Well, I'm not sure how "all over" it is in the mass news media. I don't tune in to the mass news media. Instead I took control of the media myself, using the Net even to find the TV I want to watch over cable. I haven't been able to read a newspaper for a over a decade without gagging on the obvious agenda, and broadcast news is even worse. Cable news is pretty bad, with a few exceptions, like some shows on MSNBC and PBS - but not all on those networks.
I'm not alone. I think the "mass" media is breaking up, giving way to interactive media, media blogs steered by commentary, and eventually P2P journalism. The old system is crashing under its own weight. Even these phonejamming and evil robocalling systems are new media, that people will learn to protect ourselves from.
So while it's pretty bad here in the US, I think we've turned some corners. YouTube, political/social blogs, mobile media phones, social networks - all of them give regular people much more balance of media power. That is where the hope lies in the US: the power of the people to work with (and against) each other, without relying on some king or CEO to connect to reality.
Are you in New Hampshire, on the Do Not Call list? What makes you think that the calls you've gotten are breaking the law? Political robocalls aren't against the law. Even in New Hampshire, they're only illegal if you're on the Do Not Call list, while other states don't even have that restriction.
I'm not shocked, but I'm disappointed whenever Republicans are caught at their crimes, and people's response is "Democrats do it just as much", without any evidence that they are.
Hopefully the diehard Republicans will turn out tomorrow in the same force as the TrollMods. The authoritarian 23% who would drag us all along as they follow Bush over the cliff. Which should get outweighed by the 80% (including the Democrats' 3 authoritarian points) voting to stop before it's too late.
I didn't specify what controlling the FCC has to do with recovering these fines, because there's no "direct" connection. But I do think that Sununu getting elected by illegal robocalling to control the FCC tells us a lot about what's wrong with telecom in this country.
And what's wrong has a lot to do with Republicans. It's no coincidence that we've got (Bush) Jr as president, (Sununu) Jr from NH controlling the FCC, (Kean) Jr nearly in an NJ Senate seat, another Bush running Florida... these family cronies are just part of the crony system. Since you mentioned the Supreme Court, it occurs to me that Clarence Thomas' wife worked for the Bush 2000 campaign, vetting resumes for the incoming admin that depended on her husband's "vote" for Bush to be president. Oh, and Colin Powell's son was the first Bush FCC head. And
William Rehnquist's daughter was nominated for Inspector General with Health and Human Services. Antonin Scalia's son was made Solicitor of Labor. Clarence Thomas's wife was nominated for a top position in the Office of Management and Budget. And Strom Thurmond's son, only three years out of law school, was handpicked by Strom himself to be South Carolina's US Attorney.
Of course, there's plenty more where that came from. Now, I'm willing to believe that Democrats are just as nepotistic, just as cronyist. If someone can show me the evidence. Until then, I'll consider Republican obsession with "Kennedy Dynasty" and "Clinton Dynasty", much more limited and all ratified by voters (not merely appointments), as their inspiration to convert the US political system to the hereditary European system they emulate in so many other ways.
Here's a column published in Philly by someone thinking Democrats were harassing her with robocalls. Even though they sensibly asked why Democrats would do such a thing when it would turn voters off, they thought it was the Democratic candidate. Pretty typical reaction.
Their untypical reaction was to call the Democrat's office demanding an explanation. Which turned out to be "it's a Republican dirty trick". But how many people will find out before voting? And how many people will believe it's not Democrats lying to blame Republicans, when they already believe Democrats have been harassing them with robocalls?
Meanwhile, in New Hampshire, Republicans have followed up their 2002 phonejamming of Democrats' lines (preventing Democrats from getting voters to polls) with enough illegal robocalls to cost $100 MILLION in fines. Of course, those 2002 robocalls got John Sununu Jr (R-NH) into the Senate, where he controls the FCC, and he hasn't given up the job he DDoS'ed his way into. So I don't expect Republicans to cough up the $100M they'd owe for this year's attack on the election process.
Unless maybe enough Republicans get fired in the election tomorrow that they can't do these crimes unpunished anymore. Go to the polls and do your part.
I know that is sometimes the case in some laws. But since practically every function of the government could be delivered by a private vendor, but usually isn't, there's plenty of role for the government to offer services where the current market isn't served. Do you know that the ADA or other laws related to that service are covered that way?
At the very least the government should offer validation without charge to the websites testing themselves, as legal compliance tests are part of the government's operations. Perhaps by paying validators to provide the service. Maybe even paying vendors of compliant website components. Still probably cheaper than just law enforcement, and lost productivity/commerce (/ability) of disabled shoppers.
I would disbar and probably fine lawyers whose business is producing frivolous lawsuits. Likewise, I would treat lawyers who refuse as "frivolous" meritorious cases they just don't think they can win, because they're not good enough lawyers.
Frivolous lawyers get 2 strikes, go on automatic probation, and go under review (a trial). Three strikes and they have to argue in court to defend themselves from disbarment and fines. Lame lawyers claiming "frivolous" to just deny representation should have a similar system, initiated by complaints by deferred clients or other lawyers, with the threshold numbers set by the Judicial Branch, after studying that independent, but related, problem.
Are you trying to bust noncompliant businesses, or are you trying to get businesses to serve disabled people? I'm saying our government should make it easy for websites to comply with the ADA's rigorous requirements, because it's cheaper and more effective.
Why do you prefer to punish some percentage of violators, rather than making fewer violators?
The judge? How about the law? The ADA was Bush Sr's favorite "social justice" law, which required many expensive (and probably worthwhile) changes to how American business places were operated. It hasn't been amended by the Republican Congress in the 12 years both Republicans and the ADA have both been in power.
It's unreasonable for all the people of the US, through our government, to install disabled-accessible architecture at physical stores. But it's perfectly reasonable for our government to offer free architectural diagrams and plans for stores to build their own.
Likewise, if our government is going to require websites to comply with ADA, our government should offer free software and validation testing for easy compliance. That's a lot more cost-effective (and just effective) than spending time and money forcing websites to do it without assistance.
I'm not surprised, I just don't like it - or the reasons why it becomes necessary for practically all media control to be corporate.
In fact, you're talking to a corporation right now, one that I control which owns my Internet connection and other related assets. Again, I don't like it, but I'm not a martyr. OTOH, I don't use my corporations to do bad things with their limited liability. My choice - all too unpopular.
What do you mean, "don't forget compression"? In my post, I mentioned compression at every turn - even 20x compression for the "baseline" XGA. And again in the mobile scenario. And again, explicitly, for the audio. Which I can very much tell is better at 500Kbps than at 384Kbps, especially in the headphones that mobile devices prioritize.
I'm not sure which post you're replying to. Because the mobile screen I detailed is QVGA, not QXGA.
I have not seen/heard the AT&T streaming you mention. But since it's so much lower bitrate than the raw data, I expect it's really bad, or that they're lying, or both (they are AT&T, after all). While really bad quality media is certainly possible on mobiles, that's not the high-end boundary scenario I was describing.
Freedom can be dangerous when the government harvests what you've done with it. Just get people hooked on something free, like the Internet, and then unilaterally add strict requirements later, that people will "compromise" to accept rather than give up their toy.
Like a drug pusher who tells you "the first bag is free".
Or an ISP, telco or bank which unilaterally changes Terms of Service or privacy "agreements".
It's clear to me that Republican incumbency abuse solely for reelection and cronyism is unprecedented with today's Republican Party.
But I agree that incumbents have the unfair privilege of campaigning through their term at taxpayer expense, on taxpayer time. Controlling the nuanced difference between campaigning and legitimate constituent communications is much too complex to work by rules. It's supposed to be overbalanced by campaign challengers, who are supposed to expose the endless campaigning of the incumbent, and convince the constituents the new guy will be better. The media is supposed to work harder to expose the incumbent, qualify the challenger, and debunk the incumbent's defensive spin. Media control by corporations making deals with incumbents for more media power has ruined the competition between the media and the government. But it can be fixed, especially with networked media and P2P journalism.
One term only removes the weak, but existing, deterrence of incumbents. To get reelected, they keep their crony abuse and incompetence down, because they have something to lose. Until incumbents are prosecuted for malfeasance and corrpution more, not less, than private people, the threat of losing the reelection is the biggest deterrence, if now obviously insufficient. And of course there's lots of government work that does require longterm management by a single person with vision, or the even more unaccountable bureaucracy will have all the power, using passing politicians as purely spokesmodels.
Of course we should have competitive races (including primaries), accurate media, and convicted criminal politicians. If we just destroy the reelection incentive first, we'll lose any control. If we restore those other "enforcement" features first, we might find that incumbency isn't so much a liability as a benefit - to the people, not the politicians.
I'm not ignorant of the torture at Guantanamo or the budget cuts at Arecibo. What else than negativity and fear is supposed to come from our Guantanamo torture camp?
BTW, it's up to you whether you respond to the facts about Bush's torture preference to science with hate, or with positive action. But I guess if you're going to react to messengers like me with the kind of hatred you have, you have already made your choice.
Your choice for torture. The worst kind of ignorant, negative fear and hate mongering.
PCs have at least XGA, 1024*768 pixels *24 color bits *30FPS = over 550Mbps just for video display (the vast majority of needed bandwidth). Even compressing that by 20x is over 25Mbps. But mobile phones' much smaller screens are probably quite good looking with QVGA, 320*240, 55Mbps, perhaps compressible to 5Mbps or less, maybe 3Mbps.
500Kbps compressed audio will also complement the small, detailed screen with the (relatively) hifi audio that is the priority for mobile media.
Which puts HSDPA's 3.6Mbps max right at the basic upper limit for bandwidth demands on these devices. So the next generation or two will probably reach 3.6Mbps as a minimum reliable rate.
More to which point, that the Military Times has been calling for Rumsfeld's resignation for a while, but he's still doing even worse?
The point that they deny the timing has to do with the election, when their editor said "it was inspired after Bush's stated earlier this week that he wants Rumsfeld and Vice President Dick Cheney in their posts through the end of his term."?
When they already called for his resignation outside "election season" (whenever that is, now that Republicans do nothing but campaign their entire term)?
The point is that Rumsfeld is so bad that the Military Times has now repeatedly called for his resignation, while Bush ignores those calls. Other points include the demands for Rumsfeld's resignation from so many in Congress, and the points about Rumsfeld's terrible butchery of his Iraq War.
Then there's the point that Rumsfeld lovers like you will stare straight into a news org saying they're speaking out a day before the election in response to Bush's provocative statement a week before the election, and say it's the news org that's playing with the timing, not Bush. That the news org's timeliness in covering timely events is a "rather weak" argument.
Oh, and the point that I still don't know of any other Defense Secretary whose resignation has been demanded by those military papers. Maybe if you could come up with one, you wouldn't be trying to score such a tiny point on such a worthless semantic distinction.
While I'm making all the meaningful points in response to your meaningless one, how about the point that Rumsfeld's last career "highlight" was running the losing of the Vietnam War, which he insists has nothing in common with Iraq. Except bloodbath, lies to justify invasion, the US losing the war and our credibility, and Rumsfeld.
You Republicans never learn. Vietnam, Watergate, Iran/Contra, Iraq. Living in a world of weak arguments makes you an expert, but not in making strong ones.
Anonymous Coward defends Bush spending money on torture instead of science. By insisting I'm an idiot, with mamby-pamby sarcasm as their factless argument.
I understand that Anonymous Cowards who hate facts and love torture are Bush's natural constituency. But after so many years, it's you who should be getting old, old enough to know better not to slime up Slashdot with your infantile tirades.
Vizzini: You only think I guessed wrong! That's what's so funny! I switched glasses when your back was turned! Ha ha! You fool! You fell victim to one of the classic blunders! The most famous is never get involved in a land war in Asia, but only slightly less well-known is this: never go in against a Sicilian when death is on the line! Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha! Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha! Ha ha ha...
In the middle of a security breach? If it's really bad, like publishing nuke secrets in Arabic on the Internet while you're inciting the terrorist world, you should "stay the course". Accuse those disclosing the breach to authorities of "emboldening the enemy" and "disclosing security procedures". Attack, attack, attack. You'll get to keep your job, though your company might go out of business, perhaps in a mushroom cloud. Then you could claim you'd been "right all along", while you burn in hell for eternity.
How much extra Greenhouse gas and climate change will trillions of manufactured and launched spacecraft add to the problem?
And how many other nonlinear, unpredicted problems will meddling with the chaotic system of which we've barely become aware, and don't really understand, inflame?
Global industry and aerospace has gone from denying the Greenhouse could possibly exist, to launching trillions of spacecraft to blot out the Sun, in a couple of years. Who could possibly trust these greedy, hamfisted dreamers with anything like the survival of our climate?
Slashdot Mirror
Well, I'm not sure how "all over" it is in the mass news media. I don't tune in to the mass news media. Instead I took control of the media myself, using the Net even to find the TV I want to watch over cable. I haven't been able to read a newspaper for a over a decade without gagging on the obvious agenda, and broadcast news is even worse. Cable news is pretty bad, with a few exceptions, like some shows on MSNBC and PBS - but not all on those networks.
I'm not alone. I think the "mass" media is breaking up, giving way to interactive media, media blogs steered by commentary, and eventually P2P journalism. The old system is crashing under its own weight. Even these phonejamming and evil robocalling systems are new media, that people will learn to protect ourselves from.
So while it's pretty bad here in the US, I think we've turned some corners. YouTube, political/social blogs, mobile media phones, social networks - all of them give regular people much more balance of media power. That is where the hope lies in the US: the power of the people to work with (and against) each other, without relying on some king or CEO to connect to reality.
You make me laugh.
Are you in New Hampshire, on the Do Not Call list? What makes you think that the calls you've gotten are breaking the law? Political robocalls aren't against the law. Even in New Hampshire, they're only illegal if you're on the Do Not Call list, while other states don't even have that restriction.
I'm not shocked, but I'm disappointed whenever Republicans are caught at their crimes, and people's response is "Democrats do it just as much", without any evidence that they are.
Moderation +2
50% Insightful
30% Interesting
20% Troll
Hopefully the diehard Republicans will turn out tomorrow in the same force as the TrollMods. The authoritarian 23% who would drag us all along as they follow Bush over the cliff. Which should get outweighed by the 80% (including the Democrats' 3 authoritarian points) voting to stop before it's too late.
And what's wrong has a lot to do with Republicans. It's no coincidence that we've got (Bush) Jr as president, (Sununu) Jr from NH controlling the FCC, (Kean) Jr nearly in an NJ Senate seat, another Bush running Florida... these family cronies are just part of the crony system. Since you mentioned the Supreme Court, it occurs to me that Clarence Thomas' wife worked for the Bush 2000 campaign, vetting resumes for the incoming admin that depended on her husband's "vote" for Bush to be president. Oh, and Colin Powell's son was the first Bush FCC head. And
Of course, there's plenty more where that came from. Now, I'm willing to believe that Democrats are just as nepotistic, just as cronyist. If someone can show me the evidence. Until then, I'll consider Republican obsession with "Kennedy Dynasty" and "Clinton Dynasty", much more limited and all ratified by voters (not merely appointments), as their inspiration to convert the US political system to the hereditary European system they emulate in so many other ways.
Here's a column published in Philly by someone thinking Democrats were harassing her with robocalls. Even though they sensibly asked why Democrats would do such a thing when it would turn voters off, they thought it was the Democratic candidate. Pretty typical reaction.
Their untypical reaction was to call the Democrat's office demanding an explanation. Which turned out to be "it's a Republican dirty trick". But how many people will find out before voting? And how many people will believe it's not Democrats lying to blame Republicans, when they already believe Democrats have been harassing them with robocalls?
Meanwhile, in New Hampshire, Republicans have followed up their 2002 phonejamming of Democrats' lines (preventing Democrats from getting voters to polls) with enough illegal robocalls to cost $100 MILLION in fines. Of course, those 2002 robocalls got John Sununu Jr (R-NH) into the Senate, where he controls the FCC, and he hasn't given up the job he DDoS'ed his way into. So I don't expect Republicans to cough up the $100M they'd owe for this year's attack on the election process.
Unless maybe enough Republicans get fired in the election tomorrow that they can't do these crimes unpunished anymore. Go to the polls and do your part.
I know that is sometimes the case in some laws. But since practically every function of the government could be delivered by a private vendor, but usually isn't, there's plenty of role for the government to offer services where the current market isn't served. Do you know that the ADA or other laws related to that service are covered that way?
At the very least the government should offer validation without charge to the websites testing themselves, as legal compliance tests are part of the government's operations. Perhaps by paying validators to provide the service. Maybe even paying vendors of compliant website components. Still probably cheaper than just law enforcement, and lost productivity/commerce (/ability) of disabled shoppers.
I would disbar and probably fine lawyers whose business is producing frivolous lawsuits. Likewise, I would treat lawyers who refuse as "frivolous" meritorious cases they just don't think they can win, because they're not good enough lawyers.
Frivolous lawyers get 2 strikes, go on automatic probation, and go under review (a trial). Three strikes and they have to argue in court to defend themselves from disbarment and fines. Lame lawyers claiming "frivolous" to just deny representation should have a similar system, initiated by complaints by deferred clients or other lawyers, with the threshold numbers set by the Judicial Branch, after studying that independent, but related, problem.
Are you trying to bust noncompliant businesses, or are you trying to get businesses to serve disabled people? I'm saying our government should make it easy for websites to comply with the ADA's rigorous requirements, because it's cheaper and more effective.
Why do you prefer to punish some percentage of violators, rather than making fewer violators?
The judge? How about the law? The ADA was Bush Sr's favorite "social justice" law, which required many expensive (and probably worthwhile) changes to how American business places were operated. It hasn't been amended by the Republican Congress in the 12 years both Republicans and the ADA have both been in power.
It's unreasonable for all the people of the US, through our government, to install disabled-accessible architecture at physical stores. But it's perfectly reasonable for our government to offer free architectural diagrams and plans for stores to build their own.
Likewise, if our government is going to require websites to comply with ADA, our government should offer free software and validation testing for easy compliance. That's a lot more cost-effective (and just effective) than spending time and money forcing websites to do it without assistance.
I'm not surprised, I just don't like it - or the reasons why it becomes necessary for practically all media control to be corporate.
In fact, you're talking to a corporation right now, one that I control which owns my Internet connection and other related assets. Again, I don't like it, but I'm not a martyr. OTOH, I don't use my corporations to do bad things with their limited liability. My choice - all too unpopular.
What do you mean, "don't forget compression"? In my post, I mentioned compression at every turn - even 20x compression for the "baseline" XGA. And again in the mobile scenario. And again, explicitly, for the audio. Which I can very much tell is better at 500Kbps than at 384Kbps, especially in the headphones that mobile devices prioritize.
I'm not sure which post you're replying to. Because the mobile screen I detailed is QVGA, not QXGA.
I have not seen/heard the AT&T streaming you mention. But since it's so much lower bitrate than the raw data, I expect it's really bad, or that they're lying, or both (they are AT&T, after all). While really bad quality media is certainly possible on mobiles, that's not the high-end boundary scenario I was describing.
Freedom can be dangerous when the government harvests what you've done with it. Just get people hooked on something free, like the Internet, and then unilaterally add strict requirements later, that people will "compromise" to accept rather than give up their toy.
Like a drug pusher who tells you "the first bag is free".
Or an ISP, telco or bank which unilaterally changes Terms of Service or privacy "agreements".
It's clear to me that Republican incumbency abuse solely for reelection and cronyism is unprecedented with today's Republican Party.
But I agree that incumbents have the unfair privilege of campaigning through their term at taxpayer expense, on taxpayer time. Controlling the nuanced difference between campaigning and legitimate constituent communications is much too complex to work by rules. It's supposed to be overbalanced by campaign challengers, who are supposed to expose the endless campaigning of the incumbent, and convince the constituents the new guy will be better. The media is supposed to work harder to expose the incumbent, qualify the challenger, and debunk the incumbent's defensive spin. Media control by corporations making deals with incumbents for more media power has ruined the competition between the media and the government. But it can be fixed, especially with networked media and P2P journalism.
One term only removes the weak, but existing, deterrence of incumbents. To get reelected, they keep their crony abuse and incompetence down, because they have something to lose. Until incumbents are prosecuted for malfeasance and corrpution more, not less, than private people, the threat of losing the reelection is the biggest deterrence, if now obviously insufficient. And of course there's lots of government work that does require longterm management by a single person with vision, or the even more unaccountable bureaucracy will have all the power, using passing politicians as purely spokesmodels.
Of course we should have competitive races (including primaries), accurate media, and convicted criminal politicians. If we just destroy the reelection incentive first, we'll lose any control. If we restore those other "enforcement" features first, we might find that incumbency isn't so much a liability as a benefit - to the people, not the politicians.
I'm not ignorant of the torture at Guantanamo or the budget cuts at Arecibo. What else than negativity and fear is supposed to come from our Guantanamo torture camp?
BTW, it's up to you whether you respond to the facts about Bush's torture preference to science with hate, or with positive action. But I guess if you're going to react to messengers like me with the kind of hatred you have, you have already made your choice.
Your choice for torture. The worst kind of ignorant, negative fear and hate mongering.
PCs have at least XGA, 1024*768 pixels *24 color bits *30FPS = over 550Mbps just for video display (the vast majority of needed bandwidth). Even compressing that by 20x is over 25Mbps. But mobile phones' much smaller screens are probably quite good looking with QVGA, 320*240, 55Mbps, perhaps compressible to 5Mbps or less, maybe 3Mbps.
500Kbps compressed audio will also complement the small, detailed screen with the (relatively) hifi audio that is the priority for mobile media.
Which puts HSDPA's 3.6Mbps max right at the basic upper limit for bandwidth demands on these devices. So the next generation or two will probably reach 3.6Mbps as a minimum reliable rate.
Just in time for displays to get bigger.
When you can swallow a Vulcan whole, you'll be well beyond _Princess Bride_'s reach.
More to which point, that the Military Times has been calling for Rumsfeld's resignation for a while, but he's still doing even worse?
The point that they deny the timing has to do with the election, when their editor said "it was inspired after Bush's stated earlier this week that he wants Rumsfeld and Vice President Dick Cheney in their posts through the end of his term."?
When they already called for his resignation outside "election season" (whenever that is, now that Republicans do nothing but campaign their entire term)?
The point is that Rumsfeld is so bad that the Military Times has now repeatedly called for his resignation, while Bush ignores those calls. Other points include the demands for Rumsfeld's resignation from so many in Congress, and the points about Rumsfeld's terrible butchery of his Iraq War.
Then there's the point that Rumsfeld lovers like you will stare straight into a news org saying they're speaking out a day before the election in response to Bush's provocative statement a week before the election, and say it's the news org that's playing with the timing, not Bush. That the news org's timeliness in covering timely events is a "rather weak" argument.
Oh, and the point that I still don't know of any other Defense Secretary whose resignation has been demanded by those military papers. Maybe if you could come up with one, you wouldn't be trying to score such a tiny point on such a worthless semantic distinction.
While I'm making all the meaningful points in response to your meaningless one, how about the point that Rumsfeld's last career "highlight" was running the losing of the Vietnam War, which he insists has nothing in common with Iraq. Except bloodbath, lies to justify invasion, the US losing the war and our credibility, and Rumsfeld.
You Republicans never learn. Vietnam, Watergate, Iran/Contra, Iraq. Living in a world of weak arguments makes you an expert, but not in making strong ones.
See it with a chick. Or read the book - it's even brider. It's worth the effort. If it fails, test yourself for Vulcan blood.
Anonymous Coward defends Bush spending money on torture instead of science. By insisting I'm an idiot, with mamby-pamby sarcasm as their factless argument.
I understand that Anonymous Cowards who hate facts and love torture are Bush's natural constituency. But after so many years, it's you who should be getting old, old enough to know better not to slime up Slashdot with your infantile tirades.
In the middle of a security breach? If it's really bad, like publishing nuke secrets in Arabic on the Internet while you're inciting the terrorist world, you should "stay the course". Accuse those disclosing the breach to authorities of "emboldening the enemy" and "disclosing security procedures". Attack, attack, attack. You'll get to keep your job, though your company might go out of business, perhaps in a mushroom cloud. Then you could claim you'd been "right all along", while you burn in hell for eternity.
How much extra Greenhouse gas and climate change will trillions of manufactured and launched spacecraft add to the problem?
And how many other nonlinear, unpredicted problems will meddling with the chaotic system of which we've barely become aware, and don't really understand, inflame?
Global industry and aerospace has gone from denying the Greenhouse could possibly exist, to launching trillions of spacecraft to blot out the Sun, in a couple of years. Who could possibly trust these greedy, hamfisted dreamers with anything like the survival of our climate?
Money for torture in Guantanamo, but no money for science in Arecibo.
We're building the Cuban economy while shafting the Puerto Rican economy. But oh, the things we'll learn - about the sadists who run the US.