I've worked at a company that went from high security to low, another company that did the reverse, two that were controlled by the "Network Nazis," and one with so little security that I could still (don't work there anymore) bring down half the network with just a few keystrokes. I think there is a lot of money to be saved by cutting certain security measures, and most descisions need to be based on what the company does, what employees are authorized to do what, and how computer literate the staff is. It really takes little effort to sit down for an hour or two and iron out a list of security measures the company NEEDS. And even if the company can afford the WANTS, there is probably a better place and use for that cash. For instance, there is nothing worse than collecting all kinds of user data and logs when you really have no manpower to smartly analyze all those bytes. Now, concerning the PC logon password issue, I think all companies should use this inexpensive feature; however, $20 per call to reset a forgotten password is absolutely ridiculous and is something that needs to be brought in-house or renegociated separately in the service contract.
boardgames, Uno, Lincoln Logs, trains
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Low Tech Toys?
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I'm amazed to see He-Man and Cabbage Patch Kids making a comeback. But, I guess with the new He-Man series and that fact that Cabbage Patch are good alteratives for traditional baby dolls, it shouldn't surprise me too much. G.I.Joe, considering that the new toys look stupid and that there is no cartoon airing; it surprises me to see those on the shelves. Really though, there will always be those couple hot toys per year, but any kid could latch onto one brand for their own mysterious reasons. And if one kid latches on, all his/her friends may follow soon after. Parents know how that works: "Mom, Kevin's got one; I need one to be cool." I had a LOT of toys as a kid in the 80s, but I was pretty focused on Tonka trucks, Matchbox and Hotwheels, Transformers and Gobots, Star Wars and G.I.Joe, Lincoln Logs and Construx. And of course I used to merge Star Wars and Joe armies and build their forts with Lincoln Logs (fun to crash vehicles into!) and Construx (you could build wicked towers and forts!). I just bought Lincoln Logs for my little newphew, knowning that he could use them with his Rescue Heroes and Bob The Builder toys. He already stopped playing with my old Tonka trucks I passed to him. The last "toy" of my childhood though, was a model train table (HO scale), all custombuilt by me and my father; that is quite a bond builder between father and son; expensive habbit though. I have tons of Star Wars items from then and the current run that I'm willing to sell, if anybody is interested (packaged and not packaged, but all complete and in fair to very excellent condition).
Anybody that writes for a living or an important part of their job is to write NEEDS to read a lot and should spend quality-paced time doing so. Scientists not carefully reading works they're citing is irresponsible and shows greed, greed to have their name on another paper and willing to shortcut their work to write said paper. And this applies to other jobs as well, whether you are a fiction writer, a newspaper journalist or columnist, or a consumer critic. I like to think myself as a pretty good writer, and my two strongest periods of writing came when (1) I was writing poetry and lyrics and when (2) I was writing editorials, news features, and CD reviews as a senior editor of my college newspaper. In both cases, I was ready others' writing heavily and it helped influence and inspire me, make me strive to be original, and it surely made me more knowledgable of what I was writing about. I mean, how can a novelist write a compelling book if s/he does not read others' work AND keep up on today's headlines? How can a scientist or doctor do their job most effectively and write about their results if s/he doesn't thoroughly read the works they cite; not to mention the ethical problems with that trend. Yes, we are all so busy in today's hi-tech word that we can't read everything and read it thoroughly. But we should be able to pull out the necessities and focus on those news articles, books, etc.
"And that my friends, is why Nemesis didn't even have to be a really good movie." I probably won't see Nemesis until January, but it's not because of all the naysaying. My father and I need to break apart from our separate lives and we WILL see this movie in the theatre. And no, neither of us is a true Trekkie. My question here is this: what do you all expect from a Trek movie? It is just like Star Wars, in that, every movie that comes out is never immediately embraced like the previous or the original. But I say, just like music albums, you cannot always go into a movie or TV series expecting it to be as good as your past favorite. Hope to be as good? Sure. Expect to be as good? No, because that is what ruins it for you before you have even seen the flick. That's why I ignore movie reviews. I read one every now and then, but I force myself to go in only expecting to be entertained. Sure, my fav Trek is "First Contact" and my least fav is "Generations." My father's fav is "Search For Spock" and his least fav is also "Generations." But I'm not expecting Nemesis to meet or beat those cult favs. I simply know that I will am going to see some of my fav characters on the big screen again, one last time.
A bobble-head of your $65-million boss? Are you serious? I HAVE heard it all now; I can rest assured! It is pathetic how, even in the current economy, that we pay our execs more money than they deserve or know what to do with, but we are unwilling to give employees minimal raises and at least a hundred buck bonus for the Holidays (and as end-of-the-year recognition). I went to my wife's holiday party this past Friday and it is amazing that my scotch-and-whiskey breathe didn't remark (out loud) the stupidity and thougthlessness of her bosses. The business is comprised of my wife doing all the office work, her boss running the show, one web guy and a slew of investors who bring in vendors thru connections. I had joked to my wife before the party that she would get the "1st annual employee of the year" award, as she is the first and only regular employee there. Instead, at the party, neither boss who gave a toast even gave a word or glance to my wife's hard work. And my wife admitted to me the following day that she was upset about it. Add to this that all the "investors" got thousands-dollars bonuses and she didn't get a penny extra, even when her boss knows that my wife and I are having more trouble than ever catching up on the bills. What an ass! Great, now I'm more fired up after typing this!!! I won't even get into her boss' pathetic business plan (which he was TRYING to impress me with) and the fact that he called the webguy their CTO when even I could program circles around his lazy ass (that I actually did blurt out a comment about... dope!!!). EEERRRRRR!!!!
Yes, the suspense of it and seeing a movie like LotR on the bigscreen is important, and that excitement is still alive in this day of bootlegs and downloads. Simply look at movie ticket sales! Other countries are crazed with bootleg DVDs of brandnew movies, but more because of the unlikelyhood that the majority of movie and music fans over there will (1) see the movie in the theater due to money and location or (2) be able to afford the price of legit DVDs and CDRs.
Mugs are pretty generic, but I actually like collecting company mugs from my employers, especially if they are good, thick, tall mugs that I'll use. T-shirts are crap. Glasses? Do you mean shot glasses, sunglasses or what? If shot glass, that is pretty cool; if some other "glass," sounds like crap! One workplace gave us long-sleeve button-downs with the company logo "tastefully" sized and positioned above the left pocket; as long as it's a nice shirt I can wear at work and home, that is a useable item I'll glady accept. Travel bags are good for some people, but not others. I got a really nice American Hunter overnight bag while working at the NRA, and my wife and I use it every trip, so that was a good gift.
As for other items, that is a tough question if you are tying to avoid monotony. You could do the star registry thing, granted some will laugh; but it is a unique idea and a conversation starter; it is also symbolic, like saying that all your employees are star workers. Another idea, if your company allows music in the workplace AND you can think of enough songs, is to create a compilation CD (professionally, from one of the many websites) of songs that are heard in the workplace a lot, even songs that represent the company's past year.
I think the most important thing is that company logo gifts be items that are quality made and useable at the office and out of the office (whether at home, or even a new job elsewhere). These days, in this economy, usefulness and durability are most important. It's the same when my family asks what I want for Christmas or my b-day; I tell them I want clothes, cause I'll use them and rarely go to the dept. store anyway.
If this doesn't belong in the Stupid News folder, I don't know what does! This reveals a(nother) fundamental flaw in copyright laws if a SPAMmer can send millions of unsolicated e-mails (including porn and scams) but can prevent a website from posting the SPAMmage on a non-profit website. Sounds like free advertising to me. If the SPAM's product was legit, free advertising would be a corporate wet-dream. But this just proves that SPAMmers don't want their illegimate crap revealed to the masses without their deceptive control of its distribution. What crap! How does this affect this other SPAM archive post: http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=02/11/29/141820 2
On a side note about this article thread, zerOnlne's use of the word "hacker" made me think. I use the word with more frequency now than before. The original slang meaning really applies the word to any programming, hardware workaround. Grabbing other peoples code, script or mark-up and then editing it to do what you want; that is hacking. Ripping MP3s or recording a movie from satellite to your Apple/PC is hacking, really. I would argue that using MS Word to create an HTML page is a hack. Even brewing TEA with a COFFEE maker could be considered hacking. Of how about taking the RevLimiter off your Yamaha or CBR crotch-rocket motorcycle so you can pop a wheelie?
My point here is that politicians and non-tech/non-mechanical people use the term hacking to immediately imply malicious behavior, a threat to the public, like hacking into top secret gov't networks or stealing credit card numbers from an e-commerce site. So, what happens when the FBI (Carnivore) and the new Homeland Security Dept. flag your Slashdot username as a hacker simply because their bots picked up your name posting a message where you say something like "when I want to get some late-night hacking in"? This may sound stupid to some of you, but hear me out. I think more and more of us need to publicly use the word hack (hacked, hacking, etc.) in an attempt to make the word so arbitrarily vague, that the government cannot use the word in legislative drafts, executive orders or judicial summaries. Terms like hacking and "intellectual property" have been made dangerous black holes by the government and exploited by corporate America. And when corporate America exploits something, international businesses learn to follow suit, because they can get away with it!
So on that note, Merry Hacking and have a Hacking New Year!
These DVD sets of entire TV seasons is such an incredible idea. And I'm glad to see DS9 coming out right after TNG; hopefully, Voyager will follow suit. Here are the complete TV series I would like to see released in DVD sets (just wish I could afford these mammoth releases!): Babylon 5 (including the movies and few Crusade episodes), Outer Limits (the modern run), Highlander (including the short-run female series), Airwolf, Knight Rider (including the reunion stuff), A-Team, Street Hawk, MANTIS, X-Files and Millenium, and both of Sci-Fi Channel's Invincible Man and Farscape. And what was the name of that series that used to air after the Outer Limits on Fox several years ago? What is called the Prophecy? How about some cop series to, like CHiPs, TJ Hooker, Hunter (and what was the name of Fred Dryer's spin-off series on UPN?), Law & Order, and of course, Silk Stalkings (damn that female cop was a hottie!). Babylon 5's first season DVD set was available at Costco. So was the 7-episode Carl Sagan series. My So-Called Life just came out on DVD, too; and I have hated Claire Danes in everyting after that excellent MTV series. MTV's Undressed would be another great DVD idea. Damn, I wish I won the lotto and could vegge on this stuff all day!!!
Out of the five jobs I've had out of college, only one (my second) required a written exam, which they told me was a salary placement test (for their own use) since I would be working on federal contracts. For my previous job, I had to take one of those ridiculous personality tests on the computer. And I don't think I have ever had to take tests for any job I didn't get. But my third job (at a biotech company), at the interview, the CIO and SDM asked me some oldschool computer questions that only a former IBM employee or computer science purist would have known the answers to!
Now, if I was the manager doing the hiring, I would create a written test. There is value in it.
I agree w/ ali_bubba that burning bridges is a bad idea. And it is easy to do so unintentionally too, so be careful what you say and do and around who! If a former employer calls me, I will help them out over the phone. By doing so, I now have contract work with my previous employer. But I have also left on less-than-ideal terms before. When I worked at a medium-sized web company, the COO (one of my direct bosses) took a comment I made in e-mail to be a blow against him directly, which was simply a misunderstanding that I think I worked out before my last day there. And then at my next job (a non-profit biotech), I gave two weeks notice that I was taking a job in another region of the state and the Marketing VP (my primary boss) seemed rather pissed that I couldn't make it four weeks. He had HR sign me own as a contract worker after my last day there, but I was never called back and a month later received a "end of contract hire" letter. This brings a question to bare that I know has been asked at/. many a time before: is it really so wrong to give only two weeks when that is the HR standard?
I can see the pros of this venture: no more video rental late fees; no more renting scratched up and dirty DVDs. But the cons are far greater: video store make the most profit off those late fees, so watch stores close; 8 hours is fine if you plan to watch the movie once, but what if you rent a movie that you'd like to watch several times over the course of two nights?; just another absolute waste of plastic, adding yet another non-biodegradeable piece to the jump pile; and frankly, if accepted by the naive majority, it is a dangerous path straight to media companies controlling what and how we what movies and listen to music, hence soaking even more money from our paychecks, forcing us to hack more and buy less, forcing more legal wrangling, and continuing the damn vicious cycle.
Zope is a good option. But I must praise ColdFusion. Ever since Macromedia took over this product, it is far superior. Yes, it costs money, but it is so worth it. Without a doubt the easiest scripting language and server app admin to learn, yet it is a very powerful product. I have yet to find something I cannot accomplish with ColdFusion in the workplace. I even used it for internal reporting and database admin. I scrape other websites with it; I built shopping carts and members-only sites with it; I ran webserver logs with it; etc. And two other quality notes are: (1) the books that come with the studio/server products are thorough and easy to read/apply, and (2) the discussion forum and custom tag gallery at Macromedia's own website are also the definitive resource for this suite. I can pop a question into Macromedia's ColdFusion forum and have quality answers within hours. If you are looking for quick learning curve and easy, easy maintenance, ColdFusion is a brilliant product, far better than ASP, PHP, or Zope, and I have worked with them all. Oh, and ColdFusion runs on MS, Unix, or RedHat.
"Paradoxically, even as we have higher and higher level programming tools with better and better abstractions, becoming a proficient programmer is getting harder and harder." -Joel Spolsky (http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/LeakyAbstr actions.html)
These type of headlines infuriate me. If any judge permits this type of corporate and Hollywood bullying of the law, he or she deserves to be tried for stupidity and degradation of society. A person's name cannot and should not be a copyright concern. Do you know how many Bill Wymans and people with the last name Nissan there must be in this world? It's bad enough a burnt-out rock star is claiming copyright infringement when he is the one that changed his name in the first place. What is the original Wyman supposed to do, change his name? Damnit this flames me!
I'm not a hardware junkie, but I am a music and sci-fi techie. My office is on the first level of our home. My wife got all crazy and painted it pumpkin orange as a brilliant background for all my Star Wars posters and books, my guitar gear, and my black metal CD drawers. The room wakes you up when you walk in, especially at night. I originally wanted midnight blue, but my wife gave me a killer computer room, my room!
Once again, governments are forcing technology to remain stagnet. With every great new innovation that means more bang of for the consumer dollar, companies using aging, legacy equipment would rather invest in politicians before technology. Traditional telcos don't want to embrace the VoIP industry (they'd rather rip us off every month) or lose their monopoly, so they convince gov't that VoIP is the spawn of Satan or something. Think P2P with music and movies. Think DIVX and/or TiVo technology with studios and TV networks. Think stem cell research and tissue/organ cloning with corrupt, decrepid organized religions (some that would rather forgive child molesters before accepting the fact that not everybody follows the belief system). Now think of the oldest industries and how little they have had to change (thanks to lobbying and unions) while technology offers better alternatives for the public (who the government should be working for): auto industry, telcos, movie studios, big-5 music corps., etc. Sure, there have been changes, but fundamentally, the same cow has been milked to death at the consumer's expense. And even when a young, new leader steps up to the executive plate, there are usually enough old white guys pulling the strings or dangling the carrot; thereby, innovation is squashed again. Am I bitter? Yes.
Is there a comprehensive website that maintains a database of website EUAs and software EULAs... now that would be a fun read! Add some discussion boards to each item, and that sounds like a damn good website!
what kind of attachments; how many users?
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E-Mail Size Limits?
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I think there are two simple questions to ask:
(1) What kind of attachments are the complainees sending/receiving (and are they work related);
and also, (2) how many users are we talking about here. I only ask the second question because I have worked at places with as many as 200 employees, and the SysAdmins had no trouble maintaining custom size limits per user (of course, there was a 5MB default) depending on job duties (does the job require the transmission of large attachments?).
But the first question is the most important whether you maintain user limits individually, in in groups, or overall. I would first investigate what the large attachments coming in and going out really are. Are they work-related (.pdf,.doc,.xls...) or for fun (.swf,.exe,.jpg...).
I would also make the recommendation that all e-mail be sent in text format only. HTML e-mails are on "needed" by SPAMmers, not by professional business people. As the webmaster at a mid-sized biotech firm, I successfully proposed and wrote the draft for a company-wide e-mail style guide, and text-only format was a requirement. The SysAdmins predicted improvements in bandwidth and the Marketing dept. agreed that text-only was more professional, compatible with all e-mail clients in all countries, and that HTML e-mails were inconsistently "designed" (font size, color, type, etc.) and from some individuals, sometimes tacky!
The other thing to investigate is whether the e-mails w/ large attachments are between members of the LAN? If so, they should utilitze a file-server instead of clogging up the e-mail server. Or, if the majority of the computers have ZIP drives or some other removable storage format, there is no reason one cannot walk that disk across the office.
Companies should not have to spend lots of money and time on e-mail servers. Dealing with SPAM, hack attacks, and wrong e-mail addresses is work enough.
"It's getting easier and cheaper to outsource programming jobs to India, Russia and Singapore (among other nations)."
Question for you all: Do you think that U.S. IT job opportunities are already visibly threatened by out-of-country outsourcing? I mean, I'm having a damn hard time finding a new job. And I say that only half jokingly.
"even as America keeps killing its own educational system"
Amazing how many Americas agree with this statement, regardless of their background, yet we are not doing anything positive about it. Vouchers and SOL testing are band-aids, not cures. Money and complete restructuring (of how and what we teach) are the only solution to the public school system in each state.
"hire 'em young, burn 'em out, discard 'em"
Interesting statement. I agree, but at the same time, why does every job listing (for any industry these days) ask for 5 years of this and 10 years of that, yet the starting salary is ridiculously low? Companies don't care about there employees anymore because they think we're all short-timers. Yet, no company wants to stop and ask why we have become short-timers. Additionally, and still because of the short-timer stigma, companies don't want to train new employees, so switching industries or finding a job right out of college is a nightmare, if not impossible. However, those same companies are not willing to pay for that previous experience. They just know you need a job.
"It's disappointing to see so many technology companies jumping into bed with the entertainment cartel instead of fighting for customers' rights... Here in the U.S., meanwhile, we're moving toward having two or at most three ways to access the Net in any given community. That's terrifying from an innovation and free speech perspective."
I completely agree. But the number of tech savvy customers is growing with each generation. Customers will fight back in ways that government and corporate America will never be able to control. If all the telecos, tech, and entertainment companies do succeed in using law to control and censor the current Internet, customers will create their own solution, be it hacks or an entirely new Internet. We're smarter than they are, and sneakier. Wireless will be a big part of this.
"I strongly believe geeks need to be much more active. The people who want central control of everything are shutting down innovation and freedom -- and geeks have as much to lose as anyone, maybe more."
I agree and I try to do my part. I write my congresspeople and president. I flame specific companies/organizations and spokespeople in public forums, but with facts and smart conclusions to prove a point about what they are trying to do is wrong and foolish (think RIAA, MPAA, MS, etc.). But how much of our activism is taken seriously by the general public, the media, the gov't? When corporate America funds our politicians, how can we win? I'm not saying our activism is fruitless, in fact we all need to do more. But what can be done differently and taken more seriously?
I used to be glued to the Sci-Fi Channel, but without "Invincible Man," "Farscape," and "Babylon 5" in the 7pm slot (I always miss the current 5pm slot), the only time I glance at the station is weekend mornings for "Mystery Science Theater." I don't even know when "Outer Limits" is on, or if it is (love that show). And I used to watch a couple other shows religiously, but I can't even remember their names it's been so long. I just know that aren't aired anymore either. It definitely seems that the Sci-Fi Channel goes thru management often, and it's easy to tell when cause one year the channel rocks (last year) and then the next it sucks (right now).
As far as sc-fi TV in general, the last season of "X-Files" was incredible without Mulder. His character was getting annoying. "Star Trek: Enterprise" is a lot better than its given credit for. Remember how much you hated each Trek series at series start? I hated "DS9" and "Voyager" for the first seasons, but then they learned what worked and the shows were much more entertaining. I think "Enterprise" was horrible for the first couple episodes, but it has grown on me. "CSI" isn't *really* sci-fi, but it obviously is rooted in science more than cop-show; point is that it is a fantastic show, and "CSI Miami" will get better (I just hate Kim Delaney in this show; liked her previous failed lawyer drama, but hate her on "CSI"). "Alias" has grown on me, too; yes, she's gorgeous, but her physical performance (not just appearance) makes that show alive.
As for "SG1," I used to watch the show on its original channel, but I just lost interest at some point. Now, if we could just get the Channel to finally start up a new B5 series, that would be awesome!
If my programming Zen is in full swing, I won't tire of coding and am usually pumped after I'm finished with the project, like a rush of congraduatory adrenaline. In fact, I usally forget to eat and get mad if I have to make a restroom pitstop. Usually, I only need a break if I'm stuck on a piece of the project; will just need to step away, let my pulse slow down, take some Excedrin, eat something warm, power-nap, etc. I usually only drink coffee (actually, usually hot cocoa w/ coffee poured in) or green tea if I'm cold. There is nothing worse than trying to type away with cold-numb hands. I always have my water bottle near my workstation; a lot healthier than soda or iced tea; juice gets nasty if it's no longer cold; and cola usually leaves that film in your mouth that seems particularly annoying with on the computer.
I think the most important thing is to keep what you need at your workstation and always replenish. Just don't eat over the keyboard, cause that just gets nasty over time! Here's what I keep handy at my desk: water bottle; Kleenex; Excedrin; Lip Medex; Listerine mouth strips; music; spare sweatshirt. Getting up to eat or just splash the face with water is always a quick but healthy break.
thedude makes an important point: too many companies are focusing their efforts on equipment that analyzes on feature of a potential criminal. Eyes, walk, voice, fingerprint, facial structure or bone structure, etc. We need to be creating equipment that combines all of these featrues into one system. That would be something law enforcement and security could actually use.
Superman would destroy Batman; but there are more
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I'm sorry, but Superman would obviously defeat Batman. Superman has superpowers. Batman just has expensive equipment and is a little smarter. But nothing Batman would throw at Superman would make a dealt in the Man of Steel. As for the "Superman, Batman, Spider-Man, any Jedi (particularly Yoda), and James Bond" comparison, I'd place them in this order of whoop-ass, from greatest to least: Yoda; other Jedi; Superman; Spider-Man; Batman; Bond. Of course, we're leaving off a lot of X-Men, the Power Rangers, Thundercats, He-Man, the Hulk, Rambo (or Rocky?!), Chewbacca, Ethan Hunt, Lieutenant Commander Data or Worf, B.A. Buracus and Austin Powers; but that's a much larger discussion!
Slashdot Mirror
I've worked at a company that went from high security to low, another company that did the reverse, two that were controlled by the "Network Nazis," and one with so little security that I could still (don't work there anymore) bring down half the network with just a few keystrokes. I think there is a lot of money to be saved by cutting certain security measures, and most descisions need to be based on what the company does, what employees are authorized to do what, and how computer literate the staff is. It really takes little effort to sit down for an hour or two and iron out a list of security measures the company NEEDS. And even if the company can afford the WANTS, there is probably a better place and use for that cash. For instance, there is nothing worse than collecting all kinds of user data and logs when you really have no manpower to smartly analyze all those bytes. Now, concerning the PC logon password issue, I think all companies should use this inexpensive feature; however, $20 per call to reset a forgotten password is absolutely ridiculous and is something that needs to be brought in-house or renegociated separately in the service contract.
I'm amazed to see He-Man and Cabbage Patch Kids making a comeback. But, I guess with the new He-Man series and that fact that Cabbage Patch are good alteratives for traditional baby dolls, it shouldn't surprise me too much. G.I.Joe, considering that the new toys look stupid and that there is no cartoon airing; it surprises me to see those on the shelves. Really though, there will always be those couple hot toys per year, but any kid could latch onto one brand for their own mysterious reasons. And if one kid latches on, all his/her friends may follow soon after. Parents know how that works: "Mom, Kevin's got one; I need one to be cool." I had a LOT of toys as a kid in the 80s, but I was pretty focused on Tonka trucks, Matchbox and Hotwheels, Transformers and Gobots, Star Wars and G.I.Joe, Lincoln Logs and Construx. And of course I used to merge Star Wars and Joe armies and build their forts with Lincoln Logs (fun to crash vehicles into!) and Construx (you could build wicked towers and forts!). I just bought Lincoln Logs for my little newphew, knowning that he could use them with his Rescue Heroes and Bob The Builder toys. He already stopped playing with my old Tonka trucks I passed to him. The last "toy" of my childhood though, was a model train table (HO scale), all custombuilt by me and my father; that is quite a bond builder between father and son; expensive habbit though. I have tons of Star Wars items from then and the current run that I'm willing to sell, if anybody is interested (packaged and not packaged, but all complete and in fair to very excellent condition).
Anybody that writes for a living or an important part of their job is to write NEEDS to read a lot and should spend quality-paced time doing so. Scientists not carefully reading works they're citing is irresponsible and shows greed, greed to have their name on another paper and willing to shortcut their work to write said paper. And this applies to other jobs as well, whether you are a fiction writer, a newspaper journalist or columnist, or a consumer critic. I like to think myself as a pretty good writer, and my two strongest periods of writing came when (1) I was writing poetry and lyrics and when (2) I was writing editorials, news features, and CD reviews as a senior editor of my college newspaper. In both cases, I was ready others' writing heavily and it helped influence and inspire me, make me strive to be original, and it surely made me more knowledgable of what I was writing about. I mean, how can a novelist write a compelling book if s/he does not read others' work AND keep up on today's headlines? How can a scientist or doctor do their job most effectively and write about their results if s/he doesn't thoroughly read the works they cite; not to mention the ethical problems with that trend. Yes, we are all so busy in today's hi-tech word that we can't read everything and read it thoroughly. But we should be able to pull out the necessities and focus on those news articles, books, etc.
"And that my friends, is why Nemesis didn't even have to be a really good movie." I probably won't see Nemesis until January, but it's not because of all the naysaying. My father and I need to break apart from our separate lives and we WILL see this movie in the theatre. And no, neither of us is a true Trekkie. My question here is this: what do you all expect from a Trek movie? It is just like Star Wars, in that, every movie that comes out is never immediately embraced like the previous or the original. But I say, just like music albums, you cannot always go into a movie or TV series expecting it to be as good as your past favorite. Hope to be as good? Sure. Expect to be as good? No, because that is what ruins it for you before you have even seen the flick. That's why I ignore movie reviews. I read one every now and then, but I force myself to go in only expecting to be entertained. Sure, my fav Trek is "First Contact" and my least fav is "Generations." My father's fav is "Search For Spock" and his least fav is also "Generations." But I'm not expecting Nemesis to meet or beat those cult favs. I simply know that I will am going to see some of my fav characters on the big screen again, one last time.
A bobble-head of your $65-million boss? Are you serious? I HAVE heard it all now; I can rest assured! It is pathetic how, even in the current economy, that we pay our execs more money than they deserve or know what to do with, but we are unwilling to give employees minimal raises and at least a hundred buck bonus for the Holidays (and as end-of-the-year recognition). I went to my wife's holiday party this past Friday and it is amazing that my scotch-and-whiskey breathe didn't remark (out loud) the stupidity and thougthlessness of her bosses. The business is comprised of my wife doing all the office work, her boss running the show, one web guy and a slew of investors who bring in vendors thru connections. I had joked to my wife before the party that she would get the "1st annual employee of the year" award, as she is the first and only regular employee there. Instead, at the party, neither boss who gave a toast even gave a word or glance to my wife's hard work. And my wife admitted to me the following day that she was upset about it. Add to this that all the "investors" got thousands-dollars bonuses and she didn't get a penny extra, even when her boss knows that my wife and I are having more trouble than ever catching up on the bills. What an ass! Great, now I'm more fired up after typing this!!! I won't even get into her boss' pathetic business plan (which he was TRYING to impress me with) and the fact that he called the webguy their CTO when even I could program circles around his lazy ass (that I actually did blurt out a comment about ... dope!!!). EEERRRRRR!!!!
Yes, the suspense of it and seeing a movie like LotR on the bigscreen is important, and that excitement is still alive in this day of bootlegs and downloads. Simply look at movie ticket sales! Other countries are crazed with bootleg DVDs of brandnew movies, but more because of the unlikelyhood that the majority of movie and music fans over there will (1) see the movie in the theater due to money and location or (2) be able to afford the price of legit DVDs and CDRs.
Mugs are pretty generic, but I actually like collecting company mugs from my employers, especially if they are good, thick, tall mugs that I'll use. T-shirts are crap. Glasses? Do you mean shot glasses, sunglasses or what? If shot glass, that is pretty cool; if some other "glass," sounds like crap! One workplace gave us long-sleeve button-downs with the company logo "tastefully" sized and positioned above the left pocket; as long as it's a nice shirt I can wear at work and home, that is a useable item I'll glady accept. Travel bags are good for some people, but not others. I got a really nice American Hunter overnight bag while working at the NRA, and my wife and I use it every trip, so that was a good gift.
As for other items, that is a tough question if you are tying to avoid monotony. You could do the star registry thing, granted some will laugh; but it is a unique idea and a
conversation starter; it is also symbolic, like saying that all your employees are star workers. Another idea, if your company allows music in the workplace AND you can think of enough songs, is to create a compilation CD (professionally, from one of the many websites) of songs that are heard in the workplace a lot, even songs that represent the company's past year.
I think the most important thing is that company logo gifts be items that are quality made and useable at the office and out of the office (whether at home, or even a new job elsewhere). These days, in this economy, usefulness and durability are most important. It's the same when my family asks what I want for Christmas or my b-day; I tell them I want clothes, cause I'll use them and rarely go to the dept. store anyway.
If this doesn't belong in the Stupid News folder, I don't know what does! This reveals a(nother) fundamental flaw in copyright laws if a SPAMmer can send millions of unsolicated e-mails (including porn and scams) but can prevent a website from posting the SPAMmage on a non-profit website. Sounds like free advertising to me. If the SPAM's product was legit, free advertising would be a corporate wet-dream. But this just proves that SPAMmers don't want their illegimate crap revealed to the masses without their deceptive control of its distribution. What crap! How does this affect this other SPAM archive post: http://slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=02/11/29/141820 2
On a side note about this article thread, zerOnlne's use of the word "hacker" made me think. I use the word with more frequency now than before. The original slang meaning really applies the word to any programming, hardware workaround. Grabbing other peoples code, script or mark-up and then editing it to do what you want; that is hacking. Ripping MP3s or recording a movie from satellite to your Apple/PC is hacking, really. I would argue that using MS Word to create an HTML page is a hack. Even brewing TEA with a COFFEE maker could be considered hacking. Of how about taking the RevLimiter off your Yamaha or CBR crotch-rocket motorcycle so you can pop a wheelie?
My point here is that politicians and non-tech/non-mechanical people use the term hacking to immediately imply malicious behavior, a threat to the public, like hacking into top secret gov't networks or stealing credit card numbers from an e-commerce site. So, what happens when the FBI (Carnivore) and the new Homeland Security Dept. flag your Slashdot username as a hacker simply because their bots picked up your name posting a message where you say something like "when I want to get some late-night hacking in"? This may sound stupid to some of you, but hear me out. I think more and more of us need to publicly use the word hack (hacked, hacking, etc.) in an attempt to make the word so arbitrarily vague, that the government cannot use the word in legislative drafts, executive orders or judicial summaries. Terms like hacking and "intellectual property" have been made dangerous black holes by the government and exploited by corporate America. And when corporate America exploits something, international businesses learn to follow suit, because they can get away with it!
So on that note, Merry Hacking and have a Hacking New Year!
These DVD sets of entire TV seasons is such an incredible idea. And I'm glad to see DS9 coming out right after TNG; hopefully, Voyager will follow suit. Here are the complete TV series I would like to see released in DVD sets (just wish I could afford these mammoth releases!): Babylon 5 (including the movies and few Crusade episodes), Outer Limits (the modern run), Highlander (including the short-run female series), Airwolf, Knight Rider (including the reunion stuff), A-Team, Street Hawk, MANTIS, X-Files and Millenium, and both of Sci-Fi Channel's Invincible Man and Farscape. And what was the name of that series that used to air after the Outer Limits on Fox several years ago? What is called the Prophecy? How about some cop series to, like CHiPs, TJ Hooker, Hunter (and what was the name of Fred Dryer's spin-off series on UPN?), Law & Order, and of course, Silk Stalkings (damn that female cop was a hottie!). Babylon 5's first season DVD set was available at Costco. So was the 7-episode Carl Sagan series. My So-Called Life just came out on DVD, too; and I have hated Claire Danes in everyting after that excellent MTV series. MTV's Undressed would be another great DVD idea. Damn, I wish I won the lotto and could vegge on this stuff all day!!!
Out of the five jobs I've had out of college, only one (my second) required a written exam, which they told me was a salary placement test (for their own use) since I would be working on federal contracts. For my previous job, I had to take one of those ridiculous personality tests on the computer. And I don't think I have ever had to take tests for any job I didn't get. But my third job (at a biotech company), at the interview, the CIO and SDM asked me some oldschool computer questions that only a former IBM employee or computer science purist would have known the answers to!
Now, if I was the manager doing the hiring, I would create a written test. There is value in it.
I agree w/ ali_bubba that burning bridges is a bad idea. And it is easy to do so unintentionally too, so be careful what you say and do and around who! If a former employer calls me, I will help them out over the phone. By doing so, I now have contract work with my previous employer. But I have also left on less-than-ideal terms before. When I worked at a medium-sized web company, the COO (one of my direct bosses) took a comment I made in e-mail to be a blow against him directly, which was simply a misunderstanding that I think I worked out before my last day there. And then at my next job (a non-profit biotech), I gave two weeks notice that I was taking a job in another region of the state and the Marketing VP (my primary boss) seemed rather pissed that I couldn't make it four weeks. He had HR sign me own as a contract worker after my last day there, but I was never called back and a month later received a "end of contract hire" letter. This brings a question to bare that I know has been asked at /. many a time before: is it really so wrong to give only two weeks when that is the HR standard?
I can see the pros of this venture: no more video rental late fees; no more renting scratched up and dirty DVDs. But the cons are far greater: video store make the most profit off those late fees, so watch stores close; 8 hours is fine if you plan to watch the movie once, but what if you rent a movie that you'd like to watch several times over the course of two nights?; just another absolute waste of plastic, adding yet another non-biodegradeable piece to the jump pile; and frankly, if accepted by the naive majority, it is a dangerous path straight to media companies controlling what and how we what movies and listen to music, hence soaking even more money from our paychecks, forcing us to hack more and buy less, forcing more legal wrangling, and continuing the damn vicious cycle.
Zope is a good option. But I must praise ColdFusion. Ever since Macromedia took over this product, it is far superior. Yes, it costs money, but it is so worth it. Without a doubt the easiest scripting language and server app admin to learn, yet it is a very powerful product. I have yet to find something I cannot accomplish with ColdFusion in the workplace. I even used it for internal reporting and database admin. I scrape other websites with it; I built shopping carts and members-only sites with it; I ran webserver logs with it; etc. And two other quality notes are: (1) the books that come with the studio/server products are thorough and easy to read/apply, and (2) the discussion forum and custom tag gallery at Macromedia's own website are also the definitive resource for this suite. I can pop a question into Macromedia's ColdFusion forum and have quality answers within hours. If you are looking for quick learning curve and easy, easy maintenance, ColdFusion is a brilliant product, far better than ASP, PHP, or Zope, and I have worked with them all. Oh, and ColdFusion runs on MS, Unix, or RedHat.
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"Paradoxically, even as we have higher and higher level programming tools with better and better abstractions, becoming a proficient programmer is getting harder and harder." -Joel Spolsky (http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/LeakyAbst
These type of headlines infuriate me. If any judge permits this type of corporate and Hollywood bullying of the law, he or she deserves to be tried for stupidity and degradation of society. A person's name cannot and should not be a copyright concern. Do you know how many Bill Wymans and people with the last name Nissan there must be in this world? It's bad enough a burnt-out rock star is claiming copyright infringement when he is the one that changed his name in the first place. What is the original Wyman supposed to do, change his name? Damnit this flames me!
I'm not a hardware junkie, but I am a music and sci-fi techie. My office is on the first level of our home. My wife got all crazy and painted it pumpkin orange as a brilliant background for all my Star Wars posters and books, my guitar gear, and my black metal CD drawers. The room wakes you up when you walk in, especially at night. I originally wanted midnight blue, but my wife gave me a killer computer room, my room!
Once again, governments are forcing technology to remain stagnet. With every great new innovation that means more bang of for the consumer dollar, companies using aging, legacy equipment would rather invest in politicians before technology. Traditional telcos don't want to embrace the VoIP industry (they'd rather rip us off every month) or lose their monopoly, so they convince gov't that VoIP is the spawn of Satan or something. Think P2P with music and movies. Think DIVX and/or TiVo technology with studios and TV networks. Think stem cell research and tissue/organ cloning with corrupt, decrepid organized religions (some that would rather forgive child molesters before accepting the fact that not everybody follows the belief system). Now think of the oldest industries and how little they have had to change (thanks to lobbying and unions) while technology offers better alternatives for the public (who the government should be working for): auto industry, telcos, movie studios, big-5 music corps., etc. Sure, there have been changes, but fundamentally, the same cow has been milked to death at the consumer's expense. And even when a young, new leader steps up to the executive plate, there are usually enough old white guys pulling the strings or dangling the carrot; thereby, innovation is squashed again. Am I bitter? Yes.
Is there a comprehensive website that maintains a database of website EUAs and software EULAs ... now that would be a fun read! Add some discussion boards to each item, and that sounds like a damn good website!
I think there are two simple questions to ask:
.doc, .xls...) or for fun (.swf, .exe, .jpg...).
(1) What kind of attachments are the complainees sending/receiving (and are they work related);
and also, (2) how many users are we talking about here. I only ask the second question because I have worked at places with as many as 200 employees, and the SysAdmins had no trouble maintaining custom size limits per user (of course, there was a 5MB default) depending on job duties (does the job require the transmission of large attachments?).
But the first question is the most important whether you maintain user limits individually, in in groups, or overall. I would first investigate what the large attachments coming in and going out really are. Are they work-related (.pdf,
I would also make the recommendation that all e-mail be sent in text format only. HTML e-mails are on "needed" by SPAMmers, not by professional business people. As the webmaster at a mid-sized biotech firm, I successfully proposed and wrote the draft for a company-wide e-mail style guide, and text-only format was a requirement. The SysAdmins predicted improvements in bandwidth and the Marketing dept. agreed that text-only was more professional, compatible with all e-mail clients in all countries, and that HTML e-mails were inconsistently "designed" (font size, color, type, etc.) and from some individuals, sometimes tacky!
The other thing to investigate is whether the e-mails w/ large attachments are between members of the LAN? If so, they should utilitze a file-server instead of clogging up the e-mail server. Or, if the majority of the computers have ZIP drives or some other removable storage format, there is no reason one cannot walk that disk across the office.
Companies should not have to spend lots of money and time on e-mail servers. Dealing with SPAM, hack attacks, and wrong e-mail addresses is work enough.
"It's getting easier and cheaper to outsource programming jobs to India, Russia and Singapore (among other nations)."
Question for you all: Do you think that U.S. IT job opportunities are already visibly threatened by out-of-country outsourcing? I mean, I'm having a damn hard time finding a new job. And I say that only half jokingly.
"even as America keeps killing its own educational system"
Amazing how many Americas agree with this statement, regardless of their background, yet we are not doing anything positive about it. Vouchers and SOL testing are band-aids, not cures. Money and complete restructuring (of how and what we teach) are the only solution to the public school system in each state.
"hire 'em young, burn 'em out, discard 'em"
Interesting statement. I agree, but at the same time, why does every job listing (for any industry these days) ask for 5 years of this and 10 years of that, yet the starting salary is ridiculously low? Companies don't care about there employees anymore because they think we're all short-timers. Yet, no company wants to stop and ask why we have become short-timers. Additionally, and still because of the short-timer stigma, companies don't want to train new employees, so switching industries or finding a job right out of college is a nightmare, if not impossible. However, those same companies are not willing to pay for that previous experience. They just know you need a job.
"It's disappointing to see so many technology companies jumping into bed with the entertainment cartel instead of fighting for customers' rights ... Here in the U.S., meanwhile, we're moving toward having two or at most three ways to access the Net in any given community. That's terrifying from an innovation and free speech perspective."
I completely agree. But the number of tech savvy customers is growing with each generation. Customers will fight back in ways that government and corporate America will never be able to control. If all the telecos, tech, and entertainment companies do succeed in using law to control and censor the current Internet, customers will create their own solution, be it hacks or an entirely new Internet. We're smarter than they are, and sneakier. Wireless will be a big part of this.
"I strongly believe geeks need to be much more active. The people who want central control of everything are shutting down innovation and freedom -- and geeks have as much to lose as anyone, maybe more."
I agree and I try to do my part. I write my congresspeople and president. I flame specific companies/organizations and spokespeople in public forums, but with facts and smart conclusions to prove a point about what they are trying to do is wrong and foolish (think RIAA, MPAA, MS, etc.). But how much of our activism is taken seriously by the general public, the media, the gov't? When corporate America funds our politicians, how can we win? I'm not saying our activism is fruitless, in fact we all need to do more. But what can be done differently and taken more seriously?
I used to be glued to the Sci-Fi Channel, but without "Invincible Man," "Farscape," and "Babylon 5" in the 7pm slot (I always miss the current 5pm slot), the only time I glance at the station is weekend mornings for "Mystery Science Theater." I don't even know when "Outer Limits" is on, or if it is (love that show). And I used to watch a couple other shows religiously, but I can't even remember their names it's been so long. I just know that aren't aired anymore either. It definitely seems that the Sci-Fi Channel goes thru management often, and it's easy to tell when cause one year the channel rocks (last year) and then the next it sucks (right now).
As far as sc-fi TV in general, the last season of "X-Files" was incredible without Mulder. His character was getting annoying. "Star Trek: Enterprise" is a lot better than its given credit for. Remember how much you hated each Trek series at series start? I hated "DS9" and "Voyager" for the first seasons, but then they learned what worked and the shows were much more entertaining. I think "Enterprise" was horrible for the first couple episodes, but it has grown on me. "CSI" isn't *really* sci-fi, but it obviously is rooted in science more than cop-show; point is that it is a fantastic show, and "CSI Miami" will get better (I just hate Kim Delaney in this show; liked her previous failed lawyer drama, but hate her on "CSI"). "Alias" has grown on me, too; yes, she's gorgeous, but her physical performance (not just appearance) makes that show alive.
As for "SG1," I used to watch the show on its original channel, but I just lost interest at some point. Now, if we could just get the Channel to finally start up a new B5 series, that would be awesome!
If my programming Zen is in full swing, I won't tire of coding and am usually pumped after I'm finished with the project, like a rush of congraduatory adrenaline. In fact, I usally forget to eat and get mad if I have to make a restroom pitstop. Usually, I only need a break if I'm stuck on a piece of the project; will just need to step away, let my pulse slow down, take some Excedrin, eat something warm, power-nap, etc. I usually only drink coffee (actually, usually hot cocoa w/ coffee poured in) or green tea if I'm cold. There is nothing worse than trying to type away with cold-numb hands. I always have my water bottle near my workstation; a lot healthier than soda or iced tea; juice gets nasty if it's no longer cold; and cola usually leaves that film in your mouth that seems particularly annoying with on the computer.
I think the most important thing is to keep what you need at your workstation and always replenish. Just don't eat over the keyboard, cause that just gets nasty over time! Here's what I keep handy at my desk: water bottle; Kleenex; Excedrin; Lip Medex; Listerine mouth strips; music; spare sweatshirt. Getting up to eat or just splash the face with water is always a quick but healthy break.
"Let the juvenile comedy commence!"
Okay: Porn sites will make millions off this innovation!
thedude makes an important point: too many companies are focusing their efforts on equipment that analyzes on feature of a potential criminal. Eyes, walk, voice, fingerprint, facial structure or bone structure, etc. We need to be creating equipment that combines all of these featrues into one system. That would be something law enforcement and security could actually use.
I'm sorry, but Superman would obviously defeat Batman. Superman has superpowers. Batman just has expensive equipment and is a little smarter. But nothing Batman would throw at Superman would make a dealt in the Man of Steel. As for the "Superman, Batman, Spider-Man, any Jedi (particularly Yoda), and James Bond" comparison, I'd place them in this order of whoop-ass, from greatest to least: Yoda; other Jedi; Superman; Spider-Man; Batman; Bond. Of course, we're leaving off a lot of X-Men, the Power Rangers, Thundercats, He-Man, the Hulk, Rambo (or Rocky?!), Chewbacca, Ethan Hunt, Lieutenant Commander Data or Worf, B.A. Buracus and Austin Powers; but that's a much larger discussion!