Nonsense. "Religious freedom," in today's parlance, doesn't mean freedom to try and force your religion upon another person; it means freedom from other religions which are persecuting your religion, so you can be free to persecute other's religions. It's the theological equivalent to a "cease fire," during which you rapidly reload and pick some new allies / various weaker enemies to annihilate during the down time. It is, from my standpoint, breathtakingly boring, but since every side "believes" it can win, but only if they take the initiative to ambush / bonk the other side while they're not looking, it never ends.
Why yes guys, that's what we need -> more charisma, more strained arguments, more violence, more threats, more indirect answers, more lying on behalf of our god(s). That'll win them over.
Some days I almost, for several moments, consider that kind of future; with a good head start, we could play a game of who is the bigger monster; I don't know if I'd win, but again, with some resources and planning, I'm sure I can break the top one hundred. But war is rough on the china, and it's rarely very profitable, and certainly not sustainable (you'll run out of enemies to conquer sooner or later, and adjustment to peace-time operations can be rough on the average soldier's wage), so I'd have to give it a miss, out of habit.
"If God existed, he'd be quite capable of fighting his own wars. Seriously, he didn't attain the title of Almighty by needing anyone else to fight a war for him."
If memory serves me correct, the Muslims believe that their God is the same as the Christians and Jews, which again, if memory serves me correct, YHWH is considered something of a war god in the old testament. That means he might just have an idea how to wage, and win, a war.
Though that "chariots of iron" thing is kind of an odd read.
Technology is what separates us from the animals. It's the one thing human beings actually excel at.
If we are falling behind, then we must find out why. This requires some honesty, as no one wants to be blamed. As such, anything and everything will be blamed and sacrificed under the sun, until the actual problem is located and at the very least, attenuated. Every dime-store charlatan and snake oil salesman will peddle a "cure" for what ails us, and none of them will work; these hucksters will take money and accumulate power, while delivering nothing of value.
If we are falling behind in technology, its use and development, we must ask ourselves, why? What stands in technology's way? Everyone has their favorite enemy to throw under the bus here, but again, this process requires some objectivity.
I personally do not know what is causing the technological slowdown. I've studied it, have seen many possibilities, but none which I would argue is the smoking gun, or is in collusion with the smoking gun.
Nonsense. They are simply the "band of the month," in terms of a technology industry darling. IBM has been there, Microsoft has been there, Yahoo has been there, Google has been there, Facebook and Apple are there right now.
No one "owns" our government, they can only rent it, from time to time, through the campaign donation box conveniently located outside most Congressmen's offices. Nothing reminds a company more that they are only renting as when they forget to pay the rent.
*Looks around* We don't have free trade in America. Never have, probably never will.
We do, however, have some treaties and agreements with "free trade" in their names, yet sadly, like the "Patriot Act," the name has little to do with the actual legislation. As is the common practice, in order to understand what an actual treaty / bill does, one need only flip or invert the name. As such, our "free trade" agreements are actually giant protectionist mechanisms, with hefty tariffs outlined in them.
Typically, yes. There are, however, a few exceptions.
Notably, the technological sector (software) and the pharmaceutical sector. Of course, the US is losing the bleeding edge of technology, and appears happy to have only the leading edge of technology. Which eventually backfires, but what the hell, up until that point, it's pretty fricking awesome (great ROI, or so I am told). Of course, after that point, you have to spend hideous amounts of capital trying to catch up again (let alone pass everyone else), so it's actually easier / cheaper to just maintain your bleeding edge, but then, we've been doing a lot of silly things lately...
I prefer to save C for the linux kernel. C# does just fine for regular programming, and doesn't make you hate yourself when you forget to properly terminate a string.
And I know classes have, for some odd reason, fallen out of style for programmers, but I like them. I've tried functional programming, and I just don't like it. I prefer my code to be more...organized / sane.
Agreed. I purchased web hosting for a year (out of the US), and a domain name. I'm considering a Parisienne firm for some minor website artwork. The number of businesses / services that accept BitCoins are growing.
The only people shouting Pyramid Scheme as those who are butt-hurt from trying to 'get in' at the wrong time; many of those people were more invested in turning a magical short-term profit by reselling their coins to 'suckas' who would buy in later. Surprise, surprise, the same kind of mentality seen with the flipping of homes on the real estate market, and just like with that market, it backfires -> absolutely no understanding of market fundamentals or finance, but the people involved think they've found a path to Easy Street. Probably bought in at $14 / coin, and sold out at $3 / coin, only to watch the market rebound, as of late, back to $7 / coin. Guys, if you want to turn a major profit, do two things -> 1.) read up on some finance / economics (the heavy stuff that you special order online, not the stuff B&N stocks in the "Investing" aisle), and 2.) long-term investing (not everyone is cut out to be a day trader, and long term tends to be quite profitable).
One of the larger things harming BitCoin is the constant f*ckups the various exchanges and online wallet sites keep experiencing. Mt. Gox kept screwing the market with their repeatedly hacked accounts (ah yes, PHP, the epitome of secure languages), followed by Dwolla and their API nonsense (has anyone seen my head? it appears located inside my rectum), and that one online BitCoin wallet service whose owners took everyone's wallet and cashed out (why yes, everyone, why doesn't you store your unencrypted wallet with me for a while? wink wink). In all seriousness, I myself am surprised that BitCoin is still around -> it's based on a sound design, but the growing pains it has experienced from every goober who has come along since have been synonymous with a 90 lbs geek trying out for the high-school football team.
Which is the importance of getting your contracts specified in a currency that they can't print. For US contracts, get the money paid in Euros. For European contracts, get the money in Yen (or whatever Asian currency you prefer), and for Asian contracts, get the money paid in US dollars.
The government will call their brethren overseas to trade their currency for the one specified in your contract. Get a general idea of when they make that transaction, and you can make some more money -> I call it fractional investing. The people in the government who signed a contract with you have been playing the money printing game since forever, so play them at their own game, and hit them up for extra cash at every milestone. A single $30 million dollar contract can, with the right information, be worth over $250 million.
As the saying goes, we will pretend to work as they pretend to pay us. But then, I can understand their approach -> as the Finance majors have pointed out to us on many occasions, the value of a currency is entirely in your head. And I can actually understand now why these people are so desperate to spend their dollars -> no one knows when this house of cards will come tumbling down, which makes trading paper for hard assets a good idea. With a currency that is rapidly depreciating, and is on questionable grounds, spending it immediately would be a good idea.
Finish sinking the ship as an artificial reef after removing the fuel, collect the insurance money (in the tech world, it's always time to upgrade), build a new ship, find a new captain, and make the old ship / artificial reef part of the tour.
This is fun to watch. Technological dominance moves as a wave, from east to west, and has done so for quite some time. Occasionally, it tarries, but once the host country gets full of itself, it moves on.
Asia is enjoying it now, and soon after, the Middle East will be enjoying it. Then Europe again. Then the Americas again.
Which reminds me. I need to move out of this country before they decide to take revenge for the (pending) war on Iran.
Perhaps, but it's more along the lines of protesting the TSA by getting their security badges locked out of their own system. Which serves a valid point: if you can't secure your own system, what business do you have securing others?
Which is why we need to convince the insurance companies who cover actors that they haven't been charging enough for their premiums. And then we need to play with the movie stocks...
Since their yearly income, as reported by themselves, is only around $300 million, it will only take a little to begin sapping their strength. And it's not like the public isn't already fed up with them; the words "Talent-less hacks with a $5 dollar story written on a paper napkin" has been an apt description of their efforts for the past several years. Won't take much to sink this Titanic.
Slashdot Mirror
Nonsense. "Religious freedom," in today's parlance, doesn't mean freedom to try and force your religion upon another person; it means freedom from other religions which are persecuting your religion, so you can be free to persecute other's religions. It's the theological equivalent to a "cease fire," during which you rapidly reload and pick some new allies / various weaker enemies to annihilate during the down time. It is, from my standpoint, breathtakingly boring, but since every side "believes" it can win, but only if they take the initiative to ambush / bonk the other side while they're not looking, it never ends.
Why yes guys, that's what we need -> more charisma, more strained arguments, more violence, more threats, more indirect answers, more lying on behalf of our god(s). That'll win them over.
Some days I almost, for several moments, consider that kind of future; with a good head start, we could play a game of who is the bigger monster; I don't know if I'd win, but again, with some resources and planning, I'm sure I can break the top one hundred. But war is rough on the china, and it's rarely very profitable, and certainly not sustainable (you'll run out of enemies to conquer sooner or later, and adjustment to peace-time operations can be rough on the average soldier's wage), so I'd have to give it a miss, out of habit.
"If God existed, he'd be quite capable of fighting his own wars. Seriously, he didn't attain the title of Almighty by needing anyone else to fight a war for him."
If memory serves me correct, the Muslims believe that their God is the same as the Christians and Jews, which again, if memory serves me correct, YHWH is considered something of a war god in the old testament. That means he might just have an idea how to wage, and win, a war.
Though that "chariots of iron" thing is kind of an odd read.
The makeup of the asteroid determines whether or not we would use nukes. They come in a few different types, last I checked.
A solid core asteroid can, with enough planning and time, be deflected by a nuke (probably several). A rocky asteroid, not so much.
And yes, I do understand the issue.
Agreed. It's been a while, but I believe we have a limited chance of detecting an asteroid before it comes too close to use a nuke.
And what did you replace it with?
Technology is what separates us from the animals. It's the one thing human beings actually excel at.
If we are falling behind, then we must find out why. This requires some honesty, as no one wants to be blamed. As such, anything and everything will be blamed and sacrificed under the sun, until the actual problem is located and at the very least, attenuated. Every dime-store charlatan and snake oil salesman will peddle a "cure" for what ails us, and none of them will work; these hucksters will take money and accumulate power, while delivering nothing of value.
If we are falling behind in technology, its use and development, we must ask ourselves, why? What stands in technology's way? Everyone has their favorite enemy to throw under the bus here, but again, this process requires some objectivity.
I personally do not know what is causing the technological slowdown. I've studied it, have seen many possibilities, but none which I would argue is the smoking gun, or is in collusion with the smoking gun.
Nonsense. They are simply the "band of the month," in terms of a technology industry darling. IBM has been there, Microsoft has been there, Yahoo has been there, Google has been there, Facebook and Apple are there right now.
No one "owns" our government, they can only rent it, from time to time, through the campaign donation box conveniently located outside most Congressmen's offices. Nothing reminds a company more that they are only renting as when they forget to pay the rent.
*Looks around* We don't have free trade in America. Never have, probably never will.
We do, however, have some treaties and agreements with "free trade" in their names, yet sadly, like the "Patriot Act," the name has little to do with the actual legislation. As is the common practice, in order to understand what an actual treaty / bill does, one need only flip or invert the name. As such, our "free trade" agreements are actually giant protectionist mechanisms, with hefty tariffs outlined in them.
Typically, yes. There are, however, a few exceptions.
Notably, the technological sector (software) and the pharmaceutical sector. Of course, the US is losing the bleeding edge of technology, and appears happy to have only the leading edge of technology. Which eventually backfires, but what the hell, up until that point, it's pretty fricking awesome (great ROI, or so I am told). Of course, after that point, you have to spend hideous amounts of capital trying to catch up again (let alone pass everyone else), so it's actually easier / cheaper to just maintain your bleeding edge, but then, we've been doing a lot of silly things lately...
Chinese are ahead of you: Foxconn is moving to automation.
No. Don't even pursue this line of inquiry.
SOPA is the straw that threatens to break the camel's back. It takes a lot to stop a House / Senate bill on short notice, even if it's temporary.
The people who write the history books, a hundred years from now.
More along the lines of being the owner of a cafe that the rebels of a current government frequent.
Being in the same room as other does not equal complicity in the crimes perpetrated.
Need? No. Prefer? Yes.
I prefer to save C for the linux kernel. C# does just fine for regular programming, and doesn't make you hate yourself when you forget to properly terminate a string.
And I know classes have, for some odd reason, fallen out of style for programmers, but I like them. I've tried functional programming, and I just don't like it. I prefer my code to be more...organized / sane.
Agreed. I purchased web hosting for a year (out of the US), and a domain name. I'm considering a Parisienne firm for some minor website artwork. The number of businesses / services that accept BitCoins are growing.
The only people shouting Pyramid Scheme as those who are butt-hurt from trying to 'get in' at the wrong time; many of those people were more invested in turning a magical short-term profit by reselling their coins to 'suckas' who would buy in later. Surprise, surprise, the same kind of mentality seen with the flipping of homes on the real estate market, and just like with that market, it backfires -> absolutely no understanding of market fundamentals or finance, but the people involved think they've found a path to Easy Street. Probably bought in at $14 / coin, and sold out at $3 / coin, only to watch the market rebound, as of late, back to $7 / coin. Guys, if you want to turn a major profit, do two things -> 1.) read up on some finance / economics (the heavy stuff that you special order online, not the stuff B&N stocks in the "Investing" aisle), and 2.) long-term investing (not everyone is cut out to be a day trader, and long term tends to be quite profitable).
One of the larger things harming BitCoin is the constant f*ckups the various exchanges and online wallet sites keep experiencing. Mt. Gox kept screwing the market with their repeatedly hacked accounts (ah yes, PHP, the epitome of secure languages), followed by Dwolla and their API nonsense (has anyone seen my head? it appears located inside my rectum), and that one online BitCoin wallet service whose owners took everyone's wallet and cashed out (why yes, everyone, why doesn't you store your unencrypted wallet with me for a while? wink wink). In all seriousness, I myself am surprised that BitCoin is still around -> it's based on a sound design, but the growing pains it has experienced from every goober who has come along since have been synonymous with a 90 lbs geek trying out for the high-school football team.
Exactly. Facebook Credits = Flooz.
Which is the importance of getting your contracts specified in a currency that they can't print. For US contracts, get the money paid in Euros. For European contracts, get the money in Yen (or whatever Asian currency you prefer), and for Asian contracts, get the money paid in US dollars.
The government will call their brethren overseas to trade their currency for the one specified in your contract. Get a general idea of when they make that transaction, and you can make some more money -> I call it fractional investing. The people in the government who signed a contract with you have been playing the money printing game since forever, so play them at their own game, and hit them up for extra cash at every milestone. A single $30 million dollar contract can, with the right information, be worth over $250 million.
As the saying goes, we will pretend to work as they pretend to pay us. But then, I can understand their approach -> as the Finance majors have pointed out to us on many occasions, the value of a currency is entirely in your head. And I can actually understand now why these people are so desperate to spend their dollars -> no one knows when this house of cards will come tumbling down, which makes trading paper for hard assets a good idea. With a currency that is rapidly depreciating, and is on questionable grounds, spending it immediately would be a good idea.
And the US doesn't understand why overseas businesses are reluctant to store information on US servers...
Finish sinking the ship as an artificial reef after removing the fuel, collect the insurance money (in the tech world, it's always time to upgrade), build a new ship, find a new captain, and make the old ship / artificial reef part of the tour.
More Minister and Pastors than what?
This is fun to watch. Technological dominance moves as a wave, from east to west, and has done so for quite some time. Occasionally, it tarries, but once the host country gets full of itself, it moves on.
Asia is enjoying it now, and soon after, the Middle East will be enjoying it. Then Europe again. Then the Americas again.
Which reminds me. I need to move out of this country before they decide to take revenge for the (pending) war on Iran.
Perhaps, but it's more along the lines of protesting the TSA by getting their security badges locked out of their own system. Which serves a valid point: if you can't secure your own system, what business do you have securing others?
Which is why we need to convince the insurance companies who cover actors that they haven't been charging enough for their premiums. And then we need to play with the movie stocks...
Since their yearly income, as reported by themselves, is only around $300 million, it will only take a little to begin sapping their strength. And it's not like the public isn't already fed up with them; the words "Talent-less hacks with a $5 dollar story written on a paper napkin" has been an apt description of their efforts for the past several years. Won't take much to sink this Titanic.
And when they find that a few of the various ip addresses belong to them?