers to handle all the in-house applications we need, one of our critical systems is still on powerbuilder 5 or 6... Ontario just went from GST+PST to the Harmonized Sales Tax... Lets just say the Programmers are swamped. On the other side we've got 4 technicians and a manager. The manager contracts out our firewall setups to some guy who really doesn't seem any more competant than the rest of us, in fact he tries to keep us distracted while he does his work so we can't actually learn his job. I guess most contractors are probably like that though. But otherwise, its just 4 of us to handle ~800 PCs which is probably going to bump up to 1000 before December here, as we have roughly 5 new locations opening up.
So we're not equipped to handle hackers - and we've officially been hacked. What do we do? Turn to an industrialized hacker and hope we can pay more than our competitor's might pay? After all, it's a double edged sword. If we go looking for help on our security, it shows we have a weakness, and if we don't want to pay for his services he can go right next door and try and sell our goods with confidence. To me that sounds like a scenario where they can name just about any price they like. And with the current state of the company (growing) it would seem we have a lot of money to lose.
More devastating though, would be a hacker who ISN'T in it for the money. We get a lot of turn over here - and not just the summer student temps but in pretty much every division but IT and accounting. Someone who wants the company to fail and has a friend with expertise, or the expertise themselves, could easily bring this place down. I think we got lucky that we were hit by someone who seems to do nothing but self promotion of his abilities. Things aren't good right now, but they could be a lot worse.
No, I'm not a small minority, if I were, Jailbreaking an iPhone wouldn't even be a thing.
The fact that I and MANY OTHERS have to do something against Apple's wishes to use the device how we want to shows there is a fundamental flaw in the design and how users want to use the device.
It's in their best interest to keep the labels happy though. Sometimes the private jet, the pool, the mercedes, aren't actually owned by the musicians (though they'll say that they are on MTV Cribs) but are actually loaned out by the labels so that the band can live the high life while they're on their streak of popularity. You make the label money, they take care of their top money bags to keep them with the label. You fall off the charts? Want to switch labels? Well they're going to repo that car and give it to the next big shot in town.
So when the largest and most successful musicians seem to be slaming their FANS because they want to enjoy the music, it's because the record sales are keeping them in the Hollywood lifestyle. Perhaps you might be unaware of this, but sometimes when you sign up with a label, you can't actually go on tour without the labels permission. Then they've got you by the balls where you can't make money unless they let you.
What Apple does is come up with a nice design and have the technical people make it real. Most other companies have the techs make a product then have designers spray perfume on it.
Well what MOST companies do is have the designers talk to the customers to find out what it is they want, and then they take those specs to the Engineers and ask "How doable is this in this time frame, or what can you give me" - and then they both work on their respective parts from there.
I feel like Neither Microsoft Nor Apple has really pulled through on this regard. Microsoft Products seem to be able to do everything I want but never in an efficient manner, and Apple products just seem to frustrate me with how much they cater to how everyone else uses their product, and not how I want to use their product.
I wouldn't expect either companies to actually interface with their customers though. Ballmer's interaction with developers is scary enough and Job's is always just so full of himself.
This is a fallacy.
What part? All he is trying to convey is that the claims of Zuckerberg being in it for the money from the start are not true. If that's the case for every website out there, it still makes the parents claim true.
And I think you are a little confused about it. Facebook wasn't designed with a "Let's be free to grow as fast as possible" scheme in mind. It didn't have financial incentive UNTIL it got big, but Amazon had financial incentive all along, but didn't invoke any of its plans until it got big. There is a difference.
It's worked in the past. Just look for a local female musician, photographer, make up artist, etc - and offer to build them a website over the weekend.
Maybe I'm Crazy...
Or High...
But how did Super Mario Bros turn 25 before the NES Turned 25?
Sure Quake with it's actual 3d had something going for it, but Duke's engine was much more interactive and the graphics, though sprite based, still seemed to be higher in quality than Quake's at the time (considering that I was running Quake using the software renderer).
That also ties into the whole timeless classic where gameplay over compensated for graphics, like when people hail Dwarf Fortress or one of the Super Mario Bros titles.
Quake's graphics were actually pretty good at the time (I remember playing it without the software rendering necessary) - but the gameplay was definately not parallel to Duke 3D. Quake was more parellel to Doom, where it was more about getting the good guns and power ups and just rolling through opponents in a big bloody mess. Duke 3D was, in my opinion, far superior with its use of Pipebombs, holograms, Cameras/Screens, and all the little things about its gameplay, like being able to quickly look over your left and right shoulder while moving. It was less about getting the best gun for the level and owning it up and more about getting what weapons were best for your style of play - and owning it up.
And the single player - is there really any contest? Strippers make everything better.
I'm more interested in transporting this off of a multitouch device and putting it on a desktop I've got at home. That may sound odd at first (who has a touch interface desktop besides restaraunts?) but it's actually a fun project that's turned into more of a project I've got going.
I saw Johnny Lee's Wii Hack back in 2008 and fell in love with the idea of having that wall projected screen with interaction from the couch using just a pen or something of that nature. As such I took my desktop, went out and bought a wii-mote, and set it up. Johnny has said that he doesn't have enough time to port it to Linux but he created a Sourceforge project for it. Not many people have been interested in it though, and I can see why: it's a very niche product idea as it is right now.
But, if Ubuntu has a new multi-touch interface, then there might be such a demand for this. If the interface is too cumbersome for mobile devices, perhaps it can be better used on more TV like devices.
Imagine this: You've got a big screen TV or wall projector. You've got an Ubuntu Box set up to handle your Internet TV or Incoming Cable/Satellite. You don't need anything on the remote control besides the power button, and once everything is on you can access your TV, Movies, music, photos, and surf the web on your TV set using nothing but an infrared pen to click around while on the couch. You've got a wireless keyboard should you need to type anything in, and a second light pen for some multi touch gestures should you want to do anything intense.
I've got most of this set up with a Windows Box right now (minus the Cable/InternetTV) - and I really enjoy it minus the whole Windows Experience. I get enough Windows at work and doing hobby programming - I really do like Ubuntu for surfing the web and for family slide show get togethers and that sort of thing. I would be interested if this OS made it onto a desktop and then the Wiimote Whiteboard hack was ported.
But I guess that's very niche market though.
That depends on what kind of Droid he has. Like if he has an R2 unit, that thing'll just plug right into the wall socket and edit the Employee Database so he is still on a paycheck!
Wowzers, you're still paying for telephone services WHILE paying for Internet?
The only reason I even HAVE a cell phone is for work and the occaisonal need to get a hold of people while on the run.
But seriously, if I ever need to talk to my friends and family, no matter what the geographic condition is, we've all been able to use Skype, or MSN messenger, or any of the other free video/audio/text chat applications available. I haven't made a long distance phone call in like 10 years.
But do you understand what Slim was trying to say there, it's easier for people to get a hold of you if you're on Facebook instead of relying on Email if that's what your friends and family are using? I mean - yes, my Mother could call up each and every one of us and ask us our Christmas gift wish lists and then redistribute them amongst the family - OR, she can start a facebook convo, with all of us involved, and say "Reminder, post your Christmas list or you'll get coal!" and we can all read each other's list without a lot of redundant conversation. And the added benefit is that Sibling A checks their facebook way more often than they check their email.
Logic comprehension:
Whether they were 3 times as likely to have them removed or whether they were 3 times as likely to be healthy is irrelevant: the fact is that they were removed under reasoning of Appendicitus, which means they had to have at least correlated to the symptoms of Appendicitus - when the appendix could have been naturally healthy is the claim they are making.
Essentially, all they are saying is that statistically it could have been something besides Appendicitus but because they were Albanian they favoured that particular diagnosis, hence why I brought up my points about Doctors researching family history.
Not to mention that there is a lot of potential ability to recycle Rare Earth metals from electronics yet for whatever reason we keep shipping them off to China to be disassembled.
If you don't want China to have all the Rare Earth Metals... STOP GIVING IT BACK TO THEM.
If the bandwidth isn't unlimitted, they should stop selling these "unlimitted" plans.
This equates to me boasting that I could win a hot dog eating contest and then requesting that the contest be limitted to one hot dog.
You ARE aware of the placebo effect, right?
I've always considered the Placebo Effect to be a good thing. If your mind affecting your biochemistry works as well as the actual drugs, that's less we need to give to people.
It is a BIG problem for big pharma ...
Oh. OH. Problem for big pharmaceutical companies. They don't want people to cure their ailments unless its going to cost em.
Hmmm...
Studies show that I should be modded up.
There is fat in diet?
Good thing I drink Coke Zero instead of Diet Coke!
In 2001, rumors were circulating in Greek hospitals that surgery residents, eager to rack up scalpel time, were falsely diagnosing hapless Albanian immigrants with appendicitis. At the University of Ioannina medical school’s teaching hospital, a newly minted doctor named Athina Tatsioni was discussing the rumors with colleagues when a professor who had overheard asked her if she’d like to try to prove whether they were true—he seemed to be almost daring her. She accepted the challenge and, with the professor’s and other colleagues’ help, eventually produced a formal study showing that, for whatever reason, the appendices removed from patients with Albanian names in six Greek hospitals were more than three times as likely to be perfectly healthy as those removed from patients with Greek names.
Okay - so I only bothered getting this far into TFA.
Now - I'm no medical junkie, I didnt' even take Bio in high school, but I have occaisonally watched Scrubs and House and ER and a bunch of other medical dramas from time to time.
One thing that always seems to surface in these TV shows is the patients history, like their religion, nationality, where they work, etc. This leads me to believe that maybe - JUST MAYBE - there is actually some correlation between something in the Albanian culture and society that has an increased chance of appendicitis, and that its entirely possible that this pushes doctors towards diagnosing that when some of the symptoms appear. (Not that this is particularily the best course of action, but what else would you do? Run every test?)
But at the same time I know how incredibly innaccurate a lot of television can be about portraying a subject. However, the IT Crowd has basically mimicked my life, but thats another story for another time. Anyways, so if I'm absolutely and completely wrong, feel free to mod me down - but I just thought I'd interject.