Broadband is not a necessity of life. People need food, water, and shelter (including heat in the winter) to survive. None of those require internet access. For what I'd consider a decent quality of life, people need food, water, shelter, indoor plumbing, and maybe electricity. You'll notice broadband still isn't in the list. Let's put a few more things -- luxuries, mostly -- in the list: food, water, shelter, indoor plumbing, electricity, a car (or some sort of enclosed transport -- a good, reliable, frequent bus service was fine by me when I lived in Boston), access to a reasonable basic education and materials to further your education. A variety of foods is nice, too. Relatively clean air should definitely be on the list.
Internet? Well, maybe we can put it on now... That makes it what, number 10? And I can think of a few other things (friends, family, etc) that I'd probably put on ahead of it.
When there's no one in the world who is starving, or dying of exposure, or involuntarily living homeless, then we can start worrying about things like universal internet access.
Sure they will... Give them a street address, and be polite but insistent. I've had good luck with that over my last three moves.
Me: "Hi, I'm looking at moving to (address) in (town), (state). Can you tell me if I'll be able to get a broadband connection there?" Customer Service Drone: "I'm sorry, I'll need a phone number before I can check." Me: "No problem, I realize you don't have full access to the system. Can you please transfer me to a supervisor or department head, so I can check with them?" CSD: "Sure... "(Subtext: "Oh... you're one of THEM. Glad I can get you off MY plate...") Manager: Yes? Me: "Hi, I'm looking at moving to (address) in (town), (state). Can you tell me if I'll be able to get a broadband connection there?" Manager: "Oh... let me check." *long wait* "Nope. Our lines don't get that far. Maybe within the next few years." Me: "Thanks very much, and have a good day."
Sure, I've had a few idiots at the first level who tried to convince me they didn't have managers, but I mostly just hung up on them and called back. It's a toll-free call, so I don't care.
Of course not everyone has to follow the "standard" model. Only people who want others to understand quickly what they're talking about.
As with many apparently stupid standards, there are reasons for this one. It's the best way to get your point across quickly and concisely. (As one of my professors put it, "Tell people what you're going to tell them, tell them, then tell them what you've told them.") It's also a good way to hook people into reading your article; I only read this after an officemate asked if I'd read the review. I hadn't, because I wasn't interested in a re-hash of why the government sucks, and the few occasions when it doesn't. Had the author made it a bit clearer, I would have read it the first time I came across it.
How about "earth-like planets"? Or "planets like ours"?
Honestly... phrases like "earth 2.0" and "web 2.0" (not to mention WiFi, which really ought to be pronounced "whiffy") make me wonder about the collective intelligence of the technically inclined.
First impressions when looking at the image that accompanies this article: 1) The block text version is actually blurred. Compare the initial "M" from each side... there's a major difference in clarity of the image. 2) I find the "clear" version nearly impossible to read. It's a bit too randomly coloured and formatted. 3) The people who did this research are idiots.
OK, so two of the three are subjective. But I'm pretty certain about the first, and I think the third is pretty likely.
Add in the points other people have mentioned -- long scroll times, loss of standard formatting tricks to convey meaning -- and this all starts looking pretty useless to me.
The problem here, as with so many places, is not thinking things through.
Environmental scientists declare that global warming is an issue, and we need to stop using so much energy. "Hurrah!" shout the environmentalists and pro-looking-good-in-newspapers politicians, "everyone throw away your incandescent bulbs and use CF bulbs instead!" Never mind the question of how much energy it takes to make CF bulbs, or what happens to the mercury in them once they're thrown away; that's not relevant, the problem is global warming!
Unfortunately, the same goes for your argument: how much mercury is produced by coal-burning powerplants? Is it more or less than the amount used in making CF bulbs? And is it easier to contain when it's in the form of a light bulb than when it's going up the smokestack of a powerplant?
Honestly, I don't know. I can easily envision an intelligent system for recycling old bulbs to re-collect the mercury, but then I can also envision a filter of some sort to capture mercury from powerplants. (And, with a lot more effort, a mass conversion to nuclear, wind, or solar power, allowing us to go back to those ineffecient but mostly non-polluting incandescents.) Realistically, I think the problem is too many layers deep for anyone to come up with a workable solution. I think the only real option is to work on one piece at a time, and accept that each fix is going to cause new problems.
It may simply be spoken by someone who values big explosions and flashy effects over playability. (Face it... Nethack IS ugly. It also happens to be a good game, but that doesnt' change the fact that it's ugly.)
I don't give a damn what the license says as long as it doesn't restrict my use of the OS.
What I DO give a damn about is that the OS runs well on my hardware, and does what I want it to do. At the moment, for most of my daily applications, that means I run linux or BSD.
If all I cared about was the license, I'd go back to pen and paper, which puts no artificial usage restrictions on me at all. Your comment shouldn't have been modded insightful: it should have been modded "-1; elitist jackass."
Depends on your stove. I use an old O'Keefe and Merritt, and I can get the heat down as low as I want it pretty easily. It definitely took some practice, though -- I burned the first few things I cooked on it pretty badly before I got the hang of the controls.
It also helps to have good cookware. Don't bother with the aluminum core super extra expensive stuff -- go to a flea market and buy yourself a couple of cast iron pans. I got a set of 3 frying pans, plus a couple of saucepans, and I think I've paid about $50, total, including the one I decided I didn't like and gave away. Read up on maintaining them, and they'll last longer, with less work, than the new ones. (They're also good for building up wrist and forearm strength -- damn but those things are heavy!)
Linux IS dependent on closed source drivers. I decided I wanted a computer with reasonably fast graphics, which meant 3D hardware acceleration support. After asking around and doing some research, and then going out and trying some things, I found that the only good support was for nVidia cards, through their binary drivers. To be honest, I've never gotten 3D acceleration working on any other card.
Now, to address your question: I think that, as long as Windows is the predominant operating system, it will be the biggest target for attacks. Therefore, I think Linux will remain more secure and stable than Windows in the only sense that matters to me: my computer doesn't crash as often. When you get right down to it, I'm a consumer, not a zealot. I don't much care about the politics of software. Sure, if I can support OSS it gives me a warm fuzzy feeling, but then... so does being able to do what I want with my computer.
OK, so you weren't asking me the question. I'm still going to respond to it, and assume it's really not a troll.
I don't mind running proprietary code in Linux. I run quite a lot of it, actually... I'm using the nVidia drivers right now, and I'm writing this in Opera. There are a few other programs I use that are non-open.
So what do I get from running Linux instead of Windows? For one thing, I'm not giving money to Microsoft. I bought a computer with no OS, and I'm not running Office. For another, I get stability. Sure, Windows has gotten better. A LOT better, really. And linux is, in my experience, getting worse in some ways. But still, I find that Linux is a lot more stable.
And what about spyware? Sure, in Windows I can run FireFox or Opera, and make sure I've got good virus and malware scanners, and run AdAware or something like it once a week, but in Linux, I don't mostly have to worry. Are there exploits for problems in linux? Hell yeah! Are people actively attacking them on a massive basis? Well... not that I've heard. Certainly not as much as they're attacking Windows.
I also like the user environment better. I get better control over what my system does, and I can drop down and use the command line when I want to, since I think it's better for some things. Furthermore, I don't really like any of the Windows SSH clients I've tried. There's nothing WRONG with them, I just don't like the way they look. Konsole, however, suits me perfectly. And since a lot of my job requires running SSH sessions to three or four different systems at once, I'd really rather have a system that I like the look of. Sure, I suppose I could run KDE in X.org/Cygwin, but why would I want to?
So, to put it more briefly: By not running windows, I get choice, and some level of security.
"As armchair speculators of space exploration, do our posts & blogs create negative fallout for NASA or is public criticism like this healthy for keeping government agencies in line?"
Yes.
No, I really mean that. Naysayers and people playing devil's advocate ALWAYS create problems for those in power, and for groups working on giant projects. Investors don't like hearing about major problems in the projects they're investing in, even if they're governments, and, well... that sort of trouble just gets spread around. On the other hand, if no one ever says "It'll never work, and here's why", a lot of problems will go overlooked. Hey, SOMEONE has to spot the problems, and it's not necessarily going to be the person you're paying to do it.
We can tell you what we think, but you're the one as has to make the decision in the end...
That said: I would much rather make less doing a job I enjoy than get paid a lot for doing something I hate. Does the lower paying job cover your bills? Will it allow you to build up at least a little bit of a reserve? If you decide to move, will you be able to afford living nearer that job, and if not, will you be able to afford to commute? Assuming the answers to all of those are "yes," I'd take the job that pays less but looks like more fun. Don't buy into the American "money is everything" mentality -- money does you no good if you're miserable.
Just what we need. More idiots suing people for... not much.
If you don't want to listen to these, hang up on them. If you don't feel like picking up, don't. The world won't end because you didn't answer the phone. Yes, I get these sometimes, and used to get them constantly. I just started hanging up on the machines, and telling the people "Please put me on your do not call list. If you wish to contact me in the future, please send me something by mail." None of them ever send me anything in the mail, and they stop calling me.
Sure, these calls are anoying, but they're hardly worth a lawsuit.
I was given an old all-in-one PowerMac by some neighbors, who'd bought a new iMac. See, they wanted to play the newest games, and I wanted to play some really old ones. The only problem was, they'd been having some problems with the monitor, and they'd never actually gotten the ethernet card to work. "OK," I think to myself, "how bad can this really be? I'll pop it open, and see what it looks like inside."
Turns out it worked fine, once I cleaned the spaghetti sauce off the mainboard and the ethernet card. On the other hand, the color was never quite right, since I didn't feel like opening the display and cleaning dried tomato bits out of the tube....
The only way to become a good writer is to write a lot, and have a better writer (or at least proof-reader) around to point out what you did wrong, and how to fix it.
I should point out here that I phrased that as I did deliberately: having someone point out "what you could have done better" or "where you could use some work" doesn't help. Most engineering and comp-sci students have a big enough ego that telling them they screwed up isn't going to do them any damage.
When I got to college, I thought I was a pretty good writer: I'd gotten good grades in english, I read a lot, and so on. Then I went to a college where writing was considered to be the most important thing in any field -- you can always look up facts, but if you can't communicate, you're lost. So we'd all hand in our papers, feeling pretty proud of ourselves, and next class we'd get them back with comments like "I have no idea what you were trying to say. Rewrite this." or "This is garbage. Rewrite it." Once you got past the first comment, every sentence the prof didn't like would be underlined, with comments on what needed to be changed. Grammar, spelling, and punctuation were marked, but what they cared most about was clarity: how could this paragraph be made more effective? Would it be better if these sentences were reversed? How about just removing them?
These days, I'm inclined to think my writing isn't very good. I can look back at things I wrote later on at that college, and see that what I'm writing now is pretty poor compared to most of what I wrote there... but it's still worlds better than what I see handed in for Junior writing classes at the University where I work now. So tell your students when their writing is crap, then tell them how to make it better. They'll thank you in the long run.
Learning by experimentation is good, and the lessons you learn will stick longer. You probably see a "but..." coming here, and you're right.
Ever taken a college level physics or chemistry class? You learn by doing experiments, but the experiments are directed. They say "OK, you're going to figure out how to (whatever). Here's how you start." It's the same in computing. The first time I used linux, I gave up because the community was terrible, and I just needed a machine that did what I wanted, without having to learn to program. Later, I found SuSE, and used that until I was comfortable doing things manually, at which point I decided I wanted a system that I had a little more direct control over.
So, for you, the "throw me in the river, I'm sure I'll figure out how to swim eventually" system works well. For me, the "OK, so my system does what I need it to do, without my having to know anything. Now I'm going to try to make it do things that are more complicated..." system works better.
And regardless, for any distro where I've gotten rude, unhelpful responses on the official mailing lists, I've dropped the distro and not gone back.
... the problem may be your doctor. I'd tried getting contacts twice, with no luck. After I moved, I decided to try once more, and my new eye-doctor went with a different lens, which works fine. I tend to wear 'em from around eight in the morning until midnight most days, without any real problems.
Yes... but if you read about it on a dozen websites, you'd know exactly how it worked, and possibly be able to find a way to neutralize it. Not much of a mystery if you can get information on what it is from an official press release.
I currently do about 50% of my shopping at Mom & Pop stores: the local lumber yard sells dimensional lumber at prices that are competetive with Home Depot, and much higher quality. The deli down the street sells better cuts of meat than Stop & Shop, Big Y, or even Whole Foods, for about 2/3 of the price -- plus, a lot of it is locally farmed. During the summer, I buy veggies from farm stands at the local farms. There are a bunch of locally owned bookstores in the area, and I find that about half the time, at least with special orders, their prices are on par or only a little higher than Barnes and Noble.
It's not that Mom and Pop stores suck, it's that they sell a different style of product. And, granted, a lot of them DO suck. But if I can do half my shopping at small, locally-owned stores, and the rest at stores that at least aren't completely evil, I think I'm doing OK.
The problem I have here is with your rhetoric: You can't call 80% of the population an "extreme minority" on the theory that they may soon be only 10%. They're still a majority. Honestly, I don't see that sort of switch happening overnight, though I suspect it will happen slowly over the next five to ten years. But then, I tend to be a pessimist.
In general, I haven't HAD to find anything for windows that simply wasn't available. In linux, on the other hand, I've had to compile basic packages (Firefox, for instance) because the new, secure version wasn't yet available as a package. I grant you, the same problem sometimes holds true in Windows, but it's not reasonable to say it's NEVER true in linux.
If you haven't had to worry about having everything available, you're lucky. I work for a state university, and we absolutely have to be able to exchange documents with odd fonts and symbols in them with other groups, which, at the moment, means MS Office running in Windows. We have HR interface systems that absolutely require Internet Explorer, documents from financial offices that have to be filled out in the Windows version of Office (the Mac version doesn't work correctly), and the list goes on.
I still have no idea what the death incarnate thing was about. Certainly it had no relation to what you were responding to, but whatever.
And THAT would be why I keep two copies of my most-frequently-loaned books on hand at all times. I figure it's worth spending the extra money to ensure that (A) people get turned on to new books and (B) I still have a copy for myself when my loaner goes missing.
Although I do tend to get a large percentage back, eventually... maybe I just have more honest friends than most people. Or maybe I'm just better at pestering them until they give me the book back. 8-)
Slashdot Mirror
...its a luxury not a basic utility.
Bullshit, this is 2007, not 1997.
First of all, how did this get modded insightful?
Now, on to something meaningful.
Broadband is not a necessity of life. People need food, water, and shelter (including heat in the winter) to survive. None of those require internet access. For what I'd consider a decent quality of life, people need food, water, shelter, indoor plumbing, and maybe electricity. You'll notice broadband still isn't in the list. Let's put a few more things -- luxuries, mostly -- in the list: food, water, shelter, indoor plumbing, electricity, a car (or some sort of enclosed transport -- a good, reliable, frequent bus service was fine by me when I lived in Boston), access to a reasonable basic education and materials to further your education. A variety of foods is nice, too. Relatively clean air should definitely be on the list.
Internet? Well, maybe we can put it on now... That makes it what, number 10? And I can think of a few other things (friends, family, etc) that I'd probably put on ahead of it.
When there's no one in the world who is starving, or dying of exposure, or involuntarily living homeless, then we can start worrying about things like universal internet access.
Sure they will... Give them a street address, and be polite but insistent. I've had good luck with that over my last three moves.
Me: "Hi, I'm looking at moving to (address) in (town), (state). Can you tell me if I'll be able to get a broadband connection there?"
Customer Service Drone: "I'm sorry, I'll need a phone number before I can check."
Me: "No problem, I realize you don't have full access to the system. Can you please transfer me to a supervisor or department head, so I can check with them?"
CSD: "Sure... "(Subtext: "Oh... you're one of THEM. Glad I can get you off MY plate...")
Manager: Yes?
Me: "Hi, I'm looking at moving to (address) in (town), (state). Can you tell me if I'll be able to get a broadband connection there?"
Manager: "Oh... let me check." *long wait* "Nope. Our lines don't get that far. Maybe within the next few years."
Me: "Thanks very much, and have a good day."
Sure, I've had a few idiots at the first level who tried to convince me they didn't have managers, but I mostly just hung up on them and called back. It's a toll-free call, so I don't care.
accordions have more than 5 keys.
So do bagpipes. Or they have less, depending on how you look at it... they have no keys, but they have 8 holes in the chanter.
So... I like the example, but it's not much better than his.
Of course not everyone has to follow the "standard" model. Only people who want others to understand quickly what they're talking about.
As with many apparently stupid standards, there are reasons for this one. It's the best way to get your point across quickly and concisely. (As one of my professors put it, "Tell people what you're going to tell them, tell them, then tell them what you've told them.") It's also a good way to hook people into reading your article; I only read this after an officemate asked if I'd read the review. I hadn't, because I wasn't interested in a re-hash of why the government sucks, and the few occasions when it doesn't. Had the author made it a bit clearer, I would have read it the first time I came across it.
What the heck are you smoking?
How about "earth-like planets"? Or "planets like ours"?
Honestly... phrases like "earth 2.0" and "web 2.0" (not to mention WiFi, which really ought to be pronounced "whiffy") make me wonder about the collective intelligence of the technically inclined.
First impressions when looking at the image that accompanies this article:
1) The block text version is actually blurred. Compare the initial "M" from each side... there's a major difference in clarity of the image.
2) I find the "clear" version nearly impossible to read. It's a bit too randomly coloured and formatted.
3) The people who did this research are idiots.
OK, so two of the three are subjective. But I'm pretty certain about the first, and I think the third is pretty likely.
Add in the points other people have mentioned -- long scroll times, loss of standard formatting tricks to convey meaning -- and this all starts looking pretty useless to me.
The problem here, as with so many places, is not thinking things through.
Environmental scientists declare that global warming is an issue, and we need to stop using so much energy. "Hurrah!" shout the environmentalists and pro-looking-good-in-newspapers politicians, "everyone throw away your incandescent bulbs and use CF bulbs instead!" Never mind the question of how much energy it takes to make CF bulbs, or what happens to the mercury in them once they're thrown away; that's not relevant, the problem is global warming!
Unfortunately, the same goes for your argument: how much mercury is produced by coal-burning powerplants? Is it more or less than the amount used in making CF bulbs? And is it easier to contain when it's in the form of a light bulb than when it's going up the smokestack of a powerplant?
Honestly, I don't know. I can easily envision an intelligent system for recycling old bulbs to re-collect the mercury, but then I can also envision a filter of some sort to capture mercury from powerplants. (And, with a lot more effort, a mass conversion to nuclear, wind, or solar power, allowing us to go back to those ineffecient but mostly non-polluting incandescents.) Realistically, I think the problem is too many layers deep for anyone to come up with a workable solution. I think the only real option is to work on one piece at a time, and accept that each fix is going to cause new problems.
Not necessarily true:
It may simply be spoken by someone who values big explosions and flashy effects over playability. (Face it... Nethack IS ugly. It also happens to be a good game, but that doesnt' change the fact that it's ugly.)
Nonsense.
I don't give a damn what the license says as long as it doesn't restrict my use of the OS.
What I DO give a damn about is that the OS runs well on my hardware, and does what I want it to do. At the moment, for most of my daily applications, that means I run linux or BSD.
If all I cared about was the license, I'd go back to pen and paper, which puts no artificial usage restrictions on me at all. Your comment shouldn't have been modded insightful: it should have been modded "-1; elitist jackass."
Depends on your stove. I use an old O'Keefe and Merritt, and I can get the heat down as low as I want it pretty easily. It definitely took some practice, though -- I burned the first few things I cooked on it pretty badly before I got the hang of the controls.
It also helps to have good cookware. Don't bother with the aluminum core super extra expensive stuff -- go to a flea market and buy yourself a couple of cast iron pans. I got a set of 3 frying pans, plus a couple of saucepans, and I think I've paid about $50, total, including the one I decided I didn't like and gave away. Read up on maintaining them, and they'll last longer, with less work, than the new ones. (They're also good for building up wrist and forearm strength -- damn but those things are heavy!)
Linux IS dependent on closed source drivers. I decided I wanted a computer with reasonably fast graphics, which meant 3D hardware acceleration support. After asking around and doing some research, and then going out and trying some things, I found that the only good support was for nVidia cards, through their binary drivers. To be honest, I've never gotten 3D acceleration working on any other card.
Now, to address your question: I think that, as long as Windows is the predominant operating system, it will be the biggest target for attacks. Therefore, I think Linux will remain more secure and stable than Windows in the only sense that matters to me: my computer doesn't crash as often. When you get right down to it, I'm a consumer, not a zealot. I don't much care about the politics of software. Sure, if I can support OSS it gives me a warm fuzzy feeling, but then... so does being able to do what I want with my computer.
OK, so you weren't asking me the question. I'm still going to respond to it, and assume it's really not a troll.
I don't mind running proprietary code in Linux. I run quite a lot of it, actually... I'm using the nVidia drivers right now, and I'm writing this in Opera. There are a few other programs I use that are non-open.
So what do I get from running Linux instead of Windows? For one thing, I'm not giving money to Microsoft. I bought a computer with no OS, and I'm not running Office. For another, I get stability. Sure, Windows has gotten better. A LOT better, really. And linux is, in my experience, getting worse in some ways. But still, I find that Linux is a lot more stable.
And what about spyware? Sure, in Windows I can run FireFox or Opera, and make sure I've got good virus and malware scanners, and run AdAware or something like it once a week, but in Linux, I don't mostly have to worry. Are there exploits for problems in linux? Hell yeah! Are people actively attacking them on a massive basis? Well... not that I've heard. Certainly not as much as they're attacking Windows.
I also like the user environment better. I get better control over what my system does, and I can drop down and use the command line when I want to, since I think it's better for some things. Furthermore, I don't really like any of the Windows SSH clients I've tried. There's nothing WRONG with them, I just don't like the way they look. Konsole, however, suits me perfectly. And since a lot of my job requires running SSH sessions to three or four different systems at once, I'd really rather have a system that I like the look of. Sure, I suppose I could run KDE in X.org/Cygwin, but why would I want to?
So, to put it more briefly: By not running windows, I get choice, and some level of security.
"As armchair speculators of space exploration, do our posts & blogs create negative fallout for NASA or is public criticism like this healthy for keeping government agencies in line?"
Yes.
No, I really mean that. Naysayers and people playing devil's advocate ALWAYS create problems for those in power, and for groups working on giant projects. Investors don't like hearing about major problems in the projects they're investing in, even if they're governments, and, well... that sort of trouble just gets spread around. On the other hand, if no one ever says "It'll never work, and here's why", a lot of problems will go overlooked. Hey, SOMEONE has to spot the problems, and it's not necessarily going to be the person you're paying to do it.
We can tell you what we think, but you're the one as has to make the decision in the end...
That said: I would much rather make less doing a job I enjoy than get paid a lot for doing something I hate. Does the lower paying job cover your bills? Will it allow you to build up at least a little bit of a reserve? If you decide to move, will you be able to afford living nearer that job, and if not, will you be able to afford to commute? Assuming the answers to all of those are "yes," I'd take the job that pays less but looks like more fun. Don't buy into the American "money is everything" mentality -- money does you no good if you're miserable.
Just what we need. More idiots suing people for... not much.
If you don't want to listen to these, hang up on them. If you don't feel like picking up, don't. The world won't end because you didn't answer the phone. Yes, I get these sometimes, and used to get them constantly. I just started hanging up on the machines, and telling the people "Please put me on your do not call list. If you wish to contact me in the future, please send me something by mail." None of them ever send me anything in the mail, and they stop calling me.
Sure, these calls are anoying, but they're hardly worth a lawsuit.
Not exactly a help call, but still entertaining.
I was given an old all-in-one PowerMac by some neighbors, who'd bought a new iMac. See, they wanted to play the newest games, and I wanted to play some really old ones. The only problem was, they'd been having some problems with the monitor, and they'd never actually gotten the ethernet card to work. "OK," I think to myself, "how bad can this really be? I'll pop it open, and see what it looks like inside."
Turns out it worked fine, once I cleaned the spaghetti sauce off the mainboard and the ethernet card. On the other hand, the color was never quite right, since I didn't feel like opening the display and cleaning dried tomato bits out of the tube....
The only way to become a good writer is to write a lot, and have a better writer (or at least proof-reader) around to point out what you did wrong, and how to fix it.
I should point out here that I phrased that as I did deliberately: having someone point out "what you could have done better" or "where you could use some work" doesn't help. Most engineering and comp-sci students have a big enough ego that telling them they screwed up isn't going to do them any damage.
When I got to college, I thought I was a pretty good writer: I'd gotten good grades in english, I read a lot, and so on. Then I went to a college where writing was considered to be the most important thing in any field -- you can always look up facts, but if you can't communicate, you're lost. So we'd all hand in our papers, feeling pretty proud of ourselves, and next class we'd get them back with comments like "I have no idea what you were trying to say. Rewrite this." or "This is garbage. Rewrite it." Once you got past the first comment, every sentence the prof didn't like would be underlined, with comments on what needed to be changed. Grammar, spelling, and punctuation were marked, but what they cared most about was clarity: how could this paragraph be made more effective? Would it be better if these sentences were reversed? How about just removing them?
These days, I'm inclined to think my writing isn't very good. I can look back at things I wrote later on at that college, and see that what I'm writing now is pretty poor compared to most of what I wrote there... but it's still worlds better than what I see handed in for Junior writing classes at the University where I work now. So tell your students when their writing is crap, then tell them how to make it better. They'll thank you in the long run.
Learning by experimentation is good, and the lessons you learn will stick longer. You probably see a "but..." coming here, and you're right.
Ever taken a college level physics or chemistry class? You learn by doing experiments, but the experiments are directed. They say "OK, you're going to figure out how to (whatever). Here's how you start." It's the same in computing. The first time I used linux, I gave up because the community was terrible, and I just needed a machine that did what I wanted, without having to learn to program. Later, I found SuSE, and used that until I was comfortable doing things manually, at which point I decided I wanted a system that I had a little more direct control over.
So, for you, the "throw me in the river, I'm sure I'll figure out how to swim eventually" system works well. For me, the "OK, so my system does what I need it to do, without my having to know anything. Now I'm going to try to make it do things that are more complicated..." system works better.
And regardless, for any distro where I've gotten rude, unhelpful responses on the official mailing lists, I've dropped the distro and not gone back.
Why is there no "Flamebait, but good advice" tag?
... the problem may be your doctor. I'd tried getting contacts twice, with no luck. After I moved, I decided to try once more, and my new eye-doctor went with a different lens, which works fine. I tend to wear 'em from around eight in the morning until midnight most days, without any real problems.
Yes... but if you read about it on a dozen websites, you'd know exactly how it worked, and possibly be able to find a way to neutralize it. Not much of a mystery if you can get information on what it is from an official press release.
I currently do about 50% of my shopping at Mom & Pop stores: the local lumber yard sells dimensional lumber at prices that are competetive with Home Depot, and much higher quality. The deli down the street sells better cuts of meat than Stop & Shop, Big Y, or even Whole Foods, for about 2/3 of the price -- plus, a lot of it is locally farmed. During the summer, I buy veggies from farm stands at the local farms. There are a bunch of locally owned bookstores in the area, and I find that about half the time, at least with special orders, their prices are on par or only a little higher than Barnes and Noble.
It's not that Mom and Pop stores suck, it's that they sell a different style of product. And, granted, a lot of them DO suck. But if I can do half my shopping at small, locally-owned stores, and the rest at stores that at least aren't completely evil, I think I'm doing OK.
The problem I have here is with your rhetoric: You can't call 80% of the population an "extreme minority" on the theory that they may soon be only 10%. They're still a majority. Honestly, I don't see that sort of switch happening overnight, though I suspect it will happen slowly over the next five to ten years. But then, I tend to be a pessimist.
In general, I haven't HAD to find anything for windows that simply wasn't available. In linux, on the other hand, I've had to compile basic packages (Firefox, for instance) because the new, secure version wasn't yet available as a package. I grant you, the same problem sometimes holds true in Windows, but it's not reasonable to say it's NEVER true in linux.
If you haven't had to worry about having everything available, you're lucky. I work for a state university, and we absolutely have to be able to exchange documents with odd fonts and symbols in them with other groups, which, at the moment, means MS Office running in Windows. We have HR interface systems that absolutely require Internet Explorer, documents from financial offices that have to be filled out in the Windows version of Office (the Mac version doesn't work correctly), and the list goes on.
I still have no idea what the death incarnate thing was about. Certainly it had no relation to what you were responding to, but whatever.
Yep! But this is slashdot, so no-one really expects people to READ their comments, do they?
(That's what I get for reading one comment and answering another, I guess. Oops.)
And THAT would be why I keep two copies of my most-frequently-loaned books on hand at all times. I figure it's worth spending the extra money to ensure that (A) people get turned on to new books and (B) I still have a copy for myself when my loaner goes missing.
Although I do tend to get a large percentage back, eventually... maybe I just have more honest friends than most people. Or maybe I'm just better at pestering them until they give me the book back. 8-)