Reading further in their web site it says that the $1,000 per month is per tenant. Which would mean that each tenant in a 100Mbps-wired apartment complex would have to foot a $1,000 a month Internet bill.
However, think of what this could do for poor school districts and Internet access. Get a grant or find a rich philanthropist and you could hook up the entire school with high-speed Internet access for relatively little.
I know this is mainly for businesses only, but I thought of at least one consumer application. I currently live in an apartment complex. If the owners of the complex decided to do this, they could hook up all of their apartments with high-speed Internet access for relatively cheap. The landlord can now charge a bit more for rent and list built-in super-high-speed 'Net access as a selling point.
Admit it, which of you wouldn't mind paying a bit more for an apartment with a 100Mbps connection built-in? (Yeah, yeah. I know it'd probably slow down if a lot of people were online. But even if it slowed down to 10Mbps, that'd be great.)
But instead of waiting for MS to build it in to the OS, I made a program that does just that.
<plug mode on>
WatchDog intercepts Windows Scripting Host files by making itself be the default program that should run them. When a script tries to get run (say by tricking you to click on that e-mailed "Love Letter"), WatchDog will run and will examine the contents of the script to determine what security risks it poses. It then prompts you and lets you decide whether or not you should run it.
I'm currently working on a new version that lets you mark a script as safe. (WatchDog will, however, keep a record of the size and last modified date of the script and prompt you if those change.)
It won't replace your normal anti-virus program, but there's no way a WSH virus could get by it. (Which means it can catch new WSH virus' without needing update patches.) For those of you who'd like to try it out (it's freeware) go to http://www.winmag.com/fixes/watchdog/.
<end plug mode>
I guess I'm not the only one who thought of this obvious solution. I'd make two amendments to it. Don't worry about multiplying the vote by 100, just do away with the physical electoral college. Ideally, they just vote for who they're supposed to vote for (and if they don't, they're not really doing their job are they). Replace them with a system where the candidates get their electoral college votes added up. Secondly, have the one with the most votes the winner instead of needing a certain number. This will make it easier to still have a winner even if there are more than 2 major candidates in a race. (i.e. The presence of a string 3rd party won't cause a deadlock with none of the candidates reaching 270.)
This Split Electoral College system has 3 major advantages over the straight-electoral college system we have now.
1. Voting for a candidate that loses the state doesn't invalidate your vote. For example, a friend of mine in NY voted for Bush. However, NY went to Gore 60% - 35%, so Gore got all 33 electoral college votes from NY. So 35% of NY-ers had their vote ignored. Splitting the electoral college vote would have given Gore 19.8 votes and Bush 11.55 votes.
2. Third party candidates would be better represented. In '96, Perot got 10% of the vote, but didn't earn a single electoral vote. In this past election, Nader didn't get a single electoral vote in NY, even though over 200,000 people (4%) voted for him. By splitting the electoral college votes, 3rd party candidates would get electoral college votes. (For example, Nader's 4% in NY would have earned him 1.32 votes.) It might not be enough to win, but it would help them get attention to their causes.
3. The electoral vote would more accurately represent the popular vote. In the '96 election, Clinton won by a margin of 9% of the popular vote, yet he won the election by over 200 electoral votes! By splitting the vote, he would have still won, but with a margin of only 46 votes. (268 - Dole's 222.... yes I did the math, and yes I have way too much free time on my hands.:-) )
(Sorry about the double post, I hit Submit instead of preview.)
A bit of "Obvious" humor/enlightenment before you vote based on who's promising you the best tax cuts. http://www2.uclick.com/client/z zz/ nq/2000/10/22/ (Thanks go to Wiley of Non Sequitur, one of the few great comic satirists out there.)
A bit of "Obvious" humor/enlightenment before you vote based on who's promising you the best tax cuts. http://www2.uclick.com/client/zzz/nq/2000/10/22/ (Thanks go to Wiley of Non Sequitur, one of the few great comic satirists out there.)
X-10 also has a "DVD Anywhere." In reality they're the same product. So while I've never used mine to play MP3's, my experience with using it to play DVDs might still apply.
I used my DVD Anywhere to transmit DVD video from my PC to a TV screen over 24 feet away. The image is crisp and clear and the audio sounds great (except for some static when someone walks between the recievers).
The remote's a pain to set up, but mainly because it's designed to be extremely flexible. Once it's set up, it's easy.
Like bluestar said, it's $80, but they seem to be running a deal where it's only $70 (plus free shipping). Apart from some stuff for the remote control, I don't think there was any software to install to get the MP3/DVD transmission functionality working. So those of you running Linux boxes wouldn't have to worry about Win9x-only software. (And they have a Linux-version software for another of their products, so my guess is, they'd provide Linux software if the demand was high enough.)
Chat rooms seem to be a wasteland of children and idiots constantly on with their LOL and BRB, and I can't imagine anyone finding that to be a great use of time.
I can't completely agree with this.... I met my fiancee in a Yahoo chat room! (Yes, I know I'm probably the exception to the rule.)
Well, I can't vouch for going up through Jesus (being Jewish I never read the "New Testament"), but the Torah (Old Testament to those Christians out there) has a pretty good lineage from Adam to Moses. Of course, it also has Adam living for (as I recall) just under 1,000 years.
Though it might seem a workable (I won't say good) idea on the surface
I wouldn't even call it workable. If I recall correctly (and I'm sure someone will correct me if I'm wrong), HIV can go for months in the bloodstream without even being detected. So even if some government was cruel enough to quarantine people with AIDS, it wouldn't get rid of the disease. The first wave would get rid of people with obvious symptoms and those who have been infected for awhile. The disease would still circulate though.
It would become an undetectable threat that, when detected, would be an instant death sentence. (What kind of health care do you think society would want to provide to a quarantined group of "infectious threats." And a government that would quarantine individuals based on a disease they have is just a short hop from simply killing them. (Again, once you make someone an outcast it dehumanizes them and making them viewed as "expendable.")
Sounds to me like a slippery slope leading towards Nazi Germany. And if anyone thinks that it wouldn't affect them, I suggest they read "Then they came for me" by Pastor Martin Niemller:
"First they came for the Communists, and I did not speak up because I was not a Communist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak up because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak up because I was not a trade unionist.
Then they came for the Catholics, and I did not speak up because I was a Protestant.
Then they came for me, and there was no one left to speak out for me."
So to the person who said "Is it reasonable to trade the freedom of a few thousand...for the lives of the millions": Just remember, which thousand are sacrificed can easily change from a group you don't belong to, to a group you do belong to.
Am I the only one who's thinking that it doesn't matter whether SDMI was actually hacked? It sounds to me like the RIAA wants to proceed with it whether it's really secure or not. They'll probably deny it was hacked in the end, proclaim it secure, and threaten to sue anyone who says (or proves) otherwise.
They've thrown millions of dollars at making a secure (in their minds) technology. They'll spend millions more trying to convince us that it's in our best interest to ditch our old stereo equipment so we'll comply with their new rules. And then they'll spend millions more in court to silence people who say or prove that it's not secure (hiding behind the DCMA no doubt).
Yup, SDMI is secure. Just like DVD. Can't be cracked at all. And on a similar note, those emperor's clothes look great.
There's an article in the November 2000 Discover Magazine (unfortunately not online yet) on why our electoral system is mathematically flawed. They give 2 intriguing possible solutions. (Working from memory here so please excuse any mistakes.)
In one system (forgetting the name now), you'd vote for as many candidates as you feel deserve the job. Only one person would win of course, but voting would be more of a "Who do you think is qualified to be President of the US." 3rd party candidates would get a higher percentage because people could vote for their 3rd party favorites without feeling like they're wasting their vote. For example, I might vote for Al Gore and Ralph Nader as qualified.
The other system was Borda count. In this you'd rank the candidates from first to last based on your preference. So I might vote Al Gore as #1, Ralph Nader #2, Bush #3, and Buchanan (a so distant as to be nonexistant) #4. As the results are tabulated, candidates getting a #1 would get so many points, #2 a little less, etc all the way down to 4.
Either system would provide more strength to 3rd party candidates and would let the vote more accurately reflect the will of the people.
To get this back on track, I would ask the candidates, given these options, and given the obvious flaws in the current system, how would they propose to change the system (or would they even want to).
The best ST game, IMO, wasn't even an "official" Star Trek game. It was a Mac-only (hey, I was in college then;-) ) game known as Rescue. Basic Premise: You control the Enterprise. You have to rescue colonists on some farflung colonies, return them to starbases safely, and defend the universe from various enemies. It was very detailed and allowed for many custom missions.
Of course, Paramount got word of this and shut them down. You can still find it around if you search hard enough though. And using a Mac emulator (see http://www.emaculation.com/) you can run it no matter what platform you're using.
...if it has an infomercial, it'd qualify for a site I have. My site (UrateIt.com) lets people rate items advertised on Infomercials. I don't get much traffic, so I can't guarantee that the world would see your review, but it couldn't hurt. It might just keep some unsuspecting consumer from picking up a CueCat of their own. (It done just that with EpilStop, one of the products reviewed on my site.)
Yup. There is the other option of completely changing how Social Security works, and I agree it needs an overhaul. However, in the rare case that a politician advances this idea (or a similar one), they are beset by groups lobbying for the elderly who feel they want to take away Social Security entirely. They can't move left or right without raising a political ruckus, so they seem to just opt for the status quo thinking: "Sure Social Security might need to be fixed, but I'm not risking my neck to fix it."
I believe it means that the smallest objects that can be seen without a great degree of trouble are 1 meter long. Note, although 1 meter = 3' 4", you can't see people because people aren't (well, usually aren't) over 3 feet wide.
The problem with Social Security isn't what's happening with it now, but what will happen to it a years down the road. The key is that the money you pay into Social Security isn't saved for you until you retire. It's paid to current retirees.
Right now the "baby boomer" generation is paying the Social Security bills of the generation before them. This is all well and good as there are more baby boomers than current retirees living off of Social Security.
However, advance a few years down the road and the baby boomers will have retired. They'll be living off of Social Security while "Gen X-ers" (for lack of a better term) pay the bills. This is where the problem lies. There will be more Baby Boomers on Social Security than people putting money into the system.
There are basically 3 courses of action:
1 - The "Out of sight, out of mind" theory. Don't change anything and hope the problem goes away. The problem here being that the problem will not just go away, Social Security will eventually be drained, and either #2 or #3 (or both) will have to be enacted.
2 - Raise Social Security taxes. Unlikely (except to a small degree, perhaps) as this would be political suicide. Think of how much of your paycheck is eaten up by Social Security already and ask yourself "How would I react if that was doubled?"
3 - Lower the Social Security payoff. This has been done to a small degree by shifting the "official retirement age." Anytime a politician so much as thinks of touching someone's Social Security check, though, they are attacked by the (ever-larger) voting community that relies on those checks.
It's not an easy problem to solve. It'll take a lot of hard work. But the politicians can't change things one way or another without committing political suicide. So they opt to stick their heads in the sand and leave the problem for the folks that come after them.
I agree that the cash the artists ultimately get when the RIAA is finished gorging is pitiful. We definitely need some type of tipping mechanism in place. If it's easy enough to use, not only do I think that customers will use it, but recording artists will be more likely to "release" their music through this system. As it stands now, there is no such system in place. Until the system is in place
What I'd like to see is a plugin for Winamp and other MP3 players that:
Connects to a online database (ala the old CDDB or maybe FreeDB)
Figures out who the artist is based on the ID3 tag or based on some "signature" in the MP3 file.
Lets the user tip the artist directly either with a predefined (by the artist) amount, or by an amount the user determines.
The pieces are in place. CDDB-now-gracenote claims to be able to recognize MP3 files. Fairtunes lets people tip artists directly. PayPal lets people send micropayments over the web. Now someone just needs to tie these 3 together and make it easy to use. I wouldn't even mind them skimming some of the tips off the top (so long as the artist recieves at least half). Anyone out there willing/able to create this service? I won't even charge licensing off my idea.;-)
I believe it is immoral to unnecessarily limit the freedom of a human being.
But freedoms aren't absolute. I can't just walk by a produce stand, grab up an apple, and say I have the freedom of "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of happiness." Nor can I publish something blatantly false and damaging to a person as fact (opinion would be different, allowing more leeway), call it "freedom of speech/press" without incurring charges of libel. (Or at least having to provide proof.) Our society is built upon freedoms, but there are limits to the freedoms.
If you don't want your information to be spread, the keep it in your head. If you send sound waves, text, or code in someone's direction, then that becomes part of their life experience which they then have the right to remember and share as they see fit.
Take the following hypothetical situation: Say I had an idea for a great novel and I sit down to lunch with a friend of mine that happens to be in the book publishing business. I tell him my story idea. Now some other author happens to be sitting at the next table and overhears my idea. He writes a book based on my idea and it hits the bestseller list. Meanwhile my book won't be published because it's too similar his.
By your reasoning, if I get a great idea, I should never share it for fear of someone running off with it.
I'm not saying "information should never be free." In some cases it should be. But it's not an all-or-nothing proposition. Not all ideas should be expected to be freely given away. It should be determined on a case-by-case basis.
In the case of online music (specifically the Napster trial), a balance needs to be reached. On one side, the RIAA seems to want music to be controlled too much. On the other side, Napster releases the control on the music too much. What we need is a third option. One that frees up online music, while still compensating the artists. (In fact, any such system would most likely bypass the RIAA middlemen and give more money to the artists.) So in this case, information shouldn't be free, but it definitely should cost less than it does now.
...is actually not in Windows, but in a separate program (albeit installed with Windows) that allows people to write scripts to run in windows (appropriately named Windows Scripting Host). It gives access to the file system and mailing capabilities amoung other things. It's been awhile since I've used a Unix system, but I believe they have similar capabilities (albiet with better permissions cabalilities than Win9x I'm guessing).
[shameless plug]
Of course, you could use my free Watchdog program to trap the WSH scripts before they do any damage.
[/shameless plug]
MS would be smart to make this type of protection standard in Windows Scripting Host.
I recently signed on with PayPal so I can use it instead of a banner ad on a web page I run. [shameless plug]http://www.urateit.com/[/shameless plug].
I don't get enough traffic for my site to generate any real revenue from banner ads. (In fact, the ads up there now are from LinkExchange which doesn't drive traffic to my site or give me money.) I figured if just a few people think my web service is worth it, they might be inclined to throw a few bucks my way which would help me recoup the cash I pay out of pocket to run the site. I'm not looking to become an "Internet Millionaire" like this, just looking to break even. (Ok, maybe a little better than breaking even.)
That argument doesn't prove the nonexistence of intelligent alien life. Even if you assume that any intelligent alien life would, by definition, produce Von Neuman Machines, they're apparent non-arrival wouldn't mean intelligent alien life doesn't exist.
By the same token, you could place yourself in the shoes of the American Indians in the pre-Columbus era and say: "If there were intelligent life on other continents they would have crossed the seas and contacted us already." Just because no European explorer crossed the Atlantic at that time (ok, excepting the Viking that supposedly did it too), doesn't mean none ever will, and doesn't disprove life in Europe at the time.
That there might be something wrong with this argument was famously articulated by nuclear physicist Enrico Fermi in 1950. If extraterrestrials are commonplace, he asked, where are they? Should their presence not be obvious? This question has become known as the Fermi Paradox.
This type of reasoning could be used to justify anything. Pre-breaking the sound barrier: "If man can break the sound barrier, why hasn't he yet?"
Just because something hasn't been detected yet or done yet isn't proof that it isn't there (or can't be done).
Slashdot Mirror
A few months ago, I was given the opportunity to review the Stowaway keyboard for the website I work for. Feel free to check out my review.
Reading further in their web site it says that the $1,000 per month is per tenant. Which would mean that each tenant in a 100Mbps-wired apartment complex would have to foot a $1,000 a month Internet bill.
However, think of what this could do for poor school districts and Internet access. Get a grant or find a rich philanthropist and you could hook up the entire school with high-speed Internet access for relatively little.
I know this is mainly for businesses only, but I thought of at least one consumer application. I currently live in an apartment complex. If the owners of the complex decided to do this, they could hook up all of their apartments with high-speed Internet access for relatively cheap. The landlord can now charge a bit more for rent and list built-in super-high-speed 'Net access as a selling point.
Admit it, which of you wouldn't mind paying a bit more for an apartment with a 100Mbps connection built-in? (Yeah, yeah. I know it'd probably slow down if a lot of people were online. But even if it slowed down to 10Mbps, that'd be great.)
But instead of waiting for MS to build it in to the OS, I made a program that does just that.
<plug mode on>
WatchDog intercepts Windows Scripting Host files by making itself be the default program that should run them. When a script tries to get run (say by tricking you to click on that e-mailed "Love Letter"), WatchDog will run and will examine the contents of the script to determine what security risks it poses. It then prompts you and lets you decide whether or not you should run it.
I'm currently working on a new version that lets you mark a script as safe. (WatchDog will, however, keep a record of the size and last modified date of the script and prompt you if those change.)
It won't replace your normal anti-virus program, but there's no way a WSH virus could get by it. (Which means it can catch new WSH virus' without needing update patches.) For those of you who'd like to try it out (it's freeware) go to http://www.winmag.com/fixes/watchdog/.
<end plug mode>
I guess I'm not the only one who thought of this obvious solution. I'd make two amendments to it. Don't worry about multiplying the vote by 100, just do away with the physical electoral college. Ideally, they just vote for who they're supposed to vote for (and if they don't, they're not really doing their job are they). Replace them with a system where the candidates get their electoral college votes added up. Secondly, have the one with the most votes the winner instead of needing a certain number. This will make it easier to still have a winner even if there are more than 2 major candidates in a race. (i.e. The presence of a string 3rd party won't cause a deadlock with none of the candidates reaching 270.)
:-) )
This Split Electoral College system has 3 major advantages over the straight-electoral college system we have now.
1. Voting for a candidate that loses the state doesn't invalidate your vote. For example, a friend of mine in NY voted for Bush. However, NY went to Gore 60% - 35%, so Gore got all 33 electoral college votes from NY. So 35% of NY-ers had their vote ignored. Splitting the electoral college vote would have given Gore 19.8 votes and Bush 11.55 votes.
2. Third party candidates would be better represented. In '96, Perot got 10% of the vote, but didn't earn a single electoral vote. In this past election, Nader didn't get a single electoral vote in NY, even though over 200,000 people (4%) voted for him. By splitting the electoral college votes, 3rd party candidates would get electoral college votes. (For example, Nader's 4% in NY would have earned him 1.32 votes.) It might not be enough to win, but it would help them get attention to their causes.
3. The electoral vote would more accurately represent the popular vote. In the '96 election, Clinton won by a margin of 9% of the popular vote, yet he won the election by over 200 electoral votes! By splitting the vote, he would have still won, but with a margin of only 46 votes. (268 - Dole's 222.... yes I did the math, and yes I have way too much free time on my hands.
(Sorry about the double post, I hit Submit instead of preview.)
A bit of "Obvious" humor/enlightenment before you vote based on who's promising you the best tax cuts. http://www2.uclick.com/client/z zz/ nq/2000/10/22/ (Thanks go to Wiley of Non Sequitur, one of the few great comic satirists out there.)
A bit of "Obvious" humor/enlightenment before you vote based on who's promising you the best tax cuts. http://www2.uclick.com/client/zzz/nq/2000/10/22/ (Thanks go to Wiley of Non Sequitur, one of the few great comic satirists out there.)
X-10 also has a "DVD Anywhere." In reality they're the same product. So while I've never used mine to play MP3's, my experience with using it to play DVDs might still apply.
I used my DVD Anywhere to transmit DVD video from my PC to a TV screen over 24 feet away. The image is crisp and clear and the audio sounds great (except for some static when someone walks between the recievers).
The remote's a pain to set up, but mainly because it's designed to be extremely flexible. Once it's set up, it's easy.
Like bluestar said, it's $80, but they seem to be running a deal where it's only $70 (plus free shipping). Apart from some stuff for the remote control, I don't think there was any software to install to get the MP3/DVD transmission functionality working. So those of you running Linux boxes wouldn't have to worry about Win9x-only software. (And they have a Linux-version software for another of their products, so my guess is, they'd provide Linux software if the demand was high enough.)
Chat rooms seem to be a wasteland of children and idiots constantly on with their LOL and BRB, and I can't imagine anyone finding that to be a great use of time.
I can't completely agree with this.... I met my fiancee in a Yahoo chat room! (Yes, I know I'm probably the exception to the rule.)
Well, I can't vouch for going up through Jesus (being Jewish I never read the "New Testament"), but the Torah (Old Testament to those Christians out there) has a pretty good lineage from Adam to Moses. Of course, it also has Adam living for (as I recall) just under 1,000 years.
Though it might seem a workable (I won't say good) idea on the surface
I wouldn't even call it workable. If I recall correctly (and I'm sure someone will correct me if I'm wrong), HIV can go for months in the bloodstream without even being detected. So even if some government was cruel enough to quarantine people with AIDS, it wouldn't get rid of the disease. The first wave would get rid of people with obvious symptoms and those who have been infected for awhile. The disease would still circulate though.
It would become an undetectable threat that, when detected, would be an instant death sentence. (What kind of health care do you think society would want to provide to a quarantined group of "infectious threats." And a government that would quarantine individuals based on a disease they have is just a short hop from simply killing them. (Again, once you make someone an outcast it dehumanizes them and making them viewed as "expendable.")
Sounds to me like a slippery slope leading towards Nazi Germany. And if anyone thinks that it wouldn't affect them, I suggest they read "Then they came for me" by Pastor Martin Niemller:
"First they came for the Communists, and I did not speak up because I was not a Communist.
Then they came for the Jews, and I did not speak up because I was not a Jew.
Then they came for the trade unionists, and I did not speak up because I was not a trade unionist.
Then they came for the Catholics, and I did not speak up because I was a Protestant.
Then they came for me, and there was no one left to speak out for me."
So to the person who said "Is it reasonable to trade the freedom of a few thousand...for the lives of the millions": Just remember, which thousand are sacrificed can easily change from a group you don't belong to, to a group you do belong to.
Am I the only one who's thinking that it doesn't matter whether SDMI was actually hacked? It sounds to me like the RIAA wants to proceed with it whether it's really secure or not. They'll probably deny it was hacked in the end, proclaim it secure, and threaten to sue anyone who says (or proves) otherwise.
They've thrown millions of dollars at making a secure (in their minds) technology. They'll spend millions more trying to convince us that it's in our best interest to ditch our old stereo equipment so we'll comply with their new rules. And then they'll spend millions more in court to silence people who say or prove that it's not secure (hiding behind the DCMA no doubt).
Yup, SDMI is secure. Just like DVD. Can't be cracked at all. And on a similar note, those emperor's clothes look great.
There's an article in the November 2000 Discover Magazine (unfortunately not online yet) on why our electoral system is mathematically flawed. They give 2 intriguing possible solutions. (Working from memory here so please excuse any mistakes.)
In one system (forgetting the name now), you'd vote for as many candidates as you feel deserve the job. Only one person would win of course, but voting would be more of a "Who do you think is qualified to be President of the US." 3rd party candidates would get a higher percentage because people could vote for their 3rd party favorites without feeling like they're wasting their vote. For example, I might vote for Al Gore and Ralph Nader as qualified.
The other system was Borda count. In this you'd rank the candidates from first to last based on your preference. So I might vote Al Gore as #1, Ralph Nader #2, Bush #3, and Buchanan (a so distant as to be nonexistant) #4. As the results are tabulated, candidates getting a #1 would get so many points, #2 a little less, etc all the way down to 4.
Either system would provide more strength to 3rd party candidates and would let the vote more accurately reflect the will of the people.
To get this back on track, I would ask the candidates, given these options, and given the obvious flaws in the current system, how would they propose to change the system (or would they even want to).
...are downloadable blueprints for those DeCSS T-shirts! ;-)
The best ST game, IMO, wasn't even an "official" Star Trek game. It was a Mac-only (hey, I was in college then ;-) ) game known as Rescue. Basic Premise: You control the Enterprise. You have to rescue colonists on some farflung colonies, return them to starbases safely, and defend the universe from various enemies. It was very detailed and allowed for many custom missions.
Of course, Paramount got word of this and shut them down. You can still find it around if you search hard enough though. And using a Mac emulator (see http://www.emaculation.com/) you can run it no matter what platform you're using.
...if it has an infomercial, it'd qualify for a site I have. My site (UrateIt.com) lets people rate items advertised on Infomercials. I don't get much traffic, so I can't guarantee that the world would see your review, but it couldn't hurt. It might just keep some unsuspecting consumer from picking up a CueCat of their own. (It done just that with EpilStop, one of the products reviewed on my site.)
Yup. There is the other option of completely changing how Social Security works, and I agree it needs an overhaul. However, in the rare case that a politician advances this idea (or a similar one), they are beset by groups lobbying for the elderly who feel they want to take away Social Security entirely. They can't move left or right without raising a political ruckus, so they seem to just opt for the status quo thinking: "Sure Social Security might need to be fixed, but I'm not risking my neck to fix it."
I believe it means that the smallest objects that can be seen without a great degree of trouble are 1 meter long. Note, although 1 meter = 3' 4", you can't see people because people aren't (well, usually aren't) over 3 feet wide.
The problem with Social Security isn't what's happening with it now, but what will happen to it a years down the road. The key is that the money you pay into Social Security isn't saved for you until you retire. It's paid to current retirees.
Right now the "baby boomer" generation is paying the Social Security bills of the generation before them. This is all well and good as there are more baby boomers than current retirees living off of Social Security.
However, advance a few years down the road and the baby boomers will have retired. They'll be living off of Social Security while "Gen X-ers" (for lack of a better term) pay the bills. This is where the problem lies. There will be more Baby Boomers on Social Security than people putting money into the system.
There are basically 3 courses of action:
1 - The "Out of sight, out of mind" theory. Don't change anything and hope the problem goes away. The problem here being that the problem will not just go away, Social Security will eventually be drained, and either #2 or #3 (or both) will have to be enacted.
2 - Raise Social Security taxes. Unlikely (except to a small degree, perhaps) as this would be political suicide. Think of how much of your paycheck is eaten up by Social Security already and ask yourself "How would I react if that was doubled?"
3 - Lower the Social Security payoff. This has been done to a small degree by shifting the "official retirement age." Anytime a politician so much as thinks of touching someone's Social Security check, though, they are attacked by the (ever-larger) voting community that relies on those checks.
It's not an easy problem to solve. It'll take a lot of hard work. But the politicians can't change things one way or another without committing political suicide. So they opt to stick their heads in the sand and leave the problem for the folks that come after them.
What I'd like to see is a plugin for Winamp and other MP3 players that:
Connects to a online database (ala the old CDDB or maybe FreeDB)
Figures out who the artist is based on the ID3 tag or based on some "signature" in the MP3 file.
Lets the user tip the artist directly either with a predefined (by the artist) amount, or by an amount the user determines.
;-)
The pieces are in place. CDDB-now-gracenote claims to be able to recognize MP3 files. Fairtunes lets people tip artists directly. PayPal lets people send micropayments over the web. Now someone just needs to tie these 3 together and make it easy to use. I wouldn't even mind them skimming some of the tips off the top (so long as the artist recieves at least half). Anyone out there willing/able to create this service? I won't even charge licensing off my idea.
I believe it is immoral to unnecessarily limit the freedom of a human being.
But freedoms aren't absolute. I can't just walk by a produce stand, grab up an apple, and say I have the freedom of "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of happiness." Nor can I publish something blatantly false and damaging to a person as fact (opinion would be different, allowing more leeway), call it "freedom of speech/press" without incurring charges of libel. (Or at least having to provide proof.) Our society is built upon freedoms, but there are limits to the freedoms.
If you don't want your information to be spread, the keep it in your head. If you send sound waves, text, or code in someone's direction, then that becomes part of their life experience which they then have the right to remember and share as they see fit.
Take the following hypothetical situation: Say I had an idea for a great novel and I sit down to lunch with a friend of mine that happens to be in the book publishing business. I tell him my story idea. Now some other author happens to be sitting at the next table and overhears my idea. He writes a book based on my idea and it hits the bestseller list. Meanwhile my book won't be published because it's too similar his.
By your reasoning, if I get a great idea, I should never share it for fear of someone running off with it.
I'm not saying "information should never be free." In some cases it should be. But it's not an all-or-nothing proposition. Not all ideas should be expected to be freely given away. It should be determined on a case-by-case basis.
In the case of online music (specifically the Napster trial), a balance needs to be reached. On one side, the RIAA seems to want music to be controlled too much. On the other side, Napster releases the control on the music too much. What we need is a third option. One that frees up online music, while still compensating the artists. (In fact, any such system would most likely bypass the RIAA middlemen and give more money to the artists.) So in this case, information shouldn't be free, but it definitely should cost less than it does now.
...is actually not in Windows, but in a separate program (albeit installed with Windows) that allows people to write scripts to run in windows (appropriately named Windows Scripting Host). It gives access to the file system and mailing capabilities amoung other things. It's been awhile since I've used a Unix system, but I believe they have similar capabilities (albiet with better permissions cabalilities than Win9x I'm guessing).
[shameless plug]
Of course, you could use my free Watchdog program to trap the WSH scripts before they do any damage.
[/shameless plug]
MS would be smart to make this type of protection standard in Windows Scripting Host.
I recently signed on with PayPal so I can use it instead of a banner ad on a web page I run. [shameless plug]http://www.urateit.com/[/shameless plug].
I don't get enough traffic for my site to generate any real revenue from banner ads. (In fact, the ads up there now are from LinkExchange which doesn't drive traffic to my site or give me money.) I figured if just a few people think my web service is worth it, they might be inclined to throw a few bucks my way which would help me recoup the cash I pay out of pocket to run the site. I'm not looking to become an "Internet Millionaire" like this, just looking to break even. (Ok, maybe a little better than breaking even.)
That argument doesn't prove the nonexistence of intelligent alien life. Even if you assume that any intelligent alien life would, by definition, produce Von Neuman Machines, they're apparent non-arrival wouldn't mean intelligent alien life doesn't exist.
By the same token, you could place yourself in the shoes of the American Indians in the pre-Columbus era and say: "If there were intelligent life on other continents they would have crossed the seas and contacted us already." Just because no European explorer crossed the Atlantic at that time (ok, excepting the Viking that supposedly did it too), doesn't mean none ever will, and doesn't disprove life in Europe at the time.
From the article:
That there might be something wrong with this argument was famously articulated by nuclear physicist Enrico Fermi in 1950. If extraterrestrials are commonplace, he asked, where are they? Should their presence not be obvious? This question has become known as the Fermi Paradox.
This type of reasoning could be used to justify anything. Pre-breaking the sound barrier: "If man can break the sound barrier, why hasn't he yet?"
Just because something hasn't been detected yet or done yet isn't proof that it isn't there (or can't be done).