The tech support deparment I worked in for a state uni kept a Ghost image of the student machines so if they became screwed up it was a quick automated task to fix the problem.
"Just opening Internet Explorer results in about 3 minutes of closing popups"
So why were you putting your head in the sand by installing two pieces of software that had nothing to do with the problem? No wonder you got chewed out. You using FireFox and Winamp aren't doing anything to help.
If you want to make yourself useful you should have downloaded AdAware and cleaned up the system for them and then went to Windows Update and patched the system like engineers like to not do. Then, when AdAware is done getting rid of the pop-up problem you uninstall it and no one knows. And, you actually fixed the problem.
Rather than just breaking policy which is there to prevent unneeded crap from being installed and bogging down the system. If you can install your toys so can all the students and now the system is unusable and needs to be reimaged.
The college of ed at a major state university where a certain couple famous people recently debated, where I used to work only uses IE on their systems. They also used Windows 98 until recently (now they use XP). During the hay day of blaster and myDoom and whatnot guess which department was the least affected by it all? The College of Ed. Even with all our Win98 boxes being directly on the wire. Even our division of teachers was the least affected. There were a few that turned off automatic update like we told them not to and those were the ones that got it.
Guess who was most affected by the worms? The engineering department which requires logging onto the domain with your student ID and who run Windows 2000.
The College of Ed tech support people actually did their job and that prevented a lot of problems. So the fact that the IT people of Penn State are sending out a warning to 80,000 students just makes me laugh.
Our wonderful IT deparment can't even keep the network running reliably during heavy usage times such as pre-registration week and when grades come out.
IE and Windows aren't the problem.
Sending out a rediculous warning e-mail isn't going to do anything for them or the open source movement. People keep telling me the sky is falling and I've yet to see it actually happen to my systems.
A better solution would be to educate the students on where to get the free VirusScan software from the university and how to keep it up to date along with their Windows system.
It doesn't matter what browser you're using. It needs to be kept up to date.
It wasn't a third party download either. It was the version you got directly from Mozilla and the spyware part wasn't an option, it was part of the package.
If I find out a piece of software I need has spyware I run AdAware to clean it up and if that doesn't fix it, I uninstall the program when I'm done with whatever I was using it for and find something else.
If the program is up front about it and isn't an obnoxious little whore about it, I'll let it slide. Google Toolbar is spyware but it's nothing I object to and nothing I can't opt out of. eDonkey decided to infect Windows with a pain in the butt to remove browser hijack so that will never be used again. Apparently the ads weren't good enough for them. I finished what I started downloading and completely removed eDonkey and cleaned up the spyware.
If Mozilla had been up front about their spyware in the German version of the browser, they wouldn't have had such a negative reaction. All they had to do was make it an option and point out that it helps fund the foundation to try to persuade people to use it. But, instead they decided to use typical spyware tactics and tried to slip it in under the radar without the user's consent.
then they'll advertise it for free depending on their means. Otherwise it's going to take a paycheck. If I don't like a product enough I'll negatively advertise it.
If there is a cost involved with advertising the product then of course someone is going to consider whether they will demand a fee or not depending on how much they like or dislike the product.
If a rich person really likes or dislikes product A then they may spend a million bucks advertising it because they want to. This happens in politics often. A local millionaire spent a lot of money campaigning against a recent proposition. Other rich people campaigned for it. If a modestly wealthy person likes product A then they may seek cheaper avenues to advertise such as basic word of mouth or print ads.
This isn't late breaking news or anything that has to do with Open Source. This has been public knowledge since forever. Word of mouth is the cheapest and best advertising and you can only get it from people who like your product enough to talk about it.
Every company seeks to get word of mouth. This is why they have occasionally steeply discounted or free samples of their product. A limited number of people buy it because of the price point and then advertise to friends and family who then may pay a higher price for it after the sale ends.
It's not a religious issue, it's a reality issue
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Doom Movie Update
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· Score: 0, Troll
The "jesusland" people would be pissed that there's so much gore and whatnot. If the fact that a human is conquering hell was a "jesusland" problem I can think of other movies that present the same idea that got to theaters just fine without a rewrite of the key plot device. "End of Days" being one of them.
The problem is that "hell isn't real." Being mutated by crazy viruses is real (or at least a scientific possibility).
I wouldn't blame "jesusland" for this one. I'd blame atheists who are trying to make the movie more realistic (and therefore more scary). Since hell doesn't actually exist according to them, it's the first to go.
But hey, let's blame the Jews (er Christians) for spoiling all our fun. Rather than standard Hollywood proceedure of picking plot devices that sell. Religious scapegoats are more fun.
Commission Junction does commission based advertising. I used them for quite awhile. I still have all the stats. Well over 60,000 impressions, and not a single penny in revenue generated. That was when I went to subscriptions. I made quite a bit more that way. Then I discovered Google AdSense and I make more than I made with subscriptions.
TV advertisers don't get paid commission for sales, why should web-site owners?
If you don't like their system, think it's stupid, then there are plenty of other options to choose from. In the mean time, a few jerk offs aren't going to destroy Google's system, they're simply going to delude the value of a click. Which means more agressive advertising from publishers.
Which is why we have pop-ups and pop-unders to begin with. And pages with multiple ads on the same page, and news stories broken up between multiple pages and ads that come up between pages that you have to click past. All because of a bunch of idiot publishers who have tried to scam advertising companies over the years.
On my site I only display an ad ~60% of the time on average and never more than one ad on a page. That works for me. Impressions go way down but clicks go up.
Google was trying to play really nice and genuinly help people out. If this revenue stream goes away, I'm going back to subscriptions for a large portion of my site. It doesn't hurt me anything.
I don't like charging people. I like having a very large site that's 100% free. But I've got costs to cover.
So yes it is a real site. And a signed SSL certificate is only useful to let the end user know they're who they say they are. It has nothing to do with the security of the site.
This is why Slashdot can't link directly to them but certain companies like Transunion can. If you type in the name of the domain yourself then link scams don't work so a signed SSL isn't an issue.
Also, once I hit the sign up area it went to a secure connection without any warnings. I don't bother with a sign cert for my web-mail and am warned when I access it through SSL.
So you're pretty much wrong about everything and the moderators didn't bother to verify your claims before they wasted their mod points on you.
But if my AdSense revenue goes away, I'll go back to subscriptions. I even have my pages set so that ads only appear a fraction of the time (50-80%) which cuts down on ad impressions and actually increases revenue.
You can't adblock your way out of subscriptions. There is no bandwidth fairy. It costs content providers real money to host things.
You're either going to allow the advertisers to pay for the costs by "suffering" through some ads or pay for it yourself.
Lots of major sites already are going to the dual model of free content and paid premium content.
The money has to come from somewhere. Either the provider is rich (or the web-site is cheap to run) and willing to cover all the costs themselves, the advertisers cover costs, or the visitors cover costs.
I've been the sole developer for www.icarusindie.com for going on 4 years now. I built the site up from scratch. I've found that the most popular thing people want is how-to's. Rather than building complete projects, I've begun working on smaller projects and go into detail on how each part works. For example, I took www.Wolf5K.com deobfuscated it and posted detailed tutorials on how each part works. I then converted it to C++ and upped the graphics quality.
That kind of thing got a lot of attention. If I had just made yet another Wolf 3D clone, I'd get no attention.
I also have a complete project which I just need to get the rights to before I can release it. Other than that, single coder that took an existing product and made an on-line version. That's the easy way. Go into a game store (board games et al), find a game that interests you that was made by a small time publisher, and make a computer version of it. A small time publisher is more likely to talk to you about a licensing deal without demanding a lot (if any) up front money.
If nothing else, it's a great way to learn how to make a professional product without having to go through the whole concept development process. The design doc is the instruction manual and you can scan in all the graphics. So no programmer art.
It's much easier to blow $20 every once in awhile than have to blow $300. That's nearly a car payment + insurance. You don't need to plan ahead for a $20 expense but you do have to plan ahead for a $300 expense.
Tivo can negotiate how much they want for the data they collect. Typical Joe Public can't because another Joe Public will take the $5 and be content since they don't see it as valuable anyway. Tivo knows exactly how much it's worth. And it's more than $5 per viewer per week.
Just look at how much various shows can pay their cast and demand from advertisers. That kind of information is worth a lot of money.
Nielson is using a limited number of viewers to extrapolate the larger population. Tivo has access to a much greater population than Nielson can reach. And the data is already entered into a database and ready to be mined using statistical software. There's no time and money consuming data entry by people.
The Internet is abuzz with speculation that there were so many voting irregularities this election that President Bush may not have won after all.
But the man who headed the Democrats' team of 3,600 attorneys, spread across the country to address irregularities, says, "that ain't the case." Kerry adviser Jack Corrigan, quoted by the Boston Globe, says, "No one would be more interested than me in finding out that we really won... I get why people are frustrated, but [Republicans] did not steal this election. There were a few problems here and there in the election. But unlike 2000, there is no doubt that they actually got more votes than we did, and they got them in the states that mattered."
Other Kerry campaign officials agree. --------
You can find that quote in a number of news sources now. That blurb is from FoxNews.com but you can also find it here:
http://www.iht.com/articles/2004/11/11/news/elec t. html
They need to remember that the next election so they don't do a repeat of this election. The anti-Bush crowd did an excellent job alienating the Republicans and motivating them to vote for Bush. In the process they failed to build up the support they needed for their own candidate. Any rational argument against Bush was quickly lost by screaming loonies calling Bush, Hitler and insulting the intelligence of anyone who didn't have the same negative opinion.
They put the Republicans on the defensive which resulted in Bush being re-elected, the Republicans getting a larger margin in the house and senate and the minority leader losing his job. The first time that's happened in 50 years.
I think the problem was that the Democrats thought they were in the majority judging by all the various polls and world opinion and they didn't need "idiots" voting for their guy. Turns out they really were the minority.
a lesbian complained that Chasing Amy made it sound as those homosexuality were just a choice and that a lesbian just needed a "deep dicking" to be converted.
Kevin Smith pointed out that the Jason Lee character said that because his character is so WRONG about everything. Kevin Smith was making a point that such a line of reasoning is WRONG.
"Syndrome" said that because the idea is WRONG. If were were coming out of Mr Incredible's mouth then it might possibly be construed that Pixar was trying to convince people that were the way things are.
What made you think that the villian in the movie was the one to pay attention to for some kind of moral lesson? Pixar had Syndrome say those lines because he's the bad guy and HE'S WRONG. Dash says it because he's young and ignorant. And he later finds out he was WRONG. His entire family has special abilities that make them unique.
All the Incredibles are unique in their own special way. The heros are like that because that is the CORRECT moral lesson Pixar was putting out there.
Seriously. I can't think of any movie where every character good and bad speaks only moral truths that the audience is supposed to take as correct. This like every other movie ever made has characters which have incorrect world views which are then demonstrated to be wrong by events of the film.
distributing copyrighted material without permission is illegal. You know the law. Don't be so shocked and horrified that companies start making use of it. Companies have grinned and beared it for quite awhile.
Nobody cares if you copy movies and share amongst friends. But when your "friends" are anyone who happens by, no duh you're going to get in trouble. If you and a few friends swipe a bit of candy from the Brach's candy bin, chances are the store isn't going to give a shit. But if you advertise "free candy" and help the neighborhood out to "free" candy, you can expect to escorted somewhere by security.
I don't fear loaning movies/music to actual friends in private. Nobody has ever been prosecuted for that. When you do it publically and to a large audience, what do you expect to happen?
I see and buy lots of movies. I know the value of old films so I rarely pay more than $15 for a DVD. I only pay more if it's a really really good movie that recently came out. And you can always buy used or rent. There is no justification for piracy of mainstream movies which is what the MPAA is going after. There are plenty of legal options available to you regardless of your budget.
People are more interested in what you've done rather than what you say you're going to do which may or may not happen. Everybody knows that campaign promises tend to be broken so what you say you're going to do is going to be taken with a grain of salt.
This campaign really is about what GW did and whether you like it or not. Not so much about what either candidate plans to do the next four years.
I invested in my current stock AVN because they've done interesting things in the past, their stock history is good and because they had interesting current projects. I paid $1.76 a share and it's now above $3 a share. Their current project at the time is now showing real promise and getting some attention.
A soilder joined the service knowing the risks. They agreed to put their life on the line so others wouldn't have to.
Liberals act like people who support war don't know how horrible it is. Because after all, if we knew how horrible it is how could we possibly support it?
We know how horrible it is, and we're grateful for those who serve so we don't have to.
""This is important enough to me that I think a bunch of people I've never met should be sent to die while I sit at home risk-free"?"
reduction to absurdity. Nobody is sending the soilders off to die. We send them off to do their duty knowing that some may die. There's a very large difference.
It's no different than calling 911 and expecting a fireman to jump into your burning house to save your kid. Or expecting the cops to come put their lives in danger to come help you. We know that fireman and policemen may die because of a 911 call and yet we still dial the numbers when we're in trouble.
It's a rediculous idea to pretend that those who agreed to protect and serve shouldn't be depended on by those who havn't signed on to the profession.
Those who can't should repspect and support those who do.
"in the case of war, there are compelling arguments that they shouldn't"
No such arguments actually exist. If they did I'd imagine you'd at least put one of them in your post.
Only the democrates are putting bills out on the issue and it's going nowhere. Any time I see anyone mention the draft it just screams ignorant scare tactic. I'd really like to know what the dems are smoking that they can even pretend to threaten people with this issue. Only the democrates are claiming Bush is planning to initiate a draft and yet only the democrates have crafted bills to initiate it which the republicans aren't giving the time of day to.
After Vietnam the country came to it's senses and realized that you can't force somebody to fight for their country. That was a "small part" of how we became a country in the first place. You have a right to not have to put your neck on the line for your country if you don't believe a cause is worth fighting.
It's called a "conscientious objector" back when there was a draft. Not everyone who got out of the draft fled the country. Many "COed" their way out of the war. Even if there were a draft (which there won't because it's been found wrong on so many levels) you can object to the war and go home.
It really is a shame that the dems have stooped to this scare tactic to try to get people to stop supporting the war on Iraq.
Not everybody who supports any war, fights in it. And there's nothing wrong with that no matter how many liberals scream otherwise. It's idiotic to assume that you can't support anything dangerous if you don't put your neck on the line yourself. If someone wants to put their neck on the line for a cause (even dangerous sports) then they need supporters of all types. Even those who are sitting in safety. It's good to know there are people who can't do what you do, who appreciate what you do for them.
While I'm stuck working part time as a programmer to pay the bills (a nice gig that allows me to make my own hours while I'm going to school), I've got a web-site that is beginning to show promise as a way to get a decent amount of residual income. The sections that bring in the most revenue are the sections I havn't touched in months. So it's not something I must do constantly.
I'm also making money on the stock market. I'm not getting rich yet, I'm young enough to do proof of concept and risk hundreds of dollars to learn. Once I get financially situated in a real job then I can drop more money on the market to try to increase that income stream.
And when I get out of school, I'll be a high school math teacher making me as free from computers as I want to be. It'll be a hobby and a teaching tool (math demonstration scripts, class sessions in MP3 format, notes, homework assignments, etc) but not a necessity. It's the not being a necessity part that keeps programming interesting.
The trick is to either maximize residual income (so you can work less at a real job) or focus on shifting careers to something that doesn't require a computer constantly.
It's just a matter of figuring out where you want to be and figuring out how to get there.
I don't want to spend my life in front of a computer so I'm not going to.
Whether or not it's legal is irrelavent. It violates someone as a person to post pictures of them for all the world to see without their permission. It's absurdly disrespectful.
Imagine if your mom decided to put up a public web-site and post all your embaressing pictures for the world to see. Complete with commentary.
That said, I imagine that these pictures weren't actually lost. Or this guy is just looking to be bared from carrying a camera if he ever gets invited to a party. If these aren't his pictures and didn't get persmission to post them from the people in them then he's just established that he's someone that can't be trusted with a camera. He's got no respect.
in relation to the parent post in which it was a reponse to. It's a called a "tangent." If you don't want to waste moderation points on tangents then that's your business.
"It is the responsibility of the mods to keep this kind of bantering and obvious trolling off of the comment boards."
I didn't realize that countering someone's opinion that showing F9/11 all over town was a good idea, is trolling. Just because you don't agree with me, doesn't make me a troll.
He said it was a good movie, I said it was a bad movie. We're all entitled to our opinions.
You also don't get excellent karma by posting "off-topic tripe" all over Slashdot.
And from my own review on www.icarusindie.com ----------
The other important point that Moore doesn't bother to consider is that it was not Bush that authorized the Bin Laden's to leave the country but Richard Clarke. On May 26, 2004 Clarke told The Hill newspaper:
"I take responsibility for it. I don't think it was a mistake, and I'd do it again." ... "It didn't get any higher than me," he said. "On 9-11, 9-12 and 9-13, many things didn't get any higher than me. I decided it in consultation with the FBI."
http://www.hillnews.com/news/052604/clarke.aspx
I guess we can excuse Moore's ignorance on the issue since Richard Clarke came clean on it most likely after Moore had finished editing his film and history. What Moore also failed to consider is that fact that the Bin Laden family was actually talked to. But that's very inconvenient for Moore since those old cop movie clips provided a bit of humor for his farce. --------------
Concerning doing actual research, Moore had this to say about Americans:
------------- One of the more despicable accusations Moore makes is that somehow Iraq was better off with Saddam. He has kids flying kites and playing and whatnot. And then the war starts. Moore had this to say about Americans:
"(Americans) are possibly the dumbest people on the planet... in thrall to conniving, thieving, smug pr*cks. We Americans suffer from an enforced ignorance. We don't know about anything that's happening outside our country. Our stupidity is embarrassing."
Apparently he thinks Americans are so stupid that we'll forget what Saddam has done to millions of his own people. You can hear all about his crimes against humanity during Saddam's trial. Apparently Michael Moore feels that Iraqis would rather be tortured, gassed, murdered, buried in mass graves, denied any rights, than suffer through a war that will make it possible for more than just the lucky kids born under the favorable thumb of Saddam to fly a kite and be happy without worrying about their family being murdered before their very eyes. How stupid does Moore have to be to think Americans are that ignorant to completely forget all that we've learned about Saddam in the last decade? -------------------
F9/11 just reaffirmed why I'm voting for Bush. Michael Moore wrote an excellent piece of propoganda. But that's all it is. Blaring it out on the rooftops is just going to help Bush get elected if people bother to actually check out Moore's little story.
Moore's use of sources is no better than me proving the earth is flat by using sources from the Flat Earth Society. Moore fails to ask any questions. He just finds sources that support him and doesn't bother to challenge them.
I find it pathetic that the only news station with the spine to criticize the movie is Fox News.
Any time the news talks about a searching for something on-line they use the phrase "google it." Even my second semester English teacher talked about using Google. This is why "google" is now a recognized verb.
Gmail on the other hand may not be known to the "average" user but that's completely Google's fault. They aren't out there advertising it to Joe User. As soon as they start putting it on the front page of their search engine they'll get brand recognition there as well.
MS only has an advantage if they put out a much better product.
Unless Google starts charging for a premium version of GMail they're going to have to be very cautious about making it public. MS and Yahoo have no trouble charging people and have no trouble getting people to pay. GMail so far relies completely on ads and Google has to ensure that the ad revenue covers costs or their own popularity could be the death of them.
Slashdot Mirror
The tech support deparment I worked in for a state uni kept a Ghost image of the student machines so if they became screwed up it was a quick automated task to fix the problem.
"Just opening Internet Explorer results in about 3 minutes of closing popups"
So why were you putting your head in the sand by installing two pieces of software that had nothing to do with the problem? No wonder you got chewed out. You using FireFox and Winamp aren't doing anything to help.
If you want to make yourself useful you should have downloaded AdAware and cleaned up the system for them and then went to Windows Update and patched the system like engineers like to not do. Then, when AdAware is done getting rid of the pop-up problem you uninstall it and no one knows. And, you actually fixed the problem.
Rather than just breaking policy which is there to prevent unneeded crap from being installed and bogging down the system. If you can install your toys so can all the students and now the system is unusable and needs to be reimaged.
The college of ed at a major state university where a certain couple famous people recently debated, where I used to work only uses IE on their systems. They also used Windows 98 until recently (now they use XP). During the hay day of blaster and myDoom and whatnot guess which department was the least affected by it all? The College of Ed. Even with all our Win98 boxes being directly on the wire. Even our division of teachers was the least affected. There were a few that turned off automatic update like we told them not to and those were the ones that got it.
Guess who was most affected by the worms? The engineering department which requires logging onto the domain with your student ID and who run Windows 2000.
The College of Ed tech support people actually did their job and that prevented a lot of problems. So the fact that the IT people of Penn State are sending out a warning to 80,000 students just makes me laugh.
Our wonderful IT deparment can't even keep the network running reliably during heavy usage times such as pre-registration week and when grades come out.
IE and Windows aren't the problem.
Sending out a rediculous warning e-mail isn't going to do anything for them or the open source movement. People keep telling me the sky is falling and I've yet to see it actually happen to my systems.
A better solution would be to educate the students on where to get the free VirusScan software from the university and how to keep it up to date along with their Windows system.
It doesn't matter what browser you're using. It needs to be kept up to date.
they'll have plenty of free time to spend the holidays with their family.
And with full pay for a number of months they get all the perks of having a job without the job.
Fixed now due to complaints
It wasn't a third party download either. It was the version you got directly from Mozilla and the spyware part wasn't an option, it was part of the package.
If I find out a piece of software I need has spyware I run AdAware to clean it up and if that doesn't fix it, I uninstall the program when I'm done with whatever I was using it for and find something else.
If the program is up front about it and isn't an obnoxious little whore about it, I'll let it slide. Google Toolbar is spyware but it's nothing I object to and nothing I can't opt out of. eDonkey decided to infect Windows with a pain in the butt to remove browser hijack so that will never be used again. Apparently the ads weren't good enough for them. I finished what I started downloading and completely removed eDonkey and cleaned up the spyware.
If Mozilla had been up front about their spyware in the German version of the browser, they wouldn't have had such a negative reaction. All they had to do was make it an option and point out that it helps fund the foundation to try to persuade people to use it. But, instead they decided to use typical spyware tactics and tried to slip it in under the radar without the user's consent.
then they'll advertise it for free depending on their means. Otherwise it's going to take a paycheck. If I don't like a product enough I'll negatively advertise it.
If there is a cost involved with advertising the product then of course someone is going to consider whether they will demand a fee or not depending on how much they like or dislike the product.
If a rich person really likes or dislikes product A then they may spend a million bucks advertising it because they want to. This happens in politics often. A local millionaire spent a lot of money campaigning against a recent proposition. Other rich people campaigned for it. If a modestly wealthy person likes product A then they may seek cheaper avenues to advertise such as basic word of mouth or print ads.
This isn't late breaking news or anything that has to do with Open Source. This has been public knowledge since forever. Word of mouth is the cheapest and best advertising and you can only get it from people who like your product enough to talk about it.
Every company seeks to get word of mouth. This is why they have occasionally steeply discounted or free samples of their product. A limited number of people buy it because of the price point and then advertise to friends and family who then may pay a higher price for it after the sale ends.
The "jesusland" people would be pissed that there's so much gore and whatnot. If the fact that a human is conquering hell was a "jesusland" problem I can think of other movies that present the same idea that got to theaters just fine without a rewrite of the key plot device. "End of Days" being one of them.
The problem is that "hell isn't real." Being mutated by crazy viruses is real (or at least a scientific possibility).
I wouldn't blame "jesusland" for this one. I'd blame atheists who are trying to make the movie more realistic (and therefore more scary). Since hell doesn't actually exist according to them, it's the first to go.
But hey, let's blame the Jews (er Christians) for spoiling all our fun. Rather than standard Hollywood proceedure of picking plot devices that sell. Religious scapegoats are more fun.
Commission Junction does commission based advertising. I used them for quite awhile. I still have all the stats. Well over 60,000 impressions, and not a single penny in revenue generated. That was when I went to subscriptions. I made quite a bit more that way. Then I discovered Google AdSense and I make more than I made with subscriptions.
TV advertisers don't get paid commission for sales, why should web-site owners?
If you don't like their system, think it's stupid, then there are plenty of other options to choose from. In the mean time, a few jerk offs aren't going to destroy Google's system, they're simply going to delude the value of a click. Which means more agressive advertising from publishers.
Which is why we have pop-ups and pop-unders to begin with. And pages with multiple ads on the same page, and news stories broken up between multiple pages and ads that come up between pages that you have to click past. All because of a bunch of idiot publishers who have tried to scam advertising companies over the years.
On my site I only display an ad ~60% of the time on average and never more than one ad on a page. That works for me. Impressions go way down but clicks go up.
Google was trying to play really nice and genuinly help people out. If this revenue stream goes away, I'm going back to subscriptions for a large portion of my site. It doesn't hurt me anything.
I don't like charging people. I like having a very large site that's 100% free. But I've got costs to cover.
So yes it is a real site. And a signed SSL certificate is only useful to let the end user know they're who they say they are. It has nothing to do with the security of the site.
This is why Slashdot can't link directly to them but certain companies like Transunion can. If you type in the name of the domain yourself then link scams don't work so a signed SSL isn't an issue.
Also, once I hit the sign up area it went to a secure connection without any warnings. I don't bother with a sign cert for my web-mail and am warned when I access it through SSL.
So you're pretty much wrong about everything and the moderators didn't bother to verify your claims before they wasted their mod points on you.
But if my AdSense revenue goes away, I'll go back to subscriptions. I even have my pages set so that ads only appear a fraction of the time (50-80%) which cuts down on ad impressions and actually increases revenue.
Making Sense of Google AdSense
You can't adblock your way out of subscriptions. There is no bandwidth fairy. It costs content providers real money to host things.
You're either going to allow the advertisers to pay for the costs by "suffering" through some ads or pay for it yourself.
Lots of major sites already are going to the dual model of free content and paid premium content.
The money has to come from somewhere. Either the provider is rich (or the web-site is cheap to run) and willing to cover all the costs themselves, the advertisers cover costs, or the visitors cover costs.
Most big sites pick one of the last two.
Ben
I've been the sole developer for www.icarusindie.com for going on 4 years now. I built the site up from scratch. I've found that the most popular thing people want is how-to's. Rather than building complete projects, I've begun working on smaller projects and go into detail on how each part works. For example, I took www.Wolf5K.com deobfuscated it and posted detailed tutorials on how each part works. I then converted it to C++ and upped the graphics quality.
That kind of thing got a lot of attention. If I had just made yet another Wolf 3D clone, I'd get no attention.
I also have a complete project which I just need to get the rights to before I can release it. Other than that, single coder that took an existing product and made an on-line version. That's the easy way. Go into a game store (board games et al), find a game that interests you that was made by a small time publisher, and make a computer version of it. A small time publisher is more likely to talk to you about a licensing deal without demanding a lot (if any) up front money.
If nothing else, it's a great way to learn how to make a professional product without having to go through the whole concept development process. The design doc is the instruction manual and you can scan in all the graphics. So no programmer art.
Ben
WorldPaint
Anyone can plot pixels so eventually it's got to turn into something you can use.
It's much easier to blow $20 every once in awhile than have to blow $300. That's nearly a car payment + insurance. You don't need to plan ahead for a $20 expense but you do have to plan ahead for a $300 expense.
Ben
Tivo can negotiate how much they want for the data they collect. Typical Joe Public can't because another Joe Public will take the $5 and be content since they don't see it as valuable anyway. Tivo knows exactly how much it's worth. And it's more than $5 per viewer per week.
Just look at how much various shows can pay their cast and demand from advertisers. That kind of information is worth a lot of money.
Nielson is using a limited number of viewers to extrapolate the larger population. Tivo has access to a much greater population than Nielson can reach. And the data is already entered into a database and ready to be mined using statistical software. There's no time and money consuming data entry by people.
Ben
The Internet is abuzz with speculation that there were so many voting irregularities this election that President Bush may not have won after all.
... I get why people are frustrated, but [Republicans] did not steal this election. There were a few problems here and there in the election. But unlike 2000, there is no doubt that they actually got more votes than we did, and they got them in the states that mattered."
c t. html
But the man who headed the Democrats' team of 3,600 attorneys, spread across the country to address irregularities, says, "that ain't the case." Kerry adviser Jack Corrigan, quoted by the Boston Globe, says, "No one would be more interested than me in finding out that we really won
Other Kerry campaign officials agree.
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You can find that quote in a number of news sources now. That blurb is from FoxNews.com but you can also find it here:
http://www.iht.com/articles/2004/11/11/news/ele
He Lost, MoveOn.
Ben
They need to remember that the next election so they don't do a repeat of this election. The anti-Bush crowd did an excellent job alienating the Republicans and motivating them to vote for Bush. In the process they failed to build up the support they needed for their own candidate. Any rational argument against Bush was quickly lost by screaming loonies calling Bush, Hitler and insulting the intelligence of anyone who didn't have the same negative opinion.
They put the Republicans on the defensive which resulted in Bush being re-elected, the Republicans getting a larger margin in the house and senate and the minority leader losing his job. The first time that's happened in 50 years.
I think the problem was that the Democrats thought they were in the majority judging by all the various polls and world opinion and they didn't need "idiots" voting for their guy. Turns out they really were the minority.
a lesbian complained that Chasing Amy made it sound as those homosexuality were just a choice and that a lesbian just needed a "deep dicking" to be converted.
Kevin Smith pointed out that the Jason Lee character said that because his character is so WRONG about everything. Kevin Smith was making a point that such a line of reasoning is WRONG.
"Syndrome" said that because the idea is WRONG. If were were coming out of Mr Incredible's mouth then it might possibly be construed that Pixar was trying to convince people that were the way things are.
What made you think that the villian in the movie was the one to pay attention to for some kind of moral lesson? Pixar had Syndrome say those lines because he's the bad guy and HE'S WRONG. Dash says it because he's young and ignorant. And he later finds out he was WRONG. His entire family has special abilities that make them unique.
All the Incredibles are unique in their own special way. The heros are like that because that is the CORRECT moral lesson Pixar was putting out there.
Seriously. I can't think of any movie where every character good and bad speaks only moral truths that the audience is supposed to take as correct. This like every other movie ever made has characters which have incorrect world views which are then demonstrated to be wrong by events of the film.
distributing copyrighted material without permission is illegal. You know the law. Don't be so shocked and horrified that companies start making use of it. Companies have grinned and beared it for quite awhile.
Nobody cares if you copy movies and share amongst friends. But when your "friends" are anyone who happens by, no duh you're going to get in trouble. If you and a few friends swipe a bit of candy from the Brach's candy bin, chances are the store isn't going to give a shit. But if you advertise "free candy" and help the neighborhood out to "free" candy, you can expect to escorted somewhere by security.
I don't fear loaning movies/music to actual friends in private. Nobody has ever been prosecuted for that. When you do it publically and to a large audience, what do you expect to happen?
I see and buy lots of movies. I know the value of old films so I rarely pay more than $15 for a DVD. I only pay more if it's a really really good movie that recently came out. And you can always buy used or rent. There is no justification for piracy of mainstream movies which is what the MPAA is going after. There are plenty of legal options available to you regardless of your budget.
Ben
People are more interested in what you've done rather than what you say you're going to do which may or may not happen. Everybody knows that campaign promises tend to be broken so what you say you're going to do is going to be taken with a grain of salt.
This campaign really is about what GW did and whether you like it or not. Not so much about what either candidate plans to do the next four years.
I invested in my current stock AVN because they've done interesting things in the past, their stock history is good and because they had interesting current projects. I paid $1.76 a share and it's now above $3 a share. Their current project at the time is now showing real promise and getting some attention.
A soilder joined the service knowing the risks. They agreed to put their life on the line so others wouldn't have to.
Liberals act like people who support war don't know how horrible it is. Because after all, if we knew how horrible it is how could we possibly support it?
We know how horrible it is, and we're grateful for those who serve so we don't have to.
""This is important enough to me that I think a bunch of people I've never met should be sent to die while I sit at home risk-free"?"
reduction to absurdity. Nobody is sending the soilders off to die. We send them off to do their duty knowing that some may die. There's a very large difference.
It's no different than calling 911 and expecting a fireman to jump into your burning house to save your kid. Or expecting the cops to come put their lives in danger to come help you. We know that fireman and policemen may die because of a 911 call and yet we still dial the numbers when we're in trouble.
It's a rediculous idea to pretend that those who agreed to protect and serve shouldn't be depended on by those who havn't signed on to the profession.
Those who can't should repspect and support those who do.
"in the case of war, there are compelling arguments that they shouldn't"
No such arguments actually exist. If they did I'd imagine you'd at least put one of them in your post.
Ben
Only the democrates are putting bills out on the issue and it's going nowhere. Any time I see anyone mention the draft it just screams ignorant scare tactic. I'd really like to know what the dems are smoking that they can even pretend to threaten people with this issue. Only the democrates are claiming Bush is planning to initiate a draft and yet only the democrates have crafted bills to initiate it which the republicans aren't giving the time of day to.
After Vietnam the country came to it's senses and realized that you can't force somebody to fight for their country. That was a "small part" of how we became a country in the first place. You have a right to not have to put your neck on the line for your country if you don't believe a cause is worth fighting.
It's called a "conscientious objector" back when there was a draft. Not everyone who got out of the draft fled the country. Many "COed" their way out of the war. Even if there were a draft (which there won't because it's been found wrong on so many levels) you can object to the war and go home.
It really is a shame that the dems have stooped to this scare tactic to try to get people to stop supporting the war on Iraq.
Not everybody who supports any war, fights in it. And there's nothing wrong with that no matter how many liberals scream otherwise. It's idiotic to assume that you can't support anything dangerous if you don't put your neck on the line yourself. If someone wants to put their neck on the line for a cause (even dangerous sports) then they need supporters of all types. Even those who are sitting in safety. It's good to know there are people who can't do what you do, who appreciate what you do for them.
Ben
I run a very reliable (see netcraft result) web-server that I can and do happily ignore for long stretches of time.
While I'm stuck working part time as a programmer to pay the bills (a nice gig that allows me to make my own hours while I'm going to school), I've got a web-site that is beginning to show promise as a way to get a decent amount of residual income. The sections that bring in the most revenue are the sections I havn't touched in months. So it's not something I must do constantly.
I'm also making money on the stock market. I'm not getting rich yet, I'm young enough to do proof of concept and risk hundreds of dollars to learn. Once I get financially situated in a real job then I can drop more money on the market to try to increase that income stream.
And when I get out of school, I'll be a high school math teacher making me as free from computers as I want to be. It'll be a hobby and a teaching tool (math demonstration scripts, class sessions in MP3 format, notes, homework assignments, etc) but not a necessity. It's the not being a necessity part that keeps programming interesting.
The trick is to either maximize residual income (so you can work less at a real job) or focus on shifting careers to something that doesn't require a computer constantly.
It's just a matter of figuring out where you want to be and figuring out how to get there.
I don't want to spend my life in front of a computer so I'm not going to.
Ben
Whether or not it's legal is irrelavent. It violates someone as a person to post pictures of them for all the world to see without their permission. It's absurdly disrespectful.
Imagine if your mom decided to put up a public web-site and post all your embaressing pictures for the world to see. Complete with commentary.
That said, I imagine that these pictures weren't actually lost. Or this guy is just looking to be bared from carrying a camera if he ever gets invited to a party. If these aren't his pictures and didn't get persmission to post them from the people in them then he's just established that he's someone that can't be trusted with a camera. He's got no respect.
Ben
in relation to the parent post in which it was a reponse to. It's a called a "tangent." If you don't want to waste moderation points on tangents then that's your business.
"It is the responsibility of the mods to keep this kind of bantering and obvious trolling off of the comment boards."
I didn't realize that countering someone's opinion that showing F9/11 all over town was a good idea, is trolling. Just because you don't agree with me, doesn't make me a troll.
He said it was a good movie, I said it was a bad movie. We're all entitled to our opinions.
You also don't get excellent karma by posting "off-topic tripe" all over Slashdot.
Ben
Fifty-nine Deceits in Fahrenheit 9/11
... in thrall to conniving, thieving, smug pr*cks. We Americans suffer from an enforced ignorance. We don't know about anything that's happening outside our country. Our stupidity is embarrassing."
And from my own review on www.icarusindie.com
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The other important point that Moore doesn't bother to consider is that it was not Bush that authorized the Bin Laden's to leave the country but Richard Clarke. On May 26, 2004 Clarke told The Hill newspaper:
"I take responsibility for it. I don't think it was a mistake, and I'd do it again."
...
"It didn't get any higher than me," he said. "On 9-11, 9-12 and 9-13, many things didn't get any higher than me. I decided it in consultation with the FBI."
http://www.hillnews.com/news/052604/clarke.aspx
I guess we can excuse Moore's ignorance on the issue since Richard Clarke came clean on it most likely after Moore had finished editing his film and history. What Moore also failed to consider is that fact that the Bin Laden family was actually talked to. But that's very inconvenient for Moore since those old cop movie clips provided a bit of humor for his farce.
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Concerning doing actual research, Moore had this to say about Americans:
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One of the more despicable accusations Moore makes is that somehow Iraq was better off with Saddam. He has kids flying kites and playing and whatnot. And then the war starts. Moore had this to say about Americans:
"(Americans) are possibly the dumbest people on the planet
Apparently he thinks Americans are so stupid that we'll forget what Saddam has done to millions of his own people. You can hear all about his crimes against humanity during Saddam's trial. Apparently Michael Moore feels that Iraqis would rather be tortured, gassed, murdered, buried in mass graves, denied any rights, than suffer through a war that will make it possible for more than just the lucky kids born under the favorable thumb of Saddam to fly a kite and be happy without worrying about their family being murdered before their very eyes. How stupid does Moore have to be to think Americans are that ignorant to completely forget all that we've learned about Saddam in the last decade?
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F9/11 just reaffirmed why I'm voting for Bush. Michael Moore wrote an excellent piece of propoganda. But that's all it is. Blaring it out on the rooftops is just going to help Bush get elected if people bother to actually check out Moore's little story.
Moore's use of sources is no better than me proving the earth is flat by using sources from the Flat Earth Society. Moore fails to ask any questions. He just finds sources that support him and doesn't bother to challenge them.
I find it pathetic that the only news station with the spine to criticize the movie is Fox News.
Ben
Any time the news talks about a searching for something on-line they use the phrase "google it." Even my second semester English teacher talked about using Google. This is why "google" is now a recognized verb.
Gmail on the other hand may not be known to the "average" user but that's completely Google's fault. They aren't out there advertising it to Joe User. As soon as they start putting it on the front page of their search engine they'll get brand recognition there as well.
MS only has an advantage if they put out a much better product.
Unless Google starts charging for a premium version of GMail they're going to have to be very cautious about making it public. MS and Yahoo have no trouble charging people and have no trouble getting people to pay. GMail so far relies completely on ads and Google has to ensure that the ad revenue covers costs or their own popularity could be the death of them.
Ben