Apparently it has succeeded in America -- the terrorists "hate our freedom" (TM), so we figured that if we get rid of a bit of our freedom, they will hate us less and be less likely to attack. Mission accomplished!
Security theater is all well and good up to a point, but the TSA has made air travel almost unbearable. Furthermore, I have serious doubts about the Constitutionality of the Federal Government deciding that we need to forfeit every last bit of our privacy every time we want to get on a plane. The whole thing was ridiculous and funny 10 years ago, but it has gone way beyond that now, into scary/infuriating territory.
How are we going to organize a boycott? How many nerds do you think really care enough about these issues? Do you really think Comcast is going to see 14 nerds out in front of their building and go OH NOES WE NEED TO CHANGE OUR WAYS? My options are Comcast or dial-up. As I need (not want, need) high speed Internet access to fulfill my work responsibilities, my options are Comcast, or move.
Why is this baffling? They bounce a laser off of the groove and the voltage fluctuations are then sent to an amplifier. Lasers exist perfectly well in the analog realm, the fact that they are used very commonly to read digital data from optical discs is irrelevant.
This whole thing is getting out of control. First of all, only a tiny percentage of child abuse happens through the Internet. Even kids are smart enough to recognize that it's not a good idea to meet up with some random person they met in a chat room -- most (somewhere in the neighborhood of 95%) child abuse happens at the hands of family members and close family friends. Of the remaining 5%, very little is facilitated by the Internet. This stuff is certainly bad, but it seems horrifyingly misguided to be writing specific legislation aimed at stomping out this tiny bastion of crime -- particularly when the inevitable collateral damage is considered.
While we are on the terrorism thing -- I would like to point out that we would be better off passing anti-bee legislation, as significantly more people are killed by bees than terrorists. Again, the whole thing seems completely absurd.
Your explanation of this analogy fails. Contrary to what you may believe, there are significant restrictions in the process of hiring and firing employees, even for at will employees. If I were to find out that one of my employees was a different religion, and then promptly fire them, they could sue me to the moon and back (and rightly so). The GP was not attempting to say that it IS illegal for your boss to fire you for the sex video, they were saying that it SHOULD BE illegal, as the video on the Internet is none of the boss's business, and therefore outside of the scope of your employment. At will employers still need a fairly good reason to fire you -- you said it yourself. If at will employers really could fire you for no reason, then there would be nothing to prevent them from firing you for not having sex with them.
What will stop the cops from cruising down the street looking into peoples' houses, spotting illegal activity, telling a judge that they received an anonymous tip, obtaining a warrant, and then legally raiding your home. Answer: nothing. To further expound, we can absolutely expect this to happen if this sort of technology becomes common-place. The government is not in the business of protecting the citizens anymore -- it is in the business of keeping us scared of as many things as possible to preserve its own power.
Microsoft has been quite the nasty little patent troll itself in the past -- I do hope they win this one, but it is always amusing to see them get a taste of their own medicine.
Umm... in many of these cases, the judge will assign punitive damages to the defendant. That acknowledges that the fines in question exist solely as punishment to the defendant in an attempt to teach him/her to not do whatever they did again. I do believe in rehabilitation and personal responsibility, but we don't live in a world of black and white, there is a time and a place for both carrots and sticks in the criminal justice system. For the record, I think carrots are more effective most of the time, but when the stick is required, we should make sure that the size of the stick is appropriate to inflict the same amount of pain, regardless of the defendant.
Yeah, I agree. I see no reason why we need anything more than Quake 2 era graphics in games -- I mean, we can still see everything that's going on, and we can still play the game. I mean, does Quake 3 really play better than Quake 2? Sorry dude, but you fail at logic. Just because games don't NEED better graphics is hardly an argument against better graphics. You don't NEED anything more than a bit of food, some water, and a way to stay warm when it gets cold outside.
No. Crysis DX9 vs. DX10 really is no appreciable difference at all -- in Crysis, the Very High setting is locked for DX10 only, but this is a totally artificial limitation, probably to try and drum up support for DX10. Even at that, the difference between High and Very High is not earth-shattering. The Internet quickly figured out how to enable all of the Very High graphics setting for DX9 through.INI tweaks, even before Crysis was on store shelves. Being called out on their bullshit, Crytek then released Crysis: Warhead with the Enthusiast (Very High) graphics setting unlocked in DX9. Here is a great article with screenshots:
Yes. You need high quality equipment for the difference between DVD and Blu Ray to be worthwhile. What's your point? There are some of us who care about quality and have thousands of dollars of home theater equipment. There are some who don't. I feel that it makes the experience of watching a film far more engrossing and worth the cost. You have chosen to spend your money differently, so it's not worth upgrading to Blu Ray. On my set-up, however, the difference is immediate, obvious, and clearly worth the money for those who care about such things.
Sure, sometimes good enough is good enough for most. Then there are some who care about quality and are willing to pay more for it. I happen to enjoy watching films more when they are on Blu Ray, and the higher quality image and sound further immerse me into the experience. If you don't happen to find the difference worth the cost, that's fine, but I see no reason to complain. Blu Ray is coexisting quite nicely with DVD at the moment, and I don't see anyone shoving the upgrade down your throat.
We need that in America. It is completely absurd that if Bill Gates and I committed the same criminal offense, we would incur the same fine. Bill would pull the money out of his wallet in much the same manner that I buy a pack of gum and go about his day, whereas I would be financially devastated. In this case, while the actual dollar amount of the fines were equal, the punishment absolutely was not. The fine should be adjusted so that the punishment is equal in both cases -- it is completely absurd that this is not the case already.
We don't live in a true democracy -- a true democracy would be an absolute nightmare. We need a buffer to protect us from the tyranny of the majority. If the United States were a true democracy, it is likely that Conservative Christianity would be the official religion, morality would be mandated on a mass scale (far more than it already is), and things would be an all around disaster. Pure democracy = mob rule, plain and simple.
You shouldn't not pay your speeding ticket because not everyone who was speeding got a ticket, but if there were a law on the books that granted you the right to speed (hey, we are talking hypotheticals here), it would be worth putting the law to the test, as the two laws are mutually exclusive.
The illustrations are clearly not a literal representation of reality, but they could certainly be a figurative representation of reality used to elucidate the accompanying non-fiction text. If you looked through any modern science text book, the often bizarre figures and illustrations used to clarify the point could very easily be construed as fiction to one who was not familiar with the format.
From the research I have done, it does not seem to be very widely accepted that this manuscript is a hoax -- for instance, I find it extremely unlikely that the author would have created such a convincing fake to fool the crytologists 500 years ago -- the code could have been a far more transparent fake and would have been accepted for quite some time.
I haven't looked into the issue too much -- but it seems like XP mode is nothing more than virtualized XP -- how is this any different than booting up an XP install in VirtualBox or VMWare? This is not even to mention the fact that Windows 7 is extremely dual-boot friendly, and runs everything I have thrown at it as of yet without a hitch.
Who cares, dude? Shakespeare made up hundreds of words. English is a living language -- if people weren't allowed to make up words we would have nothing to call that machine you are using to post this inane crap, nor for the medium by which we are all disgraced by your brain vomit.
Slashdot Mirror
Apparently it has succeeded in America -- the terrorists "hate our freedom" (TM), so we figured that if we get rid of a bit of our freedom, they will hate us less and be less likely to attack. Mission accomplished!
Security theater is all well and good up to a point, but the TSA has made air travel almost unbearable. Furthermore, I have serious doubts about the Constitutionality of the Federal Government deciding that we need to forfeit every last bit of our privacy every time we want to get on a plane. The whole thing was ridiculous and funny 10 years ago, but it has gone way beyond that now, into scary/infuriating territory.
How are we going to organize a boycott? How many nerds do you think really care enough about these issues? Do you really think Comcast is going to see 14 nerds out in front of their building and go OH NOES WE NEED TO CHANGE OUR WAYS? My options are Comcast or dial-up. As I need (not want, need) high speed Internet access to fulfill my work responsibilities, my options are Comcast, or move.
I don't trust my ISP -- I use them because I have no other option where I live.
Why is this baffling? They bounce a laser off of the groove and the voltage fluctuations are then sent to an amplifier. Lasers exist perfectly well in the analog realm, the fact that they are used very commonly to read digital data from optical discs is irrelevant.
Over $9,000
This whole thing is getting out of control. First of all, only a tiny percentage of child abuse happens through the Internet. Even kids are smart enough to recognize that it's not a good idea to meet up with some random person they met in a chat room -- most (somewhere in the neighborhood of 95%) child abuse happens at the hands of family members and close family friends. Of the remaining 5%, very little is facilitated by the Internet. This stuff is certainly bad, but it seems horrifyingly misguided to be writing specific legislation aimed at stomping out this tiny bastion of crime -- particularly when the inevitable collateral damage is considered.
While we are on the terrorism thing -- I would like to point out that we would be better off passing anti-bee legislation, as significantly more people are killed by bees than terrorists. Again, the whole thing seems completely absurd.
Your explanation of this analogy fails. Contrary to what you may believe, there are significant restrictions in the process of hiring and firing employees, even for at will employees. If I were to find out that one of my employees was a different religion, and then promptly fire them, they could sue me to the moon and back (and rightly so). The GP was not attempting to say that it IS illegal for your boss to fire you for the sex video, they were saying that it SHOULD BE illegal, as the video on the Internet is none of the boss's business, and therefore outside of the scope of your employment. At will employers still need a fairly good reason to fire you -- you said it yourself. If at will employers really could fire you for no reason, then there would be nothing to prevent them from firing you for not having sex with them.
What will stop the cops from cruising down the street looking into peoples' houses, spotting illegal activity, telling a judge that they received an anonymous tip, obtaining a warrant, and then legally raiding your home. Answer: nothing. To further expound, we can absolutely expect this to happen if this sort of technology becomes common-place. The government is not in the business of protecting the citizens anymore -- it is in the business of keeping us scared of as many things as possible to preserve its own power.
Microsoft has been quite the nasty little patent troll itself in the past -- I do hope they win this one, but it is always amusing to see them get a taste of their own medicine.
Umm... in many of these cases, the judge will assign punitive damages to the defendant. That acknowledges that the fines in question exist solely as punishment to the defendant in an attempt to teach him/her to not do whatever they did again. I do believe in rehabilitation and personal responsibility, but we don't live in a world of black and white, there is a time and a place for both carrots and sticks in the criminal justice system. For the record, I think carrots are more effective most of the time, but when the stick is required, we should make sure that the size of the stick is appropriate to inflict the same amount of pain, regardless of the defendant.
Yeah, I agree. I see no reason why we need anything more than Quake 2 era graphics in games -- I mean, we can still see everything that's going on, and we can still play the game. I mean, does Quake 3 really play better than Quake 2? Sorry dude, but you fail at logic. Just because games don't NEED better graphics is hardly an argument against better graphics. You don't NEED anything more than a bit of food, some water, and a way to stay warm when it gets cold outside.
No. Crysis DX9 vs. DX10 really is no appreciable difference at all -- in Crysis, the Very High setting is locked for DX10 only, but this is a totally artificial limitation, probably to try and drum up support for DX10. Even at that, the difference between High and Very High is not earth-shattering. The Internet quickly figured out how to enable all of the Very High graphics setting for DX9 through .INI tweaks, even before Crysis was on store shelves. Being called out on their bullshit, Crytek then released Crysis: Warhead with the Enthusiast (Very High) graphics setting unlocked in DX9. Here is a great article with screenshots:
http://www.gamespot.com/features/6182140/index.html
Yes. You need high quality equipment for the difference between DVD and Blu Ray to be worthwhile. What's your point? There are some of us who care about quality and have thousands of dollars of home theater equipment. There are some who don't. I feel that it makes the experience of watching a film far more engrossing and worth the cost. You have chosen to spend your money differently, so it's not worth upgrading to Blu Ray. On my set-up, however, the difference is immediate, obvious, and clearly worth the money for those who care about such things.
Sure, sometimes good enough is good enough for most. Then there are some who care about quality and are willing to pay more for it. I happen to enjoy watching films more when they are on Blu Ray, and the higher quality image and sound further immerse me into the experience. If you don't happen to find the difference worth the cost, that's fine, but I see no reason to complain. Blu Ray is coexisting quite nicely with DVD at the moment, and I don't see anyone shoving the upgrade down your throat.
We need that in America. It is completely absurd that if Bill Gates and I committed the same criminal offense, we would incur the same fine. Bill would pull the money out of his wallet in much the same manner that I buy a pack of gum and go about his day, whereas I would be financially devastated. In this case, while the actual dollar amount of the fines were equal, the punishment absolutely was not. The fine should be adjusted so that the punishment is equal in both cases -- it is completely absurd that this is not the case already.
We don't live in a true democracy -- a true democracy would be an absolute nightmare. We need a buffer to protect us from the tyranny of the majority. If the United States were a true democracy, it is likely that Conservative Christianity would be the official religion, morality would be mandated on a mass scale (far more than it already is), and things would be an all around disaster. Pure democracy = mob rule, plain and simple.
You shouldn't not pay your speeding ticket because not everyone who was speeding got a ticket, but if there were a law on the books that granted you the right to speed (hey, we are talking hypotheticals here), it would be worth putting the law to the test, as the two laws are mutually exclusive.
The illustrations are clearly not a literal representation of reality, but they could certainly be a figurative representation of reality used to elucidate the accompanying non-fiction text. If you looked through any modern science text book, the often bizarre figures and illustrations used to clarify the point could very easily be construed as fiction to one who was not familiar with the format.
From the research I have done, it does not seem to be very widely accepted that this manuscript is a hoax -- for instance, I find it extremely unlikely that the author would have created such a convincing fake to fool the crytologists 500 years ago -- the code could have been a far more transparent fake and would have been accepted for quite some time.
I haven't looked into the issue too much -- but it seems like XP mode is nothing more than virtualized XP -- how is this any different than booting up an XP install in VirtualBox or VMWare? This is not even to mention the fact that Windows 7 is extremely dual-boot friendly, and runs everything I have thrown at it as of yet without a hitch.
On a completely unrelated note -- how the fsck does that dastardly command execute itself? Isn't that kind of like eating your own head?
Yes. I agree. Microsoft Windows should be 100% secure from malware. Not like it is ever the user's fault or anything...
Well if that were the case, I am sure that you would be safe, as it is the Large Hardon Collider.
Zing! Thank you, I'll be here all week.
Who cares, dude? Shakespeare made up hundreds of words. English is a living language -- if people weren't allowed to make up words we would have nothing to call that machine you are using to post this inane crap, nor for the medium by which we are all disgraced by your brain vomit.