I think Alexie is just a bitter guy. We grew up in the same general area (didn't know each other, he's older and ran with different people, but I suspect we had common friends-of-friends) so I have an idea of the environment in which he grew up: poor reservations and project housing. But, that in mind, and given his notoriety and success--award-winning author, recovering alcoholic, family man--he fucking bitches a lot. I have known people from that area who killed themselves trying to get whacked on PineSol, or had spouses put hatches through their foreheads, or drank themselves to slow, painful deaths on Milwaukee's Best and $2 gallons of zinfandel. Alexie's lot didn't turn out so badly by comparison.
He's trying to work for Indian and author rights--I get it. But, Thor's Nailgun, it's like he tries to rattle people just to get attention, and ends up alienating himself and his causes in the process.
He spoke at my community college once, and was booed at the lectern for saying something along the lines of "none of you are going to amount to anything in life, so you might as well get along with the people around you". Again, his intentions were probably good, but his delivery sucks.
I, too, work for a Large American Company (one of the largest).Ten years ago I was a developer, server admin, and DBA for critical systems, and had full admin for pretty much the whole world (along with my one partner). We never blew up anything too badly (luck, mostly, and our willingness to work insane numbers of hours to fix our mistakes before userville woke up), but, as you can imagine, we needed full admin just to get by since we couldn't hire more hands.
Fast forward a decade, and LAC has seen the light; they don't even let developers reset passwords, don't let DBAs write code, don't let server admins create user IDs, etc, etc, . Even restarting services goes through change control. And, we have a bona fide dev/test/prod environment on Linux (no more MSSQL 7 and WinApache all running on a 486 that I rest my feet on all day).
It makes for a safe, secure environment--but Jesus Willem Defoe, it takes for-goddamn-ever to do even the simplest tasks.Senior Vice President signature, committee vetting, and 3 week change control process to bounce a server? Yeah, that's why I'm not in tech with LAC anymore. They're probably still running 2.2 kernels because they can't get approval to upgrade.
tl;dr: Some big companies don't realize that security and functionality requires balance.
I'm not sure how often my ISP cycles it. That's the thing to check, I guess. Sometimes when I run tor/provoxy, I get blocked by a few sites because the end node has been "spoiled" and the IP blocked.
I was thinking more along the lines of their new tablet multi-function device rumored for the near future. Free games, cheap e-books & e-mags, subsidized & limited 'net access...all for the price of some horrible flash ads that make you want to put your fist through the screen. Makes the Sony Reader look even better.
...and furthermore, I would add that it's not just systems-folk who will bail out of frustration. I work for a company--large bank, actually--that by stated policy buys the lowest-end desktop/laptop hardware possible, with the understanding that it is cheaper to fix or replace 8,000 defective units a year than to buy 100,000 quality units a year.
What they don't take into consideration (with many, many similar non-tech decisions as well, but that's a different thread) is that it pounds on the morale of users to have to wait 1/2 hour to boot, spend 5 minutes to send an email because Outlook is choking while trying to talk to the directory server, or spend three hours a month on the phone with someone in India who is reading troubleshooting tips off of a website and has to escalate everything above a password reset to L2.
There was a time when bankers were sought-after (and, in some categories, still are); hating their computer, the thing that they spent more time with than their spouse or children most days, would give them one more reason to not stick around.
One could, in theory, trade the common problems of finding time for family, paying bills, etc, with the more deeply moral problem created by the slight tinge of guilt produced when issuing commands into a homemade computer system made of hundreds of thousands of humans holding signs that read 0 on one side and 1 on the other, all feeding information into an 8 bit display made of even more people standing on the field of a football stadium holding giant multi-colored dice.
It's the SCO business model...if you can't make money selling products, your lawyers can become a replacement sales force.
To extend your analogy (and because I have karma to burn): give it six more years, and the last remnants of the tall tent pole music distribution model will be found hanging in a closet in Bangkok.
Organic garden attracts hippies. Hippies smoke pot. Pot is a gateway drug, leading to heroin and cocaine, which are manufactured and distributed by terrorists. Increased terrorist activity leads to more convervatives in office, which then creates a groundswell of liberals to counter them every 4 years or so. Liberals, of course, only eat organic garlic.
Slashdot Mirror
"Call it a masterpiece, call it a urinal. It doesn't matter--it's art, so there's nothing to prove."
-Amanda Palmer 2010
Many moons ago, my brother-in-law was an ATM tech. He told me that ATMs were the last major users of BeOS. Waddayaknow.
Fixed that for you:
http://lh4.ggpht.com/_UjgyEXeDpYo/S74drJ79OpI/AAAAAAAAAR8/NERXd6BQXjk/s800/canyouhearmenowbitch.jpg
That only counts on a raed.
Pools closed.
etc.
etc.
But what about the boobies^H^H^H superbowl commerci^H^H^H quality service they provide?
As disappoint in myself I am to admit it, I've seen a few threads that went that way.
"Hey look, I'm a camwhore with bathroom mirror nudie pix!"
"Hey, look, I found your lat/lon in the EXIF data"
"Hey, look, I found your house on Google Maps at this link. RAEDZ!"
Customer: What's your name? I need to talk to your supervisor.
Microsoft Phone Support: Hu.
Customer: (head explodes)
If the Nobel committee gets 419'd, I will never, ever stop laughing.
I think Alexie is just a bitter guy. We grew up in the same general area (didn't know each other, he's older and ran with different people, but I suspect we had common friends-of-friends) so I have an idea of the environment in which he grew up: poor reservations and project housing. But, that in mind, and given his notoriety and success--award-winning author, recovering alcoholic, family man--he fucking bitches a lot. I have known people from that area who killed themselves trying to get whacked on PineSol, or had spouses put hatches through their foreheads, or drank themselves to slow, painful deaths on Milwaukee's Best and $2 gallons of zinfandel. Alexie's lot didn't turn out so badly by comparison.
He's trying to work for Indian and author rights--I get it. But, Thor's Nailgun, it's like he tries to rattle people just to get attention, and ends up alienating himself and his causes in the process.
He spoke at my community college once, and was booed at the lectern for saying something along the lines of "none of you are going to amount to anything in life, so you might as well get along with the people around you". Again, his intentions were probably good, but his delivery sucks.
I, too, work for a Large American Company (one of the largest).Ten years ago I was a developer, server admin, and DBA for critical systems, and had full admin for pretty much the whole world (along with my one partner). We never blew up anything too badly (luck, mostly, and our willingness to work insane numbers of hours to fix our mistakes before userville woke up), but, as you can imagine, we needed full admin just to get by since we couldn't hire more hands.
Fast forward a decade, and LAC has seen the light; they don't even let developers reset passwords, don't let DBAs write code, don't let server admins create user IDs, etc, etc, . Even restarting services goes through change control. And, we have a bona fide dev/test/prod environment on Linux (no more MSSQL 7 and WinApache all running on a 486 that I rest my feet on all day).
It makes for a safe, secure environment--but Jesus Willem Defoe, it takes for-goddamn-ever to do even the simplest tasks.Senior Vice President signature, committee vetting, and 3 week change control process to bounce a server? Yeah, that's why I'm not in tech with LAC anymore. They're probably still running 2.2 kernels because they can't get approval to upgrade.
tl;dr: Some big companies don't realize that security and functionality requires balance.
Ditto. I can hit two cell towers with a wrist rocket from my back yard, but my (and my wife's) AT&T coverage is so spotty as to be near worthless.
Does praying that I can reload my auto-shotgun before the tank punts me across the room count?
I'm not sure how often my ISP cycles it. That's the thing to check, I guess. Sometimes when I run tor/provoxy, I get blocked by a few sites because the end node has been "spoiled" and the IP blocked.
Anyone hosting tor ports to assist? I considered, but I'm nervous about having some /b/onehead abuse my address.
I like shamrock shakes. They smell like gum.
do you have battletoads?
I was thinking more along the lines of their new tablet multi-function device rumored for the near future. Free games, cheap e-books & e-mags, subsidized & limited 'net access...all for the price of some horrible flash ads that make you want to put your fist through the screen. Makes the Sony Reader look even better.
My first thought when I read this was 4chan:
"Hay guize, I found the passwordz to grammas heart. RAEDZ!"
Yes! Epic fail: I f'd up three names with one reference! +3 internets for me. (crawls back into cave)
This is funny: go back and look at the picture, and imagine it as a Don Berg fold-up from the last page of Mad Magazine. It totally works.
Hideously disproportionate. Lauren's response was a pumpkin on a fencepost. Jack Skellington after lent. Comet Hyatuke.
A mushroom-shaped tantrum, one may say.
...and furthermore, I would add that it's not just systems-folk who will bail out of frustration. I work for a company--large bank, actually--that by stated policy buys the lowest-end desktop/laptop hardware possible, with the understanding that it is cheaper to fix or replace 8,000 defective units a year than to buy 100,000 quality units a year.
What they don't take into consideration (with many, many similar non-tech decisions as well, but that's a different thread) is that it pounds on the morale of users to have to wait 1/2 hour to boot, spend 5 minutes to send an email because Outlook is choking while trying to talk to the directory server, or spend three hours a month on the phone with someone in India who is reading troubleshooting tips off of a website and has to escalate everything above a password reset to L2.
There was a time when bankers were sought-after (and, in some categories, still are); hating their computer, the thing that they spent more time with than their spouse or children most days, would give them one more reason to not stick around.
One could, in theory, trade the common problems of finding time for family, paying bills, etc, with the more deeply moral problem created by the slight tinge of guilt produced when issuing commands into a homemade computer system made of hundreds of thousands of humans holding signs that read 0 on one side and 1 on the other, all feeding information into an 8 bit display made of even more people standing on the field of a football stadium holding giant multi-colored dice.
And I will call this meat-computer Tim
It's the SCO business model...if you can't make money selling products, your lawyers can become a replacement sales force.
To extend your analogy (and because I have karma to burn): give it six more years, and the last remnants of the tall tent pole music distribution model will be found hanging in a closet in Bangkok.
Close. It's a big happy circle:
Organic garden attracts hippies. Hippies smoke pot. Pot is a gateway drug, leading to heroin and cocaine, which are manufactured and distributed by terrorists. Increased terrorist activity leads to more convervatives in office, which then creates a groundswell of liberals to counter them every 4 years or so. Liberals, of course, only eat organic garlic.
And all is well with the world.