The real key here is the decrease in activity. Farmers typically eat diets rich in meats and dairy ( processed or not) , and yet stay thin. Because they burn those calories and convert the protein into muscle.
Processed foods may be a contributing cause,but the basic cause of obesity remains the same: eat more calories than you burn, and you'll gain weight. . .
John Ringo, amongst others, have publicly stated that he is NOT interested in the Hugos, and would not accept a nomination. Correia and Torgersen have done the same.
Likewise, I'm a Sad Puppy. And am amused, that, IMMEDIATELY, the narrative came out again about this being a right-wing effort. if you go back to the start, Larry Correia started the Campaign to Stop Puppy-Related Sadness as a tongue-in-cheek parody of a relatively standard campaign for the social cause du jour, which always seems to be "for the children"
The point was, boring fiction used as a vehicle for social messaging and virtue signaling had been increasingly dominating the Hugo Awards, and he, and those of us that joined him, wanted the Hugo to be about the BEST Science Fiction of the year. Since then, it's become a source of repeated One Minute Hates from "trufandom".
As I've said elsewhere in the topic today, the Hugo and the WorldCon and "Trufandom" are of increasingly less significance every year. SF and Fantasy Fandom are no longer tiny, cloistered groups, and the rise of Indie Publishing is slowly killing off the gatekeepers of "TradPub". i.e. "traditional" publishing.
Me, I really don't care about the Hugos, but AM highly amused that, amongst the nominees, is "Space Raptor Butt Invasion". Never read the book, don't plan too, but am laughing at the reaction. . .
In a vacuum, yes this is true, a powerful government can take everything from you. Keep in mind, though, that the alternative is to allow powerful individuals to control everything instead; in that case, a state which humanity has languished in for thousands of years, those powerful individuals will take everything from you.
You appear to believe this is an either/or situation. I would suggest that, as significantly smaller governments HAVE existed, would prove that we do not have a binary solution set, but that there is an entire range of solutions. Some of which would be acceptable to the vast majority of the population. . .
I'm a Sad Puppy too, and have been since it all started. What's amusing, is that, last year, Vox Day and his alt-right people decided to leverage the "Sad Puppies" with their own "Rabid Puppies" slate. And, of course, both have been conflated, despite the fact that they come from VERY different places.
Besides, the Hugo Awards, and Worldcon, have been dying for years. The announcement of the Dragon Award by DragonCon in Atlanta is just another nail in the coffin. When the "WorldCon" got 5,171 attendees last year, while DragonCon got over 70K attendees. . . the argument than the WorldCon is representative of Fandom tends to fail. . . similar attendance is seen consistently at the San Diego Comic Con, the Salt Lake City Comic Con, and the New York ComicCon.
That would suggest that perhaps the Hugos and the WorldCon are NOT representative of SF and Fantasy fandom. . .
Addendum: It's common, in big contracts, and especially if specialized skills and/or security clearances are required, for the new Prime Contractor, or someone on their team, to pick up most of the current people. It's also a way of getting rid of people that the customer can't fire, but doesn't like.
The new prime was willing to do this for everyone. . . IF we accepted the 20% pay cut. At the time, jobs were still plentiful: as I noted, 20+ moved to new jobs in under a week. ..so why take a pay cut ?
Prime: On any large Federal contract, there's usually a team of companies. The one leading the effort, and submitting the formal proposal, etc, is the Prime Contractor.
Everyone else is a Sub, i.e. a Sub-contractor. Subs are usually a mix of big integrators (Lockheed, Boeing, Northrop, IBM, Dell, etc) and smaller companies, with set-asides for "Small, Disadvantaged Businesses", also known as "*8A's".
Typically, 8A's are, at least on paper, owned by a woman or a minority, or both. In quite a few cases, that ownership is a paper one. I've seen larger companies spin-off several 8As to get in on a contract. It's technically legal, and almost impossible to fight, but it really is kind of gaming the system against actual 8As.
I was working one particular Fed contract, which, after several appeals by the current prime, was finally awarded to the competitor.
Who promptly announced that everyone could keep their jobs. . . at 20% less. Contract handover was two months later.
My shop had a total of 34 contractors. Inside of a week, we were down to 9 of us, and I left the next week (12% raise). I'm told the last guy left 2 weeks later, one month out from handover.
And the new prime had exactly ZERO acceptance from current contract staff. New prime was reportedly going crazy, because NOBODY would accept a pay cut.
They called a meeting of all the previous contractors. Nobody showed. They called another, with the bait of a free $50. Amazon card for attending. . ..they then offered a 5% cut instead. We started walking (not that I was going to accept anyway). . ..they offered par. We kept walking.
Eventually, they offered +10% and signing bonuses, but pretty much everybody was settled in elsewhere. They ended up having to bring the old prime on as a sub, to get it manned. . .
1. What formally defines "Clean Diesel". "Euro 6" is spectacularly uninformative.
2. How badly the standard was blown: a few percentage point, or orders of magnitude ?
3. Some historical data. For instance, what did emissions look like before ANY emission controls were put in place.
Furthermore, the Guardian article offers zero actual numbers. As an engineer, I'm always skeptical of any claim when no specific numbers are mentioned. Gee, real-world conditions aren't well-replicated in testing environments ? I'm shocked, shocked, I tell you, to hear it. But I suspect a real-world testing regime for all vehicles would be both costly and cumbersome, and probably non even cost-effective. ...
. . . . the "Cleared" vertical. No H1b's. Heavy on older workers, because it simply wasn't cool (or, admittedly, half as lucrative. . ..) as purely private-sector efforts.
And, face it, getting, and KEEPING a clearance is something of a chore. Not to mention the PII colonoscopy you get every 5 years, aka "clearance re-investigation".
OUR biggest problem is finding ANY qualified people, especially on the latest technologies. Way back when, I started as a Windows and Netware SysAdmin. Evolved significantly, simply because (1) the needs were there, and the people weren't, and (2) what used to take a bunch of people, now can be done by 1-2 journeyman-level people at each site. Nowadays, I'm dual-hatted, vulnerability assessment and software assurance. Being an older guy helps: I've worked Windows from NT 3.51 on, Solaris from 2.5, and Linux from the days when Red Hat came on 3 1/2 inch floppies . . . .
The problem I've noted with the younger set, is that they know how to code, but generally not how it all works, under the hood. . . simply because they didn't HAVE to.
. . . until you move it to payment cards, and buy items with it. . . or any of several thousand OTHER ways of laundering the money. Disposable accounts. Cash Cards. et cetera ad nauseam . . .
Indeed. There is much to be said for running on old, cheap iron (or phones), if it gets the job done.
War Story: I was working in the Pentagon. We were in the process of clearing out our space, prior to the entire corridor being gutted as part of the Pentagon Renovation (this was 1997-98 or so). We've systematically stripped everything out, even ancient Thicknet with transceivers and vampire taps. . ..when we find a wire running into the wall, the other end connected and active to the switch in the space.
Carefully, the drywall was demolished, and in the small 4x4 space it revealed, was a positively ancient Zenith box, running SCO. As I was the only guy there who knew ANYTHING about Unix or Linux, I checked uptime. It had been quietly running for nearly 8 years. Slow, but got the job done.
Eventually, we found that the system it had been connecting to had been retired in 1995. But it still chugged along. . .
I would disagree, at least in the case of Amazon. They've revolutionized Logistics and Distribution, especially in concert with the shipping partners like UPS, FedEx, and DHL.
Better logistics and distribution adds to productivity.
Slashdot Mirror
I hear that many Catholic Priests DO spend all day, thinking about the children. . .
Indeed. I'm waiting for Metamucil to buy Slashdot. It will, at least, change WHAT is being Slashvertised. . . . (grin)
The real key here is the decrease in activity. Farmers typically eat diets rich in meats and dairy ( processed or not) , and yet stay thin. Because they burn those calories and convert the protein into muscle.
Processed foods may be a contributing cause,but the basic cause of obesity remains the same: eat more calories than you burn, and you'll gain weight. . .
Well, I know the reverse situation was written: Michael Z. Williamson's "Freehold". It's even free to read, in ebook form.
All hail the Baen Free Library!!
John Ringo, amongst others, have publicly stated that he is NOT interested in the Hugos, and would not accept a nomination. Correia and Torgersen have done the same.
. . . to Pournelle's Iron Law of Bureaucracy. It's just human nature.
Likewise, I'm a Sad Puppy. And am amused, that, IMMEDIATELY, the narrative came out again about this being a right-wing effort. if you go back to the start, Larry Correia started the Campaign to Stop Puppy-Related Sadness as a tongue-in-cheek parody of a relatively standard campaign for the social cause du jour, which always seems to be "for the children"
The point was, boring fiction used as a vehicle for social messaging and virtue signaling had been increasingly dominating the Hugo Awards, and he, and those of us that joined him, wanted the Hugo to be about the BEST Science Fiction of the year. Since then, it's become a source of repeated One Minute Hates from "trufandom".
As I've said elsewhere in the topic today, the Hugo and the WorldCon and "Trufandom" are of increasingly less significance every year. SF and Fantasy Fandom are no longer tiny, cloistered groups, and the rise of Indie Publishing is slowly killing off the gatekeepers of "TradPub". i.e. "traditional" publishing.
Me, I really don't care about the Hugos, but AM highly amused that, amongst the nominees, is "Space Raptor Butt Invasion". Never read the book, don't plan too, but am laughing at the reaction. . .
In a vacuum, yes this is true, a powerful government can take everything from you. Keep in mind, though, that the alternative is to allow powerful individuals to control everything instead; in that case, a state which humanity has languished in for thousands of years, those powerful individuals will take everything from you.
You appear to believe this is an either/or situation. I would suggest that, as significantly smaller governments HAVE existed, would prove that we do not have a binary solution set, but that there is an entire range of solutions. Some of which would be acceptable to the vast majority of the population. . .
I'm a Sad Puppy too, and have been since it all started. What's amusing, is that, last year, Vox Day and his alt-right people decided to leverage the "Sad Puppies" with their own "Rabid Puppies" slate. And, of course, both have been conflated, despite the fact that they come from VERY different places.
Besides, the Hugo Awards, and Worldcon, have been dying for years. The announcement of the Dragon Award by DragonCon in Atlanta is just another nail in the coffin. When the "WorldCon" got 5,171 attendees last year, while DragonCon got over 70K attendees. . . the argument than the WorldCon is representative of Fandom tends to fail. . . similar attendance is seen consistently at the San Diego Comic Con, the Salt Lake City Comic Con, and the New York ComicCon.
That would suggest that perhaps the Hugos and the WorldCon are NOT representative of SF and Fantasy fandom. . .
Addendum: It's common, in big contracts, and especially if specialized skills and/or security clearances are required, for the new Prime Contractor, or someone on their team, to pick up most of the current people. It's also a way of getting rid of people that the customer can't fire, but doesn't like.
The new prime was willing to do this for everyone. . . IF we accepted the 20% pay cut. At the time, jobs were still plentiful: as I noted, 20+ moved to new jobs in under a week. . .so why take a pay cut ?
Prime: On any large Federal contract, there's usually a team of companies. The one leading the effort, and submitting the formal proposal, etc, is the Prime Contractor.
Everyone else is a Sub, i.e. a Sub-contractor. Subs are usually a mix of big integrators (Lockheed, Boeing, Northrop, IBM, Dell, etc) and smaller companies, with set-asides for "Small, Disadvantaged Businesses", also known as "*8A's".
Typically, 8A's are, at least on paper, owned by a woman or a minority, or both. In quite a few cases, that ownership is a paper one. I've seen larger companies spin-off several 8As to get in on a contract. It's technically legal, and almost impossible to fight, but it really is kind of gaming the system against actual 8As.
I've worked for Primes, Subs, and 8A subs. . . .
. . .only if someone is sufficiently cross. . .
I was working one particular Fed contract, which, after several appeals by the current prime, was finally awarded to the competitor.
Who promptly announced that everyone could keep their jobs. . . at 20% less. Contract handover was two months later.
My shop had a total of 34 contractors. Inside of a week, we were down to 9 of us, and I left the next week (12% raise). I'm told the last guy left 2 weeks later, one month out from handover.
And the new prime had exactly ZERO acceptance from current contract staff. New prime was reportedly going crazy, because NOBODY would accept a pay cut.
They called a meeting of all the previous contractors. Nobody showed. They called another, with the bait of a free $50. Amazon card for attending. . . .they then offered a 5% cut instead. We started walking (not that I was going to accept anyway). . . .they offered par. We kept walking.
Eventually, they offered +10% and signing bonuses, but pretty much everybody was settled in elsewhere. They ended up having to bring the old prime on as a sub, to get it manned. . .
1. What formally defines "Clean Diesel". "Euro 6" is spectacularly uninformative.
2. How badly the standard was blown: a few percentage point, or orders of magnitude ?
3. Some historical data. For instance, what did emissions look like before ANY emission controls were put in place.
Furthermore, the Guardian article offers zero actual numbers. As an engineer, I'm always skeptical of any claim when no specific numbers are mentioned. Gee, real-world conditions aren't well-replicated in testing environments ? I'm shocked, shocked, I tell you, to hear it. But I suspect a real-world testing regime for all vehicles would be both costly and cumbersome, and probably non even cost-effective. . ..
. . . . the "Cleared" vertical. No H1b's. Heavy on older workers, because it simply wasn't cool (or, admittedly, half as lucrative. . . .) as purely private-sector efforts.
And, face it, getting, and KEEPING a clearance is something of a chore. Not to mention the PII colonoscopy you get every 5 years, aka "clearance re-investigation".
OUR biggest problem is finding ANY qualified people, especially on the latest technologies. Way back when, I started as a Windows and Netware SysAdmin. Evolved significantly, simply because (1) the needs were there, and the people weren't, and (2) what used to take a bunch of people, now can be done by 1-2 journeyman-level people at each site. Nowadays, I'm dual-hatted, vulnerability assessment and software assurance. Being an older guy helps: I've worked Windows from NT 3.51 on, Solaris from 2.5, and Linux from the days when Red Hat came on 3 1/2 inch floppies . . . .
The problem I've noted with the younger set, is that they know how to code, but generally not how it all works, under the hood. . . simply because they didn't HAVE to.
. . . until you move it to payment cards, and buy items with it. . . or any of several thousand OTHER ways of laundering the money. Disposable accounts. Cash Cards. et cetera ad nauseam . . .
. . .and Americans still, allegedly, starve.
Haven't seen much indication of that at the local Wal-Mart, however. . . .
Let me fix that for you:
You mean the government that claims to protect you from snake-oil salesmen, but is actually the government that's bought off by crony capitalists.
Thank you for your attention. . .
Indeed. There is much to be said for running on old, cheap iron (or phones), if it gets the job done.
War Story: I was working in the Pentagon. We were in the process of clearing out our space, prior to the entire corridor being gutted as part of the Pentagon Renovation (this was 1997-98 or so). We've systematically stripped everything out, even ancient Thicknet with transceivers and vampire taps. . . .when we find a wire running into the wall, the other end connected and active to the switch in the space.
Carefully, the drywall was demolished, and in the small 4x4 space it revealed, was a positively ancient Zenith box, running SCO. As I was the only guy there who knew ANYTHING about Unix or Linux, I checked uptime. It had been quietly running for nearly 8 years. Slow, but got the job done.
Eventually, we found that the system it had been connecting to had been retired in 1995. But it still chugged along. . .
. . . .every time there's a "Health Threat", it's based on tests with white lab mice.
So . . . ban white lab mice.
This message brought to you by Acme Laboratories. . .
I would disagree, at least in the case of Amazon. They've revolutionized Logistics and Distribution, especially in concert with the shipping partners like UPS, FedEx, and DHL.
Better logistics and distribution adds to productivity.
. . . . with carbon monoxide or nitrogen, and the species will improve as a whole rather markedly.
And chances are, they'll be so self-absorbed, that they won't even notice they're dead. . .
Coming Soon: GovCorp.com.gov . . .
Also, in the USA, there is no right to be forgotten...
Actually, the "low-paid security guard" was a Lieutenant in the UC Davis Campus police. Likely earning in the US$60-70K region . . .