Actually, that's a very good first step to a totalitarian/fascist/police state: make so many seemingly innoccuous offenses that pretty much everybody becomes a transgressor through normal day-to-day activites.
Then when you want to target someone just look at the trivial crimes he has committed and take it from there...
I work for one of the major cellphone carriers in the US,and I can tell you that we are falling over ourselves to get these handsets. One of the key motivations is to displace landlines, and also to carry traffic over (cheap) IP rather than (expensive) gsm wherever possible.
As a BBC license payer, I'm incensed that they could be spreading such FUD. Since when has Linux "eschewed the notion of property"?
Just because the open source community is vehemently opposed to software patents, doesn't mean that they don't support the "notion of property". Without such notions as copyright for instance, the GPL would be impossible.
Better a quarry than a mine shaft, and at least they don't have Bernard Cribbins, though thinking about it - which I do - he would probably have been a lot better as FP than Mos Def...
Thank you for you measured response. I was quite expecting to come back and see this modded (Score -60: Yankee-hater) or similar. Of course, if I wanted to be even MORE incendiary I could take you to task for talking about "American" soldiers...;-)
It takes just one copy transcoded into an easily-copiable digital form, and their system breaks. And as the legal copies become more fragile and easily damage, that 97% will soon start looking for ways to get unencumbered copies...
LinuxInsider has on several occasions in the past been a troll site for the SCO/IBM Linux dispute, coming down firmly on the FUD-mongers' side. They are a platform for people like Enderle, DiDio. Ignore, is my advice...
Consider the (admittedly unlikely) scenario of a massive backlash by vergetarians
So smoking grass mellows you, but eating it makes you cranky and violent? My horse is a vergetarian and she is as sweet-natured as you could imagine...
IBM has basically given away most of its IP portfolio?
Errmm, while I don't know how exactly many patents IBM holds, 500 is by no means, nowhere near, not even vaguely close to being "most of its IP portfolio".
Also, please don't use the term "IP": it muddies the waters: see here for why it is unhelpful at best to use the term IP.
There was this COBOL programmer who was living and working in the mid to late 1990s. His name was Jack. After years of being taken for granted and treated as a technological dinosaur by all the UNIX programmers, Client/Server programmers and website developers, Jack was finally getting some respect. He'd become a private consultant specializing in Year 2000 conversions. Inasmuch as most of the systems in desperate need for Year 2000 conversions were written in the relatively archaic COBOL computer language, Jack was working short-term assignments for prestige companies, traveling all over the world on different, highly profitable gigs. Unfortunately, he was working 70 and 80 and even 90 hour weeks, but it was worth a lot of bucks.
The problem arose when after several years of this relentless, mind-numbing work had taken its toll on Jack, he had begun to have problems sleeping and having anxiety dreams about the Year 2000. It had reached a point where even the thought of the year 2000 made him nearly violent. He must have suffered some sort of breakdown, because all he could think about was how he could avoid the year 2000 and all that came with it.
Jack decided to contact a company that specialized in cryogenics. He made a deal to have himself frozen until March 15th, 2000. This was a very expensive process and totally automated, but by this time, Jack had become really quite wealthy. In fact, the cost was no object and he was thrilled at the prospect that the next thing he would know would be that he'd wake up in the year 2000; after the New Year celebrations and computer debacles; after the leap day, and with nothing else to worry about except getting on with his life.
Jack was put into his cryogenic receptacle, the technicians set the revive date, he was given injections to slow his heartbeat to a bare minimum, and that was that.
The next thing that Jack saw was an enormous and very modern room filled with excited people. They were all shouting, "I can't believe it!", and "It's a miracle," and "He's alive!". There were cameras (unlike any he'd ever seen) and equipment that looked like it came out of a science fiction movie.
Someone who was obviously a spokesperson for the group stepped forward. Jack couldn't contain his enthusiasm. "It is over?," he asked. "Is 2000 already here? Are all the millennial parties and promotions and crises all over and done with?"
The spokesman explained that there had been a problem with the programming of the timer on Jack's cryogenic receptacle, it hadn't been year 2000 compliant. It was actually eight thousand years later, not the year 2000. But the spokesman told Jack that he shouldn't get too excited about such an unimportant detail inasmuch as there was someone very important who wanted to speak to him.
Suddenly a wall-sized projection screen displayed the image of a man that looked very much like Bill Gates. This man was Prime Minister of Earth. He told Jack not to be upset. That this was a wonderful time to be alive. That there was world peace and no more starvation. That the space program had been reinstated and there were colonies on the moon and on Mars. That technology had advanced to such a degree that everyone had virtual reality interfaces which allowed them to contact anyone else on the planet, or to watch any entertainment, or to hear any music recorded anywhere.
"That sounds terrific," said Jack. "But I'm curious. Why is everybody so interested in me?"
"Well," said the Prime Minister. "The year 10,000 is just around the corner, and it says in your files that you know COBOL".
This is coming: I have already seen and tried out devices that have VoIP and GSM capability in the same unit. The acronym you need to watch out for is UMA - Unlicensed Mobile Access. Look here for basics.
Exactly: the reason they bought Connectix, not VMWare, was that Microsoft and Connectix are both nine letter: they wouldn't need to deal with any pesky offset differences when they did a global search and replace...
Slashdot Mirror
Actually, that's a very good first step to a totalitarian/fascist/police state: make so many seemingly innoccuous offenses that pretty much everybody becomes a transgressor through normal day-to-day activites.
Then when you want to target someone just look at the trivial crimes he has committed and take it from there...
monkey in "hooked on Monkey Phonics" that masturbates instead of helping Cartman spell "chair"
Hmmm... I know at least two major US carriers who will be happily selling this as christmas present kit for 2005...Not exactly years,is it?
I work for one of the major cellphone carriers in the US,and I can tell you that we are falling over ourselves to get these handsets. One of the key motivations is to displace landlines, and also to carry traffic over (cheap) IP rather than (expensive) gsm wherever possible.
As a BBC license payer, I'm incensed that they could be spreading such FUD. Since when has Linux "eschewed the notion of property"?
Just because the open source community is vehemently opposed to software patents, doesn't mean that they don't support the "notion of property". Without such notions as copyright for instance, the GPL would be impossible.
Then why are you telling us? Write to the BBC...
Better a quarry than a mine shaft, and at least they don't have Bernard Cribbins, though thinking about it - which I do - he would probably have been a lot better as FP than Mos Def...
Did they change Trillian's name to Trisha?
Trillian's name is Tricia (sic):
See here
Thank you for you measured response. I was quite expecting to come back and see this modded (Score -60: Yankee-hater) or similar. Of course, if I wanted to be even MORE incendiary I could take you to task for talking about "American" soldiers... ;-)
(even an American soldier, although being a foreign soldier is better)
Isn't an American soldier a foreign soldier in Iraq?
It takes just one copy transcoded into an easily-copiable digital form, and their system breaks. And as the legal copies become more fragile and easily damage, that 97% will soon start looking for ways to get unencumbered copies...
He sure was a hoopy frood.
Aaaaaarrrggghh! IMHO, one of the worst mistakes DA ever made in THHGTG was to make the NOUN "hoopy" sound like an adjective: it's a NOUN, people:
Hoopy: really together guy
LinuxInsider has on several occasions in the past been a troll site for the SCO/IBM Linux dispute, coming down firmly on the FUD-mongers' side. They are a platform for people like Enderle, DiDio. Ignore, is my advice...
Consider the (admittedly unlikely) scenario of a massive backlash by vergetarians
So smoking grass mellows you, but eating it makes you cranky and violent? My horse is a vergetarian and she is as sweet-natured as you could imagine...
IBM has basically given away most of its IP portfolio?
Errmm, while I don't know how exactly many patents IBM holds, 500 is by no means, nowhere near, not even vaguely close to being "most of its IP portfolio".
Also, please don't use the term "IP": it muddies the waters: see here for why it is unhelpful at best to use the term IP.
Wouldn't mind playing with some Amazons myself.
Me either: I fancy some death by snoo snoo
- Lawrence Olivier
- Calculon
- Miss Piggy
- Peter O'Toole
continue until bored...Is that you, MacGyver?
There was this COBOL programmer who was living and working in the mid to late 1990s. His name was Jack. After years of being taken for granted and treated as a technological dinosaur by all the UNIX programmers, Client/Server programmers and website developers, Jack was finally getting some respect. He'd become a private consultant specializing in Year 2000 conversions. Inasmuch as most of the systems in desperate need for Year 2000 conversions were written in the relatively archaic COBOL computer language, Jack was working short-term assignments for prestige companies, traveling all over the world on different, highly profitable gigs. Unfortunately, he was working 70 and 80 and even 90 hour weeks, but it was worth a lot of bucks.
The problem arose when after several years of this relentless, mind-numbing work had taken its toll on Jack, he had begun to have problems sleeping and having anxiety dreams about the Year 2000. It had reached a point where even the thought of the year 2000 made him nearly violent. He must have suffered some sort of breakdown, because all he could think about was how he could avoid the year 2000 and all that came with it.
Jack decided to contact a company that specialized in cryogenics. He made a deal to have himself frozen until March 15th, 2000. This was a very expensive process and totally automated, but by this time, Jack had become really quite wealthy. In fact, the cost was no object and he was thrilled at the prospect that the next thing he would know would be that he'd wake up in the year 2000; after the New Year celebrations and computer debacles; after the leap day, and with nothing else to worry about except getting on with his life.
Jack was put into his cryogenic receptacle, the technicians set the revive date, he was given injections to slow his heartbeat to a bare minimum, and that was that.
The next thing that Jack saw was an enormous and very modern room filled with excited people. They were all shouting, "I can't believe it!", and "It's a miracle," and "He's alive!". There were cameras (unlike any he'd ever seen) and equipment that looked like it came out of a science fiction movie.
Someone who was obviously a spokesperson for the group stepped forward. Jack couldn't contain his enthusiasm. "It is over?," he asked. "Is 2000 already here? Are all the millennial parties and promotions and crises all over and done with?"
The spokesman explained that there had been a problem with the programming of the timer on Jack's cryogenic receptacle, it hadn't been year 2000 compliant. It was actually eight thousand years later, not the year 2000. But the spokesman told Jack that he shouldn't get too excited about such an unimportant detail inasmuch as there was someone very important who wanted to speak to him.
Suddenly a wall-sized projection screen displayed the image of a man that looked very much like Bill Gates. This man was Prime Minister of Earth. He told Jack not to be upset. That this was a wonderful time to be alive. That there was world peace and no more starvation. That the space program had been reinstated and there were colonies on the moon and on Mars. That technology had advanced to such a degree that everyone had virtual reality interfaces which allowed them to contact anyone else on the planet, or to watch any entertainment, or to hear any music recorded anywhere.
"That sounds terrific," said Jack. "But I'm curious. Why is everybody so interested in me?"
"Well," said the Prime Minister. "The year 10,000 is just around the corner, and it says in your files that you know COBOL".
This is coming: I have already seen and tried out devices that have VoIP and GSM capability in the same unit. The acronym you need to watch out for is UMA - Unlicensed Mobile Access. Look here for basics.
This is not new
Exactly: the reason they bought Connectix, not VMWare, was that Microsoft and Connectix are both nine letter: they wouldn't need to deal with any pesky offset differences when they did a global search and replace...
The story will be losely, losely, based on the first novel.
This is the first, first, first time I have ever seen the "reverse" mis-spelling. Does this mean I should be booking a table at Milliways?
Jatravartid people of Viltvodle VI
That's Viltvodle emacs, you insensitive clod...
I mean, we are the digital generation, aren't we?
Hey, you kids! Get off my lawn!
Well, I encrypted it and can't tell the difference:
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