The generic answer for "What's wrong with policy X?" is to look at the results of that policy. You don't have to look very hard to realize that the results of this policy are a disastrous race to the bottom in terms of wages, that will ultimately destroy consumer spending and crash the economy (just to mention one of the bad outcomes).
We've had quite a few people around my workplace promoting extreme programming and (fr)agile software development. It's not going to replace lack of talent, lack of planning, or not knowing what the true costs of things are. I think many people in management have taken in only the parts that they want to hear, and ignored the rest. The results of this kind of misapplication are fairly obvious.
My biggest objection is the lack of credible proof that it actually works any better than the tried an true software methodologies.
As someone else mentioned, I think it's because CS requires long hours, has a perception of being less stable, and not conducive to having a life. My wife is a doctor, and while she has no life right now, in the long run she will have a very stable career where she will have quite a bit of control over her hours. While I make more as a programmer, and potentially could make quite a bit more, there is less stability, more stress, and less sureness over what the next decade or three will be like.
I think if we want more women in computer science, then we need to look outside the field for the biases that are shaping it. The institution of the family still has radically different expectations for men and women. Our society in general is also very cut-throat and anti-family. So, I think women, who have more of a desire to have kids (whether by conditioning or biology), play it safe with their careers so they can focus on their family. Until we remove the social pressures requiring women to make safe choices (such as better welfare, single payer health care, better unemployment benefits), we'll have lopsided results with respect to gender distribution and perceived stability of career choice.
The problem is that poor people lack capital, assets, cash. They lack resources, and I'm not talking about people that will serve them.
I would be happy to work a few hours if it resulted in a true redistribution of wealth. If the government built a high tech factory, and I could produce computers for the poor that were free, that would be great. If the government took away telecom's monopoly rights, and started laying free fiber connections to everyone's homes, I would love to pitch in. If the government got rid of private health insurance, I would be happy to work at not-for-profit single payer insurer for a few hours a week.
However, if all this ends up being is a way to get free labor with a resource strapped government that has no true means to actually help people, then I say no. I worked at Head Start, and it was depressing as hell. They had a lot of good people working there, and hardly any resources. Throwing more bodies into the mix won't help if we don't actually fund these programs. If they don't have the balls to actually take away some of the excess from the haves and help out the have nots, then I won't be on board. We have a serious problem with distribution of wealth in our society, and providing an army of volunteers without giving them any resources is ridiculous.
In those other countries, the rich pay their share. All "community service" represents to me is yet another tax on the poor. If we are going to have mandatory service, then we should bring back the 94% tax bracket over $200,000 that Harry Truman had, or at least the 70% tax bracket that Nixon and Carter had. Right now, the rich pay only 35%, and many get out of paying even that. This just stinks, it's not as if working people don't already put in enough hours.
Another way to look at it is, if we are going to make people do mandatory service, then we should bring back the 94% tax bracket over $200,000 that Harry Truman had. That would mean that everyone would be sacrificing, just like World War II.
Yes, there would be trolling, but it would also be a way for people to form connections and organize. My guess is that he doesn't want his supporters talking amongst themselves.
If they cut back our work weeks to something reasonable (maybe a French work week of 30 hours, with 6 weeks paid vacation) then I'll be happy to do community service. As it stands, community service is an insult to an overworked and underpaid workforce.
Or, they could take all of the currently unemployed, who WANT to work, and actually PAY them to do work that needs to be done, such as infrastructure maintenance and improvement.
To be honest, I don't want to serve the current system, I want to change it, there is a big difference.
Shouldn't there be blogs and forums so users can actually communicate with each other and make their opinions known to each other? That would be a powerful force, as they could band together to keep Obama in line if he strays too far from his promises. The way it is set up currently, it simply is a bullhorn for Obama, while his users can "share their vision" with a recycle bin. I don't see much (yet) to get excited about. It reminds me of CNN's "talkback", which is heavily censored and filtered.
Consider that GDP is 1.04% brwoth, that means the economy will need to be 50x as large in 100 years to sustain growth. That far outpaces population growth which also follows an exponential growth curve. One example of even greater exponential growth (which isn't relatively stable like GDP) is our recent housing bubble.
Or, you can go to finance.google.com and plot out the market growth over the past 30 years. In a micro economic sense, markets grow exponentially, then crash, rebuild, find new areas of expansion, and grow exponentially again. In a macro-economic sense, it's a slow, relatively steady, 1.04% growth curve, until a significant portion of the world's resources are consumed.
I would be more worried about "overpopulation" if the entire world was full of greedy bastards. But fortunately, the "savages" figure out ways to live on 1% of the oil while we "civilized" Americans continue to plunder and use 25% of the worlds oil.
Capitalism and exponential market growth are 100x as big of a cancer on this planet as over-population will ever be. The sad thing is, those who consume the least, and contribute the most, are the least likely to get this treatment (at least at first), while some of the biggest parasites the world has ever seen will likely be first in line.
So, what you're saying is that if they hadn't figured out a working scientific model for mass to energy conversion before testing nuclear devices, you would be repeating the fact that correlation != causation after the experimental testing of the atomic bomb?
The atmosphere and objects in the environment naturally dampen high frequencies. So, if you are listening to a set of stereo speakers 15 feet away, the high frequencies are significantly reduced compared to if you put your ear right next to it. Likewise, putting an earbud in your ear means that there is NO roll-off (dampening) of high frequencies. As a result, your ear is getting a huge dose of high frequency noise. Proper modeling of this and filtering of high frequencies would go a long way to curbing hearing loss. Don't count on people turning down the treble on their own. We've grown accustomed to it, and really the hardware should do it for us.
Right, but perhaps unintentionally the parent post shows another reason why the internet is not making us stupid, but in fact is making us smarter. That is,the internet makes it easier than ever to find opposing points of view. The internet is the only form of mass-media that comes even close to being two way communication (as opposed to radio, tv, and print). It also is relatively uncensored, and encourages us to think outside of the bounds of corporate dominated media.
Building infrastructure that resides outside the control of a market based system creates resources and opportunities that can benefit us all, instead of merely the wealthy. This infrastructure is vital to helping to create and foster movements that will ensure we all get paid what we are worth. If control over computers, communications, and IP falls into the hands of only those who seek profit, the rest of us, including programmers, will suffer. In a world where we are increasingly automating, and labor is becoming ever more abundant, we can't leave it to markets to decide our fate.
You are assuming that "What's in it for me?" is the best approach to life and work, and forcing your colleagues to justify their position within this framework. I would suggest that rather than asking "What's in it for me?", instead, ask yourself who the "What's in it for me?" attitude has benefited the most. You can look to history to answer this question. Then, ask yourself who the "What's in it for us?" attitude has benefited the most. Again, look to history. A quick examination shows that those who recognize not just their own needs, but instead their needs within the context of a larger group or class, benefit more than those who go it alone. The wealthy have realized this, and worked together as a group to advance their own position. Conversely, most of us have been rather fragmented. If you look toward the recent past (100 years ago in the US), collective action, or "What's in it for us", allowed the average American to make great strides in standard of living. I support Open Source because it does a much better job of addressing "What's in it for us?" than for profit software does. The long-term outcome of Open Source is much more appealing to me, despite the fact that I may lose income (this hasn't been shown to be true). "What's in it for us" is crucial. It's the difference between having control over our culture or instead letting it rot away in a corporate vault. It's the difference between having control over our art, our movies, our music, our legacy software, our communications, our privacy, our ability to use this without having to pay a tax to corporations.
Some skills I wished I had learned in school were how to relax (meditation, exercise, etc.), and how to get through finals without caffeine and other crutches. Definitely learn how to cope with stress, because if you have any stress in school it only gets worse, and your body's ability to cope with it will drop significantly after you turn 30. Don't get too wound up or stressed out while studying, and remember to save some energy for a workout at the end of the day. If you are too exhausted from sitting in a chair for 8 hours to exercise, then that's a sign that you need to relax (take a yoga class, stretch, etc).
Now that I'm off the caffeine (and quit smoking a few years ago), I find it amusing watching those who still indulge get wound up like two-bit watches every day. While I'm sure they think they're getting a lot done, it's interesting to watch the toll that such a lifestyle takes on people after a few years. Chances are you will be in a position where the sky seems to be falling every day, and your ability to handle it with grace, and to stay relaxed will have a large impact on your future.
A better question than the one the article presents is why we put up with an economic system that threatens not just to corrupt, but to completely destroy the very democracy which this country is built on.
Like most of our (US) foreign policy, it's a business decision. Freedom, democracy, and human rights are far down on the list of priorities, if they ever make it onto that list. If it comes down to spreading capitalism or democracy, capitalism comes first. If it comes to a decision between creating a free country, or a source of profits, profits come first, always.
Slashdot Mirror
The generic answer for "What's wrong with policy X?" is to look at the results of that policy. You don't have to look very hard to realize that the results of this policy are a disastrous race to the bottom in terms of wages, that will ultimately destroy consumer spending and crash the economy (just to mention one of the bad outcomes).
Of course, the best way to get fiber laid is to first give 6 billion dollars to a bunch of institutions whose main goal is to make a profit.
With capitalism garbage rises regardless of whether or not times are tough...
We've had quite a few people around my workplace promoting extreme programming and (fr)agile software development. It's not going to replace lack of talent, lack of planning, or not knowing what the true costs of things are. I think many people in management have taken in only the parts that they want to hear, and ignored the rest. The results of this kind of misapplication are fairly obvious.
My biggest objection is the lack of credible proof that it actually works any better than the tried an true software methodologies.
As someone else mentioned, I think it's because CS requires long hours, has a perception of being less stable, and not conducive to having a life.
My wife is a doctor, and while she has no life right now, in the long run she will have a very stable career where she will have quite a bit of control over her hours. While I make more as a programmer, and potentially could make quite a bit more, there is less stability, more stress, and less sureness over what the next decade or three will be like.
I think if we want more women in computer science, then we need to look outside the field for the biases that are shaping it. The institution of the family still has radically different expectations for men and women. Our society in general is also very cut-throat and anti-family. So, I think women, who have more of a desire to have kids (whether by conditioning or biology), play it safe with their careers so they can focus on their family. Until we remove the social pressures requiring women to make safe choices (such as better welfare, single payer health care, better unemployment benefits), we'll have lopsided results with respect to gender distribution and perceived stability of career choice.
The problem is that poor people lack capital, assets, cash. They lack resources, and I'm not talking about people that will serve them.
I would be happy to work a few hours if it resulted in a true redistribution of wealth. If the government built a high tech factory, and I could produce computers for the poor that were free, that would be great. If the government took away telecom's monopoly rights, and started laying free fiber connections to everyone's homes, I would love to pitch in. If the government got rid of private health insurance, I would be happy to work at not-for-profit single payer insurer for a few hours a week.
However, if all this ends up being is a way to get free labor with a resource strapped government that has no true means to actually help people, then I say no. I worked at Head Start, and it was depressing as hell. They had a lot of good people working there, and hardly any resources. Throwing more bodies into the mix won't help if we don't actually fund these programs. If they don't have the balls to actually take away some of the excess from the haves and help out the have nots, then I won't be on board. We have a serious problem with distribution of wealth in our society, and providing an army of volunteers without giving them any resources is ridiculous.
In those other countries, the rich pay their share. All "community service" represents to me is yet another tax on the poor. If we are going to have mandatory service, then we should bring back the 94% tax bracket over $200,000 that Harry Truman had, or at least the 70% tax bracket that Nixon and Carter had. Right now, the rich pay only 35%, and many get out of paying even that. This just stinks, it's not as if working people don't already put in enough hours.
Another way to look at it is, if we are going to make people do mandatory service, then we should bring back the 94% tax bracket over $200,000 that Harry Truman had. That would mean that everyone would be sacrificing, just like World War II.
Yes, there would be trolling, but it would also be a way for people to form connections and organize. My guess is that he doesn't want his supporters talking amongst themselves.
I agree. People should be able to post their comments to a publicly viewable forum so that an open discussion and debate can occur.
If they cut back our work weeks to something reasonable (maybe a French work week of 30 hours, with 6 weeks paid vacation) then I'll be happy to do community service. As it stands, community service is an insult to an overworked and underpaid workforce.
Or, they could take all of the currently unemployed, who WANT to work, and actually PAY them to do work that needs to be done, such as infrastructure maintenance and improvement.
To be honest, I don't want to serve the current system, I want to change it, there is a big difference.
Shouldn't there be blogs and forums so users can actually communicate with each other and make their opinions known to each other? That would be a powerful force, as they could band together to keep Obama in line if he strays too far from his promises. The way it is set up currently, it simply is a bullhorn for Obama, while his users can "share their vision" with a recycle bin. I don't see much (yet) to get excited about. It reminds me of CNN's "talkback", which is heavily censored and filtered.
Consider that GDP is 1.04% brwoth, that means the economy will need to be 50x as large in 100 years to sustain growth. That far outpaces population growth which also follows an exponential growth curve. One example of even greater exponential growth (which isn't relatively stable like GDP) is our recent housing bubble.
Or, you can go to finance.google.com and plot out the market growth over the past 30 years. In a micro economic sense, markets grow exponentially, then crash, rebuild, find new areas of expansion, and grow exponentially again. In a macro-economic sense, it's a slow, relatively steady, 1.04% growth curve, until a significant portion of the world's resources are consumed.
I would be more worried about "overpopulation" if the entire world was full of greedy bastards. But fortunately, the "savages" figure out ways to live on 1% of the oil while we "civilized" Americans continue to plunder and use 25% of the worlds oil.
Capitalism and exponential market growth are 100x as big of a cancer on this planet as over-population will ever be. The sad thing is, those who consume the least, and contribute the most, are the least likely to get this treatment (at least at first), while some of the biggest parasites the world has ever seen will likely be first in line.
So, what you're saying is that if they hadn't figured out a working scientific model for mass to energy conversion before testing nuclear devices, you would be repeating the fact that correlation != causation after the experimental testing of the atomic bomb?
Wow, just..., wow..
The atmosphere and objects in the environment naturally dampen high frequencies. So, if you are listening to a set of stereo speakers 15 feet away, the high frequencies are significantly reduced compared to if you put your ear right next to it. Likewise, putting an earbud in your ear means that there is NO roll-off (dampening) of high frequencies. As a result, your ear is getting a huge dose of high frequency noise. Proper modeling of this and filtering of high frequencies would go a long way to curbing hearing loss. Don't count on people turning down the treble on their own. We've grown accustomed to it, and really the hardware should do it for us.
Right, but perhaps unintentionally the parent post shows another reason why the internet is not making us stupid, but in fact is making us smarter. That is,the internet makes it easier than ever to find opposing points of view. The internet is the only form of mass-media that comes even close to being two way communication (as opposed to radio, tv, and print). It also is relatively uncensored, and encourages us to think outside of the bounds of corporate dominated media.
No, I don't think the internet will be making us stupid, not when what it's replacing is TV, radio, and corporate controlled newspapers.
Building infrastructure that resides outside the control of a market based system creates resources and opportunities that can benefit us all, instead of merely the wealthy. This infrastructure is vital to helping to create and foster movements that will ensure we all get paid what we are worth. If control over computers, communications, and IP falls into the hands of only those who seek profit, the rest of us, including programmers, will suffer. In a world where we are increasingly automating, and labor is becoming ever more abundant, we can't leave it to markets to decide our fate.
You are assuming that "What's in it for me?" is the best approach to life and work, and forcing your colleagues to justify their position within this framework. I would suggest that rather than asking "What's in it for me?", instead, ask yourself who the "What's in it for me?" attitude has benefited the most. You can look to history to answer this question. Then, ask yourself who the "What's in it for us?" attitude has benefited the most. Again, look to history. A quick examination shows that those who recognize not just their own needs, but instead their needs within the context of a larger group or class, benefit more than those who go it alone. The wealthy have realized this, and worked together as a group to advance their own position. Conversely, most of us have been rather fragmented. If you look toward the recent past (100 years ago in the US), collective action, or "What's in it for us", allowed the average American to make great strides in standard of living. I support Open Source because it does a much better job of addressing "What's in it for us?" than for profit software does. The long-term outcome of Open Source is much more appealing to me, despite the fact that I may lose income (this hasn't been shown to be true). "What's in it for us" is crucial. It's the difference between having control over our culture or instead letting it rot away in a corporate vault. It's the difference between having control over our art, our movies, our music, our legacy software, our communications, our privacy, our ability to use this without having to pay a tax to corporations.
Some skills I wished I had learned in school were how to relax (meditation, exercise, etc.), and how to get through finals without caffeine and other crutches. Definitely learn how to cope with stress, because if you have any stress in school it only gets worse, and your body's ability to cope with it will drop significantly after you turn 30. Don't get too wound up or stressed out while studying, and remember to save some energy for a workout at the end of the day. If you are too exhausted from sitting in a chair for 8 hours to exercise, then that's a sign that you need to relax (take a yoga class, stretch, etc).
Now that I'm off the caffeine (and quit smoking a few years ago), I find it amusing watching those who still indulge get wound up like two-bit watches every day. While I'm sure they think they're getting a lot done, it's interesting to watch the toll that such a lifestyle takes on people after a few years. Chances are you will be in a position where the sky seems to be falling every day, and your ability to handle it with grace, and to stay relaxed will have a large impact on your future.
parecon
www.parecon.org
A better question than the one the article presents is why we put up with an economic system that threatens not just to corrupt, but to completely destroy the very democracy which this country is built on.
Like most of our (US) foreign policy, it's a business decision. Freedom, democracy, and human rights are far down on the list of priorities, if they ever make it onto that list. If it comes down to spreading capitalism or democracy, capitalism comes first. If it comes to a decision between creating a free country, or a source of profits, profits come first, always.
There's no reason to believe that municipalities wouldn't be able to deploy WIMAX as effectively as Sprint, is there?
We still have the best scam artists here in America. We're still top notch at figuring out ways to rip people off.