But help is on the way. In September, the Association of American Universities announced a five-year initiative to encourage faculty members in the STEM fields to use more interactive teaching techniques
The problem is not a delivery problem at the college level, but insufficient schooling from elementary to HS. You don't see this kind of drop out rates in Germany or Japan, do you? We should be copying what they do right (their pre-university education system) as opposed to putting interactive media lipstick on a pig.
You make a good point about layers, but in practice, macro abuse seems worse. Macros also make it hard to have good development tools (like Smalltalk has) because the syntax of the language can change so much through macros (at least for something like C).
#include
#define System S s;s
#define public
#define static
#define void int
#define main(x) main()
struct F{void println(char* s){std::cout s std::endl;}};
struct S{F out;};
public static void main(String[] args) {
System.out.println("Hello World!");
}
That just seems like a very different thing than the fact that when I change a class it may affect how other classes behave -- even though, it's true, there is some abstract logical equivalence.
I'm sorry but that begs the question: why do it? This is a complete violation of everything we have learned about good software development for the last 3-4 decades. More than that, it defies common sense. And that lack of common sense is not in any way related to the power of macro systems, or the nature of macro systems in general.
Indeed macro abuse is more prevalent, but that still sits squarely on the developer's fault, not on the macro system. They are more prevalent because they are easier to abuse, but so are pointers. Or object systems. Or meta-programming. And that can still be said with any other powerful mechanism of any type.
I see like this: Here is a powerful tool. Use intelligently. You screw yourself up with it, or screw somebody else up, it's on you, not the tool.
Also, I don't necessarily agree that macros makes it hard to get good development tools. Maybe harder relative to a system without macros, but not necessarily hard. Take a look at Eclipse CDT. That's what I'm using for C/C++ development, and it can tell me right away how a macro application is going to expand, or where a macro is invalid (that it cannot expand into something that can compile.)
Just as there have been people who have fucked it up with macros, there have been people who have done good work with extensive macro usage. With the vast body of knowledge we have accumulated in the last couple of decades on how to build software, we can't assign blame to the tool, not even partial blame.
We are not in the early 70's when people were discovering these stuff, using them without a body of knowledge for guidance. There is no excuse anymore to do stupid things like that, and we can't simply ignore a tool if the tool is right for the job simply because a horde of morons shoot themselves in the foot with it.
The problem with languages with macros is that unlike, say, Smalltalk, you generally never know when macros might apply when and so change the meaning of what you are looking at unless you understand the *entire* program...
That seems to be more a problem of encapsulation, coupling and cohesion than anything else. Seriously, if a change in a macro is such that you do not know how it will affect a system, then either this is a macro version of a god object (does too much, or does something incoherently); or there is an abstraction leakage in the macro (the macro purposes, regardless of size, is not discrete); or the macro is poorly documented and people are using it wrong because of it.
What you described is exactly the same that happens if you make a change to the implementation of a class or component or procedure where the aforementioned artifact exhibits the same problems in encapsulation, coupling and/or cohesion. Don't delude yourself into thinking that this is an innate problem unique to macro systems.
People can shit-code crap that exhibits side-effects when subjected to supposedly internal changes. You gotta know your tools, but most importantly, you got to know how to code and design software.
Two months ago the same professor linked internet use with the rise in autism diagnoses (not for the first time)
I have two small nephews, one 9 and one 8. Both exhibited strong autism and ADHD from a very early age (before they reached the age of 3). Both underwent a lot of therapy and the older one is functioning normally (being a very active, honors kid). The younger one, unfortunately, is still battling with autism, and sometimes has to rely on medications to be able to focus and participate in the class room.
Both extremely intelligent boys, strong in math and music and until recently training in TKD. But one, the younger, still suffering with the toll of autism. Now, this is the thing, a question to the Baroness. If she claims that there has been an increase in autism due to an increase in internet usage in these two cases. Both exhibited autism before reaching 3, and their parents (all college graduates in STEM fields), rarely use the internet (to even a Luddite point of view). The kids barely have access to the internet now, certainly they didn't when they were toddlers, at the onset of their autism?
An explanation that these two kids are outliers would feel like a cop-out... and yes, my question is purely rhetorical. The Baroness is just talking shit.
what people complain about Eclipse? Bloated, slow? Depends on how you configure it, and (in particular in this time and age of the mighty google) ( would expect any self-proclaimed geek or for-a-living-geek to know how to configure it no time. I've used it at work, for a living, for both Java and C/C++, on both Linux and Windows, and it certainly suits development needs quite well. On top of that, you have an entire eco-system for building things. Eclipse RCP and MTD come to mind. People use them successfully for building non-trivial stuff for a living, so I will never understand what the constant bitching about Eclipse is all about.
You're in the minority. Most developers prefer Swing since SWT kinda sucks.
Citations please? Most non-trivial GUI application I've seen written in Java for the last couple of years have been based on Eclipse RPC (or lately an RPC app sporting some type of high level DSL via Eclipse MDT.) Let's make a tally of all non-trivial, commercial or open source Java-based applications that sport a thick GUI and see how many use Swing and how many use SWT (either directly or via Eclipse RCP).
I mean, Eclipse already comes with a framework to readily create GUIs based on SWT. I know, Netbeans also provides the same for Swing. But there is an entire ecosystem to build non-trivial things in Eclipse that is completely absent anywhere else.
Beyond that point, maybe I'm in the minority group (assuming your claim about "most developers" is true.) No sir, no how that I would ever program in Swing again, or choose Swing over SWT, for new development. I'll do it if I get paid right, or I'm assigned to a project that depends on it. I can tell you that I wouldn't be titillating with excitement, though.
Swing is the one thing that got completely fucked up in Java. The fact that SWT does not implement MVC as in Swing, that is a blessing. I mean, c'mon!!!! Swing took the entire MVC pattern overboard for everything down to the simplest things. The thing is completely bizarre, and I cannot think how people can work with it and *love* it. It is a prime example of "abstraction leakage" combined with "pattern fetish, zoophilia and S&M" IMO.
The FBI will not come to one's house; rape and kill one's wife, girlfriend, mother, daughters, and/or sisters while making one watch; and then torture one to death, cut off one's head and leave it in one's lap for the police.
No instead they will come to one's house; rape and kill one's wife, girlfriend, mother, daughters, and/or sisters while making one watch; and then torture one to death, Then frame you for the rape and killing of your family and have the world think you committed suicide over your horrible crime.
For what its worth thy ask for zip codes to do avs verification. Signatures aren't very good proof either, I mean when was the last time anyone checked yours?
Zip codes are a shitty way to do avs verification. Personalized PIN codes, thought not un-shitty themselves, are less shitty than zip codes (ergo better.)
You have to physically swipe the card at Redbox kiosks. So how would "somebody" use the card but you not report it stolen?
I could see how the credit card company would leave you on the hook even if the card was stolen because there's no way to PROVE you don't have the items, the charge is recurring, and the total is just under the $50 liability limit so it's not their problem.
Fake readers. Despite their appearances in sci-fi movies like Terminator 2, they do actually exist. One would think/. posters would know about these things.
That makes no sense. If it was card fraud he should have reported it as such, and the credit card company wouldn't have had a chat with the rental company, they would have reimbursed the amount of the fraud. I agree with GP, it sounds like the guy was at fault and just didn't want to pay up, or he let a friend use his card and the friend lost the disks or maybe he tried to claim it was fraud but Redbox could show a pattern of the guy renting two DVDs every two weeks for the last six months which made it highly unlikely that the very last rental was a fraud and the CC company agreed (my money is on that explanation).
Well, he kinda tried and got the cold shoulder. I inferred that much from reading his post (which I think that's was the idea, to read it.)
Also, don't assume too much who is at fault. You are making a lot of assumptions, but in reality you don't know anything about the case. It could go either way independently of how you imagine the facts to have taken place.
Crap happens. Once I got charged a PPV by Blockbusters, specifically a boxing match with Mayweather (or whatever his name is). I certainly didn't order it since I don't watch boxing (I did order UFC PPV events at the time.) But I specifically know that I didn't order that PPV because I simply don't watch boxing and it was at a time that I just came back to the country, extremely jet-lagged (but with a shitload of work to do regardless). Boxing isn't my interest, specifically when I'm overworked and jet-lagged.
Regardless, Comcast customer service claimed that they had evidence that the order was made from the setbox in my living room. I suggested that fraud/wiretapping of some type occurred, but that didn't go anywhere. I was too tired to continue fighting, and I simply let the payment take place. And I didn't cancel Comcast because I had (and still do) my internet and phone services with them (and I need those to do work.)
Fighting it out and make a fraud report (and fight for it) sometimes is simply not worth it. Let the $50-something to get lost and get back to shit that is more important (and more expensive) at that particular time. Time passes, and then it's months, years and you do not get an incident like that (maybe never again.)
Could something like that happened to the AC with his usage of redbox? Maybe, maybe not, maybe he's lying, maybe he's confused, or maybe he's telling the truth. But I would not imagine it impossible or even unlikely (as something similar happened to me as I just described.) Don't assume online sales/rental/payment systems are infallible, they are not (I've worked on them.) Put on top of that a layer of customer service, typically populated by people who don't give a shit or who think they are at a career dead-end and display it in their behavior, and strange things happen.
On another note, I've been using RedBox for a while, mostly to rent Disney movies for my toddler. Cannot complain about the service itself, and I like the idea of paying per day (and keeping the dvd after paying something close to retail after x number of days... not that I would do that.) I'd be pretty pissed, though, if something like what the AC described were to happen to me.
Turn the Gulf war around and you have China vs. US. Yes, the US has more experience, but China simply tosses more material behind it. Old joke: US vs. China war. First week, a million Chinese war prisoners. Second week, two million Chinese war prisoners. Third week, three million Chinese war prisoners. Fourth week, telegram from Beijing to Washington: "Now what, do you surrender or do we have to continue?"
Do you really believe that tripe, or are you just joking?
Jobs solved the innovation dilemma by having a lot of engineers circled around him.
Which itself was a master stroke that made him an outlier (a positive one when it comes to profit) above the average management crop. And if we look deeper, we see him (after he was re-appointed CEO) taking Apple (which was a few weeks short of bankruptcy) and turned it in a way that it is hard to replicate in the business world. That takes more than just having a lot of engineers circling around him.
I think he was an asshole, but you cannot deny the brilliance and determination the motherfucker emanated (or farted, whichever verb appeals to you the most.)
If you use and like the amenities that become possible with technology, then calling technology a "job terminator" is at best hypocrisy.
What a major fail in logic you have displayed there pal. What sort of logic system or formal model do you use where liking the amenities of technology is mutually exclusive/contradictory to calling such things a job terminator?
Seriously, what major brain fart. I like the amenities provided by technology. That doesn't prevent me from pointing out what is f* obvious, that automation in its current form has lead to a certain number of people not being employed (and not being able to find employment) anymore. Where is the contradiction?
More importantly, where is the hypocrisy? Oh wait, you are commingling ethics (and a twisted form of ethics at that) with inference. Kudos for you, here have a cookie for winning the "dumbass logic" competition.
Too many people go for a 4-year degree, and far too many companies require such a degree for jobs that, in truth, only require a AA/AS degree.
There are two problems here. And we're attempting to blame the victims here in an effort to conceal the growing uncomfortable truth.
Errr, no. Indicating that too many people are going for a 4-year degree is not blaming the victims. It is indicating that we have a fundamental problem in education and society - there are simply no alternatives between a HS and a 4-year degree. And that is simply a false dichotomy (just look at the German model for a counterexample.)
We don't need a lot of people anymore...period.
The job market is getting more and more competitive because we're needing less and less workers.
This is a partial truth. We do not need a lot of people anymore... in manufacturing (in particular, in the type of manufacturing jobs that have gone over seas). We still need an answer for employ ability for the masses. Expecting a 4-year college education to be a baseline is not reasonable. Instead, it is an example that we are living in an educational speculative bubble.
It used to be that you had a balance between market forces on supply of labor and demand for labor. No more. We now have an oversupply of labor. As a result a Burger King is getting closer and closer to a point where they can pick up over-skilled workers at rock bottom prices. At that point you'll still need a college degree for menial labor... why? Because someone else applying will have a college degree.
That would pretty much prove then that we have too many people going for a 4-year college degree. That businesses demand it, or that people flock to them as their last hope to get a job (any job) simply proves that indeed, too many people are going for them. We should see enough people going for these degrees only if an economy can justifiably absorb them. Anything else, regardless of the cause, is an indication of too many people going for them. Period.
The other problem is that an AA or AS only is usually only useful for a specific job. What happens when that job goes away? Then we're back to again blaming the victims for not preparing for a rapidly changing workforce by over-educating up front to avoid being laid off down the road.
I'm *way* over-educated for my job. But I'm adequately educated to be employable in 4-5 different areas so should my current job go belly up I could quickly move into another employable field. If we encourage exclusively trade school then we need to also recognzie that these people will unemployed more frequently and require further education down the road as a rapidly changing job market eliminates their existing trainable skill.
If you can learn it in an AA... it's probably ripe for automation.
I'm not sure what kind of AA/AS you are thinking off. There are AS in nursing, culinary sciences, paralegal/criminal justice, firefighter/paramedic/first respondent, aviation, HVAC, mechanics and mortuary sciences. And a AA degree with a focus on CS or IT gives you all you need for most jobs in IT. Are you telling me that these are ripe for automation? That their jobs are going to go away, and the graduates of these degrees will be like WTF?
Let's look even closer to the disciple most of us in this board work on. Software. I started my programming career with a AA, not even a AS, but a AA. And back in that time, a AA would suffice to get an job in IT/Enterprise computing (eventually I got my BS CS, went to grad school also in CS, and I'm now pursuing a more hardware oriented graduate degree.) It is no exaggeration that my peers from community college and I were typically coding circles around most juniors in a 4-year degree. Sans coverage on formal theory or operating systems, we typically had all the tools required to do a good job.
Speaking as a successful software developer who needed student loans to attend college. Bullshit. Student loans SUCK, but they are the only thing that allows a large number of low to middle income people get into the career they want and need.
There are alternatives to student loans:
Ron Pauls solution: only the wealthy may attend college. Tuitions will skyrocket even farther because there are so few new students. Hundreds of universities are forced to close their doors and all we are left with are a lot of trade schools and the Ivy Leagues.
Something rational: Recognize that state universities are state universities and have no profit obligation and should not be run like corporations. Cut administrative costs (tuition increases go almost 100% to higher administrative wages and more administrative positions instead of to professors and facilities) and offer low or free tuition subsidized by the state.
^^^ This. This a million times.
I find Ron Paul's position akin to an bone-headed, no-hold-barred adherence to an extremist interpretation of laissez faire capitalism and libertarianism, everything else be damned. This is just the libertarian doppelgänger of the tragically known Maoist great leap forward. I do subscribe (to a point) with libertarianism, but this is just insane!
Ok, we cut federal student loans. Great. Does that immediately solve the problems of high cost of education? No. Will it solve it? Maybe... if you are willing to believe federal intervention is the primary culprit of the rising cost of education (it is not.) We need a serious reform in education. Too many people go for a 4-year degree, and far too many companies require such a degree for jobs that, in truth, only require a AA/AS degree.
But a true reform requires support for vocational school at the HS and post-HS level (as done in the German and Japanese models of education), providing for true and diversified alternatives (at the county community college level) other than a 4-year degree. Cutting federal student loans simply does not resolve the root cause, and will cause people to pursue any form of education, independently of whether they are qualified or not.
It's not fucking rocket science to come up with something rational. But nooooooooooooooooooooooo, we have to go ZOMG! berserkers all the way to the fringe extreme of an ideological kaleidoscope. What Ron Paul is suggested is akin to having a headache, and instead of looking at the root causes, he's suggesting a lobotomy.
Ron Paul has completely jumped the shark on this one. He has foregone all reasonable explanations and solutions to the rising cost of education by pushing an extremist, radical and harmful action as a solution solely for ideological reasons.
$6/hour? They should work for free and be lucky they get food! Now get to work, slave!
Or, bring the cost of living down. I know, it's rhetorical. But consider that the primary reason our salaries are high is because of our cost of living. Whether it is possible to reduce the cost of living, that is an open question. But if it were to happen, hypothetical as it might be, we would be more competitive. Furthermore, lower cost of living does not necessarily imply lowered quality of living.
what the fuck are you talking about. "small backwater"? eat shit.
Easy tiger. If you cherish an academic discipline so much, one would imagine that you could bring your point across in a more articulated manner. I hardly believe an academic discipline needs (or appreciate) 3-grade retorts, specially if it is an academic discipline that started as a branch of Mathematics, and in which Mathematical Logic plays an important role.
He does have a point in that CS is a very small discipline in terms of its body of knowledge (in relation to other STEM fields). CS by itself is just short of 4 decades old, and the study of computability barely a century old. This opposite with the other engineering and science fields that have hundreds of years, on top of millenia of study and practice.
Don't confuse the pervasiveness of computing in modern life with the pervasiveness of Computer Science proper among the other STEM fields.
I do disagree with him, however, on his assessment that this is or might not be earth-shattering. For one, the fact that is occurring at all is earth shattering. And secondly, most earth-shattering events in science and academia do not start with a bang out of nothing (instead, they start from seed events and findings that gain momentum over time.)
Furthermore, even if CS is small fish when it comes to academic research, the institutions (both academic and private) that are pushing for this aren't small fish themselves. There is enough muscle there to bend arms.
A lot of market research is put into product names because people do care about what things are called. Sometimes it is to help with product recognition (e.g. Apple adding an 'i' to the start of their product name) and sometimes because consumers will find certain names unmemorable, confusing, or even offensive (e.g. a lot of tech products).
One would assume that said market research would do some legal research collaboration with their patent lawyers through said research and certainly before announcing said product names. I dunno, just saying...
If you've got a good degree move abroad and start afresh.
That's one hell of a one-way move if you ask me. One might as well renounce his citizenship (and I can only imagine another country granting citizenship for someone running away from state-owned debt.)
I mean, Jesus, student loans can never be defaulted, but they are open to renegotiation in terms of interest, monthly payments or grace periods. God knows how many times when I was unemployed during the dot-com era (or during financial duress), I simply picked up the phone and ask for a grace period. I always got one (typically 6 months or a year.)
You better have tried everything before choosing eternal, self-imposed exile.
Slashdot Mirror
But help is on the way. In September, the Association of American Universities announced a five-year initiative to encourage faculty members in the STEM fields to use more interactive teaching techniques
The problem is not a delivery problem at the college level, but insufficient schooling from elementary to HS. You don't see this kind of drop out rates in Germany or Japan, do you? We should be copying what they do right (their pre-university education system) as opposed to putting interactive media lipstick on a pig.
You make a good point about layers, but in practice, macro abuse seems worse. Macros also make it hard to have good development tools (like Smalltalk has) because the syntax of the language can change so much through macros (at least for something like C).
An example just to show you what textual macros can do from: http://stackoverflow.com/questions/652788/what-is-the-worst-real-world-macros-pre-processor-abuse-youve-ever-come-across
#include #define System S s;s #define public #define static #define void int #define main(x) main() struct F{void println(char* s){std::cout s std::endl;}}; struct S{F out;};
public static void main(String[] args) { System.out.println("Hello World!"); }
That just seems like a very different thing than the fact that when I change a class it may affect how other classes behave -- even though, it's true, there is some abstract logical equivalence.
I'm sorry but that begs the question: why do it? This is a complete violation of everything we have learned about good software development for the last 3-4 decades. More than that, it defies common sense. And that lack of common sense is not in any way related to the power of macro systems, or the nature of macro systems in general.
Indeed macro abuse is more prevalent, but that still sits squarely on the developer's fault, not on the macro system. They are more prevalent because they are easier to abuse, but so are pointers. Or object systems. Or meta-programming. And that can still be said with any other powerful mechanism of any type.
I see like this: Here is a powerful tool. Use intelligently. You screw yourself up with it, or screw somebody else up, it's on you, not the tool.
Also, I don't necessarily agree that macros makes it hard to get good development tools. Maybe harder relative to a system without macros, but not necessarily hard. Take a look at Eclipse CDT. That's what I'm using for C/C++ development, and it can tell me right away how a macro application is going to expand, or where a macro is invalid (that it cannot expand into something that can compile.)
Just as there have been people who have fucked it up with macros, there have been people who have done good work with extensive macro usage. With the vast body of knowledge we have accumulated in the last couple of decades on how to build software, we can't assign blame to the tool, not even partial blame.
We are not in the early 70's when people were discovering these stuff, using them without a body of knowledge for guidance. There is no excuse anymore to do stupid things like that, and we can't simply ignore a tool if the tool is right for the job simply because a horde of morons shoot themselves in the foot with it.
She completed a full research on the topic in less than 2 months. It must have been a proper and thorough.
She's a Baroness dude. She's awesome.
The problem with languages with macros is that unlike, say, Smalltalk, you generally never know when macros might apply when and so change the meaning of what you are looking at unless you understand the *entire* program...
That seems to be more a problem of encapsulation, coupling and cohesion than anything else. Seriously, if a change in a macro is such that you do not know how it will affect a system, then either this is a macro version of a god object (does too much, or does something incoherently); or there is an abstraction leakage in the macro (the macro purposes, regardless of size, is not discrete); or the macro is poorly documented and people are using it wrong because of it.
What you described is exactly the same that happens if you make a change to the implementation of a class or component or procedure where the aforementioned artifact exhibits the same problems in encapsulation, coupling and/or cohesion. Don't delude yourself into thinking that this is an innate problem unique to macro systems.
People can shit-code crap that exhibits side-effects when subjected to supposedly internal changes. You gotta know your tools, but most importantly, you got to know how to code and design software.
Two months ago the same professor linked internet use with the rise in autism diagnoses (not for the first time)
I have two small nephews, one 9 and one 8. Both exhibited strong autism and ADHD from a very early age (before they reached the age of 3). Both underwent a lot of therapy and the older one is functioning normally (being a very active, honors kid). The younger one, unfortunately, is still battling with autism, and sometimes has to rely on medications to be able to focus and participate in the class room.
Both extremely intelligent boys, strong in math and music and until recently training in TKD. But one, the younger, still suffering with the toll of autism. Now, this is the thing, a question to the Baroness. If she claims that there has been an increase in autism due to an increase in internet usage in these two cases. Both exhibited autism before reaching 3, and their parents (all college graduates in STEM fields), rarely use the internet (to even a Luddite point of view). The kids barely have access to the internet now, certainly they didn't when they were toddlers, at the onset of their autism?
An explanation that these two kids are outliers would feel like a cop-out... and yes, my question is purely rhetorical. The Baroness is just talking shit.
Is that it seems like it was designed by programmers and not in a good way.
This comment can mean anything, ergo, it means nothing.
what people complain about Eclipse? Bloated, slow? Depends on how you configure it, and (in particular in this time and age of the mighty google) ( would expect any self-proclaimed geek or for-a-living-geek to know how to configure it no time. I've used it at work, for a living, for both Java and C/C++, on both Linux and Windows, and it certainly suits development needs quite well. On top of that, you have an entire eco-system for building things. Eclipse RCP and MTD come to mind. People use them successfully for building non-trivial stuff for a living, so I will never understand what the constant bitching about Eclipse is all about.
You're in the minority. Most developers prefer Swing since SWT kinda sucks.
Citations please? Most non-trivial GUI application I've seen written in Java for the last couple of years have been based on Eclipse RPC (or lately an RPC app sporting some type of high level DSL via Eclipse MDT.) Let's make a tally of all non-trivial, commercial or open source Java-based applications that sport a thick GUI and see how many use Swing and how many use SWT (either directly or via Eclipse RCP).
I mean, Eclipse already comes with a framework to readily create GUIs based on SWT. I know, Netbeans also provides the same for Swing. But there is an entire ecosystem to build non-trivial things in Eclipse that is completely absent anywhere else.
Beyond that point, maybe I'm in the minority group (assuming your claim about "most developers" is true.) No sir, no how that I would ever program in Swing again, or choose Swing over SWT, for new development. I'll do it if I get paid right, or I'm assigned to a project that depends on it. I can tell you that I wouldn't be titillating with excitement, though.
Swing is the one thing that got completely fucked up in Java. The fact that SWT does not implement MVC as in Swing, that is a blessing. I mean, c'mon!!!! Swing took the entire MVC pattern overboard for everything down to the simplest things. The thing is completely bizarre, and I cannot think how people can work with it and *love* it. It is a prime example of "abstraction leakage" combined with "pattern fetish, zoophilia and S&M" IMO.
But allowing China's citizens to die for us is okay in your world?
Allow? It's as if you pretend we have the power of life and death over them, their government and society.
e-cojones ain't real.
The FBI will not come to one's house; rape and kill one's wife, girlfriend, mother, daughters, and/or sisters while making one watch; and then torture one to death, cut off one's head and leave it in one's lap for the police.
No instead they will come to one's house; rape and kill one's wife, girlfriend, mother, daughters, and/or sisters while making one watch; and then torture one to death, Then frame you for the rape and killing of your family and have the world think you committed suicide over your horrible crime.
Citations please.
For what its worth thy ask for zip codes to do avs verification. Signatures aren't very good proof either, I mean when was the last time anyone checked yours?
Zip codes are a shitty way to do avs verification. Personalized PIN codes, thought not un-shitty themselves, are less shitty than zip codes (ergo better.)
You have to physically swipe the card at Redbox kiosks. So how would "somebody" use the card but you not report it stolen?
I could see how the credit card company would leave you on the hook even if the card was stolen because there's no way to PROVE you don't have the items, the charge is recurring, and the total is just under the $50 liability limit so it's not their problem.
Fake readers. Despite their appearances in sci-fi movies like Terminator 2, they do actually exist. One would think /. posters would know about these things.
That makes no sense. If it was card fraud he should have reported it as such, and the credit card company wouldn't have had a chat with the rental company, they would have reimbursed the amount of the fraud. I agree with GP, it sounds like the guy was at fault and just didn't want to pay up, or he let a friend use his card and the friend lost the disks or maybe he tried to claim it was fraud but Redbox could show a pattern of the guy renting two DVDs every two weeks for the last six months which made it highly unlikely that the very last rental was a fraud and the CC company agreed (my money is on that explanation).
Well, he kinda tried and got the cold shoulder. I inferred that much from reading his post (which I think that's was the idea, to read it.)
Also, don't assume too much who is at fault. You are making a lot of assumptions, but in reality you don't know anything about the case. It could go either way independently of how you imagine the facts to have taken place.
Crap happens. Once I got charged a PPV by Blockbusters, specifically a boxing match with Mayweather (or whatever his name is). I certainly didn't order it since I don't watch boxing (I did order UFC PPV events at the time.) But I specifically know that I didn't order that PPV because I simply don't watch boxing and it was at a time that I just came back to the country, extremely jet-lagged (but with a shitload of work to do regardless). Boxing isn't my interest, specifically when I'm overworked and jet-lagged.
Regardless, Comcast customer service claimed that they had evidence that the order was made from the setbox in my living room. I suggested that fraud/wiretapping of some type occurred, but that didn't go anywhere. I was too tired to continue fighting, and I simply let the payment take place. And I didn't cancel Comcast because I had (and still do) my internet and phone services with them (and I need those to do work.)
Fighting it out and make a fraud report (and fight for it) sometimes is simply not worth it. Let the $50-something to get lost and get back to shit that is more important (and more expensive) at that particular time. Time passes, and then it's months, years and you do not get an incident like that (maybe never again.)
Could something like that happened to the AC with his usage of redbox? Maybe, maybe not, maybe he's lying, maybe he's confused, or maybe he's telling the truth. But I would not imagine it impossible or even unlikely (as something similar happened to me as I just described.) Don't assume online sales/rental/payment systems are infallible, they are not (I've worked on them.) Put on top of that a layer of customer service, typically populated by people who don't give a shit or who think they are at a career dead-end and display it in their behavior, and strange things happen.
On another note, I've been using RedBox for a while, mostly to rent Disney movies for my toddler. Cannot complain about the service itself, and I like the idea of paying per day (and keeping the dvd after paying something close to retail after x number of days... not that I would do that.) I'd be pretty pissed, though, if something like what the AC described were to happen to me.
Because: I've never known a single person who uses it.
Because you knowing or not knowing someone is a valid measure of... what was your point again?
Turn the Gulf war around and you have China vs. US. Yes, the US has more experience, but China simply tosses more material behind it. Old joke: US vs. China war. First week, a million Chinese war prisoners. Second week, two million Chinese war prisoners. Third week, three million Chinese war prisoners. Fourth week, telegram from Beijing to Washington: "Now what, do you surrender or do we have to continue?"
Do you really believe that tripe, or are you just joking?
Jobs solved the innovation dilemma by having a lot of engineers circled around him.
Which itself was a master stroke that made him an outlier (a positive one when it comes to profit) above the average management crop. And if we look deeper, we see him (after he was re-appointed CEO) taking Apple (which was a few weeks short of bankruptcy) and turned it in a way that it is hard to replicate in the business world. That takes more than just having a lot of engineers circling around him.
I think he was an asshole, but you cannot deny the brilliance and determination the motherfucker emanated (or farted, whichever verb appeals to you the most.)
If you use and like the amenities that become possible with technology, then calling technology a "job terminator" is at best hypocrisy.
What a major fail in logic you have displayed there pal. What sort of logic system or formal model do you use where liking the amenities of technology is mutually exclusive/contradictory to calling such things a job terminator?
Seriously, what major brain fart. I like the amenities provided by technology. That doesn't prevent me from pointing out what is f* obvious, that automation in its current form has lead to a certain number of people not being employed (and not being able to find employment) anymore. Where is the contradiction?
More importantly, where is the hypocrisy? Oh wait, you are commingling ethics (and a twisted form of ethics at that) with inference. Kudos for you, here have a cookie for winning the "dumbass logic" competition.
Too many people go for a 4-year degree, and far too many companies require such a degree for jobs that, in truth, only require a AA/AS degree.
There are two problems here. And we're attempting to blame the victims here in an effort to conceal the growing uncomfortable truth.
Errr, no. Indicating that too many people are going for a 4-year degree is not blaming the victims. It is indicating that we have a fundamental problem in education and society - there are simply no alternatives between a HS and a 4-year degree. And that is simply a false dichotomy (just look at the German model for a counterexample.)
We don't need a lot of people anymore...period.
The job market is getting more and more competitive because we're needing less and less workers.
This is a partial truth. We do not need a lot of people anymore... in manufacturing (in particular, in the type of manufacturing jobs that have gone over seas). We still need an answer for employ ability for the masses. Expecting a 4-year college education to be a baseline is not reasonable. Instead, it is an example that we are living in an educational speculative bubble.
It used to be that you had a balance between market forces on supply of labor and demand for labor. No more. We now have an oversupply of labor. As a result a Burger King is getting closer and closer to a point where they can pick up over-skilled workers at rock bottom prices. At that point you'll still need a college degree for menial labor... why? Because someone else applying will have a college degree.
That would pretty much prove then that we have too many people going for a 4-year college degree. That businesses demand it, or that people flock to them as their last hope to get a job (any job) simply proves that indeed, too many people are going for them. We should see enough people going for these degrees only if an economy can justifiably absorb them. Anything else, regardless of the cause, is an indication of too many people going for them. Period.
The other problem is that an AA or AS only is usually only useful for a specific job. What happens when that job goes away? Then we're back to again blaming the victims for not preparing for a rapidly changing workforce by over-educating up front to avoid being laid off down the road.
I'm *way* over-educated for my job. But I'm adequately educated to be employable in 4-5 different areas so should my current job go belly up I could quickly move into another employable field. If we encourage exclusively trade school then we need to also recognzie that these people will unemployed more frequently and require further education down the road as a rapidly changing job market eliminates their existing trainable skill.
If you can learn it in an AA... it's probably ripe for automation.
I'm not sure what kind of AA/AS you are thinking off. There are AS in nursing, culinary sciences, paralegal/criminal justice, firefighter/paramedic/first respondent, aviation, HVAC, mechanics and mortuary sciences. And a AA degree with a focus on CS or IT gives you all you need for most jobs in IT. Are you telling me that these are ripe for automation? That their jobs are going to go away, and the graduates of these degrees will be like WTF?
Let's look even closer to the disciple most of us in this board work on. Software. I started my programming career with a AA, not even a AS, but a AA. And back in that time, a AA would suffice to get an job in IT/Enterprise computing (eventually I got my BS CS, went to grad school also in CS, and I'm now pursuing a more hardware oriented graduate degree.) It is no exaggeration that my peers from community college and I were typically coding circles around most juniors in a 4-year degree. Sans coverage on formal theory or operating systems, we typically had all the tools required to do a good job.
Little secret her
Speaking as a successful software developer who needed student loans to attend college. Bullshit. Student loans SUCK, but they are the only thing that allows a large number of low to middle income people get into the career they want and need.
There are alternatives to student loans: Ron Pauls solution: only the wealthy may attend college. Tuitions will skyrocket even farther because there are so few new students. Hundreds of universities are forced to close their doors and all we are left with are a lot of trade schools and the Ivy Leagues. Something rational: Recognize that state universities are state universities and have no profit obligation and should not be run like corporations. Cut administrative costs (tuition increases go almost 100% to higher administrative wages and more administrative positions instead of to professors and facilities) and offer low or free tuition subsidized by the state.
^^^ This. This a million times.
I find Ron Paul's position akin to an bone-headed, no-hold-barred adherence to an extremist interpretation of laissez faire capitalism and libertarianism, everything else be damned. This is just the libertarian doppelgänger of the tragically known Maoist great leap forward. I do subscribe (to a point) with libertarianism, but this is just insane!
Ok, we cut federal student loans. Great. Does that immediately solve the problems of high cost of education? No. Will it solve it? Maybe... if you are willing to believe federal intervention is the primary culprit of the rising cost of education (it is not.) We need a serious reform in education. Too many people go for a 4-year degree, and far too many companies require such a degree for jobs that, in truth, only require a AA/AS degree.
But a true reform requires support for vocational school at the HS and post-HS level (as done in the German and Japanese models of education), providing for true and diversified alternatives (at the county community college level) other than a 4-year degree. Cutting federal student loans simply does not resolve the root cause, and will cause people to pursue any form of education, independently of whether they are qualified or not.
It's not fucking rocket science to come up with something rational. But nooooooooooooooooooooooo, we have to go ZOMG! berserkers all the way to the fringe extreme of an ideological kaleidoscope. What Ron Paul is suggested is akin to having a headache, and instead of looking at the root causes, he's suggesting a lobotomy.
Ron Paul has completely jumped the shark on this one. He has foregone all reasonable explanations and solutions to the rising cost of education by pushing an extremist, radical and harmful action as a solution solely for ideological reasons.
$6/hour? They should work for free and be lucky they get food! Now get to work, slave!
Or, bring the cost of living down. I know, it's rhetorical. But consider that the primary reason our salaries are high is because of our cost of living. Whether it is possible to reduce the cost of living, that is an open question. But if it were to happen, hypothetical as it might be, we would be more competitive. Furthermore, lower cost of living does not necessarily imply lowered quality of living.
what the fuck are you talking about. "small backwater"? eat shit.
Easy tiger. If you cherish an academic discipline so much, one would imagine that you could bring your point across in a more articulated manner. I hardly believe an academic discipline needs (or appreciate) 3-grade retorts, specially if it is an academic discipline that started as a branch of Mathematics, and in which Mathematical Logic plays an important role.
He does have a point in that CS is a very small discipline in terms of its body of knowledge (in relation to other STEM fields). CS by itself is just short of 4 decades old, and the study of computability barely a century old. This opposite with the other engineering and science fields that have hundreds of years, on top of millenia of study and practice.
Don't confuse the pervasiveness of computing in modern life with the pervasiveness of Computer Science proper among the other STEM fields.
I do disagree with him, however, on his assessment that this is or might not be earth-shattering. For one, the fact that is occurring at all is earth shattering. And secondly, most earth-shattering events in science and academia do not start with a bang out of nothing (instead, they start from seed events and findings that gain momentum over time.)
Furthermore, even if CS is small fish when it comes to academic research, the institutions (both academic and private) that are pushing for this aren't small fish themselves. There is enough muscle there to bend arms.
I'm pretty sure Windows 3.x did that.
Indeed it did. The /. technocratii collective memory only go thus far in time :/
A lot of market research is put into product names because people do care about what things are called. Sometimes it is to help with product recognition (e.g. Apple adding an 'i' to the start of their product name) and sometimes because consumers will find certain names unmemorable, confusing, or even offensive (e.g. a lot of tech products).
One would assume that said market research would do some legal research collaboration with their patent lawyers through said research and certainly before announcing said product names. I dunno, just saying...
If you've got a good degree move abroad and start afresh.
That's one hell of a one-way move if you ask me. One might as well renounce his citizenship (and I can only imagine another country granting citizenship for someone running away from state-owned debt.)
I mean, Jesus, student loans can never be defaulted, but they are open to renegotiation in terms of interest, monthly payments or grace periods. God knows how many times when I was unemployed during the dot-com era (or during financial duress), I simply picked up the phone and ask for a grace period. I always got one (typically 6 months or a year.)
You better have tried everything before choosing eternal, self-imposed exile.