Physics community full of frauds?
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Ununoctium Wrapup
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· Score: 2, Flamebait
Michael,
Rather more likely is that members of the slashdot community would think that the slashdot editorial staff is full of incompetent idiots -- if we were unable to see that the stupidity of one doesn't necessarily reflect on the intelligence of the rest.
Does anybody else find it sad that only the trolls managed to figure out that this was a joke? This causes me great unhappiness. I believe that euroderf should be put to death.
Well, in defense of the editors, I'm almost positive that I remember a story about the latter a few months ago.
(Of course, given that, maybe we should be even more surprised that it wasn't posted.)
Re:To anyone complaing because they have old syste
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AMD Delays Hammer
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· Score: 0, Offtopic
I'll take that into consideration. I must stop living your lifestyle. It's OK, there is help for you yet.
SickRick: stop feeding the trolls. It just makes you look like a moron.
Oh, and most of us grew out of the "I know you are, but what am I?" style of insults in sixth grade. If you're going to insult someone, at least do a good job of it. (Look at the trolls above for some pointers.)
The "good for the masses" part is that more people will be able to work on / test / debug new linux kernels, so that Joe User will end up with a more stable system. As far as Joe User who doesn't know what a kernel is, I doubt that there's much of a reason for him to be using it.
Well, I'm doing the latter, but I'd bet that 70% of the posts on this subject are going to be the former. So if you want to go with the majority, I'd make some nasty remark about Epson in a hurry.
Gee, that's a "very interesting" essay all right. It might be even more interesting if we hadn't heard exactly the same argument trotted out over and over and over on slashdot over the past couple years. Why don't you just post an article that says, "Let's get started on today's IP flamewar"?
At this point, the argument's getting ridiculous. Everyone's made up their minds, and no new evidence has been presented. (Every time a study is made, it's praised by the group that agrees with the conclusion and lambasted by the one that doesn't.)
They could use "libre software" (or "software libre"), or "GNU/free". (Those two happen to be the ones that I think are most reasonable; but I've seen lots of suggestions.)
The OP is perfectly correct, though, in saying that the "free software" movement attempts to capitalize on the fact that the phrase means "software without monetary cost", not "software that is licensed in a way which protects the FSF's idea of your freedoms." I don't think that they have made any real attempts to come up with a better term.
Yet another reason why I choose to identify myself with the "open source" camp instead.
Well, I'm still somewhat skeptical that they'll actually be able to do it... I'll believe it when it happens. But if they do manage it, I think that it's a good step forward. As the government doesn't seem to have much interest in getting us to space, we're going to have to rely on commercial ventures to do it for us.
I have. Others have too. However, it doesn't make any difference. On the other hand, if slashdot can't earn any money, their jobs are suddenly at stake. That might be enough to make them do something.
The reason why compaining in the comments is important is because it lets everyone -- not just the editors -- see the complaints. If everyone just stuck to e-mail, then they could just claim, "Not too many people are bothered; we don't need to do anything." (If you don't believe they'd do that, recall their response to page-widening.)
Well, as far as advertising goes -- I recommend that anyone that dislikes the attitude of the slashdot staff block the advertisements. (I just turn off images when coming to slashdot, though of course there are better ways of doing it.) If they're going to treat the slashdot readers as mindless consumers, I'm certainly not going to waste my bandwidth in order to help them make a profit. They've done nothing to earn my loyalty.
Did the 4,000 people who commented on the dupe story read the comments?
The more that we express our displeasure with the obvious fact that the editors don't care, the more likely they are to start paying attention. At this point, with there being generally a repeat every day, the number of complaints often outweighs the number of comments on the subject. I keep hoping that someday one of the "editors" will look at the comments and realize that there's a problem. (Of course, maybe they really don't care that thousands of people think that they're lazy idiots because they can't even glance at the front page before posting a story.)
The fact that the stories repeat isn't so bad in itself, but it's a symtom of the bigger problem that the editors simply don't care about slashdot. Until they either start working, or get a clue and step down, they deserve all the derision we can heap on them.
Please explain how you can 'steal' code from the public if they still have a copy of it. (I assume that it's the same way that you can 'steal' a song from a musician by illegally copying it. Is that right?)
In my opinion, all government-funded software should be put in the public domain. The people's taxes paid for it; they should be able to do whatever they want with it. Including modifying it and selling it to someone else.
I'm fairly certain that the original poster was referring to the fact that meteors are glowing hot when they hit the earth -- and I was trying to point out that the reason for that is air friction, which isn't relevant, since if the asteroid is inside the earth's atmosphere, it's already Too Late. I just thought it rather silly that he was playing armchair scientist, and missed something that basic.
Of course, you are correct about the temperature extremes that it will be subjected to; I'm sure that a standard mylar balloon wouldn't hold up for it. However, I'm sure that they can come up something that would work.
Thank you for your contribution. Now please prepare a report on why, exactly, incoming asteroids would be hot enough to glow. Be prepared to show whether or not that will be relevant at the time that the plastic hits the asteroid.
Just a clarification: what you're describing is the "Free Software" crowd, not "Open Source." (This is the kind of rhetoric you hear from RMS, and he's as down on the OSS movement as you can get.) I identify myself with OSS, and I'm quite pro-business. (As long as their actions aren't evil; of course there are a few cases where they are.) I don't think that your characterization of slashdotters as anti-business is correct; the proportion is probably more like 50-50. (Admittedly the 'gloom and doom' flavor of anti-business posts do tend to catch more moderation points, and are thus more visible.)
Have you made sure that you're using the latest version of Opera? (I found that older versions crashed a lot; now it only happens occasionally -- no more so than Mozilla.)
Of course, it may also just be that you're using pages that Opera doesn't like. I tend to not bother with the incredibly complex pages, as it seems to me that the complexity of a page is usually inversely proportional to the quality of information.
The examples you give are very far removed from the newspeak/doublethink of Orwell. Propaganda is nothing new, however, it's not what 1984 was about. If you read the essay about newspeak, the premise was that thoughts are completely reliant on words. As Steven Pinker says in The Language Instinct: "The idea that thought is the same as language is an example of what can be called a conventional absurdity: a statement that goes against all common sense but that everyone believes..." Doublethink is similar. Both of them do take real, human traits, but stretch them to such extremes that they become simply fantasy. That's why Orwell's book is not particularily relevant.
Finally, as someone who (at least I believe) is in control of my opinions and mental facilities; the claim that the "war on terror" and attack on Iraq is doublethink is an ad hominim attack on those who support them, not a proof of Orwell's vision. There are reasonable arguments for both sides, and an attempt to discredit the other side by comparing them to "Big Brother" rather than addressing their concerns does nothing to improve your argument.
Let's see... on the page of the paper, the author asserts that the public and corporate perception of Linux has undergone a 180 degree reversal in the last year. (Simply not true... a year, even two or three years ago, Linux was very much on most of the mentioned companies' radar. He's trying to pass off his change of mind by claiming that it was the industry's) He also states that "Linux and its global network of developers have long sought nothing less than 'total world domination.'" (Again, untrue; 'Linux,' as an operating system, doesn't have any desires. Linus Torvalds, the head of the "global network of developers," has repeatedly stated that Linux is a hobby, not a grand political scheme. The only one interested in world domination is RMS, however, in that case the article shouldn't be about Linux at all; it should be about GNU and the FSF.)
I'd take any paper that starts that way with a grain of salt.
Well... the only problem is that the 'rate of technology progression' would be defined by lawsuits, not by any scientific method. (Imagine some judge, not knowing anything about software, ordering that software patents should last 100 years. You know it would happen.) The biggest problem with 'reforms' is that those that it's supposed to effect can usually manage to stall them forever.
Slashdot Mirror
Michael,
Rather more likely is that members of the slashdot community would think that the slashdot editorial staff is full of incompetent idiots -- if we were unable to see that the stupidity of one doesn't necessarily reflect on the intelligence of the rest.
Does anybody else find it sad that only the trolls managed to figure out that this was a joke? This causes me great unhappiness. I believe that euroderf should be put to death.
(Of course, given that, maybe we should be even more surprised that it wasn't posted.)
SickRick: stop feeding the trolls. It just makes you look like a moron.
Oh, and most of us grew out of the "I know you are, but what am I?" style of insults in sixth grade. If you're going to insult someone, at least do a good job of it. (Look at the trolls above for some pointers.)
The "good for the masses" part is that more people will be able to work on / test / debug new linux kernels, so that Joe User will end up with a more stable system. As far as Joe User who doesn't know what a kernel is, I doubt that there's much of a reason for him to be using it.
You just figured it out? Your user id only has 5 digits!
Well, I'm doing the latter, but I'd bet that 70% of the posts on this subject are going to be the former. So if you want to go with the majority, I'd make some nasty remark about Epson in a hurry.
At this point, the argument's getting ridiculous. Everyone's made up their minds, and no new evidence has been presented. (Every time a study is made, it's praised by the group that agrees with the conclusion and lambasted by the one that doesn't.)
The OP is perfectly correct, though, in saying that the "free software" movement attempts to capitalize on the fact that the phrase means "software without monetary cost", not "software that is licensed in a way which protects the FSF's idea of your freedoms." I don't think that they have made any real attempts to come up with a better term.
Yet another reason why I choose to identify myself with the "open source" camp instead.
Calling Katz a journalist is an insult to real journalists everywhere. Perhaps there's a category for being a bottomless pit of stupidity?
Well, I'm still somewhat skeptical that they'll actually be able to do it ... I'll believe it when it happens. But if they do manage it, I think that it's a good step forward. As the government doesn't seem to have much interest in getting us to space, we're going to have to rely on commercial ventures to do it for us.
The reason why compaining in the comments is important is because it lets everyone -- not just the editors -- see the complaints. If everyone just stuck to e-mail, then they could just claim, "Not too many people are bothered; we don't need to do anything." (If you don't believe they'd do that, recall their response to page-widening.)
Well, as far as advertising goes -- I recommend that anyone that dislikes the attitude of the slashdot staff block the advertisements. (I just turn off images when coming to slashdot, though of course there are better ways of doing it.) If they're going to treat the slashdot readers as mindless consumers, I'm certainly not going to waste my bandwidth in order to help them make a profit. They've done nothing to earn my loyalty.
The more that we express our displeasure with the obvious fact that the editors don't care, the more likely they are to start paying attention. At this point, with there being generally a repeat every day, the number of complaints often outweighs the number of comments on the subject. I keep hoping that someday one of the "editors" will look at the comments and realize that there's a problem. (Of course, maybe they really don't care that thousands of people think that they're lazy idiots because they can't even glance at the front page before posting a story.)
The fact that the stories repeat isn't so bad in itself, but it's a symtom of the bigger problem that the editors simply don't care about slashdot. Until they either start working, or get a clue and step down, they deserve all the derision we can heap on them.
When computer games stop being a multi-billion dollar industry.
Don't be a paranoid idiot.
Please explain how you can 'steal' code from the public if they still have a copy of it. (I assume that it's the same way that you can 'steal' a song from a musician by illegally copying it. Is that right?)
In my opinion, all government-funded software should be put in the public domain. The people's taxes paid for it; they should be able to do whatever they want with it. Including modifying it and selling it to someone else.
All right ... who was the moron moderator? Did you even read the article summary?
Of course, you are correct about the temperature extremes that it will be subjected to; I'm sure that a standard mylar balloon wouldn't hold up for it. However, I'm sure that they can come up something that would work.
Thank you for your contribution. Now please prepare a report on why, exactly, incoming asteroids would be hot enough to glow. Be prepared to show whether or not that will be relevant at the time that the plastic hits the asteroid.
Thank you,
Your Fifth-Grade science teacher.
Just a clarification: what you're describing is the "Free Software" crowd, not "Open Source." (This is the kind of rhetoric you hear from RMS, and he's as down on the OSS movement as you can get.) I identify myself with OSS, and I'm quite pro-business. (As long as their actions aren't evil; of course there are a few cases where they are.) I don't think that your characterization of slashdotters as anti-business is correct; the proportion is probably more like 50-50. (Admittedly the 'gloom and doom' flavor of anti-business posts do tend to catch more moderation points, and are thus more visible.)
Have you made sure that you're using the latest version of Opera? (I found that older versions crashed a lot; now it only happens occasionally -- no more so than Mozilla.)
Of course, it may also just be that you're using pages that Opera doesn't like. I tend to not bother with the incredibly complex pages, as it seems to me that the complexity of a page is usually inversely proportional to the quality of information.
Finally, as someone who (at least I believe) is in control of my opinions and mental facilities; the claim that the "war on terror" and attack on Iraq is doublethink is an ad hominim attack on those who support them, not a proof of Orwell's vision. There are reasonable arguments for both sides, and an attempt to discredit the other side by comparing them to "Big Brother" rather than addressing their concerns does nothing to improve your argument.
I'd take any paper that starts that way with a grain of salt.
If anyone posted this garbage here, they'd be moderated to -1 in a hurry.
Are you under the impression that slashdot moderation has anything to do with the quality of a post?
Well ... the only problem is that the 'rate of technology progression' would be defined by lawsuits, not by any scientific method. (Imagine some judge, not knowing anything about software, ordering that software patents should last 100 years. You know it would happen.) The biggest problem with 'reforms' is that those that it's supposed to effect can usually manage to stall them forever.