Your English is much worse than the article. You get an F.
"Judgement" may be in online dictionaries, but it is a variant of "judgment" and is (or at least used to be when I received my Bachelor's in English from the University of Michigan a few years ago) *wrong*. Ask any English teacher.
I never said "network" should be capitalized. I said it was spelled incorrectly with two e's (ie, "netwerk") see my post instead of making things up, thanks.
If you want to translate something poorly, don't post it on Slashdot unless you are prepared for criticism. Sort of the same way you don't run for President of the United States if you're George Dubya unless you want flash movies making fun of your speech fuckups all over the internet.
I applaud those that are fluent in more than one language. It's a worthy skill to have. However, in this forum, I am free to critique the articles presented. This site is obviously an English site. Deal with it.
Hey, you can use four letter words in a semi public venue and not get spanked by daddy. Hooray for you!
When an article is referenced on Slashdot, that article is up for critique and discussion. That is what I did. Or are you part of the Slashdot staff now and giving orders about what kind of discussion may or may not take place in response to article postings?
I believe this definition to be a response to public usage. Languages do evolve over time; when I was in school, however, judgEment was *NOT* acceptable.
While informative, my brief read-through of the article revealed numerous typos or spelling mistakes. The pictures and research here is cheapened by the lack of proper editing and proofreading.
Samples from TFA:
"...caused by differences in I/O processor and I/O controller performance, cache memory, available bus bandwidth etcetera."
If you're not going to use the traditional abbreviation "etc." at least use it properly; "et cetera."
"You can't make judgements by simply..."
Judgment is spelled with one "e".
"Thanks to the onboard network connection, the management software can be directly available over the netwerk withough the help of server-side software."
"Network" and "without" are both misspelled, in the same sentence.
"It can be considered quite and achievement that..."
"And" instead of "an". A common typo, easily rectified with proofreading.
These typos/misspellings are all on the last page of the review. I could go back through the review and find more, but I think this sampling is enough to testify to the poor standards applied to this article.
"I'm to the point where I rarely even look at non-HD channels in the channel guide, let alone want to watch them. On a 100" screen, it's just too painful to watch SD most of the time."
I can sympathize heartily with this sentiment. I have a 65" HDTV and SD format is just "tolerable", especially with the horrible quality of some of the SD shows on TWC cable. (Sci Fi channel is ugly, and the new Battlestar Galactica is the only show I record in SD.)
I loved my TiVo, but it doesn't do HDTV. Hello, Scientific Atlanta 8000HD (Time Warner cable). It's a poor alternative to the TiVo interface, but it does HD. It's worth suffering through the poor interface for that, and it does HD recordings very well usually. I've already had to replace it once because of a failed hard drive (free, same-day replacement via TWC buttcrack thanks to someone else's cancellation). Plus it has two tuners, which has come in handy at times.
If an HD TiVo (standalone, not satellite) came out (yes I'm aware there was a demo unit, but no official announcement), I would look at it very hard before buying, however. The cost would be high for those 1st gen boxes.
As a child, I used to watch too much television, but books and computers are for more interesting in the long haul.
The heroin is when you sit down in the evening after work and watch whatever random stuff on television that happens to be on. Your brain atrophies. The television takes away all of your needs to be creative and make choices beyond which channel to watch.
I have a 65" HDTV. I love it. But I still only watch it, on average, an hour a day.
There *are* lots of good shows out there, entertaining and intelligent fiction and documentaries (Discovery in HD makes me swoon). Mostly we watch DVDs. The rest of the time we watch recorded shows on my HD PVR (Scientific Atlanta 8000HD, Time Warner cable.) If it weren't for the PVR, I wouldn't even need the television part of the cable because I never watch live broadcast. My fiancee and I enjoy being able to sit down when we feel like watching the tube, call up a list of the recorded episodes of the shows we like, and pick one.
You are right, there are a lot of insights to be gained by the discussion of this topic. They might help people who are considering their careers. But you know what? There are several previous articles on Slashdot about this exact same topic, with all that good advice all ready and waiting to be read! It makes me all warm inside just thinking about it.
Yeah, it would be insightful, had this same question not been asked a dozen times in the past year on Slashdot. Oh yeah, I forgot -- Slashdot is a broken record and it's OK to repost the same tired themes every month, or in some cases, 2-3 times a week. Because the market changes THAT QUICKLY, and so do the authoritative answers to a question of morality that HAS NO DEFINITIVE ANSWER.
Dear Slashdot, should I go all the way with Mary Jane? I hear she's a slut.
If these Slashdot guys want to pay me $100k a year, I'll take over as editor and make sure these repeats don't happen. Until then... sarcasm is just one of the many fine services I offer.
I can probably fix that shitty rendering error in Firefox too. WTF?
Like every other company out there that doesn't have some whacko with deep pockets and a scary secret agenda, they care about MONEY.
Period. They don't care about oil, or energy, or batteries, or patents. They care about MONEY. The bottom line is EVERYTHING. It's a company with investors and a board of directors or whatever that reviews the actions of the company and whether it is PROFITABLE and how to keep it that way.
When I first got into the ISP field, I was a phone monkey, tech support. I got the sick to my stomach feeling at first because it was a lot of pressure to learn how to troubleshoot the stuff by the seat of your pants while you're on the phone with the customer, and I never was a "people" person.
But, after a few weeks I became more comfortable with it. Eventually I got promoted out of the NOC and I began work as a network engineer... then I started looking forward to Monday morning because I liked the people I worked with, and I enjoyed my job.
Since then I've changed jobs a few times because the damn companies keep going out of business. Now my job is on the slightly negative side. I don't enjoy it; doing my work doesn't give me a thrill. It's a dream job by most people's standards (telecommuting) but it's *boring*.
I'm getting the itch to go back to work for a startup...
Obviously your moral standards are at issue here, and everyone has their own moral standards.
Would you be a prostitute? A pimp? Con man? Work at Microsoft? Work for Wal Mart? Be a lawyer? Defense attorney? Personal injury? Prosecution? Cop? Surgeon? Social worker?
Who you work for, what work you have to do, who you have to work with... these are all fundamental questions that every person in the freaking world has to ask themselves every time they look for work, and every day they go to work. The fact that you are a programmer has absolutely zero fucking relevance, except with regards to the current IT industry job market. And you know what? Special delivery from Obvious Express: IT SUCKS. Of course, with motivation, luck, (perhaps a bit of nepotism) and an excellent resume you can get a job in any big city. DUH!
Welcome to Ethics 101 and Job Finding 101, where your host is Slashdot and we can discuss sophomoric morality questions and how the current job market in IT sucks!
Later today: Does God exist? What OS would He use?
I can see how the contest would still be a positive thing; a lot of "indie artists" as you say are still getting their 15 minutes by being included in the list of comics that is available from the page... and perhaps the participation of the "pro and semi pro" folks will boost the readership of the independents.
Maybe in the end that would be a bigger boon to the independent artist community than the possible loss of camraderie and motivation the pro/semipros bring to the table.
Shouldn't the point of a contest like this be to spur webcomic artists to produce reliably so that they can become more prolific, not to put cash in the pocket of someone who has already shown he can put out a strip a day on a regular basis?
Why would a webcomic artist who has already shown himself able to produce one comic a day for the past several years (even if it's not up until 6pm) enter into a contest like this?
The point is to provide a challenge and provide competition. For people who have already proven themselves in this arena, they are merely making it psychologically impossible for the intended audience to participate and hope to win. Someone who *just might* graduate to the next level of comic production may have decided to make the plunge and make a living at it. But with people in the competition who have already shown they can do it, how many people are going to drop out just because they know that they won't be able to compete in the very long run that this contest will inevitably go to?
I think it's a bit sad when people who are already making a living at webcomics decide to get involved in a contest that's obviously not aimed at them.
No, I didn't go to the site sponsoring the competition. If they intended these "semi pro's" to participate, he's scamming a sizeable loan out of a lot of people. If they didn't intend them to participate, it obviously wasn't stated in the rules. If they didn't even think about it, they're shortsighted.
Since Enterprise takes place historically EARLIER than TOS, why would you expect it to be the perfect future society?
The Federation is something that evolves over time. It obviously didn't start out as some Utopian dream, but it started somewhere. We're seeing a budding Federation and we're seeing a the precursor to TOS. TOS, where Kirk cheated on his test, fought, and brawled. Where his engineer drank real liquor instead of synthahol. Where Spock was discriminated against because of his race. Where rules were broken and wars were fought.
We should expect Enterprise to land, in terms of human progress, somewhere between modern day and TOS, and to encounter and address issues that people of the TOS period had already overcome.
IANAF (I Am Not A Father) but I'm an average male, 18 to 35. Do I want to be able to watch what I want to watch on television? Hell, yes.
Do I want kiddie porn being sold on every corner? No way!
** Keep adult materials out of any venue that a child can be expected to be frequenting without adult supervision. **
Now, my definition of adult materials is assuredly different from someone else's. I think the human body is natural and beautiful (well, except for ugly fat people, but they're still natural), and it does not harm a child to see a naked woman or naked man, in a non-sexually explicit act. (That means I also do not believe a sexually aroused man with an erect penis is not acceptable for a public venue where there may be children).
I think all modern televisions have the V-chip, yes? All cable boxes that I've seen also have select channel lockout as well. If some repressed Christian with guilt issues wants to make nudity a Mature only setting, fine. If they want to label "hell" and "bitch" and "damn" as profanity, fine.
Just leave the filter off when I buy my television and order my cable box. I'm an adult, I will view what I want. If I find watersports objectionable to my personal taste, I will not watch it. If I have relatives with small children visiting, I will block out any adult materials for the duration of their stay.
How hard is it to define levels? Something like;
- Mild language (dammit, hell) - Mild violence (head-bonking, wrestling, kicking) - "French" kissing/soul kissing - Topless nudity - Bottomless nudity - Medium violence (punching, weapons, kung fu, blood, simple wounds) - Profane language without sexual connotations (god damn, shit, piss, bitch, fuck, asshole, dick -- used as namecalling, not as requests or as descriptions of a sexual act) (I guarantee you this is already in 95% of homes with children anyway) - Extreme violence (realistic wounds, gaping wounds, battering, decapitation, amputation, ripping, sexually-related abuse) - Sexually explicit language (fuck you, go fuck yourself, suck my dick, lick my balls you cunt whore, etc.) - Sexually-charged scenes (non-genital rubbing, implications of nudity, and post- or pre-coital setup) - Sexually implicit scenes (rubbing crotches, feeling breasts, clothed sexual maneuverings or bodies engaged in obviously sexual activity, but hidden) - Sexually explicit scenes (sexual scenes with nudity, but no actual display of penetration or contact with genitals -- ie, Cinemax after dark) - Hardcore sexually explicit scenes (shows genital contact, ejaculation, penetration, oral sexual stimulation)
I think these are all things that most people would agree to cover 99% of the cases where an adult may want to censor what a child sees, and children of various ages are considered "old enough" to view these materials. Consider popular movies that involve some extreme violence (per my chart) yet it is more acceptable than a naked woman for some fucked up reason.
Regardless, these language, violence, and sexual guidelines can be mixed and matched in real life, to match the maturity of the child. The parent makes these choices every time they decide on a movie their child should or should not watch. The V-chip and/or television/movie listings should be as thorough. If they aren't, why are you letting your child watch these things without personally checking them out?
Label it what you want; come to a sensible, reasonable agreement as to what labels go on what materials, and then assign the filter mechanisms appropriately. Parents have the burden to filter what is in their homes. Filter your cable, filter your internet.
According to some statistics I just Asked Jeeves for, 26% of the population is 18 and under. That's a sizeable number of non-adults to watch out for, and I can understand a parent's concern if they don't want their children to listen to swearing and see nudity and sexual situations before they are mature enough to
I recently purchased the DVD version of the BBC's television production of HHGTTG. I would say to anyone who loved the books and intends to see this new film, be prepared for changes. Adams liked to tweak things, and according to what I saw on the DVD, the books have been revised and changed over time as Adams fiddled with bits here and there to refine them.
The background information about the making of the series, and about Douglas Adams is fascinating. It reveals some of Adams' manic-depressive personality. It talks about how Adams was not one to write a book and then want to translate that 100% to another format; he welcomed change and refinement with the TV series, and based on what I saw in the interviews, I think he enjoyed the opportunity to revise and rewrite HHGTTG yet again on the big screen.
Adams' only problem, according to the interviews and behind the scenes information, was an awful writer's block at the start of any project. The infamous line about loving deadlines, especially the sound they make as they go whooshing by, was very true for Adams personally.
Adams was a performer; he didn't really want to be a writer. He started out performing, acting, doing live comedy. At least with writing, his particular quirky sense of humor reached many thousands of people who revere him for what he accomplished, personal foibles aside.
If you saw the BBC series, Adams was featured in two different spots. One, he was in a suit counting money while walking out of the bank. The other, he was throwing his money away and walking into the water naked.
I don't begrudge the selling of accounts or in-game items. I think that if someone wants to leave a game and get rid of their in-game resources and make a few bucks, that's cool.
The problem arises when people make this a full-time job. They create new accounts or acquire them, then strip them or build them up, then sell them. One person sits in his room with 12 computers all running a program called MacroQuest farming high level items.
When this happens, the game is flooded by materials churned out at a rate much higher than would naturally occur, and the in-game economy suffers.
Although I can't recall if Ford's color was ever mentioned in the books, I've always envisioned him as a pasty white British fellow just because that's the stereotypical Brit from TV and movies. Is Guildford a city with a higher than average black population?
Really, it shouldn't matter. As long as he has a British accent and acts well, who cares?
Personally, however, I really don't have high expectations for the movie. When I saw that Marvin was going to have a huge globe for a head, I thought that someone with a very literal imagination had read the books and immediately equated a large brain with a huge globular cranium. On a robot, a big brain doesn't have to be located above the shoulders. None of the descriptive text in the books refers to a huge head on Marvin, and the pictures I saw were of a grossly-exaggerated head. Anything that key would have been mentioned.
I've just recently finished watching the BBC's DVD version of HHGTTG, and I enjoyed it for the most part, even though it didn't have a lot of redeeming qualities, technically. Sets were extremely rough and cheesy. Trillian was a whiny, nasal exhibitionist with too much makeup. Zaphod and Ford were overacted. Arthur was tolerably well done, but seemed out of place among the other actors. Marvin's voice could have used some adjusting. The graphics representing the Guide pages were horrible, but I suppose representative of graphical effects of the time.
The film rushes through some of the explanations too fast, and a lot of detail is glossed over -- the twists of logic, puns, and wealth of sarcasm and irony in the book are too hilarious to miss out on, so please read the book(s).
To me, Anne Rice writes with a very sensual, rich style. Reading most Anne Rice novels, you have to get into what the author is describing, you have to feel the velvet, drink the wine, smear the warm blood on your hands... all in your imagination, of course. And the book was much better than the movie.
I have no idea what that specific translation is like, but her vampire series is very successful commercially, and I personally enjoyed them very much. And yes, I would agree they have a baroque feel to them.
Her Mayfair books, however, were very disappointing to me. A failed attmept to regain the glory of the vampire novels, long after they ran out of steam and were being written for money alone. After Queen of the Damned, there was no reason for her to keep writing them. They had some interesting ideas, but those ideas should have been explored with new characters instead of her trying to graft them onto a successful series.
Did you know she wrote pornography under the name Anne Rampling? Google for it. Torrid stuff, not very good compared to real novels, but I guess interesting if you're into smut books.
There's nothing revolutionary about that camera, however.
The big deal about the parent article is that (1) it's supposed to be Linux, and (2) it's the size of a deck of cards.
If you need to take video clips, and you're not too inconvenienced by having to carry around lots of proprietary memory sticks, that's fine. But this machine fails two important checks for me:
1. No high resolution photo mode. Photos are 800x600. Crap. There's GOT to be a way to have a decent "high resolution" video mode (720x480) AND a 3+ megapixel camera on the same housing.
2. Memory stick. Who cares about memory sticks? They're more expensive and less ubiquitous than SD or CF. I'll pass.
This combined with the high price tag make this a sure loser. I would really like to replace my 4mp camera with 8x optical zoom with something that can also record movies at a decent resolution, but this device isn't it. Yet. Maybe next year.
Ethics is a subject that by its very nature is open to individual interpretation. The "mob" decides what is acceptable by objecting en masse or not objecting strongly enough. Whatever can be done without a public outcry will usually be done. Science is very political.
Now, above and beyond the general public, there is the scientific community. They are comprised of the same people as "the mob" but they are *on the average* more sophisticated and educated about the alternatives and professional ethics in their fields.
Religious folks who believe in a God that created people and sets them apart from animals think that there is something sacred about humanity.
Non-relgious folks don't think there is anything better than the Greater Good and Individual Rights, although these two things are at odds with each other. (I am capitalizing these ideas to illustrate that I am discussing the grand idealized versions of these concepts.)
For example, if you could take 100 people and experiment on them and cure cancer, would you do it? Pure logic says that over time you will save millions of lives. Aren't the lives of millions worth the lives of 100? Surely this is for the best. The rights of the individual, however, is part of our self preservation, and speaks up and says, "Hey, every person has the right to live and not be harmed by others as long as he has not harmed others."
Aside from these basic ethical points, everything else is a subjective mess. Should animals be tortured by excruciating experiments that could save lives? Should human cells be mixed with animal cells? There is no right anwer to these questions because there are no absolutes in Ethics. The only concrete thing you can point to with Ethics is the "greater good." Anything else is soap opera drama.
I'm not saying that we should start imprisoning people and doing mass unrestricted testing; far from it -- I personally believe strongly in individual freedom. I'm saying that no matter what your arguments, there'll be holes in it because it's about Feelings, not logic.
But, I'm just pointing out that 99.9% of the drivel posted in this forum is subjective bullshit that can be argued for a thousand years with no final arbiter in sight.
Oh, there are a few good points in among the crap here. The person who suggested that chimera could pose a threat by becoming a bridge vector for animal diseases to the human body. Excellent point.
The opposite side of that coin should be considered as well. If pigs get some extremely virulent disease and we have hogocide, we could lose out on some tasty BLTs in the future. It reduces our menu options, and we lose species variety in our biosphere, both obviously negative factors regardless of ethics.
The reason the original Trek and subsequent Treks and other television series utilize broad strokes of a given human ( emotion / trait / vice / virtue ) is so that we can look at that portion of ourselves under a microscope and think about it.
For example, the black/white white/black races that are at war in TOS were a very simple way to say to the audience, "Racism is stupid and arbitrary." The Ferengi race is a way to look at greedy people and say, "Look at these people; pursuing wealth to the exclusion of all else is bad and turns you into a big rat."
Every two dimensional character or alien race is an opportunity for the writers to hit the unsubtle audience over the head with the morality stick.
Fortunately there were more subtle nuances to these series as well. But that's another post. The point is, writers have to write for an audience composed of different tastes and levels of sophistication.
Personally, when I saw that scene, I instantly thought that this was foreshadowing of an incident in a future episode where knowledge of her cancer will become known, and we will wonder who spilled the beans. It is inevtiable that it will get out.
But -- will we get a miracle cure? A remission? Or her death, on schedule?
I think a temporary remission with her operating with slightly impaired faculties would be the best opportunity for drama.
Wouldn't it be funny if the terrorist/freedom fighter guy (I forget his name and don't want to go look it up, but the one from "Water" played by the old Apollo) was elected president?
Personally I believe many of these "deviant" behaviors aren't "learned" so much as attempts by the participant to experience a sexual "high".
Some people become bored with what we would call "normal" sex, and do something different in order to get more of a sexual rush. Like a drug user becomes more tolerant of drug dosages, a sexual "deviant" needs to do things differently in order to enhance the experience and make it more intense.
Slashdot Mirror
Your English is much worse than the article. You get an F.
"Judgement" may be in online dictionaries, but it is a variant of "judgment" and is (or at least used to be when I received my Bachelor's in English from the University of Michigan a few years ago) *wrong*. Ask any English teacher.
I never said "network" should be capitalized. I said it was spelled incorrectly with two e's (ie, "netwerk") see my post instead of making things up, thanks.
If you want to translate something poorly, don't post it on Slashdot unless you are prepared for criticism. Sort of the same way you don't run for President of the United States if you're George Dubya unless you want flash movies making fun of your speech fuckups all over the internet.
I applaud those that are fluent in more than one language. It's a worthy skill to have. However, in this forum, I am free to critique the articles presented. This site is obviously an English site. Deal with it.
Hey, you can use four letter words in a semi public venue and not get spanked by daddy. Hooray for you!
When an article is referenced on Slashdot, that article is up for critique and discussion. That is what I did. Or are you part of the Slashdot staff now and giving orders about what kind of discussion may or may not take place in response to article postings?
Dumbass.
I believe this definition to be a response to public usage. Languages do evolve over time; when I was in school, however, judgEment was *NOT* acceptable.
While informative, my brief read-through of the article revealed numerous typos or spelling mistakes. The pictures and research here is cheapened by the lack of proper editing and proofreading.
Samples from TFA:
"...caused by differences in I/O processor and I/O controller performance, cache memory, available bus bandwidth etcetera."
If you're not going to use the traditional abbreviation "etc." at least use it properly; "et cetera."
"You can't make judgements by simply..."
Judgment is spelled with one "e".
"Thanks to the onboard network connection, the management software can be directly available over the netwerk withough the help of server-side software."
"Network" and "without" are both misspelled, in the same sentence.
"It can be considered quite and achievement that..."
"And" instead of "an". A common typo, easily rectified with proofreading.
These typos/misspellings are all on the last page of the review. I could go back through the review and find more, but I think this sampling is enough to testify to the poor standards applied to this article.
Funny. To paraphrase a popular sig around here, *real* directors don't just preserve their films; they let other people mirror them via BitTorrent.
"I'm to the point where I rarely even look at non-HD channels in the channel guide, let alone want to watch them. On a 100" screen, it's just too painful to watch SD most of the time."
I can sympathize heartily with this sentiment. I have a 65" HDTV and SD format is just "tolerable", especially with the horrible quality of some of the SD shows on TWC cable. (Sci Fi channel is ugly, and the new Battlestar Galactica is the only show I record in SD.)
I loved my TiVo, but it doesn't do HDTV. Hello, Scientific Atlanta 8000HD (Time Warner cable). It's a poor alternative to the TiVo interface, but it does HD. It's worth suffering through the poor interface for that, and it does HD recordings very well usually. I've already had to replace it once because of a failed hard drive (free, same-day replacement via TWC buttcrack thanks to someone else's cancellation). Plus it has two tuners, which has come in handy at times.
If an HD TiVo (standalone, not satellite) came out (yes I'm aware there was a demo unit, but no official announcement), I would look at it very hard before buying, however. The cost would be high for those 1st gen boxes.
As a child, I used to watch too much television, but books and computers are for more interesting in the long haul.
The heroin is when you sit down in the evening after work and watch whatever random stuff on television that happens to be on. Your brain atrophies. The television takes away all of your needs to be creative and make choices beyond which channel to watch.
I have a 65" HDTV. I love it. But I still only watch it, on average, an hour a day.
There *are* lots of good shows out there, entertaining and intelligent fiction and documentaries (Discovery in HD makes me swoon). Mostly we watch DVDs. The rest of the time we watch recorded shows on my HD PVR (Scientific Atlanta 8000HD, Time Warner cable.) If it weren't for the PVR, I wouldn't even need the television part of the cable because I never watch live broadcast. My fiancee and I enjoy being able to sit down when we feel like watching the tube, call up a list of the recorded episodes of the shows we like, and pick one.
I've been trolled! I feel so special.
You are right, there are a lot of insights to be gained by the discussion of this topic. They might help people who are considering their careers. But you know what? There are several previous articles on Slashdot about this exact same topic, with all that good advice all ready and waiting to be read! It makes me all warm inside just thinking about it.
Yeah, it would be insightful, had this same question not been asked a dozen times in the past year on Slashdot. Oh yeah, I forgot -- Slashdot is a broken record and it's OK to repost the same tired themes every month, or in some cases, 2-3 times a week. Because the market changes THAT QUICKLY, and so do the authoritative answers to a question of morality that HAS NO DEFINITIVE ANSWER.
Dear Slashdot, should I go all the way with Mary Jane? I hear she's a slut.
If these Slashdot guys want to pay me $100k a year, I'll take over as editor and make sure these repeats don't happen. Until then... sarcasm is just one of the many fine services I offer.
I can probably fix that shitty rendering error in Firefox too. WTF?
No, they don't care about energy.
Like every other company out there that doesn't have some whacko with deep pockets and a scary secret agenda, they care about MONEY.
Period. They don't care about oil, or energy, or batteries, or patents. They care about MONEY. The bottom line is EVERYTHING. It's a company with investors and a board of directors or whatever that reviews the actions of the company and whether it is PROFITABLE and how to keep it that way.
Well, not always. There is an exception.
When I first got into the ISP field, I was a phone monkey, tech support. I got the sick to my stomach feeling at first because it was a lot of pressure to learn how to troubleshoot the stuff by the seat of your pants while you're on the phone with the customer, and I never was a "people" person.
But, after a few weeks I became more comfortable with it. Eventually I got promoted out of the NOC and I began work as a network engineer... then I started looking forward to Monday morning because I liked the people I worked with, and I enjoyed my job.
Since then I've changed jobs a few times because the damn companies keep going out of business. Now my job is on the slightly negative side. I don't enjoy it; doing my work doesn't give me a thrill. It's a dream job by most people's standards (telecommuting) but it's *boring*.
I'm getting the itch to go back to work for a startup...
This is a stupid Ask Slashdot.
Obviously your moral standards are at issue here, and everyone has their own moral standards.
Would you be a prostitute? A pimp? Con man? Work at Microsoft? Work for Wal Mart? Be a lawyer? Defense attorney? Personal injury? Prosecution? Cop? Surgeon? Social worker?
Who you work for, what work you have to do, who you have to work with... these are all fundamental questions that every person in the freaking world has to ask themselves every time they look for work, and every day they go to work. The fact that you are a programmer has absolutely zero fucking relevance, except with regards to the current IT industry job market. And you know what? Special delivery from Obvious Express: IT SUCKS. Of course, with motivation, luck, (perhaps a bit of nepotism) and an excellent resume you can get a job in any big city. DUH!
Welcome to Ethics 101 and Job Finding 101, where your host is Slashdot and we can discuss sophomoric morality questions and how the current job market in IT sucks!
Later today: Does God exist? What OS would He use?
I can see how the contest would still be a positive thing; a lot of "indie artists" as you say are still getting their 15 minutes by being included in the list of comics that is available from the page... and perhaps the participation of the "pro and semi pro" folks will boost the readership of the independents.
Maybe in the end that would be a bigger boon to the independent artist community than the possible loss of camraderie and motivation the pro/semipros bring to the table.
Shouldn't the point of a contest like this be to spur webcomic artists to produce reliably so that they can become more prolific, not to put cash in the pocket of someone who has already shown he can put out a strip a day on a regular basis?
Why would a webcomic artist who has already shown himself able to produce one comic a day for the past several years (even if it's not up until 6pm) enter into a contest like this?
The point is to provide a challenge and provide competition. For people who have already proven themselves in this arena, they are merely making it psychologically impossible for the intended audience to participate and hope to win. Someone who *just might* graduate to the next level of comic production may have decided to make the plunge and make a living at it. But with people in the competition who have already shown they can do it, how many people are going to drop out just because they know that they won't be able to compete in the very long run that this contest will inevitably go to?
I think it's a bit sad when people who are already making a living at webcomics decide to get involved in a contest that's obviously not aimed at them.
No, I didn't go to the site sponsoring the competition. If they intended these "semi pro's" to participate, he's scamming a sizeable loan out of a lot of people. If they didn't intend them to participate, it obviously wasn't stated in the rules. If they didn't even think about it, they're shortsighted.
Since Enterprise takes place historically EARLIER than TOS, why would you expect it to be the perfect future society?
The Federation is something that evolves over time. It obviously didn't start out as some Utopian dream, but it started somewhere. We're seeing a budding Federation and we're seeing a the precursor to TOS. TOS, where Kirk cheated on his test, fought, and brawled. Where his engineer drank real liquor instead of synthahol. Where Spock was discriminated against because of his race. Where rules were broken and wars were fought.
We should expect Enterprise to land, in terms of human progress, somewhere between modern day and TOS, and to encounter and address issues that people of the TOS period had already overcome.
IANAF (I Am Not A Father) but I'm an average male, 18 to 35. Do I want to be able to watch what I want to watch on television? Hell, yes.
Do I want kiddie porn being sold on every corner? No way!
** Keep adult materials out of any venue that a child can be expected to be frequenting without adult supervision. **
Now, my definition of adult materials is assuredly different from someone else's. I think the human body is natural and beautiful (well, except for ugly fat people, but they're still natural), and it does not harm a child to see a naked woman or naked man, in a non-sexually explicit act. (That means I also do not believe a sexually aroused man with an erect penis is not acceptable for a public venue where there may be children).
I think all modern televisions have the V-chip, yes? All cable boxes that I've seen also have select channel lockout as well. If some repressed Christian with guilt issues wants to make nudity a Mature only setting, fine. If they want to label "hell" and "bitch" and "damn" as profanity, fine.
Just leave the filter off when I buy my television and order my cable box. I'm an adult, I will view what I want. If I find watersports objectionable to my personal taste, I will not watch it. If I have relatives with small children visiting, I will block out any adult materials for the duration of their stay.
How hard is it to define levels? Something like;
- Mild language (dammit, hell)
- Mild violence (head-bonking, wrestling, kicking)
- "French" kissing/soul kissing
- Topless nudity
- Bottomless nudity
- Medium violence (punching, weapons, kung fu, blood, simple wounds)
- Profane language without sexual connotations (god damn, shit, piss, bitch, fuck, asshole, dick -- used as namecalling, not as requests or as descriptions of a sexual act) (I guarantee you this is already in 95% of homes with children anyway)
- Extreme violence (realistic wounds, gaping wounds, battering, decapitation, amputation, ripping, sexually-related abuse)
- Sexually explicit language (fuck you, go fuck yourself, suck my dick, lick my balls you cunt whore, etc.)
- Sexually-charged scenes (non-genital rubbing, implications of nudity, and post- or pre-coital setup)
- Sexually implicit scenes (rubbing crotches, feeling breasts, clothed sexual maneuverings or bodies engaged in obviously sexual activity, but hidden)
- Sexually explicit scenes (sexual scenes with nudity, but no actual display of penetration or contact with genitals -- ie, Cinemax after dark)
- Hardcore sexually explicit scenes (shows genital contact, ejaculation, penetration, oral sexual stimulation)
I think these are all things that most people would agree to cover 99% of the cases where an adult may want to censor what a child sees, and children of various ages are considered "old enough" to view these materials. Consider popular movies that involve some extreme violence (per my chart) yet it is more acceptable than a naked woman for some fucked up reason.
Regardless, these language, violence, and sexual guidelines can be mixed and matched in real life, to match the maturity of the child. The parent makes these choices every time they decide on a movie their child should or should not watch. The V-chip and/or television/movie listings should be as thorough. If they aren't, why are you letting your child watch these things without personally checking them out?
Label it what you want; come to a sensible, reasonable agreement as to what labels go on what materials, and then assign the filter mechanisms appropriately. Parents have the burden to filter what is in their homes. Filter your cable, filter your internet.
According to some statistics I just Asked Jeeves for, 26% of the population is 18 and under. That's a sizeable number of non-adults to watch out for, and I can understand a parent's concern if they don't want their children to listen to swearing and see nudity and sexual situations before they are mature enough to
I recently purchased the DVD version of the BBC's television production of HHGTTG. I would say to anyone who loved the books and intends to see this new film, be prepared for changes. Adams liked to tweak things, and according to what I saw on the DVD, the books have been revised and changed over time as Adams fiddled with bits here and there to refine them.
The background information about the making of the series, and about Douglas Adams is fascinating. It reveals some of Adams' manic-depressive personality. It talks about how Adams was not one to write a book and then want to translate that 100% to another format; he welcomed change and refinement with the TV series, and based on what I saw in the interviews, I think he enjoyed the opportunity to revise and rewrite HHGTTG yet again on the big screen.
Adams' only problem, according to the interviews and behind the scenes information, was an awful writer's block at the start of any project. The infamous line about loving deadlines, especially the sound they make as they go whooshing by, was very true for Adams personally.
Adams was a performer; he didn't really want to be a writer. He started out performing, acting, doing live comedy. At least with writing, his particular quirky sense of humor reached many thousands of people who revere him for what he accomplished, personal foibles aside.
If you saw the BBC series, Adams was featured in two different spots. One, he was in a suit counting money while walking out of the bank. The other, he was throwing his money away and walking into the water naked.
I don't begrudge the selling of accounts or in-game items. I think that if someone wants to leave a game and get rid of their in-game resources and make a few bucks, that's cool.
The problem arises when people make this a full-time job. They create new accounts or acquire them, then strip them or build them up, then sell them. One person sits in his room with 12 computers all running a program called MacroQuest farming high level items.
When this happens, the game is flooded by materials churned out at a rate much higher than would naturally occur, and the in-game economy suffers.
Although I can't recall if Ford's color was ever mentioned in the books, I've always envisioned him as a pasty white British fellow just because that's the stereotypical Brit from TV and movies. Is Guildford a city with a higher than average black population?
Really, it shouldn't matter. As long as he has a British accent and acts well, who cares?
Personally, however, I really don't have high expectations for the movie. When I saw that Marvin was going to have a huge globe for a head, I thought that someone with a very literal imagination had read the books and immediately equated a large brain with a huge globular cranium. On a robot, a big brain doesn't have to be located above the shoulders. None of the descriptive text in the books refers to a huge head on Marvin, and the pictures I saw were of a grossly-exaggerated head. Anything that key would have been mentioned.
I've just recently finished watching the BBC's DVD version of HHGTTG, and I enjoyed it for the most part, even though it didn't have a lot of redeeming qualities, technically. Sets were extremely rough and cheesy. Trillian was a whiny, nasal exhibitionist with too much makeup. Zaphod and Ford were overacted. Arthur was tolerably well done, but seemed out of place among the other actors. Marvin's voice could have used some adjusting. The graphics representing the Guide pages were horrible, but I suppose representative of graphical effects of the time.
The film rushes through some of the explanations too fast, and a lot of detail is glossed over -- the twists of logic, puns, and wealth of sarcasm and irony in the book are too hilarious to miss out on, so please read the book(s).
I'll chime in a "me too" on this one.
Also, if you liked Contact, read Rendezvous with Rama. (But none of the sequels. Pretend they don't exist. Please, for your own sake.)
Translation can be a horrible thing.
To me, Anne Rice writes with a very sensual, rich style. Reading most Anne Rice novels, you have to get into what the author is describing, you have to feel the velvet, drink the wine, smear the warm blood on your hands... all in your imagination, of course. And the book was much better than the movie.
I have no idea what that specific translation is like, but her vampire series is very successful commercially, and I personally enjoyed them very much. And yes, I would agree they have a baroque feel to them.
Her Mayfair books, however, were very disappointing to me. A failed attmept to regain the glory of the vampire novels, long after they ran out of steam and were being written for money alone. After Queen of the Damned, there was no reason for her to keep writing them. They had some interesting ideas, but those ideas should have been explored with new characters instead of her trying to graft them onto a successful series.
Did you know she wrote pornography under the name Anne Rampling? Google for it. Torrid stuff, not very good compared to real novels, but I guess interesting if you're into smut books.
There's nothing revolutionary about that camera, however.
The big deal about the parent article is that (1) it's supposed to be Linux, and (2) it's the size of a deck of cards.
If you need to take video clips, and you're not too inconvenienced by having to carry around lots of proprietary memory sticks, that's fine. But this machine fails two important checks for me:
1. No high resolution photo mode. Photos are 800x600. Crap. There's GOT to be a way to have a decent "high resolution" video mode (720x480) AND a 3+ megapixel camera on the same housing.
2. Memory stick. Who cares about memory sticks? They're more expensive and less ubiquitous than SD or CF. I'll pass.
This combined with the high price tag make this a sure loser. I would really like to replace my 4mp camera with 8x optical zoom with something that can also record movies at a decent resolution, but this device isn't it. Yet. Maybe next year.
Ethics is a subject that by its very nature is open to individual interpretation. The "mob" decides what is acceptable by objecting en masse or not objecting strongly enough. Whatever can be done without a public outcry will usually be done. Science is very political.
Now, above and beyond the general public, there is the scientific community. They are comprised of the same people as "the mob" but they are *on the average* more sophisticated and educated about the alternatives and professional ethics in their fields.
Religious folks who believe in a God that created people and sets them apart from animals think that there is something sacred about humanity.
Non-relgious folks don't think there is anything better than the Greater Good and Individual Rights, although these two things are at odds with each other. (I am capitalizing these ideas to illustrate that I am discussing the grand idealized versions of these concepts.)
For example, if you could take 100 people and experiment on them and cure cancer, would you do it? Pure logic says that over time you will save millions of lives. Aren't the lives of millions worth the lives of 100? Surely this is for the best. The rights of the individual, however, is part of our self preservation, and speaks up and says, "Hey, every person has the right to live and not be harmed by others as long as he has not harmed others."
Aside from these basic ethical points, everything else is a subjective mess. Should animals be tortured by excruciating experiments that could save lives? Should human cells be mixed with animal cells? There is no right anwer to these questions because there are no absolutes in Ethics. The only concrete thing you can point to with Ethics is the "greater good." Anything else is soap opera drama.
I'm not saying that we should start imprisoning people and doing mass unrestricted testing; far from it -- I personally believe strongly in individual freedom. I'm saying that no matter what your arguments, there'll be holes in it because it's about Feelings, not logic.
But, I'm just pointing out that 99.9% of the drivel posted in this forum is subjective bullshit that can be argued for a thousand years with no final arbiter in sight.
Oh, there are a few good points in among the crap here. The person who suggested that chimera could pose a threat by becoming a bridge vector for animal diseases to the human body. Excellent point.
The opposite side of that coin should be considered as well. If pigs get some extremely virulent disease and we have hogocide, we could lose out on some tasty BLTs in the future. It reduces our menu options, and we lose species variety in our biosphere, both obviously negative factors regardless of ethics.
The reason the original Trek and subsequent Treks and other television series utilize broad strokes of a given human ( emotion / trait / vice / virtue ) is so that we can look at that portion of ourselves under a microscope and think about it.
For example, the black/white white/black races that are at war in TOS were a very simple way to say to the audience, "Racism is stupid and arbitrary." The Ferengi race is a way to look at greedy people and say, "Look at these people; pursuing wealth to the exclusion of all else is bad and turns you into a big rat."
Every two dimensional character or alien race is an opportunity for the writers to hit the unsubtle audience over the head with the morality stick.
Fortunately there were more subtle nuances to these series as well. But that's another post. The point is, writers have to write for an audience composed of different tastes and levels of sophistication.
Personally, when I saw that scene, I instantly thought that this was foreshadowing of an incident in a future episode where knowledge of her cancer will become known, and we will wonder who spilled the beans. It is inevtiable that it will get out.
But -- will we get a miracle cure? A remission? Or her death, on schedule?
I think a temporary remission with her operating with slightly impaired faculties would be the best opportunity for drama.
Wouldn't it be funny if the terrorist/freedom fighter guy (I forget his name and don't want to go look it up, but the one from "Water" played by the old Apollo) was elected president?
Personally I believe many of these "deviant" behaviors aren't "learned" so much as attempts by the participant to experience a sexual "high".
Some people become bored with what we would call "normal" sex, and do something different in order to get more of a sexual rush. Like a drug user becomes more tolerant of drug dosages, a sexual "deviant" needs to do things differently in order to enhance the experience and make it more intense.