I honestly wouldn't have a problem with it in any situation, since I feel that helping people is far more important than being politically correct. I'm a very religious person, however, so I doubt many other slashdotters would agree.
For those people, I still don't think most would take issue with schoolkids volunteering for the Salvation Army. I've volunteered once for them, and not once was anything religious mentioned to me. It's kind of like the YMCA... it's a Christian organization, but they're not trying to push those beliefs on anyone. They're simply following true Christian principles and trying to help people.
The story I posted the link to was a topic on local talk radio last week. The radio host put out the question: if this was a Wiccan organization, would you have a problem with it. I can honestly say that if they acted in the same way that the Salvation Army does (focusing on helping people and not on pushing an agenda), then I would definitely not have an issue with it.
The Salvation Army is an excellent charitable organization. I donate to them every year instead of the Red Cross, not because I don't like the Red Cross, but because I feel the Salvation Army is more efficient with how they spend the money.
We also donate to can drives, Toys for Tots (local charity), and the Humane Society. Food and clothing drives are the most important charities this time of year, since 100% of what you donate goes to people that really need those things. Donating to the Humane Society is just something we've always done, and as such is a family tradition. No reason it has to be done during the holidays, though.
Just for kicks, here's an annoying story about how a local school wasn't allowed to have their students volunteer for the Salvation Army, since it's a religious organization. The complaints of a few unreasonable people ruined what would have been a very good lesson for those kids.
I'm sure many Democrats will agree with you. As a Republican from Wisconsin, you'd probably be surprised that I want Feingold to run in 2008 as well. He fits right in with Kennedy and Kerry as one of the furthest left senators in the country. Those types don't get elected president, since they also need to attract the moderates. No way Feingold does that, when he'd barely carry Wisconsin (historically a swing state).
I like some of the stuff he does, but I dislike far more. More than that, he comes across as a tool most of the time. Democrats would be better off with most other Democratic senators or a Democratic governor. Hell, Herb Kohl, the other Democratic senator from Wisconsin would have a better chance of being elected president.
Good luck if they face McCain, either way. (I think McCain would be an excellent pres)
Right now Im dead tired but my skin is itchy, I feel too hot in my bed (with a multitude of fans), my balls itch, its too bright, etc. and I just CAN NOT FALL ASLEEP!
Yay semantics. What I meant is a device that would act as a GPS receiver and then transmit its coordinates to the other device. The person' handheld device would also require a GPS receiver and would just calculate the distance and direction between the two locations.
For communication, they could use a shorter range transmission frequency, similar to the ones walkie-talkies use. Then you're not limited to areas that have cellphone coverage either. I've seen cheap GPS receivers for $70. I've seen nice walkie-talkies for the same. Pair them together (2 GPS devices & 1 set of walkie-talkies) and you have a usable system for just over $200. Make the dog's device much more compact and raise the price to $300. Viola.
Anyone who played Quake2 must be familiar with ratbot. It would respond with "Yeah !!! I am a R A T B O T !!!!! ?? " or "Please help me !!! What is a bot ??" if someone's message included the text "ratbot". This worm reminds me of that... annoying, but in a really funny way.
The cellphone part is overboard, but I'd argue that the GPS tracking feature could help dog owners be even more responsible. I'm extremely careful with my $1300 Bracco Italiano, since there have been instances when they've been stolen from backyards. My dog has still gotten out of my fenced backyard twice due to people not latching the gate completely, and once when I was pushing a wheelbarrow through. I caught her every time within 2-3 blocks snooping around in neighbor's yards. Being able to know EXACTLY where she is if she gets loose would allow me to catch her faster and bring her home before she gets hurt or causes damage to other people's property.
I won't be buying one of these, however, unless they take out the cellphone portion and make it into a GPS transmitter and receiver. A receiver that could also be used for geocaching, hiking, etc. That would make it worth a couple hundred dollars to me, and would be far easier for them to manufacture.
I also have an expensive dog ($1300 Bracco Italiano and worth every penny) and would consider something similar for her. However, it would be more due to my attachment to her than the replacement cost.
The cell phone functionality is kind of stupid. I'd much rather see some type of mid-range (1-2 miles?) transmitter paired with a receiver. The receiver would just show you the direction and distance to the dog. If it works via GPS even better... have the receiver act as a normal GPS device so I can use it for geocaching as well. I'd pay a couple hundred for a combination device like that.
For those people that say people just need to be more responsible about their dogs, you obviously haven't owned an extremely active dog. My dog could get over our 4' fence in the backyard if she really wanted to (we're not allowed a taller fence due to city regulations). The real issue is with my wife, who will not always double-check the gate latch when she goes through it. Same for the UPS man who leaves packages at our back door. Hell, the dog has even decided to be a daredevil and run right by me as I came through the gate with a wheelbarrow. She was 2 blocks down running in neighbors yards when I finally caught her.
Not all dogs can be yard trained properly, either. Some extremely active dogs (like mine) can't even be contained with invisible fencing. This isn't about owners being irresponsible... it's about those of us who want to be responsible and catch our dog before they cause damage or get hurt.
And you may continue blaming Microsoft even if the issue has nothing to do with them being a monopoly. In the console market they're far from a monopoly, and their future success in the market depends on them releasing a good quality product.
Besides, I wasn't blaming the customer for anything other than being a litigious bastard. MS should fix the problem, end of story. No monetary payouts for some phantom damages. It's that crap that's driven up healthcare costs and will ruin every other market until the government is forced to place restrictions on lawsuits. Then you'll just complain about Bush, though, so what's the difference.
What about companies in the western US compared to the eastern US? What about companies with an odd number of male employees? What about companies with a CEO whose last name ends with a vowel.
Your post makes no sense... it's completely unrelated to the discussion at hand.
Cars are recalled for more than just safety issues. I took my previous car in to have some type of electronic relay replaced. It was an optional recall since not replacing it posed no real safety risk. I should have been more clear in my analogy... if car manufacturers have to do much more extensive testing for non-safety issues (like dome lamps burning out prematurely or the windows freezing shut in 30 degree F weather), then the price of cars would definitely go up.
What if I take a day off work to purchase a new computer, only to have the motherboard go out after a week. You're saying the computer store should have to pay for the time I missed at work?
The manufacturer should be responsible for fixing the problem, not paying damages and legal fees. If the man is awarded damages for some strange reason, every company that unknowingly releases a faulty product is going to get screwed. As a result, testing costs and corporate insurance costs will skyrocket and those costs will be passed on to you and me. Hope you look forward to paying 10-20% more for your next car.
If Microsoft just recalls all of the power adapters (which seem to be most of the issue), and replaces them with a different design that allows airflow underneath, they can basically stop this lawsuit and any others that are bound to come up. The other option would be to provide a free plastic base to all XBox360 owners that would snap on the bottom of the system and raise it up an inch from the surface.
People who sue over this stuff are worse than companies that unknowingly release a faulty product. There are better resolutions than calling a lawyer, like returning the system, waiting on a recall, or hacking it up with a string.
Before anyone complains about this, keep in mind that it's just television. You know... make-believe, just like the video games. It would be unfortunate for people to make predictions about how this CSI:Miami episode will affect people considering those critics would be the same ones arguing with Jack about how the games affect people's behavior.
I'm surprised this even made Slashdot. What next... a detailed analysis of how the last Numb3rs episode was incorrect? How TV shows glamorize things that aren't glamorous? It's TV... it's about ratings, not trying to change how people think.
I'm a conservative and I would agree with the original poster, that the Washington Post is biased to the right. It's not nearly as much as Fox News, but it's definitely there. The Wall Street Journal also slants to the right to some extent. I can't listen to Fox News any more than I can listen to CBS... the slant is just too much. Obvious bias in either direction is annoying.
However, I can read the Washington Post and WSJ without any problem. Same for our local ABC affiliate.
Advertisers don't know if people look at their ads in magazines or newspapers, how many people actually look in the direction of their billboard, listen to their radio ad, or don't walk away when their TV commercial is on. Being able to see how many people download a podcast is probably more indicative of people that hear the ad compared to many other media.
They're just looking for MORE accurate data, but that's totally unnecessary. Ad agencies are very good at tracking usefulness of ad campaigns without specific numbers.
One local mayoral race was determined by under 10 votes. I'm not saying there are tens of thousands of fradulent votes. I'm saying there are definitely a few hundred (see the other poster's link about more votes than voters). In addition, the current voting system in Wisconsin leaves very little room for people to alter votes. We use those nifty ballot scanning machines and double records to ensure each vote is cast only once and cast properly. I'm sure there are some issues with it, but they're much harder to solve than individuals voting twice. Why not eliminate the easy problems so the tougher problems become more obvious?
This takes care of one issue. Now they need to start requiring a photo id to vote. A couple of state politicians have presented plans that would work, including ones that provide free photo ids to anyone who doesn't have a driver's license. People who didn't have a photo id when they went to vote would still be able to cast their vote, but it would be flagged in case of a recount. The vote would be unflagged if the voter provided a photo id at any point after the vote.
It makes sense, especially when there were many cases of voter fraud in Milwaukee during the 2004 election. Many votes were cast from addresses that don't exist. Granted, a photo id won't solve all the issues with voter fraud, but neither will a paper trail. Both are still a step in the right direction.
Seriously, how many people subscribe to a newspaper for the cartoons. How many of those people would still subscribe if there were NO cartoons in the paper? Finally, how many people would subscribe or unsubscribe from a newspaper based on the availability of 2 comics. I would guess no more than 1 out of every 1000 for that last one, with 1 out of 10000 being more likely.
While this is a cool thing, since I'll take a look at any new comic in the paper, I don't see it making any noticable impact on readership. Most papers would do better by coming up with a decent tech section and an Entertainment section with some interesting content. The Onion has a huge following just for their AV section, since they're well written and targeted at the teen-30 crowd. It's a good example to follow, newspapers.
So what about all the others? This one, for example: "For there is one God" (I Timothy 2:5)
I don't think that's unclear in any way. Most of those are from the New King James Version, which is generally considered the most direct, yet readable translation.
In a broader sense, the Bible refers to anything you put before God as a god. That's different from those things being considered a deity, however.
A strawman, huh? You need to look into what that really means. The grandparent poster provided a link that gave sufficient responses to the original pi post, and you brushed them off as "hand-waving arguments". I wasn't arguing the original post about how literal the Bible should be taken, I was arguing your poor attempt to brush off a perfectly legitimate reply. Hence, no strawman.
Now, if you wanted the point of your 2nd post to be about taking the Bible literally, perhaps instead of repeating the same point you gave in the original post (you know, the one that someone provided a perfectly legitimate response to?), you could have given a different example of how the Bible should interpreted properly.
For the record, I'm a fundamentalist Christian and I don't believe that the Bible should be literally interpreted in every way. However, I do believe its erroneous to ignore entire sections of the Bible (say... Revelations?) based on the assumption that they just need to be interpreted properly. I also think it's a bad idea to try teaching ID in school. My biology teacher in high school did it properly by saying that he holds certain religious beliefs that lend to one view of how we came to be, but those beliefs aren't founded in science and as such he focused on evolution. I think that's both honest to his beliefs and honest to science.
Slashdot Mirror
I honestly wouldn't have a problem with it in any situation, since I feel that helping people is far more important than being politically correct. I'm a very religious person, however, so I doubt many other slashdotters would agree.
For those people, I still don't think most would take issue with schoolkids volunteering for the Salvation Army. I've volunteered once for them, and not once was anything religious mentioned to me. It's kind of like the YMCA... it's a Christian organization, but they're not trying to push those beliefs on anyone. They're simply following true Christian principles and trying to help people.
The story I posted the link to was a topic on local talk radio last week. The radio host put out the question: if this was a Wiccan organization, would you have a problem with it. I can honestly say that if they acted in the same way that the Salvation Army does (focusing on helping people and not on pushing an agenda), then I would definitely not have an issue with it.
The Salvation Army is an excellent charitable organization. I donate to them every year instead of the Red Cross, not because I don't like the Red Cross, but because I feel the Salvation Army is more efficient with how they spend the money.
We also donate to can drives, Toys for Tots (local charity), and the Humane Society. Food and clothing drives are the most important charities this time of year, since 100% of what you donate goes to people that really need those things. Donating to the Humane Society is just something we've always done, and as such is a family tradition. No reason it has to be done during the holidays, though.
Just for kicks, here's an annoying story about how a local school wasn't allowed to have their students volunteer for the Salvation Army, since it's a religious organization. The complaints of a few unreasonable people ruined what would have been a very good lesson for those kids.
I'm sure many Democrats will agree with you. As a Republican from Wisconsin, you'd probably be surprised that I want Feingold to run in 2008 as well. He fits right in with Kennedy and Kerry as one of the furthest left senators in the country. Those types don't get elected president, since they also need to attract the moderates. No way Feingold does that, when he'd barely carry Wisconsin (historically a swing state).
I like some of the stuff he does, but I dislike far more. More than that, he comes across as a tool most of the time. Democrats would be better off with most other Democratic senators or a Democratic governor. Hell, Herb Kohl, the other Democratic senator from Wisconsin would have a better chance of being elected president.
Good luck if they face McCain, either way.
(I think McCain would be an excellent pres)
http://slashdot.org/~rosewood/journal/8354
Right now Im dead tired but my skin is itchy, I feel too hot in my bed (with a multitude of fans), my balls itch, its too bright, etc. and I just CAN NOT FALL ASLEEP!
I sure hope it's a guy.
Yay semantics. What I meant is a device that would act as a GPS receiver and then transmit its coordinates to the other device. The person' handheld device would also require a GPS receiver and would just calculate the distance and direction between the two locations.
For communication, they could use a shorter range transmission frequency, similar to the ones walkie-talkies use. Then you're not limited to areas that have cellphone coverage either. I've seen cheap GPS receivers for $70. I've seen nice walkie-talkies for the same. Pair them together (2 GPS devices & 1 set of walkie-talkies) and you have a usable system for just over $200. Make the dog's device much more compact and raise the price to $300. Viola.
Anyone who played Quake2 must be familiar with ratbot. It would respond with "Yeah !!! I am a R A T B O T !!!!! ?? " or "Please help me !!! What is a bot ??" if someone's message included the text "ratbot". This worm reminds me of that... annoying, but in a really funny way.
The cellphone part is overboard, but I'd argue that the GPS tracking feature could help dog owners be even more responsible. I'm extremely careful with my $1300 Bracco Italiano, since there have been instances when they've been stolen from backyards. My dog has still gotten out of my fenced backyard twice due to people not latching the gate completely, and once when I was pushing a wheelbarrow through. I caught her every time within 2-3 blocks snooping around in neighbor's yards. Being able to know EXACTLY where she is if she gets loose would allow me to catch her faster and bring her home before she gets hurt or causes damage to other people's property.
I won't be buying one of these, however, unless they take out the cellphone portion and make it into a GPS transmitter and receiver. A receiver that could also be used for geocaching, hiking, etc. That would make it worth a couple hundred dollars to me, and would be far easier for them to manufacture.
I also have an expensive dog ($1300 Bracco Italiano and worth every penny) and would consider something similar for her. However, it would be more due to my attachment to her than the replacement cost.
The cell phone functionality is kind of stupid. I'd much rather see some type of mid-range (1-2 miles?) transmitter paired with a receiver. The receiver would just show you the direction and distance to the dog. If it works via GPS even better... have the receiver act as a normal GPS device so I can use it for geocaching as well. I'd pay a couple hundred for a combination device like that.
For those people that say people just need to be more responsible about their dogs, you obviously haven't owned an extremely active dog. My dog could get over our 4' fence in the backyard if she really wanted to (we're not allowed a taller fence due to city regulations). The real issue is with my wife, who will not always double-check the gate latch when she goes through it. Same for the UPS man who leaves packages at our back door. Hell, the dog has even decided to be a daredevil and run right by me as I came through the gate with a wheelbarrow. She was 2 blocks down running in neighbors yards when I finally caught her.
Not all dogs can be yard trained properly, either. Some extremely active dogs (like mine) can't even be contained with invisible fencing. This isn't about owners being irresponsible... it's about those of us who want to be responsible and catch our dog before they cause damage or get hurt.
And you may continue blaming Microsoft even if the issue has nothing to do with them being a monopoly. In the console market they're far from a monopoly, and their future success in the market depends on them releasing a good quality product.
Besides, I wasn't blaming the customer for anything other than being a litigious bastard. MS should fix the problem, end of story. No monetary payouts for some phantom damages. It's that crap that's driven up healthcare costs and will ruin every other market until the government is forced to place restrictions on lawsuits. Then you'll just complain about Bush, though, so what's the difference.
What about companies in the western US compared to the eastern US? What about companies with an odd number of male employees? What about companies with a CEO whose last name ends with a vowel.
Your post makes no sense... it's completely unrelated to the discussion at hand.
Cars are recalled for more than just safety issues. I took my previous car in to have some type of electronic relay replaced. It was an optional recall since not replacing it posed no real safety risk. I should have been more clear in my analogy... if car manufacturers have to do much more extensive testing for non-safety issues (like dome lamps burning out prematurely or the windows freezing shut in 30 degree F weather), then the price of cars would definitely go up.
What if I take a day off work to purchase a new computer, only to have the motherboard go out after a week. You're saying the computer store should have to pay for the time I missed at work?
The manufacturer should be responsible for fixing the problem, not paying damages and legal fees. If the man is awarded damages for some strange reason, every company that unknowingly releases a faulty product is going to get screwed. As a result, testing costs and corporate insurance costs will skyrocket and those costs will be passed on to you and me. Hope you look forward to paying 10-20% more for your next car.
If Microsoft just recalls all of the power adapters (which seem to be most of the issue), and replaces them with a different design that allows airflow underneath, they can basically stop this lawsuit and any others that are bound to come up. The other option would be to provide a free plastic base to all XBox360 owners that would snap on the bottom of the system and raise it up an inch from the surface.
People who sue over this stuff are worse than companies that unknowingly release a faulty product. There are better resolutions than calling a lawyer, like returning the system, waiting on a recall, or hacking it up with a string.
Before anyone complains about this, keep in mind that it's just television. You know... make-believe, just like the video games. It would be unfortunate for people to make predictions about how this CSI:Miami episode will affect people considering those critics would be the same ones arguing with Jack about how the games affect people's behavior.
I'm surprised this even made Slashdot. What next... a detailed analysis of how the last Numb3rs episode was incorrect? How TV shows glamorize things that aren't glamorous? It's TV... it's about ratings, not trying to change how people think.
It just means you haven't figured out how to install Firefox and MS Anti-Spyware on your computer. ;)
I'm a conservative and I would agree with the original poster, that the Washington Post is biased to the right. It's not nearly as much as Fox News, but it's definitely there. The Wall Street Journal also slants to the right to some extent. I can't listen to Fox News any more than I can listen to CBS... the slant is just too much. Obvious bias in either direction is annoying.
However, I can read the Washington Post and WSJ without any problem. Same for our local ABC affiliate.
Which is exactly why a count of the number of downloads of a podcast should be plenty of information for them to work with, just as my post said.
Advertisers don't know if people look at their ads in magazines or newspapers, how many people actually look in the direction of their billboard, listen to their radio ad, or don't walk away when their TV commercial is on. Being able to see how many people download a podcast is probably more indicative of people that hear the ad compared to many other media.
They're just looking for MORE accurate data, but that's totally unnecessary. Ad agencies are very good at tracking usefulness of ad campaigns without specific numbers.
One local mayoral race was determined by under 10 votes. I'm not saying there are tens of thousands of fradulent votes. I'm saying there are definitely a few hundred (see the other poster's link about more votes than voters). In addition, the current voting system in Wisconsin leaves very little room for people to alter votes. We use those nifty ballot scanning machines and double records to ensure each vote is cast only once and cast properly. I'm sure there are some issues with it, but they're much harder to solve than individuals voting twice. Why not eliminate the easy problems so the tougher problems become more obvious?
This takes care of one issue. Now they need to start requiring a photo id to vote. A couple of state politicians have presented plans that would work, including ones that provide free photo ids to anyone who doesn't have a driver's license. People who didn't have a photo id when they went to vote would still be able to cast their vote, but it would be flagged in case of a recount. The vote would be unflagged if the voter provided a photo id at any point after the vote.
It makes sense, especially when there were many cases of voter fraud in Milwaukee during the 2004 election. Many votes were cast from addresses that don't exist. Granted, a photo id won't solve all the issues with voter fraud, but neither will a paper trail. Both are still a step in the right direction.
from the nice-job-dork dept. :)
This is the first time I've ever laughed at the department. Bravo, Zonk.
Seriously, how many people subscribe to a newspaper for the cartoons. How many of those people would still subscribe if there were NO cartoons in the paper? Finally, how many people would subscribe or unsubscribe from a newspaper based on the availability of 2 comics. I would guess no more than 1 out of every 1000 for that last one, with 1 out of 10000 being more likely.
While this is a cool thing, since I'll take a look at any new comic in the paper, I don't see it making any noticable impact on readership. Most papers would do better by coming up with a decent tech section and an Entertainment section with some interesting content. The Onion has a huge following just for their AV section, since they're well written and targeted at the teen-30 crowd. It's a good example to follow, newspapers.
So what about all the others? This one, for example:
"For there is one God" (I Timothy 2:5)
I don't think that's unclear in any way. Most of those are from the New King James Version, which is generally considered the most direct, yet readable translation.
In a broader sense, the Bible refers to anything you put before God as a god. That's different from those things being considered a deity, however.
A strawman, huh? You need to look into what that really means. The grandparent poster provided a link that gave sufficient responses to the original pi post, and you brushed them off as "hand-waving arguments". I wasn't arguing the original post about how literal the Bible should be taken, I was arguing your poor attempt to brush off a perfectly legitimate reply. Hence, no strawman.
Now, if you wanted the point of your 2nd post to be about taking the Bible literally, perhaps instead of repeating the same point you gave in the original post (you know, the one that someone provided a perfectly legitimate response to?), you could have given a different example of how the Bible should interpreted properly.
For the record, I'm a fundamentalist Christian and I don't believe that the Bible should be literally interpreted in every way. However, I do believe its erroneous to ignore entire sections of the Bible (say... Revelations?) based on the assumption that they just need to be interpreted properly. I also think it's a bad idea to try teaching ID in school. My biology teacher in high school did it properly by saying that he holds certain religious beliefs that lend to one view of how we came to be, but those beliefs aren't founded in science and as such he focused on evolution. I think that's both honest to his beliefs and honest to science.