I think a lot of people miss a major point when they criticize the current state of patents and other intellectual property rights: there are two steps in the process, the formation / enactment of the law and the enforcement of the law.
Oftentimes, the law gets blamed when the true culprit is the enforcement. And vice versa.
Fortunately and unfortunately, the responsibility of patent enforcements in the U.S. is shared by the patent office and the federal courts. At times, error by one is corrected by the other [ e.g. an ambiguously defined patent is further refined by the courts ]. But at other times, the actions of one can undermine the other [ e.g. courts can interpret patents to cover activities never originally intended by the patent office ]
That said, I still think it's a leap to say that the "successful" enforcement of patent law this time around *necessarily* implies that the law is not broken.
I think with enough patience (especially among tech support and sysadmins), people from a wide cut of the socioeconomic spectrum will begin to use the computer and the Net on a daily basis. But there is a difference between being an active and a passive user. Let's consider the two technologies most compared to the Net/Computer in this discussion: TV and automobiles.
TV is inherently a passive technology: users are fed and there is only limited feedback from user to TV programmers. So it is not really a fair comparison to the Internet revolution, a revolution where users not only can get a lot of content but also actively participate in the shaping of the available content. I think Slashdot is a great example of this two way feedback. So talking about how the digital divide will disappear like it did for TVs is a misleading comparison. The divide will still be there if most of the 'masses' only learn to accept content from the Internet (such as check stock prices, news reports, sports scores) as opposed to build/manipulate some of the contents themselves.
As for the comparison with automobiles, this one probably has more merit as there is more of an active participation on the part of automobile consumers. But I think the divide that was crossed earlier is now widening: most people cannot fix nor truly understand how their cars work. This is especially true with modern cars that require sophisticated, specialized electronics to diagnose even the simplest of engine problems. And I think the automobile metaphor provides an important lesson: a divide that appeared to have been crossed can in the future re-widen. As more people become savvy with the current state of PC and Internet technologies... we have to keep in mind that technology does change (especially in the PC/Internet world) and that the divide can re-appear and widen if we don't make sure people keep up.
So in summary, we need people to embrace the digital revolution as opposed to just accept it in order to close truly the divide.
Also... am I the only person to nice this: take a look at the names of the 'Admirals' toward the casting list. Admiral Forrest. Admiral Leornard. Admiral Williams. Make the last one singular... and don't you have the first names of the actors playing the lead charaters in the original series? I find this very suspicious.
Note: The Admiral names may be placeholders (i.e. they haven't decided on names quite yet for the ancillary character)
From my understanding of U.S laws, this is the best that companies can do, legally. Employees who leave a company can only be held liable for the cost of training; they cannot be held liable some duration of work.
I've read/studied about similar situations: legal/consulting firms paying for the MBA/JD education of their junior associates. Although the *language* of the contract sounds as though they are required to work for the firm three year after the completon of their degree, the actual essence of the contract only requires the employee to pay back the (usually pro-rated) cost of the degree to the firm, early termination of the contract by the employee. Remember, indentured servitude (even when ex ante voluntary) is illegal according to U.S. statutes. In employment contracts, only the employer can be held liable for holding up the duration of the contract (barring other justification for early termination - firing - such as detrimental behavior, slacking, etc.)
There are two issues that seem to but really do not contradict the statement above: sports contracts and H1 visas
The reason why sports contracts work is because the employers (sports team owners) have colluded together to agree that they will not offer work for employees who have broken a contract with one of the other employer in the group. The cases that brought about free agency in major sports (including European soccer) is based on the claim that this collusion violates anti-trust. Consequetially, the courts, players union, and team owners have arrived at a compromise where players get limited mobility... but actually, many legal and economics scholars feel that this arrangement still violates anti-trust. Players unions use this during collective bargaining all the time to get more favorable terms. (Remember that Major League Baseball can get away with this because they received a sweet deal from Congress early on: anti-trust exemption)
So sports contract are a special example that does not really apply to more traditional jobs (yikes, can't believe I'm saying this about a bunch of hackers and geeks;-) such as those in the hi-tech communiy.
As noted in/. several times, H1 visas tend to constrict the ability of the employees to move form one job to another. This of course might be seen as an informal way of contracting employees to a firm for a duration (usually until they qualify for a green card). Keep in mind that if I remember correctly, there is nothing in the H1 Visa statutes that prevent an employee from switching jobs... just additional hassle of the new firm to arrange for a visa. This is mainly a problem with immigration, not work laws. Personally, I believe that not only should capital be allowed to cross international borders freely, but so should labor.
Not sure if this helps. But at least you might have a better undertstanding of what employers are up against when they make their employees much more valuable. I think the only way to survive is to foster a 'team' concept within the firm, make each person have a stake in the firm that is more than just her/his paycheck. Equity, of course, is one way to get at this... but so are simple things like recognition. Don't just recognize the 'team leaders' or managers... also recognize the 'grunts' who did a lot of the core work.
'What is human' is a very common theme in literature and science fiction. The fundamental problem in exploring this theme is the lack of contrast: at the base, all human cultures are fundamentally the same. As Noam Chomskey once wrote, all human languages would seem like the same to a Martian. The similarities in our culture/belief point to the features that make up humanity, but the lack of contrast prevent us from getting at the essence. All too often, we end up comparing outselves to animals... and then concluding that the essence of humanity is the ability to think and reason or the presence of a 'soul'.
Consequentially, writers have used a few different 'devices' to imagine themselves a contrast. One of the earliest involves using time (Rip Van Winkle, Time Machine, Buck Rogers). By looking at how mankind changes (or rather, fails to change) over a large period of time, we can filter out some of the more superficial features of mankind and get at the essence. Here the contrast is between man now and man in the future. But obviously this does not address the fundamental lack of contrast: we are still comparing humans to humans.
The second device often used is the introduction of non-human species living together with humans. Much of the traditional Tolken-style fantasy literature falls into this category. Humanity is contrasted with elves, dwarves, and other non-human races (for sci-fi, replace them with your favorite alien beings). A good writer can imagine an altogether different species but most writers end up disguising different human traits within each race. This of course, in of itself, is not bad. It is a great way to explore different aspect of humanity. But it provides a weak contrast. All too often (especially in hack fantasy) the meaning of humanity ends up being the hackneyed idea of how mankind, faced with a short finite life, strives for greatness (the usual human vs. elf line). You know, the candle that burns the brightest urns the shortest. But I find it troubling that what defines human life lies with its mortality - this is sort of the religious angle to defining humanity.
Heinlein, in Stranger in a Strange Land, uses a modified version of the second device. He doesn't rely on a direct comparison between the human and non-human species (Martian) but rather through an intermediary. Think of it as the 'Tarzan' device: let human children grow up in a non-human environment. (I guess of Lord of the Flies also uses a similar device as well). Although I'm not a big fan of the book (my enthusiasm for ithe book wanes with every passing year), I must admit that Heinlein does a notable job contrasting mankind with a truly alien species. The fact that we think we know but truly do not know the meaning of 'grok' highlights this stark difference between our race and the Martians (a concept that is fundamental to their race, but does not have a true equivalent in ours).
Heinlein is definitely dated. So are most of the great sci-fi stories out of the 50s-70s. If you read sci-fi for the technology and for a glimpse of the future, then I suggest sticking with the new brand of hardcore sci-fi writers. However, if you are looking for an exploration of major concepts in unusual settings, I think Heinlein is not a bad choice. But in the end, remember that it's entertainment. Not gospel. Heinlein's works ends up being a little too preachy for my taste.
Call me a cynic. I'm still not fully convinced that the real story behind the recovery of the 'stolen' Enigma machine isn't some publicity stunt, perhaps gone bad.
I'd check the parent company of the Sunday Times and see if they have a financial stake in any upcoming Engima movie/book (maybe the movie mentioned in the article, the one financed by Mick Jagger's production company)
Also, I'd see if the 'nabbed Bad Guy' really gets prosecuted. If so, who supports his defense.
Then again, sometimes the truth is stranger than fiction...
Speaking of $500 bills on the sidewalk... there's a famous economist joke that goes as follows...
A man walks down a street at night. He sees a famous economic theorist on his hands and knees searching for something around the streetlight. He approaches him and asks him what he's doing.
"I'm looking for my keys."
"Oh, did you drop them around here?"
"No, I actually dropped them over there"
"Then why are you looking for them here"
"Because the light is over here"
Point of the joke (before I get a karma drop): theories often developed by economists are based on convenience (especially mathematical convenience) than reality.
If you look at the formal presentation of the efficient market hypothesis (note the last word), you'll find quite a list of questionable assumptions driving the result... and as mathematicians say, "When proving a theorem, it's the first mistake that's the killer."
By the way, the predictions by economists are not much better than those by Wall Street pundits...
The difficulty in evaluating whether the 'bubble' has finally deflated has to do with the difficulty in distinguishing between the correlated forces giving rise to the bubble.
One of the forces is the promise of the Internet revolution. But another that is often overlooked and is just as, if not more, important is the fact that there has been a huge increase in the stock market participation of the 'average joe.' This is most apparent in the growth of mutual funds during the past 10 years.
In some sense this latter force is really a simple lesson in supply and demand. The demand in stock market investment goods went up while the supply (the stocks themselves) stayed fairly constant. Even when IPOs and new issues arrived, the resulting increase in supply was small compared to the daily growth in demand... with a 'newbie' investor opening up a $2k IRA Account every few minutes.
So the question now is how much of the semingly high price paid for 'tech stocks' is due to an optimistic view of the impact of the Internet and how much due to simple supply and demand dynamics. If it's mainly the former, then the market still has a way to go before it's deflated, with every sign that the major 'reality check' is still in the works... sort of like earthquakes in California, we've had a few large ones but the 'Big One'is still in the making.
But if the high stock prices are mainly due to the more straight-forward reason of supply and demand, then it looks like the market may have sufficiently deflated. The increase in demand (measured by the arrival of new, private investors) has significantly slowed down and there doesn't appear to be anymore 'hidden' sources of capital waiting to spring out and be fed into the stock market.
Lastly it should be noted that both of these forces reinforce each other. Optimism in the Internet is a major factor that motivated a lot of first-time investors to take money out of their banks and into NASDAQ. Similarly, greater funds in the market compared to places to put the funds contributed to the high tech prices, leading to even higher levels of Internet optimism.
Of course, the reverse is possible as well, with Internet pessimism dissuading the arrival of new funds and the lack of new funds creating more Internet doubt... both of which would have disasterous effects on stock prices...
I personally don't want any future children I may have to be playing quake 3 at 10 and 11. And if they insist it's sure as hell gonna be on a linux box =)
Better yet, let's make it into an educational experience. Don't let you kids play Q3 (or the equivalent game in the future) until they can set up their own Linux box and compile/install the game from the source!
On a more serious note, I'm happy to see the large amount of response on/. that distinguishes rights from privileges. Most people forget that while children do not have a full set of rights, they are also held responsible for only a limited set of obligations (for example, they are judged differently, more leniently, in a court of law). There is nothing inherently wrong about curtailing some access to "speech" to minors as long as the "speech" is made available once they become full fledged adult members of society.
I should say, at the same token, I find it disturbing how society (government to be exact) has begun to impose more responsibilities on children while curtailing their rights: for example, in some states in the U.S., there is a growing trend toward trying more and more kids as adults... part of that political "get tough on crime" phenomenon. Columbine has also lead to a similar response. Curtail the children's access to potentially harmful infuences but at the same time crack down hard on potential trouble-makers in school. You can't say "kids don't know what they are doing so need to be controlled" on one hand and "kids need to be held more responsible for their actions" on the other.
I get the two mixed up... but either he F-1 or J-1 visa comes with permission to work one year outside of the academic institution as part of "practical training."
The mistake I see a lot among friends and colleagues is that they (the potential immigrants) use up this year of practical training during the course of their study, rather than saving it until the end. I know it's very tempting, especially as a tech student in a hot high-tech community (such as S.V.), to cash in the year for some serious pocket money... but in the long-run, life is much easier if you save the practical training.
The year of practical training can be used as a bridge between the student visa and a work visa. Despite the recent shortage, a serious employer can usually obtain a H1B for an employee if given a year. The problem (as noted in other posts above) is when employers have to scramble to get one. Remember, most people graduate at around the same time. So if you are looking for a H1B around May-June... chances are, so are a lot of other graduates.
Avoid the possiblility of having to "sit out" of work for months or even deportation... save the year of practical training!
I mean, let's face it - these guys aren't huge thinkers or public activists. They run (ran?) a popular website which is essentially a "gosh-gee-wiz-look-at-this" portal.
I find such comments troubling especially when it comes from a community that supposedly embraces the spirit of open source and the belief that ideas discussed in the open arena can lead to better progress. Being a member of the academic community at a prestigious West Coast university, I see this kind of mentalty all the time. People are pro-DeCSS, pro-Napster, pro-Linux... but they get offended when members of the general Internet community who "lack" the credentials (e.g. big University diplomas, impressive titles at flashy companies/start-ups) begin spouting out their opinions and rise to prominence.
Give me a break. No one said you had to agree with what people say. But even non-Nobel laureates deserve to be heard (note the other lecturers in the series in recent weeks besides D. Adam are Nobel laureates). Now is the MIT lecture halls the proper medium? I think so. Creating and running an online phenom like/. is much more difficult and beneficial than most people give credit (see previous poster). Cmdr Taco not a social activist? C'mon, you don't think a lot of people get their DeCSS/Napster/Open Source juice from this website?
Good luck Rob. Just remember, that as long as you talk about things you know and believe, you'll do fine. No sense trying to pull off the "Cambridge" trick of trying to sound more intelligent than you actually are;-P
Close to 10 years ago, I was asked to pick 10 stocks I would hold for 30 years in a retirement investment portfolio. IBM was high on my list despite their then business problems. I took a lot of flack back then for my pick. But my reasoning then as well as my reasoning now is the same: IBM's willingness to accept as well as initiate changes. (aside: I applauded IBM's work on OS/2. It didn't work out in the end, but I still believe it was good thinking)
While popular hi-tech picks back then (MSFT,Intel) have floundered lately (basically for their inability to adapt to recent challenges to their market monopoly, whether from competitors or from government regulators), IBM has flourished, re-inventing itself yet again... this time as a leader in e-service.
I'm not surprised that IBM is putting money into Linux development in Asia. They seem not to be afraid to peek at the future and act/gamble accordingly. Clearly Linux will play a large role in information technology in the future. And Asia promises to grow even more than it has so far - this is most notably apparent in the number of Asian developers working at Silicon Valley outfits.
... Americans are losing jobs. But that giant sucking sound isn't from jobs fleeing to Mexico but rather to our computers!
I wonder when my employer is going to realize that most of MY work can be replaced by scripts and macros. Pretty soon, I guess I'll get "CGIed" out of real life!!! Anyone writing a Perl generator that scopes out popular trade presses and spits out forecasts and policy recommendations... sort of like with the Haiku project?
The author (BitMan) raises some good points. But he oversimplifies and exaggerates some of his claims.
Electric cars use upto 5 times as much fossil fuels than ICE (internal combustion engine) vehicles
In many states, hydro is the primary source of electricity generation. This includes the states in the West Coast (e.g. California, Oregon, Washington) and don't forget the TVA. Furthermore, most modern fossil-fuel generators now have Clean Air Act mandated scrubbers that make emission from these plants on the whole less than from a ICE (I think he concedes ths point). So BitMan is right in that electric cars still depend on fossil fuels... but 5 times is clearly exaggerated. I haven't seen the latest efficiency ratings for electric engines, but I doubt the usage is more than 1-2 times. Furthermore, ICE leads to emission everywhere while power plants can be concentrated. Yes, I know it's still environmentally bad... but this is what we do with refineries, right? We don't refine our gasoline locally.. rather we do most of our refining in five locations in the U.S. and then ship out the refined gas.
... not meet the power generation needs to support home charging of electrical cars if 1/4th of America was driven them. In addition, I think most Americans would take exception to a $400-500 "electrical bill" even if they did not have to fuel their vehicles elsewhere.
This is static thinking. In any reasonable economic model, demand/supply react to each other. The reason why there is not enough power plants right now is because there are not enough incentives to build more power plants. Right now, power producers benefit from occasional situations where supply > demand (leads to price spikes). But if Americans were to start consuming even more electricity, they'd build more. Too hard to sustain a "price spike collusion" with the increased profit potential from selling this expanded baseload electricity. Furthermore, the problem right now is not in electricity generation but in peak electricity generation. There's more than enough electriciy during non-peak hours to satisfy new demand from electric cars. And electricity prices during non-peak times are fairly cheap (wholesale prices are less than $25/MWh... I doubt an electric car recharge takes even 100 KW) So just recharge overnight.
Bitman raises an interesting argument for a hybrid system with merits. But his arguments relating to "where will the electricity come from" is flawed. With this type of thinking, Thomas Edison would have never begun stringing up electric street lights. Demand can and often does create its own supply.
Recently, I participated in an inteface study for google.com, where they tested out some beta features. I hate to say it, but more and more it looks like google is going portal. The feaure they tested during my session was a "web directory" that looked a whole lot like Yahoo's main page. Furthermore, in a previous session in which a friend was participating, one of the test items (though they tried to make it seem minor), were text ads that came at the top of the search results list. Thought you might be interested in these developments.
But really, I'm not complaining. They're still the best site for my search purposes (quick and reliable). Heck, they once cached a web site of mine that I didn't want be public (unfortunately, was housing the web site at a Stanford server for I swear a total of maybe 2 hours)...asked them nicely to take it off and they responded promptly. And they gave me $20, a T-shirt, some stickers, and pizza for participating in the 1 hour session! I got a (albeit very small) piece of their VC money:)
By the way, they seem to be really interested in hiring people (like most SV firms). We spent a lot of time during the study going over their recruitment links/homepage.
I think people forget about the enforcement "paranoia"... whether correct or not, many companies believe that once they stop enforcing their copyrights/trademarks on each transgression, they lose the option of enforcing them against future (and possibly more damaging) transgressions.
I've had a discussion with a member (maybe former) of the legal team at the Mickey Mouse company. Disney has a policy of going after anyone who uses Disney characters... resulting in some high profile situations where orphanages and low income day care centers were being prosecuted for hand painting Disney characters on their walls. The member's response was that many feel that selective prosecution doesn't work: if you stop prosecuting any transgression, it opens the floodgate for more transgression and greater difficulty in protecting copyrights / trademarks / licensing in later, more significant cases.
As several Slashdot posters note, old games may not be that important to Sega (I doubt even the trade secret coding aspect isn't really relevant for many of these games... C'mon, a high school kid could program Frogger in his CS class). I think at the heart of the issue is Sega's ability to defend itself in other cases, involving more pertinent technology, such as those in Sega's Dreamcast games or other new generation video games.
I'm not a lawyer so I don't know the exact justification for this "paranoia" but I'd be interested if someone in the Slashdot community can play Devil's Advocate (or maybe a straight advocate) and explain the rationality of this "paranoia." Why doesn't selective prosecution work? Is it sort of like the Tobacco litigation... basically, Tobacco companies spent so much money on each and every case because they couldn't afford to lose even a single case in fear of a precedent that could lead to a huge backlash (note present situation)? If Sega fails to prosecute these ROM swapping sites, does it create a precedent that makes it difficult for them to prosecute less innocuous swapping sites?
I went to the press release with a lot of anticipation. You see, I am one of those poor buggers known as an early investor in PALM stock.
I was hoping this new line would be promising, giving the ole stock price a bit of a jolt... so I could sell my PALM stock at a modest loss as opposed to the portfolio killer it is right now.
Alas, as most people here has noted... seems like the same old same old. I guess I'll need to keep drinking generic soda and buying cheap gas. Dinner's Taco Bell again...;-)
Woz is a very smart man, one who has designed many cool devices and one who has played a big roll in our past, but is he really that revelent today? Has he presented any new paradigms? Has he pushed new technology?
I think the above quote points out a major flaw in the thinking of many in our Geek community. There's a clear difference between what I call science and engineering... and by this I do not mean the usual technical definitions. The mis-concept is that something is worth admiring only if it has pushed the frontier... while in reality, there's a lot of value to activities that take what is at the frontier and make it more readily accessible to the common people.
The glory of Woz is not that he pushed the frontier of knowledge. Rather, he brought much of this knowledge and power to the masses. We often forget that there is a huge divide between what the few, select know and understand compared to the general public. For example, Edison was by no means a great scientist. His methods were crude and unorthodox, based on massive trial and error experiments (not what people today would call rational design). But his brilliance was that he was able to take solid scientific fundamentals and develop a tool (distributed electricity, light bulb) that could be appreciated and utilized by the society as a whole.
Similarly, Woz did not necessary develop the great paradigms or technologies (most of what was in the Apple ][ had already been developed)... he brought it together in a package that could be exploited by others.
Does Woz get too much credit... sure, he didn't single handedly build the PC. But should we still respect and hold some reverence for him? Absolutely. Not all of us can be the great frontier researchers, pushing the bounds of what we know and understand. But we can strive to do what Woz did... which is take what we do know and distribute it better to the general public.
I don't mind the long-time, pre-Internet "Revolution" people complaining about the changing landscape of the Bay Area... but I can't tolerate the so-called "noveau riche" who benefitted immensely from the Revolution (when IPOs still POPPED) and are now opponents of development projects that are necessary to sustain the economic growth in the Valley.
Case in point: Stanford University owns quite a bit of the land at the heart of Silicon Valley and was proposing to use some of it to develop new graduate student (and young faculty) housing. Presently, the university does not have enough on-campus housing spots (graduate students routinely get 'booted' off-campus) and off-campus housing is prohibitively expensive. Ironically, the biggest opposition for this new development came from people owning houses in the nearby area... a huge chunk of whom are either Stanford faculty or recently enriched Internet tycoons. Their biggest complaint? Development may harm the aesthetic and/or comercial value of their homes.
Give me a break, haven't they figured out that it was Stanford (and grudgingly give a nod to Berkeley) graduate students who helped fuel their recent gains? If they want to maintain the local boom, they had better make sure Stanford/Berkeley can keep attracting the best and brightest. Don't want to give MIT/Route 128 a chance to catch up and regain their early lead...
If you don't believe me about this disturbing trend, go to any of the trendy Silicon Valley hang-outs and eavesdrop on the conversation of many of these VC/IPO types. At one point in the evening, you'll most likely hear something like "God, the Valley is getting so tacky. We really need to constrain development..."
(This is sort of like the phenomenon observed by many sociologist of how many of the strongest proponent of strict immigration laws are the newer citizens)
Most environmentalists, especially the "casual crusader," make a common mistake: the main cause of our environmental ills is not so much our choice of technology but rather our choice of lifestyle. If we do not change what we consider an acceptable living standard, technology shifts will not matter or will be very difficult, if not impossible, to implement. Keep in mind, that the planet has much less resources than what it would take to provide 25% of the world population a living standard comparable to the U.S. "middle class."
A case in point is this obession with fuel cells. Fuel cells are technically more efficient - in that they have better thermal efficiencies (ratio between energy in fuel and output energy after processing) - but not better economic efficiency. The cost of building fuel cells are still so prohibitively high that we can't afford to replace our major fossil-fuel burning energy generators (whether electricity plants or car engines) and continue to consume our current amount of energy without a several magnitude increase in cost.
The better approach is not to moan about gasoline vs. methanol/fuel cell cars or renewable energy (solar, wind, etc.) vs. coal/gas burning electricity plants. Rather we should be talking about ways to curtail our energy consumption and change our lifestyles to be more eco-friendly. Talk about mass transportation. Talk about relying less on AC and other luxuries. Turn off that computer when you are not using it.
Also note that many of these new technologies (fuel cells included) are feasible in small scale but not large scale. So decreasing our consumption would also lead to a natural, voluntary shift (without use of govt subsidies) toward these newer, cleaner technologies.
My roommate and I subscribed for the PacBell (part of the SBC Empire) self-install DSL kit early June.
We have encountered NUMEROUS problems. We did not foresee too much difficulty as we were both computer savy, with my roommate being a PhD student in EE at a prestigious Silcon Valley / Bay Area university.
Our problems have mainly dealt with PacBell logistics - compounded by the fact the much of the total PacBell DSL service is outsourced to different outside companies. For example, PacBell (and I assume other SBC telcos) do not handle the shipping of DSL equipment themselves. Consequentially, when I received the wrong equipment, I had to call no less than 6 different phone numbers and speak to 10+ individuals until I was able to arrange a swap for the compatible equipment.
This compatibility problem could have been avoided if PacBell/SBC would just POST what equipment they use on their DSL Web Site. What is funny is that the "guidebook" that comes with the DSL self-install kit includes information on KNOWN CONFLICTS. I have no idea why they don't post this information. Would save both the customer and PacBell a lot of headaches.
They have also unilaterally changed the activation date on us. The latest news is that they plan to activate the DSL connection next week... but we're not holding our breathe.
Basically, I agree that it's not too difficult to get the PacBell/SBC DSL connection compatible with a Linux based network. But getting that initial connection can be a nightmare... people should keep in mind that you ARE dealing with a UTILITY and should expect the "quality" service you get from other utility companies.
P.S. On a related note, I've heard that people have had a better time subscribing to a non-teleco ISP for DSL service. Although technically the hardware is the same (the teleco owns the copper phone lines after all), I hear that some ISPs like Earthlink have better logistics... probably because they handle a much smaller load than PacBell (easily the largest residential DSL provider in the Bay Area)
If people really believe that we are on the brink of a "Digital Revolution"... we should replace the myths/legends of the previous analog millenia with more recent digital lore. Some suggestions:
Genesis: Instead of first there was light, why not "first there was the command line" (I know, stealing a book title)... or if we want to go even further into our analog lore... why not the first dial tone? Alexander Graham Bell and all.
David and Goliath: Rise and Fall of Bill Gates? Alternatively Napster vs. RIAA?
Exodus: Linus Torvalds/Richard Stallman and the open source movement?
Judas and his bag of silver: all the VCs trying to corrupt the idealistic hacker youths into selling out for the quick IPO buck?
You get the drift...
Or you can save the hassle and just put a link to a slashdot archive on the Rosetta Disk...
At the local Fry's (the Silicon Valley Geek supermarket), they were selling Diablo II for the astounding price of $59.99
Not sure if this is Fry's trying to rip me off or Blizzard.
But if it's Blizzard, let's consider some eerie resemblance between Diablo II and any Win XX release... Both are priced much higher than competitors (I believe most PC games sell for under $39.99) Both are released much later than their original release date Both have serious bugs that require patches that must be downloaded from the Net Both require a huge amount of Hard Drive space (I think Diablo II requires anywhere from 600 MB to 1.5 GB !!!) Both are hyped beyond belief and will no doubt fail to meet expectations Both are not much of an improvement over the previous version... just bigger with some more 'features' Both will result in the loss of much office productivity (although in the case of Diablo II, it's "voluntary" and comes with less frustrations)
I found this post amusing (and reflective of the different paths of learning taken by programmers world-wide) as the two universities with which I am associated have CS departments which encourage (in some cases require) their students to learn programming fundamentals using LISP... and I can't imagine too many languages that are more different from Visual Studio than LISP in a UNIX environment...
I guess they know what they are doing as both institutions crank out top programmers year in, year out.
Actually, the first thing I thought of when I saw the back-to-back Space articles was the Coca Cola TV commercial where a Coke bottle-shaped rocket lands and makes addicts out of the otherwise nice little green "Martians" (the commercial ends with them spelling out 'Send more')
Dang, with both water and sugar in space (and carbonation not a problem)... maybe we will become interstellar Cola pushers...
Slashdot Mirror
I think a lot of people miss a major point when they criticize the current state of patents and other intellectual property rights: there are two steps in the process, the formation / enactment of the law and the enforcement of the law.
Oftentimes, the law gets blamed when the true culprit is the enforcement. And vice versa.
Fortunately and unfortunately, the responsibility of patent enforcements in the U.S. is shared by the patent office and the federal courts. At times, error by one is corrected by the other [ e.g. an ambiguously defined patent is further refined by the courts ]. But at other times, the actions of one can undermine the other [ e.g. courts can interpret patents to cover activities never originally intended by the patent office ]
That said, I still think it's a leap to say that the "successful" enforcement of patent law this time around *necessarily* implies that the law is not broken.
I think with enough patience (especially among tech support and sysadmins), people from a wide cut of the socioeconomic spectrum will begin to use the computer and the Net on a daily basis. But there is a difference between being an active and a passive user. Let's consider the two technologies most compared to the Net/Computer in this discussion: TV and automobiles.
TV is inherently a passive technology: users are fed and there is only limited feedback from user to TV programmers. So it is not really a fair comparison to the Internet revolution, a revolution where users not only can get a lot of content but also actively participate in the shaping of the available content. I think Slashdot is a great example of this two way feedback. So talking about how the digital divide will disappear like it did for TVs is a misleading comparison. The divide will still be there if most of the 'masses' only learn to accept content from the Internet (such as check stock prices, news reports, sports scores) as opposed to build/manipulate some of the contents themselves.
As for the comparison with automobiles, this one probably has more merit as there is more of an active participation on the part of automobile consumers. But I think the divide that was crossed earlier is now widening: most people cannot fix nor truly understand how their cars work. This is especially true with modern cars that require sophisticated, specialized electronics to diagnose even the simplest of engine problems. And I think the automobile metaphor provides an important lesson: a divide that appeared to have been crossed can in the future re-widen. As more people become savvy with the current state of PC and Internet technologies ... we have to keep in mind that technology does change (especially in the PC/Internet world) and that the divide can re-appear and widen if we don't make sure people keep up.
So in summary, we need people to embrace the digital revolution as opposed to just accept it in order to close truly the divide.
Also ... am I the only person to nice this: take a look at the names of the 'Admirals' toward the casting list. Admiral Forrest. Admiral Leornard. Admiral Williams. Make the last one singular ... and don't you have the first names of the actors playing the lead charaters in the original series? I find this very suspicious.
Note: The Admiral names may be placeholders (i.e. they haven't decided on names quite yet for the ancillary character)
From my understanding of U.S laws, this is the best that companies can do, legally. Employees who leave a company can only be held liable for the cost of training; they cannot be held liable some duration of work.
I've read/studied about similar situations: legal/consulting firms paying for the MBA/JD education of their junior associates. Although the *language* of the contract sounds as though they are required to work for the firm three year after the completon of their degree, the actual essence of the contract only requires the employee to pay back the (usually pro-rated) cost of the degree to the firm, early termination of the contract by the employee. Remember, indentured servitude (even when ex ante voluntary) is illegal according to U.S. statutes. In employment contracts, only the employer can be held liable for holding up the duration of the contract (barring other justification for early termination - firing - such as detrimental behavior, slacking, etc.)
There are two issues that seem to but really do not contradict the statement above: sports contracts and H1 visas
The reason why sports contracts work is because the employers (sports team owners) have colluded together to agree that they will not offer work for employees who have broken a contract with one of the other employer in the group. The cases that brought about free agency in major sports (including European soccer) is based on the claim that this collusion violates anti-trust. Consequetially, the courts, players union, and team owners have arrived at a compromise where players get limited mobility ... but actually, many legal and economics scholars feel that this arrangement still violates anti-trust. Players unions use this during collective bargaining all the time to get more favorable terms. (Remember that Major League Baseball can get away with this because they received a sweet deal from Congress early on: anti-trust exemption)
So sports contract are a special example that does not really apply to more traditional jobs (yikes, can't believe I'm saying this about a bunch of hackers and geeks ;-) such as those in the hi-tech communiy.
As noted in /. several times, H1 visas tend to constrict the ability of the employees to move form one job to another. This of course might be seen as an informal way of contracting employees to a firm for a duration (usually until they qualify for a green card). Keep in mind that if I remember correctly, there is nothing in the H1 Visa statutes that prevent an employee from switching jobs ... just additional hassle of the new firm to arrange for a visa. This is mainly a problem with immigration, not work laws. Personally, I believe that not only should capital be allowed to cross international borders freely, but so should labor.
Not sure if this helps. But at least you might have a better undertstanding of what employers are up against when they make their employees much more valuable. I think the only way to survive is to foster a 'team' concept within the firm, make each person have a stake in the firm that is more than just her/his paycheck. Equity, of course, is one way to get at this ... but so are simple things like recognition. Don't just recognize the 'team leaders' or managers ... also recognize the 'grunts' who did a lot of the core work.
'What is human' is a very common theme in literature and science fiction. The fundamental problem in exploring this theme is the lack of contrast: at the base, all human cultures are fundamentally the same. As Noam Chomskey once wrote, all human languages would seem like the same to a Martian. The similarities in our culture/belief point to the features that make up humanity, but the lack of contrast prevent us from getting at the essence. All too often, we end up comparing outselves to animals ... and then concluding that the essence of humanity is the ability to think and reason or the presence of a 'soul'.
Consequentially, writers have used a few different 'devices' to imagine themselves a contrast. One of the earliest involves using time (Rip Van Winkle, Time Machine, Buck Rogers). By looking at how mankind changes (or rather, fails to change) over a large period of time, we can filter out some of the more superficial features of mankind and get at the essence. Here the contrast is between man now and man in the future. But obviously this does not address the fundamental lack of contrast: we are still comparing humans to humans.
The second device often used is the introduction of non-human species living together with humans. Much of the traditional Tolken-style fantasy literature falls into this category. Humanity is contrasted with elves, dwarves, and other non-human races (for sci-fi, replace them with your favorite alien beings). A good writer can imagine an altogether different species but most writers end up disguising different human traits within each race. This of course, in of itself, is not bad. It is a great way to explore different aspect of humanity. But it provides a weak contrast. All too often (especially in hack fantasy) the meaning of humanity ends up being the hackneyed idea of how mankind, faced with a short finite life, strives for greatness (the usual human vs. elf line). You know, the candle that burns the brightest urns the shortest. But I find it troubling that what defines human life lies with its mortality - this is sort of the religious angle to defining humanity.
Heinlein, in Stranger in a Strange Land, uses a modified version of the second device. He doesn't rely on a direct comparison between the human and non-human species (Martian) but rather through an intermediary. Think of it as the 'Tarzan' device: let human children grow up in a non-human environment. (I guess of Lord of the Flies also uses a similar device as well). Although I'm not a big fan of the book (my enthusiasm for ithe book wanes with every passing year), I must admit that Heinlein does a notable job contrasting mankind with a truly alien species. The fact that we think we know but truly do not know the meaning of 'grok' highlights this stark difference between our race and the Martians (a concept that is fundamental to their race, but does not have a true equivalent in ours).
Heinlein is definitely dated. So are most of the great sci-fi stories out of the 50s-70s. If you read sci-fi for the technology and for a glimpse of the future, then I suggest sticking with the new brand of hardcore sci-fi writers. However, if you are looking for an exploration of major concepts in unusual settings, I think Heinlein is not a bad choice. But in the end, remember that it's entertainment. Not gospel. Heinlein's works ends up being a little too preachy for my taste.
Call me a cynic. I'm still not fully convinced that the real story behind the recovery of the 'stolen' Enigma machine isn't some publicity stunt, perhaps gone bad.
I'd check the parent company of the Sunday Times and see if they have a financial stake in any upcoming Engima movie/book (maybe the movie mentioned in the article, the one financed by Mick Jagger's production company)
Also, I'd see if the 'nabbed Bad Guy' really gets prosecuted. If so, who supports his defense.
Then again, sometimes the truth is stranger than fiction ...
Speaking of $500 bills on the sidewalk ... there's a famous economist joke that goes as follows ...
A man walks down a street at night. He sees a famous economic theorist on his hands and knees searching for something around the streetlight. He approaches him and asks him what he's doing.
"I'm looking for my keys."
"Oh, did you drop them around here?"
"No, I actually dropped them over there"
"Then why are you looking for them here"
"Because the light is over here"
Point of the joke (before I get a karma drop): theories often developed by economists are based on convenience (especially mathematical convenience) than reality.
If you look at the formal presentation of the efficient market hypothesis (note the last word), you'll find quite a list of questionable assumptions driving the result ... and as mathematicians say, "When proving a theorem, it's the first mistake that's the killer."
By the way, the predictions by economists are not much better than those by Wall Street pundits ...
The difficulty in evaluating whether the 'bubble' has finally deflated has to do with the difficulty in distinguishing between the correlated forces giving rise to the bubble.
One of the forces is the promise of the Internet revolution. But another that is often overlooked and is just as, if not more, important is the fact that there has been a huge increase in the stock market participation of the 'average joe.' This is most apparent in the growth of mutual funds during the past 10 years.
In some sense this latter force is really a simple lesson in supply and demand. The demand in stock market investment goods went up while the supply (the stocks themselves) stayed fairly constant. Even when IPOs and new issues arrived, the resulting increase in supply was small compared to the daily growth in demand ... with a 'newbie' investor opening up a $2k IRA Account every few minutes.
So the question now is how much of the semingly high price paid for 'tech stocks' is due to an optimistic view of the impact of the Internet and how much due to simple supply and demand dynamics. If it's mainly the former, then the market still has a way to go before it's deflated, with every sign that the major 'reality check' is still in the works ... sort of like earthquakes in California, we've had a few large ones but the 'Big One'is still in the making.
But if the high stock prices are mainly due to the more straight-forward reason of supply and demand, then it looks like the market may have sufficiently deflated. The increase in demand (measured by the arrival of new, private investors) has significantly slowed down and there doesn't appear to be anymore 'hidden' sources of capital waiting to spring out and be fed into the stock market.
Lastly it should be noted that both of these forces reinforce each other. Optimism in the Internet is a major factor that motivated a lot of first-time investors to take money out of their banks and into NASDAQ. Similarly, greater funds in the market compared to places to put the funds contributed to the high tech prices, leading to even higher levels of Internet optimism.
Of course, the reverse is possible as well, with Internet pessimism dissuading the arrival of new funds and the lack of new funds creating more Internet doubt ... both of which would have disasterous effects on stock prices ...
I personally don't want any future children I may have to be playing quake 3 at 10 and 11. And if they insist it's sure as hell gonna be on a linux box =)
Better yet, let's make it into an educational experience. Don't let you kids play Q3 (or the equivalent game in the future) until they can set up their own Linux box and compile/install the game from the source!
On a more serious note, I'm happy to see the large amount of response on /. that distinguishes rights from privileges. Most people forget that while children do not have a full set of rights, they are also held responsible for only a limited set of obligations (for example, they are judged differently, more leniently, in a court of law). There is nothing inherently wrong about curtailing some access to "speech" to minors as long as the "speech" is made available once they become full fledged adult members of society.
I should say, at the same token, I find it disturbing how society (government to be exact) has begun to impose more responsibilities on children while curtailing their rights: for example, in some states in the U.S., there is a growing trend toward trying more and more kids as adults ... part of that political "get tough on crime" phenomenon. Columbine has also lead to a similar response. Curtail the children's access to potentially harmful infuences but at the same time crack down hard on potential trouble-makers in school. You can't say "kids don't know what they are doing so need to be controlled" on one hand and "kids need to be held more responsible for their actions" on the other.
I get the two mixed up ... but either he F-1 or J-1 visa comes with permission to work one year outside of the academic institution as part of "practical training."
The mistake I see a lot among friends and colleagues is that they (the potential immigrants) use up this year of practical training during the course of their study, rather than saving it until the end. I know it's very tempting, especially as a tech student in a hot high-tech community (such as S.V.), to cash in the year for some serious pocket money ... but in the long-run, life is much easier if you save the practical training.
The year of practical training can be used as a bridge between the student visa and a work visa. Despite the recent shortage, a serious employer can usually obtain a H1B for an employee if given a year. The problem (as noted in other posts above) is when employers have to scramble to get one. Remember, most people graduate at around the same time. So if you are looking for a H1B around May-June ... chances are, so are a lot of other graduates.
Avoid the possiblility of having to "sit out" of work for months or even deportation ... save the year of practical training!
I mean, let's face it - these guys aren't huge thinkers or public activists. They run (ran?) a popular website which is essentially a "gosh-gee-wiz-look-at-this" portal.
I find such comments troubling especially when it comes from a community that supposedly embraces the spirit of open source and the belief that ideas discussed in the open arena can lead to better progress. Being a member of the academic community at a prestigious West Coast university, I see this kind of mentalty all the time. People are pro-DeCSS, pro-Napster, pro-Linux ... but they get offended when members of the general Internet community who "lack" the credentials (e.g. big University diplomas, impressive titles at flashy companies/start-ups) begin spouting out their opinions and rise to prominence.
Give me a break. No one said you had to agree with what people say. But even non-Nobel laureates deserve to be heard (note the other lecturers in the series in recent weeks besides D. Adam are Nobel laureates). Now is the MIT lecture halls the proper medium? I think so. Creating and running an online phenom like /. is much more difficult and beneficial than most people give credit (see previous poster). Cmdr Taco not a social activist? C'mon, you don't think a lot of people get their DeCSS/Napster/Open Source juice from this website?
Good luck Rob. Just remember, that as long as you talk about things you know and believe, you'll do fine. No sense trying to pull off the "Cambridge" trick of trying to sound more intelligent than you actually are ;-P
Close to 10 years ago, I was asked to pick 10 stocks I would hold for 30 years in a retirement investment portfolio. IBM was high on my list despite their then business problems. I took a lot of flack back then for my pick. But my reasoning then as well as my reasoning now is the same: IBM's willingness to accept as well as initiate changes. (aside: I applauded IBM's work on OS/2. It didn't work out in the end, but I still believe it was good thinking)
While popular hi-tech picks back then (MSFT,Intel) have floundered lately (basically for their inability to adapt to recent challenges to their market monopoly, whether from competitors or from government regulators), IBM has flourished, re-inventing itself yet again ... this time as a leader in e-service.
I'm not surprised that IBM is putting money into Linux development in Asia. They seem not to be afraid to peek at the future and act/gamble accordingly. Clearly Linux will play a large role in information technology in the future. And Asia promises to grow even more than it has so far - this is most notably apparent in the number of Asian developers working at Silicon Valley outfits.
I wonder when my employer is going to realize that most of MY work can be replaced by scripts and macros. Pretty soon, I guess I'll get "CGIed" out of real life!!! Anyone writing a Perl generator that scopes out popular trade presses and spits out forecasts and policy recommendations ... sort of like with the Haiku project?
The author (BitMan) raises some good points. But he oversimplifies and exaggerates some of his claims.
Electric cars use upto 5 times as much fossil fuels than ICE (internal combustion engine) vehicles
In many states, hydro is the primary source of electricity generation. This includes the states in the West Coast (e.g. California, Oregon, Washington) and don't forget the TVA. Furthermore, most modern fossil-fuel generators now have Clean Air Act mandated scrubbers that make emission from these plants on the whole less than from a ICE (I think he concedes ths point). So BitMan is right in that electric cars still depend on fossil fuels ... but 5 times is clearly exaggerated. I haven't seen the latest efficiency ratings for electric engines, but I doubt the usage is more than 1-2 times. Furthermore, ICE leads to emission everywhere while power plants can be concentrated. Yes, I know it's still environmentally bad ... but this is what we do with refineries, right? We don't refine our gasoline locally .. rather we do most of our refining in five locations in the U.S. and then ship out the refined gas.
This is static thinking. In any reasonable economic model, demand/supply react to each other. The reason why there is not enough power plants right now is because there are not enough incentives to build more power plants. Right now, power producers benefit from occasional situations where supply > demand (leads to price spikes). But if Americans were to start consuming even more electricity, they'd build more. Too hard to sustain a "price spike collusion" with the increased profit potential from selling this expanded baseload electricity. Furthermore, the problem right now is not in electricity generation but in peak electricity generation. There's more than enough electriciy during non-peak hours to satisfy new demand from electric cars. And electricity prices during non-peak times are fairly cheap (wholesale prices are less than $25/MWh ... I doubt an electric car recharge takes even 100 KW) So just recharge overnight.
Bitman raises an interesting argument for a hybrid system with merits. But his arguments relating to "where will the electricity come from" is flawed. With this type of thinking, Thomas Edison would have never begun stringing up electric street lights. Demand can and often does create its own supply.
Recently, I participated in an inteface study for google.com, where they tested out some beta features. I hate to say it, but more and more it looks like google is going portal. The feaure they tested during my session was a "web directory" that looked a whole lot like Yahoo's main page. Furthermore, in a previous session in which a friend was participating, one of the test items (though they tried to make it seem minor), were text ads that came at the top of the search results list. Thought you might be interested in these developments.
But really, I'm not complaining. They're still the best site for my search purposes (quick and reliable). Heck, they once cached a web site of mine that I didn't want be public (unfortunately, was housing the web site at a Stanford server for I swear a total of maybe 2 hours) .. .asked them nicely to take it off and they responded promptly. And they gave me $20, a T-shirt, some stickers, and pizza for participating in the 1 hour session! I got a (albeit very small) piece of their VC money :)
By the way, they seem to be really interested in hiring people (like most SV firms). We spent a lot of time during the study going over their recruitment links/homepage.
I think people forget about the enforcement "paranoia" ... whether correct or not, many companies believe that once they stop enforcing their copyrights/trademarks on each transgression, they lose the option of enforcing them against future (and possibly more damaging) transgressions.
I've had a discussion with a member (maybe former) of the legal team at the Mickey Mouse company. Disney has a policy of going after anyone who uses Disney characters ... resulting in some high profile situations where orphanages and low income day care centers were being prosecuted for hand painting Disney characters on their walls. The member's response was that many feel that selective prosecution doesn't work: if you stop prosecuting any transgression, it opens the floodgate for more transgression and greater difficulty in protecting copyrights / trademarks / licensing in later, more significant cases.
As several Slashdot posters note, old games may not be that important to Sega (I doubt even the trade secret coding aspect isn't really relevant for many of these games ... C'mon, a high school kid could program Frogger in his CS class). I think at the heart of the issue is Sega's ability to defend itself in other cases, involving more pertinent technology, such as those in Sega's Dreamcast games or other new generation video games.
I'm not a lawyer so I don't know the exact justification for this "paranoia" but I'd be interested if someone in the Slashdot community can play Devil's Advocate (or maybe a straight advocate) and explain the rationality of this "paranoia." Why doesn't selective prosecution work? Is it sort of like the Tobacco litigation ... basically, Tobacco companies spent so much money on each and every case because they couldn't afford to lose even a single case in fear of a precedent that could lead to a huge backlash (note present situation)? If Sega fails to prosecute these ROM swapping sites, does it create a precedent that makes it difficult for them to prosecute less innocuous swapping sites?
I went to the press release with a lot of anticipation. You see, I am one of those poor buggers known as an early investor in PALM stock.
I was hoping this new line would be promising, giving the ole stock price a bit of a jolt ... so I could sell my PALM stock at a modest loss as opposed to the portfolio killer it is right now.
Alas, as most people here has noted ... seems like the same old same old. I guess I'll need to keep drinking generic soda and buying cheap gas. Dinner's Taco Bell again ... ;-)
Woz is a very smart man, one who has designed many cool devices and one who has played a big roll in our past, but is he really that revelent today? Has he presented any new paradigms? Has he pushed new technology?
I think the above quote points out a major flaw in the thinking of many in our Geek community. There's a clear difference between what I call science and engineering ... and by this I do not mean the usual technical definitions. The mis-concept is that something is worth admiring only if it has pushed the frontier ... while in reality, there's a lot of value to activities that take what is at the frontier and make it more readily accessible to the common people.
The glory of Woz is not that he pushed the frontier of knowledge. Rather, he brought much of this knowledge and power to the masses. We often forget that there is a huge divide between what the few, select know and understand compared to the general public. For example, Edison was by no means a great scientist. His methods were crude and unorthodox, based on massive trial and error experiments (not what people today would call rational design). But his brilliance was that he was able to take solid scientific fundamentals and develop a tool (distributed electricity, light bulb) that could be appreciated and utilized by the society as a whole.
Similarly, Woz did not necessary develop the great paradigms or technologies (most of what was in the Apple ][ had already been developed) ... he brought it together in a package that could be exploited by others.
Does Woz get too much credit ... sure, he didn't single handedly build the PC. But should we still respect and hold some reverence for him? Absolutely. Not all of us can be the great frontier researchers, pushing the bounds of what we know and understand. But we can strive to do what Woz did ... which is take what we do know and distribute it better to the general public.
I don't mind the long-time, pre-Internet "Revolution" people complaining about the changing landscape of the Bay Area ... but I can't tolerate the so-called "noveau riche" who benefitted immensely from the Revolution (when IPOs still POPPED) and are now opponents of development projects that are necessary to sustain the economic growth in the Valley.
Case in point: Stanford University owns quite a bit of the land at the heart of Silicon Valley and was proposing to use some of it to develop new graduate student (and young faculty) housing. Presently, the university does not have enough on-campus housing spots (graduate students routinely get 'booted' off-campus) and off-campus housing is prohibitively expensive. Ironically, the biggest opposition for this new development came from people owning houses in the nearby area ... a huge chunk of whom are either Stanford faculty or recently enriched Internet tycoons. Their biggest complaint? Development may harm the aesthetic and/or comercial value of their homes.
Give me a break, haven't they figured out that it was Stanford (and grudgingly give a nod to Berkeley) graduate students who helped fuel their recent gains? If they want to maintain the local boom, they had better make sure Stanford/Berkeley can keep attracting the best and brightest. Don't want to give MIT/Route 128 a chance to catch up and regain their early lead ...
If you don't believe me about this disturbing trend, go to any of the trendy Silicon Valley hang-outs and eavesdrop on the conversation of many of these VC/IPO types. At one point in the evening, you'll most likely hear something like "God, the Valley is getting so tacky. We really need to constrain development ..."
(This is sort of like the phenomenon observed by many sociologist of how many of the strongest proponent of strict immigration laws are the newer citizens)
Most environmentalists, especially the "casual crusader," make a common mistake: the main cause of our environmental ills is not so much our choice of technology but rather our choice of lifestyle. If we do not change what we consider an acceptable living standard, technology shifts will not matter or will be very difficult, if not impossible, to implement. Keep in mind, that the planet has much less resources than what it would take to provide 25% of the world population a living standard comparable to the U.S. "middle class."
A case in point is this obession with fuel cells. Fuel cells are technically more efficient - in that they have better thermal efficiencies (ratio between energy in fuel and output energy after processing) - but not better economic efficiency. The cost of building fuel cells are still so prohibitively high that we can't afford to replace our major fossil-fuel burning energy generators (whether electricity plants or car engines) and continue to consume our current amount of energy without a several magnitude increase in cost.
The better approach is not to moan about gasoline vs. methanol/fuel cell cars or renewable energy (solar, wind, etc.) vs. coal/gas burning electricity plants. Rather we should be talking about ways to curtail our energy consumption and change our lifestyles to be more eco-friendly. Talk about mass transportation. Talk about relying less on AC and other luxuries. Turn off that computer when you are not using it.
Also note that many of these new technologies (fuel cells included) are feasible in small scale but not large scale. So decreasing our consumption would also lead to a natural, voluntary shift (without use of govt subsidies) toward these newer, cleaner technologies.
My roommate and I subscribed for the PacBell (part of the SBC Empire) self-install DSL kit early June.
We have encountered NUMEROUS problems. We did not foresee too much difficulty as we were both computer savy, with my roommate being a PhD student in EE at a prestigious Silcon Valley / Bay Area university.
Our problems have mainly dealt with PacBell logistics - compounded by the fact the much of the total PacBell DSL service is outsourced to different outside companies. For example, PacBell (and I assume other SBC telcos) do not handle the shipping of DSL equipment themselves. Consequentially, when I received the wrong equipment, I had to call no less than 6 different phone numbers and speak to 10+ individuals until I was able to arrange a swap for the compatible equipment.
This compatibility problem could have been avoided if PacBell/SBC would just POST what equipment they use on their DSL Web Site. What is funny is that the "guidebook" that comes with the DSL self-install kit includes information on KNOWN CONFLICTS. I have no idea why they don't post this information. Would save both the customer and PacBell a lot of headaches.
They have also unilaterally changed the activation date on us. The latest news is that they plan to activate the DSL connection next week ... but we're not holding our breathe.
Basically, I agree that it's not too difficult to get the PacBell/SBC DSL connection compatible with a Linux based network. But getting that initial connection can be a nightmare ... people should keep in mind that you ARE dealing with a UTILITY and should expect the "quality" service you get from other utility companies.
P.S. On a related note, I've heard that people have had a better time subscribing to a non-teleco ISP for DSL service. Although technically the hardware is the same (the teleco owns the copper phone lines after all), I hear that some ISPs like Earthlink have better logistics ... probably because they handle a much smaller load than PacBell (easily the largest residential DSL provider in the Bay Area)
If people really believe that we are on the brink of a "Digital Revolution" ... we should replace the myths/legends of the previous analog millenia with more recent digital lore. Some suggestions:
Genesis: Instead of first there was light, why not "first there was the command line" (I know, stealing a book title) ... or if we want to go even further into our analog lore ... why not the first dial tone? Alexander Graham Bell and all.
David and Goliath: Rise and Fall of Bill Gates? Alternatively Napster vs. RIAA?
Exodus: Linus Torvalds/Richard Stallman and the open source movement?
Judas and his bag of silver: all the VCs trying to corrupt the idealistic hacker youths into selling out for the quick IPO buck?
You get the drift ...
Or you can save the hassle and just put a link to a slashdot archive on the Rosetta Disk ...
At the local Fry's (the Silicon Valley Geek supermarket), they were selling Diablo II for the astounding price of $59.99
Not sure if this is Fry's trying to rip me off or Blizzard.
But if it's Blizzard, let's consider some eerie resemblance between Diablo II and any Win XX release ... Both are priced much higher than competitors (I believe most PC games sell for under $39.99) Both are released much later than their original release date Both have serious bugs that require patches that must be downloaded from the Net Both require a huge amount of Hard Drive space (I think Diablo II requires anywhere from 600 MB to 1.5 GB !!!) Both are hyped beyond belief and will no doubt fail to meet expectations Both are not much of an improvement over the previous version ... just bigger with some more 'features' Both will result in the loss of much office productivity (although in the case of Diablo II, it's "voluntary" and comes with less frustrations)
Maybe there are more similarities?
I found this post amusing (and reflective of the different paths of learning taken by programmers world-wide) as the two universities with which I am associated have CS departments which encourage (in some cases require) their students to learn programming fundamentals using LISP ... and I can't imagine too many languages that are more different from Visual Studio than LISP in a UNIX environment ...
I guess they know what they are doing as both institutions crank out top programmers year in, year out.
Actually, the first thing I thought of when I saw the back-to-back Space articles was the Coca Cola TV commercial where a Coke bottle-shaped rocket lands and makes addicts out of the otherwise nice little green "Martians" (the commercial ends with them spelling out 'Send more')
Dang, with both water and sugar in space (and carbonation not a problem) ... maybe we will become interstellar Cola pushers ...