The same holds for the services that most of us already pay for. I live in a community where the garbage is picked up by people paid for by a private condo association. I pay a fee for this. However, I still pay taxes to the city, some of which are used to fund trash removal from residents outside of my community.
If I only want to use wired internet, and am willing to pay for it, why should I be forced to pay for the wireless connection my neighbor has?
I don't care if it's "cost effective" or not according to whatever study someone conducts. The simple fact of the matter is that I'm being FORCED to pay for something I don't need, use or want.
If and only if you use something, you should pay for it. That's seems like a no-brainer to me.
If this is implemented today, the next time you get a bandwidth increase will be determined by a group of elected officials who all want their cousin's contracting firm to be put in charge of upgrading the system. Good luck getting better service cheaper, something that competition enables today.
If I don't use the 'parental control' feature on my cable box, little Johnny can order any movie he pleases.
When this happens, my cable company is not liable for providing this content to Johnny. I suppose someone would really have to have it in for me, but I can even imagine the State taking little Johnny away from me for bad parenting if I let him watch Debby do Dallas.
As for the spam, if this were to become an issue (and it's not likely, since the court seems to focus on the sender as the violator), I'd imagine the parent is the one responsible for setting up a filter on little Johnny's email. Or just don't give little johnny an email account...
Today, the whole world benefits freely from advances in health technology that are driven largely by the allure of the profitable U.S. market. If the United States joins other nations in having more socialized medicine, the current pace of technology improvements might well grind to a halt
and
If the US adopts a nationalized health care system, taxes will have to double for pay for it.
Sounds like the private system actually is "way better"...
takeout menus for all your local restaurants from one central site
Right - just like these guys have been doing for years as well...
Actually 18 years - many of the early ones were via a mailing that contained all of the resturant menus, but I've been using their web order system for at least four years.
I think the bottle deposit thing definitely works in more urban areas.
I've lived in 10+ different places in and around Boston and in almost every place, you'll hear a shopping cart being hauled down the alley on trash night (or nightly behind apartments with dumpsters).
I'd guess that more than 90% of the bottles thrown in the trash are picked up by someone who's homeless. In fact, in a majority of places, people will seperate their bottles and leave them for someone else to take back. You'll usually see people put their empties in a stack next to the dumpster. The stack never stays there for all that long.
One place I lived, a guy would actually drive around and usually get to my place at 2AM on trash night. I left a broken TV out there once and he even took that. I have no idea what he planned to do with it, but it didn't end up going to the dump...
The further away you get from the city though, the less sense it makes for people to go around picking through other's trash - in which case, it's just easier to leave them out with the trash.
However, if you're far enough out that it's too much effort for someone to go from house to house on trash night picking up bottles, and it's also easier to leave stuff on the curb than to bring it back to the store, I can see that the deposit isn't incentive enough to get the bottles recycled...
Overall, I think it works fairly well though - thanks to the homeless:)
Completely agree - happens all the time to me - I've got the MS Trackball Explorer, at work and at home. For my laptop, I've got the wireless Logitech Cordless Trackman.
If you want to be 100% certain no one will ask you to "let me drive for a minute", get a split keyboard. Scares 'em all away, and people are a lot less likely to mistake your keyboard for something they're familiar with, than they are to think your trackball is a mouse.
As for gaming, I've got no complaints using it. I'll usually map the enter button on the keypad to something useful, and use it as a second thumb button.
-bs
Good points, but you left one out - faster isn't necessarily easier.
Rather than save 10 or 15 or whatever minutes by having to skillfully navigate through back roads, people will make the decision to sit in traffic and stare mindlessly at the bumper of the car in front of them.
I've done it. It's faster most of the time for me to take back roads to get home than to sit on the interstate (there is always traffic - I've never not had to stop in a 65 mph zone). But at times, I'm too exhausted to bother exerting the extra effort to stop at lights, watch for pedestrians, swerve around grandma as she pulls out of the bank w/out looking etc.
Sure, I'll save some time, but it'll take at least that amount of time once I'm home to get to the point where I can relax.
But all of this may actually help show why it'll get you where you're going faster... Depending on how many people will go through the extra effort of navigating around the gnarly stuff, it may make it easier for the people who ARE willing to do so to know when to do it.
If everyone went the quickest route all the time, and had the knowledge of what the quickest route was, traffic would be evenly spread and total time for all would be less. But, since this isn't the case, the number of people that choose to go the quicker way will have a significant effect on the outcome.
And what do you do when it's a programmer who can't use his/her computer? My pet peeve is people who rely on the mouse to use their IDE.
A couple of years ago, I worked with a developer who didn't know the "shortcut" key for build and I thought that was bad... little did I know...
Just yesterday, I watched a "programmer" fix a function on an object with a member named nSize. The function took parameter nSize1 and never set the member.
How does my coworker fix this? He selects nSize from the declaration with the mouse (already, I'm annoyed) and then right clicks to select "copy"...
Then, he scrolls down to the function definition, using the mouse and the scroll bar (not the wheel) and clicks where he's gonna insert the assignment... Then, he uses the keyboard to hit return and tab to put the cursor in the right spot (both hands on the keyboard for this). Then, back to the mouse, right click: "paste".
Ok, so now I'm really annoyed, the amount of text above was typed in about the amount of time he took to do all of this - and "nSize" really isn't all that hard to type, right?
It gets better... He switches both hands back to the keyboard, types a space and hits the "=" key (again, both hands) then, back to the mouse...
What he did next almost caused my head to explode...
You and I both know he's got "nSize" in memory, just waiting to be pasted again, then it's pretty easy to append the number 1 on it... But no, he has to actually select the parameter from the function definition, right click: copy, move the cursor back to the line of code he's trying to write, right click: paste, then type the semi-colon (this is C#).
Holy crap - that's a helluva lotta work for:
nSize = nSize1;
I didn't change the variable name to protect the innocent. This really is the line of code he used the mouse to write.
Of course, this guy uses the mouse to do everything - but seriously, he's been coding for at least five years - does it take that long to learn how to type? Much less use ctrl-c / ctrl-v...
As humanity's biotechnological prowess increases, we will confront again and again the question of what, if any, limits should be placed on research that mixes human and animal genes, cells and tissues. The main ethical concern about such research is not the creation of improved and useful animals, but the risk of producing what would be, in effect, diminished human beings.
Roy Neset's Tioga, N.D., farm isn't quite in the middle of nowhere, but it's close. Neset wanted to listen to talk radio while cultivating his fields on his tractor. But the only radio station in the area plays country music and refused to change its programming.
So Neset bought a low-power radio transmitter, got written permission from a Colorado station to carry its signal and began transmitting that station via satellite. Neset's station extends only about five miles in each direction, most of which consists of his farm. His station is also listened to by a handful of people in the area.
When the local radio station manager learned of Neset's broadcasts, he complained to the FCC's field office in Minneapolis. The FCC sent an agent to Tioga on at least two occasions to monitor the station. On learning that Neset was broadcasting on 88.3 FM without a license, the FCC convinced the U.S. Attorney in North Dakota to file a lawsuit.
During a hearing, the FCC admitted that Neset wasn't interfering with any existing station. In fact, no FM stations broadcast in the area. But the agency stuck with its argument that it's illegal to broadcast without a license.
Same here - but I was a philosophy major, so I think the tangents were part of the curriculum:)
I do think I learned a lot in school, mainly because I enjoyed my classes. I tried a double major, Philo + CS, but the math and basic programming courses were so not worth anything (all were reviews of what I'd learned in HS) that I gave up and took courses that were actually interesting.
I'm sure the logic classes I took were far more beneficial to my software development skills than an intro level PASCAL class would have been. And learning to enjoy learning is something that should help anyone in any career, no matter what the subject matter is.
Yeah, I could've done a lot of the research I did on my own, but my professors were almost always helpful and ultimately, IMHO, worth the cost of tuition.
This has been done. There really isn't any proof of it actually relieving the burden
I'm not sure I understand this... lower taxpayer burden != lower taxes ? I guess I don't understand what "burden" actually is then...
No. How about DCFS, the FDA, and all of the employees of Senators and Congressman. Let the damn lawmakers read their own email.
Agreed - I was responding to the parent who said that the argument against leagalizing drugs was that the use of drugs raise taxpayer burden because of health care costs.
Insurance and tax payer burden are two different things. Insurance is sold by private companies. Taxes are collected by the government. If you think that the fact that your insurance company is covering smokers and therefore charging you more, perhaps you should look for a company that doesn't insure smokers, or one that charges smokers higher premiums. Either way, your tax burden isn't changing if your insurance / medical costs go up.
If we stop the drug war and make drug use legal, drug users could seek help in trying to stop and not fear incarceration. This would lessen the burden on taxpayers. As for the FDA and congresscritters' staff, nix 'em all - I'm not gonna argue against it. If I think my congresscritter needs staff, I'll send it a donation - and a the less I pay in taxes, the more I'll have to send.
The war on drugs would be significantly cheaper if there weren't so many drug-using idiots.
The war on drugs would be significantly cheaper if it were ended. The purpose of the war on drugs is to cut down on use. No matter how many people use drugs, they'll still try to cut down on the number. If they could actually succeed, they'd at least be gaining ground. They're not. Time to try something else...
Go ahead. Smoking cigarettes is not a denied right. Smoking pot, though, is. Why not try following the law instead of being a vigilante.
What? I offered to pay for my own healthcare because I'm a smoker and I don't think it's right that you should have to cover the costs incurred by my choice to do what I want. How is this being a vigilante? I'm thoroughly confused...
Just don't let me catch your ass getting treatment at an emergency room, and then skipping out on the pay.
People who accept medical treatment and then "skip out" on paying for it are criminals. They should be prosecuted. OR - the hospital should carry insurance to protect them against this.
If you have a problem with a hospital that raises it's costs to cover the cost of this insurance, try to find a hospital that doesn't have it and will actually turn away patients who can't afford treatment. If you can't, blame the people who argue that hospitals have a "moral right" to treat those in need and fight for gov't regulation requiring hospitals to do so. If I'm a doctor and don't want to treat people who won't pay so that I don't have to charge the people who can pay more than they should be charged, I should have the right to do so.
Taxing me to pay for your helathcare or for an affirmative action program doesn't "hurt" me? I've gotta work for my money. Wealth redistribution hurts the people you take the wealth from...
If I am to be able to run my business the way I want, you shouldn't be telling me who I can and can't hire.
Taxing someone "like mad" doesn't stop them from polluting, it just gives them incentive to hide it, bribe those put in charge of regulating it, or to simply ensure that they're making enough to pay the tax.
We need to stop sheltering those who pollute from cival suits (the worst offender is currently the government) demanding compensation / repair for the damage.
You've oversimplified the odds calculation. The reason chance doesn't play as prominent a role in poker is because if there's 85% chance of a card coming out, and you only have to put in 5% of what you'll win, you HAVE to do it. Otherwise, in the long run, you'll lose.
At the same time, if there's an 85% chance your card will come out and you have to put in 30% of what you'll win, you should NOT do it. Thus, in the long run, you save money.
Manipulating the amount of money in the pot and the amount of money necessary to stay in the hand (by raising) can have an effect on other players such that they'll fold the winning hand because they won't win with it often enough to make the bet worth while. This is why a computer can be beat if it only plays by the odds. If the psychology of poker isn't considered, you'll never know when someone raised just to make your "always play by the odds" strategy wrong in any particular instance. A bot would need to take this into account to stay on top.
I think the point is that the person lacks the money to produce a documenatry and air it. If I've got enough money to buy 20 seconds of prime-time and run an ad, I can't. Instead, I'd need MORE money - i.e., enough to produce a documentary.
So, M/F is responsible, because it sets the amount of money you need to be much higher that it should be...
This is the antithesis of capitalism. The gov't now regulates what can and can't be said, not by allowing the market to dictate what costs will be, but by restricting what you can say based on the content of what you want to say.
I can buy an ad that says "pepsi sucks, buy coke", but I can't buy an ad that says "vote for XYZ, not ABC", all other things being equal.
Slashdot Mirror
Why not? Because I can't opt out.
The same holds for the services that most of us already pay for. I live in a community where the garbage is picked up by people paid for by a private condo association. I pay a fee for this. However, I still pay taxes to the city, some of which are used to fund trash removal from residents outside of my community.
If I only want to use wired internet, and am willing to pay for it, why should I be forced to pay for the wireless connection my neighbor has?
I don't care if it's "cost effective" or not according to whatever study someone conducts. The simple fact of the matter is that I'm being FORCED to pay for something I don't need, use or want.
If and only if you use something, you should pay for it. That's seems like a no-brainer to me.
If this is implemented today, the next time you get a bandwidth increase will be determined by a group of elected officials who all want their cousin's contracting firm to be put in charge of upgrading the system. Good luck getting better service cheaper, something that competition enables today.
-bs
If I don't use the 'parental control' feature on my cable box, little Johnny can order any movie he pleases.
When this happens, my cable company is not liable for providing this content to Johnny. I suppose someone would really have to have it in for me, but I can even imagine the State taking little Johnny away from me for bad parenting if I let him watch Debby do Dallas.
As for the spam, if this were to become an issue (and it's not likely, since the court seems to focus on the sender as the violator), I'd imagine the parent is the one responsible for setting up a filter on little Johnny's email. Or just don't give little johnny an email account...
-bs
WHAT? The US government == poor people?
I dont't care what corporation you're talking about, they can't have deeper pockets than those of the federal goverment.
This type of fraud is easy because the government is a bloated beuracratic mess, not because they are poor.
-bs
I know you're trying to be sarcastic, but you're 100% correct.
Here's an interesting article that discusses this topic.
From that article:
Today, the whole world benefits freely from advances in health technology that are driven largely by the allure of the profitable U.S. market. If the United States joins other nations in having more socialized medicine, the current pace of technology improvements might well grind to a halt
and
If the US adopts a nationalized health care system, taxes will have to double for pay for it.
Sounds like the private system actually is "way better"...
-bs
Right - just like these guys have been doing for years as well...
Actually 18 years - many of the early ones were via a mailing that contained all of the resturant menus, but I've been using their web order system for at least four years.
I've lived in 10+ different places in and around Boston and in almost every place, you'll hear a shopping cart being hauled down the alley on trash night (or nightly behind apartments with dumpsters).
I'd guess that more than 90% of the bottles thrown in the trash are picked up by someone who's homeless. In fact, in a majority of places, people will seperate their bottles and leave them for someone else to take back. You'll usually see people put their empties in a stack next to the dumpster. The stack never stays there for all that long.
One place I lived, a guy would actually drive around and usually get to my place at 2AM on trash night. I left a broken TV out there once and he even took that. I have no idea what he planned to do with it, but it didn't end up going to the dump...
The further away you get from the city though, the less sense it makes for people to go around picking through other's trash - in which case, it's just easier to leave them out with the trash.
However, if you're far enough out that it's too much effort for someone to go from house to house on trash night picking up bottles, and it's also easier to leave stuff on the curb than to bring it back to the store, I can see that the deposit isn't incentive enough to get the bottles recycled...
Overall, I think it works fairly well though - thanks to the homeless :)
-bs
If you want to be 100% certain no one will ask you to "let me drive for a minute", get a split keyboard. Scares 'em all away, and people are a lot less likely to mistake your keyboard for something they're familiar with, than they are to think your trackball is a mouse.
As for gaming, I've got no complaints using it. I'll usually map the enter button on the keypad to something useful, and use it as a second thumb button.
-bs
ex.
government subsidies for tobacco farmers
government anti-tobacco spending
-bs
Rather than save 10 or 15 or whatever minutes by having to skillfully navigate through back roads, people will make the decision to sit in traffic and stare mindlessly at the bumper of the car in front of them.
I've done it. It's faster most of the time for me to take back roads to get home than to sit on the interstate (there is always traffic - I've never not had to stop in a 65 mph zone). But at times, I'm too exhausted to bother exerting the extra effort to stop at lights, watch for pedestrians, swerve around grandma as she pulls out of the bank w/out looking etc.
Sure, I'll save some time, but it'll take at least that amount of time once I'm home to get to the point where I can relax.
But all of this may actually help show why it'll get you where you're going faster... Depending on how many people will go through the extra effort of navigating around the gnarly stuff, it may make it easier for the people who ARE willing to do so to know when to do it.
If everyone went the quickest route all the time, and had the knowledge of what the quickest route was, traffic would be evenly spread and total time for all would be less. But, since this isn't the case, the number of people that choose to go the quicker way will have a significant effect on the outcome.
-bs
We've got seven coders (hired by a manager who's no longer here), no style guidelines and code written by people who none of us have met.
I'm working on getting things cleaned up here, but it looks like a long road ahead...
-bs
A couple of years ago, I worked with a developer who didn't know the "shortcut" key for build and I thought that was bad... little did I know...
Just yesterday, I watched a "programmer" fix a function on an object with a member named nSize. The function took parameter nSize1 and never set the member.
How does my coworker fix this? He selects nSize from the declaration with the mouse (already, I'm annoyed) and then right clicks to select "copy"...
Then, he scrolls down to the function definition, using the mouse and the scroll bar (not the wheel) and clicks where he's gonna insert the assignment... Then, he uses the keyboard to hit return and tab to put the cursor in the right spot (both hands on the keyboard for this). Then, back to the mouse, right click: "paste".
Ok, so now I'm really annoyed, the amount of text above was typed in about the amount of time he took to do all of this - and "nSize" really isn't all that hard to type, right?
It gets better... He switches both hands back to the keyboard, types a space and hits the "=" key (again, both hands) then, back to the mouse...
What he did next almost caused my head to explode...
You and I both know he's got "nSize" in memory, just waiting to be pasted again, then it's pretty easy to append the number 1 on it... But no, he has to actually select the parameter from the function definition, right click: copy, move the cursor back to the line of code he's trying to write, right click: paste, then type the semi-colon (this is C#).
Holy crap - that's a helluva lotta work for:
nSize = nSize1;
I didn't change the variable name to protect the innocent. This really is the line of code he used the mouse to write.
Of course, this guy uses the mouse to do everything - but seriously, he's been coding for at least five years - does it take that long to learn how to type? Much less use ctrl-c / ctrl-v...
</rant>
-bs
Here's the conclusion
As humanity's biotechnological prowess increases, we will confront again and again the question of what, if any, limits should be placed on research that mixes human and animal genes, cells and tissues. The main ethical concern about such research is not the creation of improved and useful animals, but the risk of producing what would be, in effect, diminished human beings.
-bs
Roy Neset's Tioga, N.D., farm isn't quite in the middle of nowhere, but it's close. Neset wanted to listen to talk radio while cultivating his fields on his tractor. But the only radio station in the area plays country music and refused to change its programming.
So Neset bought a low-power radio transmitter, got written permission from a Colorado station to carry its signal and began transmitting that station via satellite. Neset's station extends only about five miles in each direction, most of which consists of his farm. His station is also listened to by a handful of people in the area.
When the local radio station manager learned of Neset's broadcasts, he complained to the FCC's field office in Minneapolis. The FCC sent an agent to Tioga on at least two occasions to monitor the station. On learning that Neset was broadcasting on 88.3 FM without a license, the FCC convinced the U.S. Attorney in North Dakota to file a lawsuit.
During a hearing, the FCC admitted that Neset wasn't interfering with any existing station. In fact, no FM stations broadcast in the area. But the agency stuck with its argument that it's illegal to broadcast without a license.
Same here - but I was a philosophy major, so I think the tangents were part of the curriculum :)
I do think I learned a lot in school, mainly because I enjoyed my classes. I tried a double major, Philo + CS, but the math and basic programming courses were so not worth anything (all were reviews of what I'd learned in HS) that I gave up and took courses that were actually interesting.
I'm sure the logic classes I took were far more beneficial to my software development skills than an intro level PASCAL class would have been. And learning to enjoy learning is something that should help anyone in any career, no matter what the subject matter is.
Yeah, I could've done a lot of the research I did on my own, but my professors were almost always helpful and ultimately, IMHO, worth the cost of tuition.
I must've gotten lucky as well...
-bs
Let me know when they invent the knife you can't cut a person with.
When they do, I'm sure there'll be an infomercial and it'll only be $ 19.95.
Just like that soldering iron that won't burn you when you do something stupid, like touch it directly to your eyeball...
-bs
That would put in... Pattersonville?
(I grew up in Amsterdam)
-bs
Check here for a fairly "balanced" discussion of why this may not be the case.
I'd have just linked to the studies that have conflicting conclusions, but that article does that and explains them better than I could.
-bs
This may be the case, but here'swhy they may simply refuse to hear an election appeal.
I thought it was interesting...
-bs
I'm not sure I understand this... lower taxpayer burden != lower taxes ? I guess I don't understand what "burden" actually is then...
No. How about DCFS, the FDA, and all of the employees of Senators and Congressman. Let the damn lawmakers read their own email.
Agreed - I was responding to the parent who said that the argument against leagalizing drugs was that the use of drugs raise taxpayer burden because of health care costs.
Insurance and tax payer burden are two different things. Insurance is sold by private companies. Taxes are collected by the government. If you think that the fact that your insurance company is covering smokers and therefore charging you more, perhaps you should look for a company that doesn't insure smokers, or one that charges smokers higher premiums. Either way, your tax burden isn't changing if your insurance / medical costs go up.
If we stop the drug war and make drug use legal, drug users could seek help in trying to stop and not fear incarceration. This would lessen the burden on taxpayers. As for the FDA and congresscritters' staff, nix 'em all - I'm not gonna argue against it. If I think my congresscritter needs staff, I'll send it a donation - and a the less I pay in taxes, the more I'll have to send.
The war on drugs would be significantly cheaper if there weren't so many drug-using idiots.
The war on drugs would be significantly cheaper if it were ended. The purpose of the war on drugs is to cut down on use. No matter how many people use drugs, they'll still try to cut down on the number. If they could actually succeed, they'd at least be gaining ground. They're not. Time to try something else...
Go ahead. Smoking cigarettes is not a denied right. Smoking pot, though, is. Why not try following the law instead of being a vigilante.
What? I offered to pay for my own healthcare because I'm a smoker and I don't think it's right that you should have to cover the costs incurred by my choice to do what I want. How is this being a vigilante? I'm thoroughly confused...
Just don't let me catch your ass getting treatment at an emergency room, and then skipping out on the pay.
People who accept medical treatment and then "skip out" on paying for it are criminals. They should be prosecuted. OR - the hospital should carry insurance to protect them against this.
If you have a problem with a hospital that raises it's costs to cover the cost of this insurance, try to find a hospital that doesn't have it and will actually turn away patients who can't afford treatment. If you can't, blame the people who argue that hospitals have a "moral right" to treat those in need and fight for gov't regulation requiring hospitals to do so. If I'm a doctor and don't want to treat people who won't pay so that I don't have to charge the people who can pay more than they should be charged, I should have the right to do so.
-bs
Which program to cut first? How 'bout the drug war?
Then, how 'bout letting the people who get sick pay their own damn bills?
If I want to smoke, I'll either pay my own medical bills or I'll die. That oughta save you some money.
-bs
-bs
Taxing me to pay for your helathcare or for an affirmative action program doesn't "hurt" me? I've gotta work for my money. Wealth redistribution hurts the people you take the wealth from...
If I am to be able to run my business the way I want, you shouldn't be telling me who I can and can't hire.
Taxing someone "like mad" doesn't stop them from polluting, it just gives them incentive to hide it, bribe those put in charge of regulating it, or to simply ensure that they're making enough to pay the tax.
We need to stop sheltering those who pollute from cival suits (the worst offender is currently the government) demanding compensation / repair for the damage.
-bs
At the same time, if there's an 85% chance your card will come out and you have to put in 30% of what you'll win, you should NOT do it. Thus, in the long run, you save money.
Manipulating the amount of money in the pot and the amount of money necessary to stay in the hand (by raising) can have an effect on other players such that they'll fold the winning hand because they won't win with it often enough to make the bet worth while. This is why a computer can be beat if it only plays by the odds. If the psychology of poker isn't considered, you'll never know when someone raised just to make your "always play by the odds" strategy wrong in any particular instance. A bot would need to take this into account to stay on top.
-bs
mine too :)
-bs
I think the point is that the person lacks the money to produce a documenatry and air it. If I've got enough money to buy 20 seconds of prime-time and run an ad, I can't. Instead, I'd need MORE money - i.e., enough to produce a documentary.
So, M/F is responsible, because it sets the amount of money you need to be much higher that it should be...
This is the antithesis of capitalism. The gov't now regulates what can and can't be said, not by allowing the market to dictate what costs will be, but by restricting what you can say based on the content of what you want to say.
I can buy an ad that says "pepsi sucks, buy coke", but I can't buy an ad that says "vote for XYZ, not ABC", all other things being equal.
-bs