I pretty much only watch sports with my family. However, probably the most offensive advertising out there is attached to sports broadcasts. I never thought it would be a problem until I was at my sister's house and her four-year-old asked, "Mom, what's an erection?"
It turns out that she had learned that word from one of the Viagra-type commercials that warned, "Erections lasting more than 4 hours require a physician," or something like that.
Especially paid overtime -- who gets that? Anyone?
When I was a co-op at IBM my first- and second-level managers got in an arguement over whose project needed me more, so I proposed to work through the weekend and on the following Monday - Memorial Day -, which was a scheduled complete plant shutdown day.
They both thought it was a great idea, if I didn't mind. I wasn't married at the time, but I did have to cancel a date, no worries. I got time and a half for the overtime for the weekend, and double time for the Memorial Day work (10 hours of it). And I did finish my piece of both projects.
However, now that I'm graduated, married, 1.5 kids, my wife would have my head for proposing such a "solution". So, for me, even if I could command that kind of dough for extra hours of work, I couldn't do it. Ergo, any job that requires that kind of hours, with or without the extra pay, is not an option.
Actually this story seems to disprove that urban legend.
http://www.eonline.com/News/Items/0,1,9847,00.ht ml
It seems that Pixar resigned a contract after Monster's Inc, for 3 more pictures.
More articles explain that talks broke down in January becuase Pixar wanted the new contract to cover the Incredibles and Cars, effectively altering the contract Pixar signed in 2001.
Much of the American system - a Republic BTW - deals with insulating the government from the whims of the people. The (hot) House is elected every 2 years and has the least amount of power. The Senate is directly elected as well, but only every 6 years. The president, who has more power than any senator or congressman, is elected by electors, given to states proportional to their population, every four years. States decide how their electors are selected.
Saying that the electoral college is obsolete is like saying we should put the SC judges up for re-election every so often.
'k I work at a Uni too, but we get free 2003 server packs. Guess what? We only use them for a Windows Domain Controller. all our databases, webservers, file servers, backups, etc. are all Linux.
We use Debian where possible, but, for hardware issues, we've had to use RedHat on three boxen. Never had a dependency issue. Never.
The 2003 Server runs faily well - still requires reboot on a lot of updates - but the Linux systems are almost never rebooted (6-month avg. uptime).
With recent virius attacks and service packs, the guy in my office whose only job is to admin the windows server and the workstations has had his hands full. I've been kicking back reading/. and spending my time learning new stuff.
Oh, and I didn't know Linux when I first set up this lab a few years back. So, my advice: Spend the hour it'll take to learn enough about Linux, set up Debian stable, crontab apt-get, and spend your time learning new stuff.
I attended an instructional technology conference last month where a doctoral student presented her research into Never Winter Nights. A brief discussion followed where several "former gamers" commented, I being one of them.
When the session was over, one of the other recovering gamers approached me and told me going cold turkey was really difficult. He then asked me how I quit. The only answer I could give him was, "I got married."
Or you could just be happy with what you've got. I live in "poverty", but I'm happy. I think the constition says something about searching for happiness.
One might think that we're stuck with these laws because right and wrong doesn't change with time or technology, right? Wrong.
I attended a speech last week by Larry Lessig and he brought up the Causbey case from the 1940s. Back then "property" extended from the Earth to the Heavens, so if your neighbor's fruit tree had a branch that hung over your property, you could either cut it off, or pick the fruit.
This started to be a gray area with commercial flights. A group of farmers in North Carolina brought suit against some pilots for trespassing by flying over their property. The case made its way to the Supreme Court who ruled that "common sense revolts" at the idea that an airplane flying over your property was trespassing.
Well, common sense also revolts at, as Lessig put it, the "insanity" of copyright and other IP law. The only difference is that the people protecting IP law are a lot better organized and funded than the farmers from North Carolina.
Until people stop voting for the 2-party duopoly and stop rewarding the lies, this mess will continue.
Amen. The problem with partisan politics is that you must accept one platform or another. You vote for a party, and therefore, everything that party stands for - whether or not you agree with it all.
When the framers of the constitution met, they represented their states, not national parties. Now, our senators represent the needs of their parties instead of their constituents.
Bush's current plan means that teachers teach tests instead of lessons
And if the tests represent what the students should know, this is bad how?
The far more insidious part of the No Child Left Behind Act is that it requires all children to be at or above grade level.... Uh, grade level is an average. The only way for EVERYONE to be AT OR ABOVE THE AVERAGE is for everyone to be EQUAL.
Also, don't forget that a Linux-based HAM radio group has already figured out how to record the HDTV broadcast signal. So, instead of recording the video after it has come through the receiver, it just records the signal to a hard drive. When it comes time to play the video back, the computer "broadcasts" the signal back to the TV. The broadcast flag is still there, and the TV obeys all restrictions associated with it.
Well, I posted the email I sent to Hatch here. This was the 3rd time I've contacted him, and the other twimes, he (or whoever answers his mail) always personalized the response, addressing specific concerns and questions I had. This time, it seems to be nothing more than a form letter. Enjoy!
----Begin Letter----
Thank you for contacting me to express your concerns about the Inducing Infringement of Copyrights Act of 2004 (S. 2560). I appreciate your comments and apologize for the delay in my response.
The media have widely broadcast misconceptions about the intent and purpose of this bill, spreading concerns that S 2560 would outlaw Google, eBay, iPods, VCRs, TiVos, computers, CD burners, recordable DVDs, and a litany of other multi-use devices and Internet service providers. Let me be clear: This legislation was not designed to have any effect on these or future technological innovations, and I will work to ensure the final bill that is considered by Congress meets those criteria.
S. 2560 has one goal - to crack down on those whose intended purpose and sole business model is to induce children, teenagers, and others to illegally download copyrighted music and movies for free. Without the illegal copying, these filesharing companies would be out of business, yet they amass huge profits while their customers are being forced to pay thousands of dollars in damages to the copyright owners. This bill is merely an attempt to close the safe-harbor loophole that these companies are using to knowingly lure their victims into this illegal activity and make them face legal liability for their actions.
From the beginning, I have worked with the technology industries to craft S. 2560 so it targets only a small group of bad actors without affecting legitimate technology interests, and I will continue to work with them to ensure that we find the best way to achieve this goal. I certainly welcome any proposed improvements or alternatives to the approach taken in @. 2560.
Again, thank you fro writing.
Sincerely, [Sig] Orrin G. Hatch United States Senator
Some say that online life is a mask people can wear to be someone else. I'm more inclined to believe it's a magnifying glass which can amplify the worst qualities in someone.
Read Lord of the Flies, and you'll see how a mask does both.
When Start Wars Galaxies came out, many people worried that everyone would want to be a Jedi, because, by far, they are the coolest, most powerful individuals in that universe.
I think Middle Earth offers a better balance of civilizations. If I were a gamer, I'd wouldn't even mind being an orc.
I worked the VIP side of a hockey rink for the 2002 winter olympics. Somehow, Sen. Dodds (Vermont, I think), snuck his uncleared father-in-law into the VIP seats. When they got up to go get something from the VIP tent, one of my volunteers told Dodds that his father did not have the proper clearance, and that if he left the stands, he would not be able to pass the checkpoint to get back in. Dodds' response:
"But I'm Senator Dodds."
I was watching the whole thing and about to get involved (which I rarely did), when the volunteer said, "That's nice, but he still doesn't have the proper clearance."
Hell reported unusually warm weather patterns emerging from the Upper North-West (aka Lindon Utah)
Actually, this is very interesting. See, I live in Utah, and it's been one of the coldest summers on record. In fact, Salt Lake City hasn't hit 100 degrees F this summer.... Strange coincidence?
Did anyone else notice that they show the thing spinning in the employees hand, but then cut to a shot of it apparently flying? I don't know, but the blue screen background and the girls there just to watch it fly around makes me question its reality.
I once asked an IT guy at my uni why we do all things MS. He said that they had considered going OSS, but that the cost of training and migration was too high.
I was in France when the Spain held the elections. The terror plot worked (turned the elections), but not in the way the terrorists had planned.
I listened fully to the coverage on BBC Radio and France Info, and I found that it was the media, not the government who suggested ETA (Basque) links. The government higher-ups stayed quiet while the pundits decryed ETA's tactics. Of course, it doesn't take a terrorist expert to realize that ETA always claims responsibility, and did not in this case.
Also, my firend in Syria told me that at that time (while the investigation was unpublished), the Arab media was pointing their fingers saying, "See, it's not always Islamic extremists..."
When the report was finally published, the opposition was *very* quick to accuse the government of hiding the Al Qaeda ties, thus deceiving the people concerning the risks of participating in Iraq. Without time to properly challenge the accusation, the people voted the opposition into office.
Now, if the government had meant to blame ETA to keep the heat off them concerning Iraq, why did they release the info a couple of days before the elections? They could have kept it hidden for another day or two, no? Also, as I said before, the media was largely responsible for the accusation of ETA, and then for the accustation that the government had tried to keep the truth form the public.
In the end, the terroists succeeded, but only through the media and the oppositon party. I think this is a small-scale preview of what could happen in the US.
Large, competitive media, more concerned about ratings/profits than truth? Check. Partisian warfare? Check.
What is truely scarry is that someone could be so politically spiteful of another party that they would help people inciting violence acheive their goals, if it hurt the other party.
The more time goes by, the less I like partisian politics.
...although there are many who oppose such approaches to college education.
I do not approach such an approach. I oppose such institution being called "Universities". If you're getting two certs, AND a CS degree, where's the Humanities, History, PE, and other pieces of a well-rounded, universal education?
OT: Some people do not like general education, and that's fine. Go to a two-year (like this one), or another vocational training program. Unfortunately, administrators, wanting to attract these people are "modernizing" university education, and cheapening it at the same time.
Slashdot Mirror
I pretty much only watch sports with my family. However, probably the most offensive advertising out there is attached to sports broadcasts. I never thought it would be a problem until I was at my sister's house and her four-year-old asked, "Mom, what's an erection?"
It turns out that she had learned that word from one of the Viagra-type commercials that warned, "Erections lasting more than 4 hours require a physician," or something like that.
Especially paid overtime -- who gets that? Anyone?
When I was a co-op at IBM my first- and second-level managers got in an arguement over whose project needed me more, so I proposed to work through the weekend and on the following Monday - Memorial Day -, which was a scheduled complete plant shutdown day.
They both thought it was a great idea, if I didn't mind. I wasn't married at the time, but I did have to cancel a date, no worries. I got time and a half for the overtime for the weekend, and double time for the Memorial Day work (10 hours of it). And I did finish my piece of both projects.
However, now that I'm graduated, married, 1.5 kids, my wife would have my head for proposing such a "solution". So, for me, even if I could command that kind of dough for extra hours of work, I couldn't do it. Ergo, any job that requires that kind of hours, with or without the extra pay, is not an option.
Actually this story seems to disprove that urban legend.
t ml
http://www.eonline.com/News/Items/0,1,9847,00.h
It seems that Pixar resigned a contract after Monster's Inc, for 3 more pictures.
More articles explain that talks broke down in January becuase Pixar wanted the new contract to cover the Incredibles and Cars, effectively altering the contract Pixar signed in 2001.
I'd happily get refuted though.
Much of the American system - a Republic BTW - deals with insulating the government from the whims of the people. The (hot) House is elected every 2 years and has the least amount of power. The Senate is directly elected as well, but only every 6 years. The president, who has more power than any senator or congressman, is elected by electors, given to states proportional to their population, every four years. States decide how their electors are selected.
Saying that the electoral college is obsolete is like saying we should put the SC judges up for re-election every so often.
Notice that talking-heads never specify a 95% confidence? They could have an alpha of 0.2, and still have a margin of error of +/- 4%.
My Multiple Regressons textbook put it best when it said news polls are "often worse than worthless".
'k I work at a Uni too, but we get free 2003 server packs. Guess what? We only use them for a Windows Domain Controller. all our databases, webservers, file servers, backups, etc. are all Linux.
/. and spending my time learning new stuff.
We use Debian where possible, but, for hardware issues, we've had to use RedHat on three boxen. Never had a dependency issue. Never.
The 2003 Server runs faily well - still requires reboot on a lot of updates - but the Linux systems are almost never rebooted (6-month avg. uptime).
With recent virius attacks and service packs, the guy in my office whose only job is to admin the windows server and the workstations has had his hands full. I've been kicking back reading
Oh, and I didn't know Linux when I first set up this lab a few years back. So, my advice: Spend the hour it'll take to learn enough about Linux, set up Debian stable, crontab apt-get, and spend your time learning new stuff.
I attended an instructional technology conference last month where a doctoral student presented her research into Never Winter Nights. A brief discussion followed where several "former gamers" commented, I being one of them.
When the session was over, one of the other recovering gamers approached me and told me going cold turkey was really difficult. He then asked me how I quit. The only answer I could give him was, "I got married."
Or you could just be happy with what you've got. I live in "poverty", but I'm happy. I think the constition says something about searching for happiness.
One might think that we're stuck with these laws because right and wrong doesn't change with time or technology, right? Wrong.
I attended a speech last week by Larry Lessig and he brought up the Causbey case from the 1940s. Back then "property" extended from the Earth to the Heavens, so if your neighbor's fruit tree had a branch that hung over your property, you could either cut it off, or pick the fruit.
This started to be a gray area with commercial flights. A group of farmers in North Carolina brought suit against some pilots for trespassing by flying over their property. The case made its way to the Supreme Court who ruled that "common sense revolts" at the idea that an airplane flying over your property was trespassing.
Well, common sense also revolts at, as Lessig put it, the "insanity" of copyright and other IP law. The only difference is that the people protecting IP law are a lot better organized and funded than the farmers from North Carolina.
Until people stop voting for the 2-party duopoly and stop rewarding the lies, this mess will continue.
Amen. The problem with partisan politics is that you must accept one platform or another. You vote for a party, and therefore, everything that party stands for - whether or not you agree with it all.
When the framers of the constitution met, they represented their states, not national parties. Now, our senators represent the needs of their parties instead of their constituents.
Bush's current plan means that teachers teach tests instead of lessons
And if the tests represent what the students should know, this is bad how?
The far more insidious part of the No Child Left Behind Act is that it requires all children to be at or above grade level.... Uh, grade level is an average. The only way for EVERYONE to be AT OR ABOVE THE AVERAGE is for everyone to be EQUAL.
Yeah, that makes sense.
Also, don't forget that a Linux-based HAM radio group has already figured out how to record the HDTV broadcast signal. So, instead of recording the video after it has come through the receiver, it just records the signal to a hard drive. When it comes time to play the video back, the computer "broadcasts" the signal back to the TV. The broadcast flag is still there, and the TV obeys all restrictions associated with it.
Well, I posted the email I sent to Hatch
here. This was the 3rd time I've contacted him, and the other twimes, he (or whoever answers his mail) always personalized the response, addressing specific concerns and questions I had. This time, it seems to be nothing more than a form letter. Enjoy!
----Begin Letter----
Thank you for contacting me to express your concerns about the Inducing Infringement of Copyrights Act of 2004 (S. 2560). I appreciate your comments and apologize for the delay in my response.
The media have widely broadcast misconceptions about the intent and purpose of this bill, spreading concerns that S 2560 would outlaw Google, eBay, iPods, VCRs, TiVos, computers, CD burners, recordable DVDs, and a litany of other multi-use devices and Internet service providers. Let me be clear: This legislation was not designed to have any effect on these or future technological innovations, and I will work to ensure the final bill that is considered by Congress meets those criteria.
S. 2560 has one goal - to crack down on those whose intended purpose and sole business model is to induce children, teenagers, and others to illegally download copyrighted music and movies for free. Without the illegal copying, these filesharing companies would be out of business, yet they amass huge profits while their customers are being forced to pay thousands of dollars in damages to the copyright owners. This bill is merely an attempt to close the safe-harbor loophole that these companies are using to knowingly lure their victims into this illegal activity and make them face legal liability for their actions.
From the beginning, I have worked with the technology industries to craft S. 2560 so it targets only a small group of bad actors without affecting legitimate technology interests, and I will continue to work with them to ensure that we find the best way to achieve this goal. I certainly welcome any proposed improvements or alternatives to the approach taken in @. 2560.
Again, thank you fro writing.
Sincerely,
[Sig]
Orrin G. Hatch
United States Senator
Some say that online life is a mask people can wear to be someone else. I'm more inclined to believe it's a magnifying glass which can amplify the worst qualities in someone.
Read Lord of the Flies, and you'll see how a mask does both.
When Start Wars Galaxies came out, many people worried that everyone would want to be a Jedi, because, by far, they are the coolest, most powerful individuals in that universe.
I think Middle Earth offers a better balance of civilizations. If I were a gamer, I'd wouldn't even mind being an orc.
I worked the VIP side of a hockey rink for the 2002 winter olympics. Somehow, Sen. Dodds (Vermont, I think), snuck his uncleared father-in-law into the VIP seats. When they got up to go get something from the VIP tent, one of my volunteers told Dodds that his father did not have the proper clearance, and that if he left the stands, he would not be able to pass the checkpoint to get back in. Dodds' response:
"But I'm Senator Dodds."
I was watching the whole thing and about to get involved (which I rarely did), when the volunteer said, "That's nice, but he still doesn't have the proper clearance."
I'm sure Sen. Kennedy's experience was similar.
Hell reported unusually warm weather patterns emerging from the Upper North-West (aka Lindon Utah)
Actually, this is very interesting. See, I live in Utah, and it's been one of the coldest summers on record. In fact, Salt Lake City hasn't hit 100 degrees F this summer.... Strange coincidence?
Did anyone else notice that they show the thing spinning in the employees hand, but then cut to a shot of it apparently flying? I don't know, but the blue screen background and the girls there just to watch it fly around makes me question its reality.
One of my favorite PHB lines (regarding why we use Lackboard):
"Blackboard may be expensive, but they're coming along."
I once asked an IT guy at my uni why we do all things MS. He said that they had considered going OSS, but that the cost of training and migration was too high.
Let's see... Migration/Training = non-reoccurring cost. Licensing = reoccurring cost.
So, which of the following is the cheaper choice?
a) A single cost divided by infinity.
b) A reoccurring cost multiplied by infinity.
I was in France when the Spain held the elections. The terror plot worked (turned the elections), but not in the way the terrorists had planned.
I listened fully to the coverage on BBC Radio and France Info, and I found that it was the media, not the government who suggested ETA (Basque) links. The government higher-ups stayed quiet while the pundits decryed ETA's tactics. Of course, it doesn't take a terrorist expert to realize that ETA always claims responsibility, and did not in this case.
Also, my firend in Syria told me that at that time (while the investigation was unpublished), the Arab media was pointing their fingers saying, "See, it's not always Islamic extremists..."
When the report was finally published, the opposition was *very* quick to accuse the government of hiding the Al Qaeda ties, thus deceiving the people concerning the risks of participating in Iraq. Without time to properly challenge the accusation, the people voted the opposition into office.
Now, if the government had meant to blame ETA to keep the heat off them concerning Iraq, why did they release the info a couple of days before the elections? They could have kept it hidden for another day or two, no? Also, as I said before, the media was largely responsible for the accusation of ETA, and then for the accustation that the government had tried to keep the truth form the public.
In the end, the terroists succeeded, but only through the media and the oppositon party. I think this is a small-scale preview of what could happen in the US.
Large, competitive media, more concerned about ratings/profits than truth? Check.
Partisian warfare? Check.
What is truely scarry is that someone could be so politically spiteful of another party that they would help people inciting violence acheive their goals, if it hurt the other party.
The more time goes by, the less I like partisian politics.
...although there are many who oppose such approaches to college education.
I do not approach such an approach. I oppose such institution being called "Universities". If you're getting two certs, AND a CS degree, where's the Humanities, History, PE, and other pieces of a well-rounded, universal education?
OT: Some people do not like general education, and that's fine. Go to a two-year (like this one), or another vocational training program. Unfortunately, administrators, wanting to attract these people are "modernizing" university education, and cheapening it at the same time.
St. Expuery forsaw this, in satire. The best quotes:
p ter13.html
"How is it possible for one to own the stars?"
"To whom do they belong?" the businessman retorted, peevishly.
"I don't know. To nobody."
"Then they belong to me, because I was the first person to think of it."
=====
Full text of the chapter: http://www.angelfire.com/hi/littleprince/framecha
The patriotic one. You know, the one with the good hair.
I don't remember who said this: The difference between a patriot and a traitor is success.
I have an X20... Did you burn your legs? When mine runs for more than five minutes, it gets very hot. Just wondering.