Absolutley correct. The web seems to promote a very do-it-yourself attitude, but sometimes you can't beat having a person who's been there before in the loop. When I bought a house, we went through a buyers agent as well, and it saved quite a bit of work. What a lot of people don't understand is not only do the agents have access to the latest houses to go on the market, they are also aware of houses that may soon go on the market.
We bought our house the day it went on the market. There's no way we could have done this without an agent (or without being extremely lucky).
In addition agents know a lot more about houses than most folks do. They know the history of a lot of houses as they may have seen them on the market, and also have access to when the house was last sold, and for how much.
My agent calls me to work on her website, and I call her to find me a house... we both realize that the other has skills in an area we do not.
What language is used matters very little. In school you're learning fundimentals. Good programming practices. These should be transferable to any modern language. The purpose of a good CS program is not to teach you a language that will help you find a job, but to teach teach you to apply the good programming practices that you've learned to different languages.
That said, Java is a fine language to learn in. Simply because java is not as widespread as say C++, does not mean it's not a good teaching language. IMHO, the ideal teaching language would never be used in the real world, to encourage students not to have a crutch language.
While I think Chris DiBona makes some very valid points, but, I do think teaching C as a introductory class lends the student to adopting it as a crutch.
Great programmers can quickly pick up other languages and apply the techniques they've learned to those different languages.
You actually could. I recall reading in Popular Mechanincs a while back that one of the prototype applications was changing signage in department stores. Apparently they produced some poster size prototypes (monochrome at this time) that could be hung from the ceilings.
So one would seem to believe that you can produce massive displays with this. What it would cost... That's probably another story.
It's still not altering your content. If a user wants to have content added beside, over, or above that's his perogitive. Your content is still available in it's pristine source, and is not actually modified. If software was doing this with out the users' consent that would be a different story. This is an optional feature that simply provides content in addition to other content.
I don't believe that disallowing end users to view the information in any fashion they deem appropriate is right. While you have a copyright on the information, they still have fair use rights. You can highlight and make notes in a copyrighted book, what's the difference if software you authorize does it for you? I don't see any.
I can't see any valid reason that a user should not be allowed to have software highlight documents for him if he so chooses.
The more important issue is that this auto highlighting may lead to content providers to stop providing external links and relying on the software to do it for them. You don't have to link stock symbols anymore, MS does it automatically.
You are aware that the user can turn this off aren't you?
Do you have the same problem with Alexa? Which does basically the same thing, looks at your page and gives you information on the page, including related sites. When someone goes to one of my sites, they get links to my competitors. Do I like that? Not particularly. Is it infringing on my copyright? No, absolutly not.
What these 'Smart Tags' are doing is just moving the content out of another window. When you serve out a HTML page you are serving out raw code. It is up to the browser to interpret how it is supposed to look. I can specify that your colors or fonts not be used, I can change the size of the page, I can even view it on a non-traditional device such as a PDA. My browser has been able to fundamentally alter any page you create for a long time now.
This is not altering your copyrighted information. It is allowing the user, if he chooses, to get more information on words that appear in your document.
As web developers we have NEVER had control of how the content is displayed on the client side. I'm not a huge fan of MS, but this doesn't infringe on anyone's copyrights. It's just giving the end user another tool, and no matter how I feel about the value of the tool or the company who's providing it, I can't argue with that.
Netscape users are STILL 15%-20% of the market, maybe more.
Not in my world. Netscape has dropped below 10% in all my logs. I'm at a point where IE specific code is getting really hard to argue against. I really doubt that Netscape can turn this around and have any sort of real market share. Sure Mozilla 1.0 should be around RSN, but for it to hit 30%? I really doubt it.
For Netscape this has become less of a holy war, and more of a struggle to keep out of the red.
I'd just like them to stop posting ask/.'s that are obviously flamebait. I mean, even ignoring the fact that this submission wasn't news worthy, (who's going to be running a dual boot on a IA64? And where are they so I can punch them in the face?) It's worded to get the hot-heads going.
/. could go a long way by not baiting the morons out there, But hey, maybe that's what they're after anymore. Maybe prepping for a new fox special they're trying to push, "When Angry, Misinformed, Geeks Attack!!"?
So, when Sony drove Sega out of the console business, and toppled Nintendo it's ok because its not MS?
They came in and launced a huge marketing campaign, and took a loss on their hardware. Signed exclusive deals with developers, and continued to market throughout the life of the product.
Nintendo was toppled and now is trying to catch up, which they probably won't, and Sega's out of the business.
Then they release their PS2, with a $300 price tag, a lot of folks paid well over $500 during the christmas season to get one. Games are significantly more expensive as well.
He's running Apache on Linux, so he'll probably make it. I mean if it was Windows I'd think the guy was a kook, but he's gotta be alright if he's running linux, right?
Really what type of presentation of any sort can't be considered "multi-media"? There's really nothing terribly exciting about most DVD's videogames, etc. The real interesting phenomenon is media convergence, or using different mediums simotamiously to complement each other without a set script.
Unfortunately this is just beginning to take shape now. For instance, being able to access the IMDB on your TV based on information fed from you DVD or DSS would be Media Convergence. The article yesterday about "Who Wants To be A Milloinaire" actually allowing people to compete at home for prizes is almost there.
Its about different mediums being able to send hints to each other on what content to display, and not the packaging of pre-defined content.
In my opinion its a lot more exciting than "Multi-media" which really, everything is. Sight, sound, and words nothing special about that.
I doubt it will push up sales much, if a few thousand hackers go and get a copy it won't register much more than a blip on anyone's radar. Here's a brief article about Charlie Pride's reasoning on why he wants to do this.
Basically he believes that others are making money off 'pirated' music. I myself have fundimental problems with making copies of a CD and selling them for profit. But I have huge problems with the way the industry is trying to ignore our fair use rights. If the artists understood what was going on here they might have a different view, but they're being fed propaganda by their labels. "Yeah, Charlie, that Napster thingy is just like when you saw pirated records in a gas station... exactly."
This one isn't vaporware. While it's certainly mis-represented in the/. article, organic LEDs are intended right now to be used mainly in cell phones. You can actually purchase one of these puppies Today. They're looking at low use devices right now because of problems with the life of the display. No one's claiming that it will replace your laptop screen tomorrow.
What I would like to know is how we as normal citizens can let your collegues know that we want the DMCA fixed? Besides writing my representives, what can I do as Joe Citizen to help get this issue the attention it deserves?
First, Microsoft absolutely has been good for the industry. PC's would not have the penetration they have today if it was not for Microsoft products. They certainly didn't do everything to make this happen, but they got the ball rolling.
Now for your other arguments:
It's really a stretch to say MS is responsible for the I Love You virus. Security holes happen, they will be exploited. Take a look at wu-ftpd or bind. If the same number of people were running RedHat 6.2, we'd see the same scale of wu-ftpd exploits as we did cases of the ILOVEYOU or Melissa virii.
While sufficiently annoying new file formats are nothing new. Ever tried to view a HTML 4.0 document with Netscape 3?
My window's NT machine on my desk here hasn't rebooted in months, neither has my wife's Win ME machine at home. I can't buy the re-boot argument for a second. If your machine has to re-boot all the time it's likely your fault.
No one has been harmed by MS. Sure, you may be gaffed for a few bucks if you buy a brand name machine with Windows on it. But you can buy a machine that comes with Linux. But if you buy it from a major player, you'll pay even more for the installation. No one's going to sell a machine without an operating system not because MS forces them to, but because 1) consumers want one and 2)the machine is unsupportable otherwise.
These are tired arguments that aren't valid. If you want to support Linux, great, glad to have you on board. But support Linux, and don't fall into the trap of bashing MS. Support linux because you believe in the advantages of Open Source, support Linux because it smells pretty, but don't support it because it's not MS. Sorry, that's not it's best feature.
I use Linux because I love it. I love bash, apache, perl, ssh, gimp, XFree and php. I love the feel of linux, I love the way I've customized my box.
But, I don't hate MS. They make good products for the masses. They've helped get PC's into most american homes. This is a good thing.
Finally, without MS, Linux wouldn't be much more than a project some Finnish kid worked on in the 90's. Without a standard, how can you have an alternative?
I've heard of the odd cases where a intruder has sued a property owner for negligence, but I've never heard of a thief being let off because he didn't have to forcefully break in. Point is you can't/shouldn't take advantages of someone else's property without proper authorization.
Most open windows shares are not meant to be open to the world, they're mistakes, you can't reasonably assume that your neighbor wants you to access his hard-drive simply because you can see it. Because someone doesn't understand how these shares work or how to secure them doesn't give anyone the right to take advantage of them.
No, It's pretty clear cut that what Bob and Joe are doing is wrong. If I leave my garage open and during the day someone decides to take a rake, shovel, or other implements of destruction, or decides to park their VW mini-bus there that's wrong.
Sure my insurance company isn't going to cover this because it was my fault I left the garage open, but the police will arrest the person who took my implements of destruction, assuming they locate them.
Additionaly if I started a business that looked for open garages, and then let people know about it, I would assume that the authorities would quickly stop me.
What these guys are doing is clearly wrong. Taking advantage of someone else's property without explicit permission is wrong whether you gain access through an open door or open share.
> why should smokers have more rights then non-smokers ?
Huh? Sorry that makes no sense. If smoking is allowed in a restraunt it isn't an extra right for smokers. You as a non-smoker simply choose not to take advantage of that particular right.
These non-smoking laws are stupid. A restaraunt can designate the entire building smoke free if they choose. These laws are forcing business owners to do this which is wrong.
If you don't like a restaurant because it's smokey complain to the manager. If they don't listen to you go somewhere else. Simple. You have the freedom of choice, let others have it too.
As a high school student there is no way anyone is going to let you do anything that's super -ool. Because with super-cool comes some risks that someone has to take responsibility for. If something goes wrong and money is lost someone's head is going to roll. No one wants to be the guy who gets fired because some high-school kid screwwed up.
So the first thing you can do to maximize your experience is to realize that you aren't going to get to do super-cool things, you're going to get to do the menial things the people with the experience don't want to do. And get over it.
The next thing you can do is meet people. Start networking and the job where you get to do the super-cool stuff will be closer. If you seem to enjoy the menial work, a future manager may be more likely to hire you on.
Learn things from other people. Keep your trap shut and listen to what us old folks have to say. Chances are there are quite a few people who have a lot of knowledge where you are. Maybe try to establish a mentor relationship with someone.
Bottom line is paitence. You are there for cheap labor, there's no getting around it. You don't have enough experience for anything else. But if you keep your eyes and ears open you probably can learn a lot.
I worked for quite a few years at a major state university. And a IT department that is completly student run wouldn't fly. The article talks about a college of 130 students. Not the tens of thousands most universities here are.
One thing that is absolutly fundimental to an IT department at a school is a long-term plan. It would be very difficult to maintain focus if about 1/4 of your staff quit every year. You'd have high and low years for the staff, some years you'd have a couple of geniuses and the next you could have no one who can fill their shoes.
Another problem is many of the positions in IT departments require the full attention of a person. When you're not only coordnating between many buildings, but quite possibly multiple campuses there's quite a bit of work when it comes to the physcial networking. Sure you could have multiple students, but you need at least one person to guide the entire thing, and this should be a full-time job. Someone has to take responsibility when things go wrong or when the wrong decision was made.
The right students could probably handle most aspects of a IT department, but should they? Yeah, it would help them learn, but really on-the-job learning isn't what colleges are there for. A student shouldn't have to be called in on the eve before finals to troubleshoot a faulty segment.
Students should be allowed to be involved in their schools IT department, but there should be some permanent staff in place to provide continuity, and overall vision. At my University, students filled many of the entry-level type positions as student workers. A good number became permanent staff members in time, myself included. A campus wide IT oversight group which included members from the different colleges also had student representation.
I think students should be involved, but I don't think it makes sense to let them run the show.
You're right, copyright is a Good Thing. But using copyrights to maintain a monopoly is a Bad Thing.
Last year Hatch threatened that they were in jeopardy of loosing their copyrights if they didn't work to promote a fair digital distribution option. Obviously they haven't even taken a step in that direction.
Congress has the responsibility of maintaing copyright code. That includes cumpulsory licences.
A compulsory license would encourage competition, and allow anyone to set up a MP3/OGG/??? distribution site so long as they pay the fee back to the owner of the copyrights. Right now the RIAA members do not want to do this because they want to keep all the profits themselves, they have a monopoly on the copyrights. Keep the copyrights there, but make the licenses compulsory and we'll have a quality, and inexpensive distribution network within a year. Record companies as we know them will eventually go by the wayside (The dinosaurs will die -NOFX).
Let the RIAA continue their monopoly, and within 3 years we may have a proprietary solution that circumvents our fair use rights. Which do you want?
Downloads are generally horribly slow. Generally most of my downloads on Napster/OpenNap servers come in around 25 - 100Kps. Audiogalaxy claims you get the fastest for your location, but I can't see how I'm getting 1-2.5Kps downloads if that's really true.
Selections not too bad, but you can't find the obscure stuff that you'll find on a network the size of Napster. It's organization is a step in the right direction, better than Napsters, but could be better.
What I really don't like about it is the fact that you have to choose which version each time. Sure, you're supposed to get the most popular version, but myself I don't like 128K mp3's. I prefer 192K files. So each time I download a song I have to choose which one I want. It would be nice if I could tell it I prefer 192K songs, and it would default to those.
With Napster I can find an entire album in a search and queue it up quickly. With AudioGalaxy it takes several clicks. You also don't have the ability to browse a users files. This is one of my favorite things about Napster is the ability to browse other users files. Sure Audio Galaxy gives you logical choices of other music, but I frequently find things I like that don't logically go with the song I initially searched for.
Basically I think AudioGalaxy is a good idea. I'd like to see a better client, maybe standalone or a Java client so it would have a little more flexibility, and I'd like to see more potential interaction between users.
First let me qualify this with this statement: I am not your stereotypical slashdotter. I will read my copy of SI before Linux Mag. I watch a lot more ESPN than Sci-fi/Comedy Central/Cartoon Network. And I absolutely love football, nothing better in the world.
That said, I agree with your point that the NFL shouldn't be villified. And I will be the first to point out NFL players who have done great things for society for every player you can mention with legal trouble. What I won't do is defend those players who have had run-ins with the law.
Ray Lewis did something wrong, when they find two dead peoples' blood in your vehicle, generally you did something very wrong. Your average 20-something black man who was in that situation would currently be serving time. Rick Reilly (last page of SI) had a very good story regarding this in the last issue.
If you've seen any of the Chmura trial, it's really sickening. I'm guessing that the jury is going to find him guilty, because his defense lawyer is probably one of the most offensive people I've seen. What Chmura did was wrong. You don't have sex with your 17 year old babysitter in your buddies bathroom, whether your enticed, drunk, high, or just stupid.
Sure, NFL players aren't the only ones to commit these kind of crimes, but that's not an excuse. Sure you don't want to hear about it, because these guys are heros to you. But... I think it serves a purpose. Sure you'll get the morons who say "those guys are all criminals" because the spot on the news they saw, but I don't give a rats ass about them. What I hope, is these players will start holding themselves to a higher standard. A standard that they should hold themselves to, because they are special people to quite a few folks.
Ever since OJ we've been able to doubt our heros, and the only way to get that trust back is to change. What Green Bay did with Chmura was great. Zero-Tolerance is what we need. Ray Lewis shouldn't play ball, definately not while he's on probation. I garuntee he wouldn't be playing for Green Bay. If more clubs took that policy football would be better off.
Jobs is debateably suffering from some sort of demensia, but I've never thought the guy was stupid.
The only way I could see Jobs doing this is if he had a big problem with Linux. OSX on x86 would hurt both Linux and Apple.
No, you say, Linux cannot be hurt by competition, only helped! That's true for the staple Linux users. Myself, I would never stop running linux because of the availability of OSX on my hardware. I might add another choice to my boot menu, but it would probably just be a fling like QNX and BeOS. I always come back to my true OS.
Its the other type of Linux user, the convert. This is the guy who hates MS, and runs linux because it's not. He rarely gets out of X, and when he does you cringe because he's logged in as root and just typed rm -rf/* These casual Linux users could jump to OSX because of it's apparent advantages Better interface, easier administration, and abundance of popular apps.
Does this really hurt Linux? Well, not the technical advancement of Linux, but Linux could begin to loose ground in the % war, fall from the limelight, and become obscure again. Bad thing? Good Thing? That's argueable.
Now apple has much more to loose. We all remember what happened when Mac Clones were around. Hardware so cheap there wasn't much point in buying Apple. Apple had to pull back licensing of the OS to slow their tailspin. Would we be seeing ads for cute little titanium G4's or Cubes if they hadn't done this? Probably not. Apple likely would have continued to die, and eventually would stop advancement of the OS. The entire Apple market would be virtually gone. Maybe LinuxPPC would have taken off on the clones eventually, but it's doubtful.
x86 hardware is now dirt cheap. You can build a top-shelf system for about $1000-1500. You can pick up a high-end laptop for under $2000. Tell me all you want about Apples superior hardware, but price is why the vast majority of the market is on x86 right now. Put OSX on x86, and you loose at least half of your current hardware market.
So I think that if Jobs decides to do this (no matter how much I might like to see it), its time to send the guy to the funny farm. Or maybe aknowledge that MS has perfected mind control.
Slashdot Mirror
Absolutley correct. The web seems to promote a very do-it-yourself attitude, but sometimes you can't beat having a person who's been there before in the loop. When I bought a house, we went through a buyers agent as well, and it saved quite a bit of work. What a lot of people don't understand is not only do the agents have access to the latest houses to go on the market, they are also aware of houses that may soon go on the market.
We bought our house the day it went on the market. There's no way we could have done this without an agent (or without being extremely lucky).
In addition agents know a lot more about houses than most folks do. They know the history of a lot of houses as they may have seen them on the market, and also have access to when the house was last sold, and for how much.
My agent calls me to work on her website, and I call her to find me a house... we both realize that the other has skills in an area we do not.
What language is used matters very little. In school you're learning fundimentals. Good programming practices. These should be transferable to any modern language. The purpose of a good CS program is not to teach you a language that will help you find a job, but to teach teach you to apply the good programming practices that you've learned to different languages.
That said, Java is a fine language to learn in. Simply because java is not as widespread as say C++, does not mean it's not a good teaching language. IMHO, the ideal teaching language would never be used in the real world, to encourage students not to have a crutch language.
While I think Chris DiBona makes some very valid points, but, I do think teaching C as a introductory class lends the student to adopting it as a crutch.
Great programmers can quickly pick up other languages and apply the techniques they've learned to those different languages.
You actually could. I recall reading in Popular Mechanincs a while back that one of the prototype applications was changing signage in department stores. Apparently they produced some poster size prototypes (monochrome at this time) that could be hung from the ceilings.
So one would seem to believe that you can produce massive displays with this. What it would cost... That's probably another story.
It's still not altering your content. If a user wants to have content added beside, over, or above that's his perogitive. Your content is still available in it's pristine source, and is not actually modified. If software was doing this with out the users' consent that would be a different story. This is an optional feature that simply provides content in addition to other content.
I don't believe that disallowing end users to view the information in any fashion they deem appropriate is right. While you have a copyright on the information, they still have fair use rights. You can highlight and make notes in a copyrighted book, what's the difference if software you authorize does it for you? I don't see any.
I can't see any valid reason that a user should not be allowed to have software highlight documents for him if he so chooses.
The more important issue is that this auto highlighting may lead to content providers to stop providing external links and relying on the software to do it for them. You don't have to link stock symbols anymore, MS does it automatically.
You are aware that the user can turn this off aren't you?
Do you have the same problem with Alexa? Which does basically the same thing, looks at your page and gives you information on the page, including related sites. When someone goes to one of my sites, they get links to my competitors. Do I like that? Not particularly. Is it infringing on my copyright? No, absolutly not.
What these 'Smart Tags' are doing is just moving the content out of another window. When you serve out a HTML page you are serving out raw code. It is up to the browser to interpret how it is supposed to look. I can specify that your colors or fonts not be used, I can change the size of the page, I can even view it on a non-traditional device such as a PDA. My browser has been able to fundamentally alter any page you create for a long time now.
This is not altering your copyrighted information. It is allowing the user, if he chooses, to get more information on words that appear in your document.
As web developers we have NEVER had control of how the content is displayed on the client side. I'm not a huge fan of MS, but this doesn't infringe on anyone's copyrights. It's just giving the end user another tool, and no matter how I feel about the value of the tool or the company who's providing it, I can't argue with that.
Netscape users are STILL 15%-20% of the market, maybe more.
Not in my world. Netscape has dropped below 10% in all my logs. I'm at a point where IE specific code is getting really hard to argue against. I really doubt that Netscape can turn this around and have any sort of real market share. Sure Mozilla 1.0 should be around RSN, but for it to hit 30%? I really doubt it.
For Netscape this has become less of a holy war, and more of a struggle to keep out of the red.until($i,$see,$it) {$belief = undef}
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I'd just like them to stop posting ask /.'s that are obviously flamebait. I mean, even ignoring the fact that this submission wasn't news worthy, (who's going to be running a dual boot on a IA64? And where are they so I can punch them in the face?) It's worded to get the hot-heads going.
/. could go a long way by not baiting the morons out there, But hey, maybe that's what they're after anymore. Maybe prepping for a new fox special they're trying to push, "When Angry, Misinformed, Geeks Attack!!"?
So, when Sony drove Sega out of the console business, and toppled Nintendo it's ok because its not MS?
They came in and launced a huge marketing campaign, and took a loss on their hardware. Signed exclusive deals with developers, and continued to market throughout the life of the product.
Nintendo was toppled and now is trying to catch up, which they probably won't, and Sega's out of the business.
Then they release their PS2, with a $300 price tag, a lot of folks paid well over $500 during the christmas season to get one. Games are significantly more expensive as well.
But MS wanting to the the same thing is worse?
He's running Apache on Linux, so he'll probably make it. I mean if it was Windows I'd think the guy was a kook, but he's gotta be alright if he's running linux, right?
Really what type of presentation of any sort can't be considered "multi-media"? There's really nothing terribly exciting about most DVD's videogames, etc. The real interesting phenomenon is media convergence, or using different mediums simotamiously to complement each other without a set script.
Unfortunately this is just beginning to take shape now. For instance, being able to access the IMDB on your TV based on information fed from you DVD or DSS would be Media Convergence. The article yesterday about "Who Wants To be A Milloinaire" actually allowing people to compete at home for prizes is almost there.
Its about different mediums being able to send hints to each other on what content to display, and not the packaging of pre-defined content.
In my opinion its a lot more exciting than "Multi-media" which really, everything is. Sight, sound, and words nothing special about that.
I doubt it will push up sales much, if a few thousand hackers go and get a copy it won't register much more than a blip on anyone's radar. Here's a brief article about Charlie Pride's reasoning on why he wants to do this.
Basically he believes that others are making money off 'pirated' music. I myself have fundimental problems with making copies of a CD and selling them for profit. But I have huge problems with the way the industry is trying to ignore our fair use rights. If the artists understood what was going on here they might have a different view, but they're being fed propaganda by their labels. "Yeah, Charlie, that Napster thingy is just like when you saw pirated records in a gas station... exactly."
This one isn't vaporware. While it's certainly mis-represented in the /. article, organic LEDs are intended right now to be used mainly in cell phones. You can actually purchase one of these puppies Today. They're looking at low use devices right now because of problems with the life of the display. No one's claiming that it will replace your laptop screen tomorrow.
What I would like to know is how we as normal citizens can let your collegues know that we want the DMCA fixed? Besides writing my representives, what can I do as Joe Citizen to help get this issue the attention it deserves?
Now for your other arguments:
No one has been harmed by MS. Sure, you may be gaffed for a few bucks if you buy a brand name machine with Windows on it. But you can buy a machine that comes with Linux. But if you buy it from a major player, you'll pay even more for the installation. No one's going to sell a machine without an operating system not because MS forces them to, but because 1) consumers want one and 2)the machine is unsupportable otherwise.
These are tired arguments that aren't valid. If you want to support Linux, great, glad to have you on board. But support Linux, and don't fall into the trap of bashing MS. Support linux because you believe in the advantages of Open Source, support Linux because it smells pretty, but don't support it because it's not MS. Sorry, that's not it's best feature. I use Linux because I love it. I love bash, apache, perl, ssh, gimp, XFree and php. I love the feel of linux, I love the way I've customized my box.
But, I don't hate MS. They make good products for the masses. They've helped get PC's into most american homes. This is a good thing.
Finally, without MS, Linux wouldn't be much more than a project some Finnish kid worked on in the 90's. Without a standard, how can you have an alternative?
I've heard of the odd cases where a intruder has sued a property owner for negligence, but I've never heard of a thief being let off because he didn't have to forcefully break in. Point is you can't/shouldn't take advantages of someone else's property without proper authorization.
Most open windows shares are not meant to be open to the world, they're mistakes, you can't reasonably assume that your neighbor wants you to access his hard-drive simply because you can see it. Because someone doesn't understand how these shares work or how to secure them doesn't give anyone the right to take advantage of them.
No, It's pretty clear cut that what Bob and Joe are doing is wrong. If I leave my garage open and during the day someone decides to take a rake, shovel, or other implements of destruction, or decides to park their VW mini-bus there that's wrong.
Sure my insurance company isn't going to cover this because it was my fault I left the garage open, but the police will arrest the person who took my implements of destruction, assuming they locate them.
Additionaly if I started a business that looked for open garages, and then let people know about it, I would assume that the authorities would quickly stop me.
What these guys are doing is clearly wrong. Taking advantage of someone else's property without explicit permission is wrong whether you gain access through an open door or open share.
> why should smokers have more rights then non-smokers ?
Huh? Sorry that makes no sense. If smoking is allowed in a restraunt it isn't an extra right for smokers. You as a non-smoker simply choose not to take advantage of that particular right.
These non-smoking laws are stupid. A restaraunt can designate the entire building smoke free if they choose. These laws are forcing business owners to do this which is wrong.
If you don't like a restaurant because it's smokey complain to the manager. If they don't listen to you go somewhere else. Simple. You have the freedom of choice, let others have it too.
As a high school student there is no way anyone is going to let you do anything that's super -ool. Because with super-cool comes some risks that someone has to take responsibility for. If something goes wrong and money is lost someone's head is going to roll. No one wants to be the guy who gets fired because some high-school kid screwwed up.
So the first thing you can do to maximize your experience is to realize that you aren't going to get to do super-cool things, you're going to get to do the menial things the people with the experience don't want to do. And get over it.
The next thing you can do is meet people. Start networking and the job where you get to do the super-cool stuff will be closer. If you seem to enjoy the menial work, a future manager may be more likely to hire you on.
Learn things from other people. Keep your trap shut and listen to what us old folks have to say. Chances are there are quite a few people who have a lot of knowledge where you are. Maybe try to establish a mentor relationship with someone.
Bottom line is paitence. You are there for cheap labor, there's no getting around it. You don't have enough experience for anything else. But if you keep your eyes and ears open you probably can learn a lot.
I worked for quite a few years at a major state university. And a IT department that is completly student run wouldn't fly. The article talks about a college of 130 students. Not the tens of thousands most universities here are.
One thing that is absolutly fundimental to an IT department at a school is a long-term plan. It would be very difficult to maintain focus if about 1/4 of your staff quit every year. You'd have high and low years for the staff, some years you'd have a couple of geniuses and the next you could have no one who can fill their shoes.
Another problem is many of the positions in IT departments require the full attention of a person. When you're not only coordnating between many buildings, but quite possibly multiple campuses there's quite a bit of work when it comes to the physcial networking. Sure you could have multiple students, but you need at least one person to guide the entire thing, and this should be a full-time job. Someone has to take responsibility when things go wrong or when the wrong decision was made.
The right students could probably handle most aspects of a IT department, but should they? Yeah, it would help them learn, but really on-the-job learning isn't what colleges are there for. A student shouldn't have to be called in on the eve before finals to troubleshoot a faulty segment.
Students should be allowed to be involved in their schools IT department, but there should be some permanent staff in place to provide continuity, and overall vision. At my University, students filled many of the entry-level type positions as student workers. A good number became permanent staff members in time, myself included. A campus wide IT oversight group which included members from the different colleges also had student representation.
I think students should be involved, but I don't think it makes sense to let them run the show.
You're right, copyright is a Good Thing. But using copyrights to maintain a monopoly is a Bad Thing.
Last year Hatch threatened that they were in jeopardy of loosing their copyrights if they didn't work to promote a fair digital distribution option. Obviously they haven't even taken a step in that direction.
Congress has the responsibility of maintaing copyright code. That includes cumpulsory licences.
A compulsory license would encourage competition, and allow anyone to set up a MP3/OGG/??? distribution site so long as they pay the fee back to the owner of the copyrights. Right now the RIAA members do not want to do this because they want to keep all the profits themselves, they have a monopoly on the copyrights. Keep the copyrights there, but make the licenses compulsory and we'll have a quality, and inexpensive distribution network within a year. Record companies as we know them will eventually go by the wayside (The dinosaurs will die -NOFX).
Let the RIAA continue their monopoly, and within 3 years we may have a proprietary solution that circumvents our fair use rights. Which do you want?
IMHO It's a long way from being decent.
Downloads are generally horribly slow. Generally most of my downloads on Napster/OpenNap servers come in around 25 - 100Kps. Audiogalaxy claims you get the fastest for your location, but I can't see how I'm getting 1-2.5Kps downloads if that's really true.
Selections not too bad, but you can't find the obscure stuff that you'll find on a network the size of Napster. It's organization is a step in the right direction, better than Napsters, but could be better.
What I really don't like about it is the fact that you have to choose which version each time. Sure, you're supposed to get the most popular version, but myself I don't like 128K mp3's. I prefer 192K files. So each time I download a song I have to choose which one I want. It would be nice if I could tell it I prefer 192K songs, and it would default to those.
With Napster I can find an entire album in a search and queue it up quickly. With AudioGalaxy it takes several clicks. You also don't have the ability to browse a users files. This is one of my favorite things about Napster is the ability to browse other users files. Sure Audio Galaxy gives you logical choices of other music, but I frequently find things I like that don't logically go with the song I initially searched for.
Basically I think AudioGalaxy is a good idea. I'd like to see a better client, maybe standalone or a Java client so it would have a little more flexibility, and I'd like to see more potential interaction between users.
First let me qualify this with this statement: I am not your stereotypical slashdotter. I will read my copy of SI before Linux Mag. I watch a lot more ESPN than Sci-fi/Comedy Central/Cartoon Network. And I absolutely love football, nothing better in the world.
That said, I agree with your point that the NFL shouldn't be villified. And I will be the first to point out NFL players who have done great things for society for every player you can mention with legal trouble. What I won't do is defend those players who have had run-ins with the law.
Ray Lewis did something wrong, when they find two dead peoples' blood in your vehicle, generally you did something very wrong. Your average 20-something black man who was in that situation would currently be serving time. Rick Reilly (last page of SI) had a very good story regarding this in the last issue.
If you've seen any of the Chmura trial, it's really sickening. I'm guessing that the jury is going to find him guilty, because his defense lawyer is probably one of the most offensive people I've seen. What Chmura did was wrong. You don't have sex with your 17 year old babysitter in your buddies bathroom, whether your enticed, drunk, high, or just stupid.
Sure, NFL players aren't the only ones to commit these kind of crimes, but that's not an excuse. Sure you don't want to hear about it, because these guys are heros to you. But... I think it serves a purpose. Sure you'll get the morons who say "those guys are all criminals" because the spot on the news they saw, but I don't give a rats ass about them. What I hope, is these players will start holding themselves to a higher standard. A standard that they should hold themselves to, because they are special people to quite a few folks.
Ever since OJ we've been able to doubt our heros, and the only way to get that trust back is to change. What Green Bay did with Chmura was great. Zero-Tolerance is what we need. Ray Lewis shouldn't play ball, definately not while he's on probation. I garuntee he wouldn't be playing for Green Bay. If more clubs took that policy football would be better off.
Jobs is debateably suffering from some sort of demensia, but I've never thought the guy was stupid.
/* These casual Linux users could jump to OSX because of it's apparent advantages Better interface, easier administration, and abundance of popular apps.
The only way I could see Jobs doing this is if he had a big problem with Linux. OSX on x86 would hurt both Linux and Apple.
No, you say, Linux cannot be hurt by competition, only helped! That's true for the staple Linux users. Myself, I would never stop running linux because of the availability of OSX on my hardware. I might add another choice to my boot menu, but it would probably just be a fling like QNX and BeOS. I always come back to my true OS.
Its the other type of Linux user, the convert. This is the guy who hates MS, and runs linux because it's not. He rarely gets out of X, and when he does you cringe because he's logged in as root and just typed rm -rf
Does this really hurt Linux? Well, not the technical advancement of Linux, but Linux could begin to loose ground in the % war, fall from the limelight, and become obscure again. Bad thing? Good Thing? That's argueable.
Now apple has much more to loose. We all remember what happened when Mac Clones were around. Hardware so cheap there wasn't much point in buying Apple. Apple had to pull back licensing of the OS to slow their tailspin. Would we be seeing ads for cute little titanium G4's or Cubes if they hadn't done this? Probably not. Apple likely would have continued to die, and eventually would stop advancement of the OS. The entire Apple market would be virtually gone. Maybe LinuxPPC would have taken off on the clones eventually, but it's doubtful.
x86 hardware is now dirt cheap. You can build a top-shelf system for about $1000-1500. You can pick up a high-end laptop for under $2000. Tell me all you want about Apples superior hardware, but price is why the vast majority of the market is on x86 right now. Put OSX on x86, and you loose at least half of your current hardware market.
So I think that if Jobs decides to do this (no matter how much I might like to see it), its time to send the guy to the funny farm. Or maybe aknowledge that MS has perfected mind control.