You don't own a television yourself? Interesting...you sound unusual, and perhaps not who I was talking about.
In terms of us needing no law...I don't believe we're at that point, personally...well, most of us anywayz. I wouldn't go around killing people even if there wasn't a legal prohibition against it myself for three reasons:-
a) Because I don't want to be killed myself, and I believe that the way "the system," if you will, balances itself is by ensuring that those who kill eventually are killed so that they can't do it any more, and
b) Because murder is an extremely psychologically damaging act in many cases for the individual who commits it...and I wouldn't want to screw up my own head to that degree.
c) Although I actually consider this a fairly grievous liability, I do feel empathy for other people, and I do not have the desire to inflict that much suffering in another human being.
I don't know how many other people think like that, though.
People calling others sheep, and then turning around and saying, "vote Ron Paul! He'll save you!"
What you indescribably brainless morons cannot comprehend is that the very act of relinquishing ALL of your sovereignty to a single individual, and then expecting that individual to be your saviour, is the very heart of America's problem. Vote for Hillary, Ron Paul, or whoever...that won't make any difference. The only thing that IS going to make any kind of difference is when you stop expecting *whoever* holds the Presidency to act as your parent, and make every single decision for you that you should be making yourselves.
Is it even possible for any of you to get it into whatever you use in place of a brain that your entire democratic system no longer functions? Are you totally incapable of seeing that, or are you simply too afraid to accept it, because you know that if you do, you will have to revolt after that if you plan to survive?
Let Bush or whoever else is President at the time start running the death camps that they've been building...it will simply be the evolutionary process at work. You're so unutterably fucking stupid and servile that you being alive is doing more harm than good to the rest of the planet anyway. My guess is you'll still be sitting in front of your fucking TV sets watching Paris Hilton when the Blackwater mercs show up at your door to drag you off to the camps.
So let them come and kill you. America will be getting exactly what it deserves. You've already shown that even right down to the very last, most grievous extreme of tyranny, that you're going to be good, passive little Germans, and you're not going to fight back, but rather wait your turn quietly and patiently to be processed like the worthless, submissive livestock that you're choosing to be...so you do not deserve to survive.
My mother has a maltese terrier/poodle cross that she's had for years, and is utterly obsessive about...I've always said that the main reason why she loves it so much is because it is able to relate to her intellectually.
The single main reason why I've always hated canines myself isn't because of a lack of intelligence...on that score, they're fine. Said intelligence however is hamstrung by a tendency towards chronic emotional codependency. People call that loyalty, when in reality in most cases it's just that the dog's a wimp.;)
I'm a cat person. Put a cat's food down, give it a small amount of attention once in a while, and the rest of the time it will do its' own thing and leave me alone. If I could find a dog like that, my opinion on them might change.
Shadowrun wasn't purely about urban environments. You had Tir Tairngire, Ireland, Australia, and so on. Mt Rainier in America was also used as the setting for one of the novels I read.
Yes, I hope someone does something intelligent with the property, in terms of games. If that meant an MMORPG, I'd play it, if they had the same people working on it that they had doing the fiction/artwork for the rulebooks and they got the vibe right.
Personally, I'd want an SR2 setting...I used to have that rulebook, and I feel that with SR3 and after they screwed things up a bit.
The single main thing about SR that saddened me a bit was when I read on William Gibson's blog that he hated it, since the SR novels were actually what led me to read (or perhaps try to read would be a more honest way of saying it) Neuromancer. To me it seemed fairly obvious that the Shadowrun character Dodger was inspired by the Dixie Flatline...they're very very similar.
...when the entirety of the legislative branch at least is at the age where they should rightfully be in nursing homes, not in the halls of government. I can't remember the last time I saw a bio page for a US senator where the photo didn't look like that of a re-animated corpse.
There needs to be a legal prohibition against anyone holding political office over the age of 40. Churchill was right when he said that the mind's proclivity towards fascism generally increases with age. The single main problem with nearly anyone associated with American politics is that they are of a sufficiently advanced age that their brain has begun to literally decompose inside their head.
...because the sooner the mask really comes off, the dictatorship becomes official, and the government starts rounding up by the thousands people it doesn't like, to be carted off for "processing," the sooner a sufficiently large majority will finally mobilise and attempt to start fighting back. The sheep currently living in America aren't going to do that until it's completely undeniable that they will die if they don't; right now, there's still sufficient room for denial, debate about whether it's really happening, and to sit down and watch really important things like what Paris Hilton is doing this week.
Another bright side to look at in all of this is that while he might not have signed the Kyoto agreement, starting next year, Bush is finally going to start doing something to ease the amount of pressure America is putting on the environment. Once he's imprisoned and/or gassed half the population, the country's ecological footprint will shrink considerably.
'When you buy an OS from Microsoft, not only you can't fix it, but it has had years of being skewed by one single entity's sense of the market. It doesn't matter how competent Microsoft -- or any individual company -- is, it's going to reflect that fact. In contrast, look at where Linux is used. Everything from cellphones and other small embedded computers that people wouldn't even think of as computers, to the bulk of the biggest machines on the supercomputer Top-500 list. That is flexibility.'
The above has been in use since 1999. It needs to be retired. "We're not Microsoft," alone isn't going to cut it for much longer. If Linux advocates keep trying to use that line to the exclusion of all else, they'll eventually find that it isn't Microsoft they'll be competing with...it's Apple. That is one battle that they can't hope to win. OSX is both UNIX based, and with close-to-mainstream user friendliness. Next to that, people have no incentive to use Linux at all.
If you dont believe that Afghnaistan and Iraq is one part of a multi-faceted approach to the fundamental "who rules dilema", then you should pack your bags and get the fuck out and take Alec Baldwin with you, you dopes!
This isn't rational argument. It's pure aggression. Can you perhaps take a deep breath, try and calm down a bit, and then explain your position without all the aggro and swearing? You might be a bit more likely to get people to listen to you, then.
First you say that Wikileaks is a bad idea, and then you say that they're not leaking anything that can't be found out easily by anyone. Can you explain that?
Also...Can you explain to me why you think governmental secrecy is important/beneficial?
Time and again arguments like "national pride", "respect"(WTF?), "useful skills" and of course "manhood"(LOL)
The other thing of course about the manhood argument in Bush's context is its' degree of inconsistency.
I heard about a soldier giving a speech at a high school in the US where he told some student to, "be a man." The immediate response that came to mind was, "what, you mean the way Bush and Cheney were when they dodged?"
Nobody should IMHO be using WW2 as justification for feeling warm and fuzzy over anyone who is idiotic enough to go to Iraq. WW2 was a very different conflict, in a very different time. Sure, back then people were fighting for the continuation of the free world...but back then, such was actually *worth* potentially getting yourself killed for. Also, back then the human race itself was something worth preserving...these days, that's nowhere near as certain as it once was.
Soldiers or vets are perfectly free in my own mind to deride me as a snot-nosed civilian who will die without ever having put my own head on the block; fine, guilty as charged. My point though is that there's *another* snot-nosed civilian currently sitting in the White House, who also has never put himself in the firing line, who even with that, orders you to go and get yourselves killed in a war that has zero relevance or benefit for you personally, and which exists in its' entirety to make said civilian and others like him a whole lot more wealthy...and you listen to him, go and do it, and then expect people to applaud this incredible gullibility if you happen to survive the experience.
Something else I read once, and which I try and apply if there's ever a scenario where it's relevant, (even if the only real place where it happens is World of Warcraft) is that the only type of commander who's worth anything at all is one who never, ever orders anyone under him to do anything that he isn't willing to do himself.
Next time you go to think of Bush as your Commander in Chief, stop and ask yourselves...Do you really think, given the opportunity, he'd willingly be there dodging bullets with you in Fallujah or Kirkuk?
I don't believe in the war with Iraq, however, I did what I believe was the right thing to do for my country.
Something I don't understand...Americans will go and die or be maimed where Bush tells them to, and see it as serving their country...Do you never think however that it would possibly be a much more effective service of said country by defending it from Bush?
I honestly do wonder how much longer Americans are going to allow their leaders to abuse them before they realise that...that surely service of country means defending the country from tyrants within it, even more urgently than those in other countries.
Fuck all of you smash capitalism and imperialist war with international socialist revolution.
Ummm...I'm fairly sure one of the things Veteran's Day would mark is the winning of the Cold War.;-)
Seriously guys...this sort of extreme Marxist ranting and foaming at the mouth is really getting old. Are any of you truly naive and idiotic enough to believe that we'd be any better off in a Marxist scenario?
What he's saying is that he thinks businesses want to dual boot, basically...in terms of running different operating systems...and that they also want no-brainer deployment with the types of hand-holding contracts from IBM and RedHat that they've always wanted.
Business as usual, to a large extent...although he actually isn't saying anything negative about Linux. He's saying that he thinks businesses want diversity of operating systems, based on what they're doing...and Linux can benefit from that.
Solution: copy recorded music to your heart's content. Bleed em dry.
The only problem with that idea is that it won't work. The reason why is people like Jessica Simpson and Britney Spears. Sure, their music sucks, but they're much, much bigger stars than the Trent Reznors and Radioheads of the world, sadly.
People like Britney don't need talent...any at all...to be able to make money for the machine. She didn't contribute anything other than her face and maybe her voice to her music; the rest was produced by other people. She didn't write lyrics, she didn't do any of it.
As long as there are blondes available who, on seeing them, teenagers wish they could fuck, the RIAA and the people they really represent will continue making money...because that is the commodity that really makes them money, not music. It's a flesh trade.
Japan != the entire world. Given the amount of commonality much of Japanese culture presumably has with that of America and Europe at least, claiming that the PC is dying world wide because business is slow in Japan is an entirely unsupportable statement.
I find it vexatious when it is assumed that the trends operating within one particular country are going to somehow magically become universal.
I for one intend to be a desktop dinosaur for as long as possible. Their architecture is a lot more transparent than that of laptops, (meaning they're a lot easier to fix or upgrade) they're a lot cheaper, and the degree of versatility I get with my desktop isn't equalled by anything else.
You might be able to play games and watch DVDs with the newest consoles; you can also do word processing with a Palm. However, you can't do word processing on a PS2, or gaming/DVDs on a handheld. If you want a machine where you can do any of those things, a PC is pretty much the only way to go. My own philosophy is that stated by Robert Heinlein, to be honest; Specialisation is for insects.;)
Another of the endless, agonisingly pretentious, navel-gazing "state of the gaming industry," articles. Spare us, Zonk.
Something about a specific game I don't mind reading...but the GameSpot droids staring deeply and intently into their belly buttons isn't something I need to be notified about every time it happens. Just like the physical variety, mental masturbation isn't a good spectator sport.
There are some conspiracy theories I do understand, but the "Google is evil," one is one I've always had a bit of difficulty following.
They've got a ton of services, yes...but I can't think of a single one which doesn't have competitors that I'm entirely free to use the moment I feel like it. If I don't like gmail, I can easily use something else. If I don't like Google itself, I can easily use Yahoo, MSN Live, or any number of others. So the fact is, they're not a monopoly at all...and I actually find their services extremely beneficial and useful, personally.
I know it's been said before, but I have to ask...
I get the feeling that this was a much more standard reaction than a lot of people realise. Sarah Michelle was very much an acquired taste; people seemed to either really love her, or really hate her...no two ways about it.
To me she was a method actor in exactly the same sense as William Shatner, David Hasselhoff, or Keanu Reeves; in the sense that she played the same individual...herself...no matter what the character's name was. For Buffy, that worked, because the personality was almost an exact match for the character...which was essentially a study of the Aries/Pisces contrast; or in non-astrological terms, a personality with a hard, fairly militaristic exterior, and a soft, much more vulnerable interior. It shows up very clearly, both in the actor's chart, and in the character's portrayal at times on the show...especially during her involvement with Angel.
I'm not saying I always liked her much either...but I understood the dichotomy. It was present in Angel's case as well, although in his case it wasn't really interesting because said dichotomy was more or less expected from a male in his position. What made it so interesting in Buffy's case is that she was female.
I think it could be safely said that in a universal sense, Angel was also a much more likeable/accessible character than Buffy, particularly for males. That was the other thing for me that actually made watching Buffy worthwhile at times...that I actually had to struggle a bit mentally to understand her position in order to be able to sympathise with her. She usually had reasons for behaving the way she did, from the perspective of her own logical/cognitive framework; sometimes it was just said model that wasn't immediately obvious.
...is why anyone is still bothering to edit Wikipedia? The claim of being a site that anyone can edit is a flat lie; the site got taken over by pedantic assholes over a year ago. I occasionally still look things up on it, but I made my last edit in May.
Wikipedia is a haven for beaurecratic idiot savants, and atheist fundamentalists of a kind who would make Richard Dawkins look objective. These are people who are utterly devoid of any other reason to exist whatsoever, and therefore derive whatever tenuous sense of self-worth they have from editing the wiki themselves, and ensuring the number of other people capable of successfully editing is kept to the smallest number possible, in order to maintain their own "prestige," and the wiki's "credibility," the latter being a source of continual, gnawing insecurity to said individuals. In other words, one great big closed, elitist, back-slapping circle jerk; exactly the thing that they spuriously claim to have avoided.
Seriously...if you want to host wiki-based content, do yourself a huge favour and host a copy of MediaWiki privately somewhere. You might think that idea sucks in terms of not getting any exposure...but your material isn't going to get any exposure either when it gets deleted from Wikipedia, with the claim that said material doesn't conform to their inane policy, when the reality in most cases is simply that they disagree with what you're writing.
Sorry, Jimbo...You had a great idea...but unfortunately, as most ideas do, yours had a fatal, head on collision with human nature.
Prince represents one fairly extreme (and minority, it should also be said) end of the spectrum as far as intellectual property is concerned. At the other end you've got people like Trent Reznor with the comments he made at his concert recently, literally telling people to pirate his music.
The moral of the story here is that if you're selecting artists to listen to, it might actually be a good idea to try and find out what their individual stance on enforcement is. Some are going to be like Prince, or Metallica. Others are going to be like Trent Reznor. Most, I suspect, will fall somewhere in between, in the sense that while they won't mind fair use to a degree similar to what has traditionally existed with radio, they will still, in the end, quite rightfully expect people to buy CDs of their music. However, I also believe that enforcement needs to be the responsibility of the artist themselves, and not middlemen organisations like the RIAA...because very often the middlemen organisations hold views which are not representative of everyone that they claim to represent.
One other thing I'd actually like to see some acts offering is the possibility of legal indemnity to individuals who can be proven to have bought copies of their music. In other words, if you buy a copy of a given artist's music, for a contract to exist between you and said artist specifying exactly what it is that you are or are not legally allowed to do with the music you've bought, and as long as you operate within those guidelines, you won't get sued. Different artists are going to have different perspectives on that, so said contracts would actually need to be extremely individual in nature. I'm also not talking about something exactly the same as a software license here, either. I would want to see something where people actually had to provide individual signatures that were recorded along with the date of purchase; not something clickthrough that is untraceable, unenforceable, and can thus be brushed off.
Someone like Prince would obviously be fairly strict; private, individual listening/viewing only, with no reproduction or secondary performance allowed of any kind whatsoever. At the other end of the spectrum you'd likely get people who'd be willing, once you've paid them, to let you do whatever you wanted, up to and including the creation of derivative works.
People who do advocate the GPL in whatever form are likely going to continue to do so. People who don't, won't.
I used to engage in schizoid ranting about this topic, and admittedly still do, from time to time...but the thing that I've at least tried to realise is that when you're dealing with a cult of the same type as say Amway or the Church of Scientology, (which IMHO the FSF and its' followers are) if you don't agree with their belief system, you can make any kind of appeal you like, and it isn't going to make any difference whatsoever.
People need IMHO to realise that about the FSF. If one of them or their followers tries to sell you on the idea of the GPL or act as an apologist for it, realise that you're dealing with a cultist. Fact is irrelevant. Logic is irrelevant. The only thing in their mind that is relevant is you becoming an additional member of the Collective. (The euphemistic references to such as a "community" is the proverbial spoonful of sugar which they hope will cause the dogmatic medicine to go down easier)
Likewise, if you're attempting to argue with them that any of the more permissive licenses are inherently less restrictive than the GPL, you truly might as well not bother. Mind control is utterly impervious to any kind of reasoned argument which you might be able to construct. Forcible deprogramming might work, but any attempt at rational argument won't.
What can we do about this? Only one thing; route around it. As far as FOSS is concerned, use anything and everything we can that isn't associated with the FSF at all. I can remember feeling enormously encouraged when reading about OpenBSD's attempts at integrating and developing another C compiler. The C compiler has long been the last major piece of the puzzle necessary to having an open source operating system that isn't affiliated with the Stallmanite cult in any way whatsoever.
In the 1800's the family dined at the dinner table.
In the 1940's the family dined around the radio.
In the 1960's the family dined around the television.
In the 2000's, single members of the family eat dinner in front of individual computer monitors in seperate rooms, and communicate via MSN. Either that, or the family doesn't exist at all, and the individual simply eats in front of the computer alone.
Slashdot Mirror
You don't own a television yourself? Interesting...you sound unusual, and perhaps not who I was talking about.
In terms of us needing no law...I don't believe we're at that point, personally...well, most of us anywayz. I wouldn't go around killing people even if there wasn't a legal prohibition against it myself for three reasons:-
a) Because I don't want to be killed myself, and I believe that the way "the system," if you will, balances itself is by ensuring that those who kill eventually are killed so that they can't do it any more, and
b) Because murder is an extremely psychologically damaging act in many cases for the individual who commits it...and I wouldn't want to screw up my own head to that degree.
c) Although I actually consider this a fairly grievous liability, I do feel empathy for other people, and I do not have the desire to inflict that much suffering in another human being.
I don't know how many other people think like that, though.
I'm sick of this irony.
People calling others sheep, and then turning around and saying, "vote Ron Paul! He'll save you!"
What you indescribably brainless morons cannot comprehend is that the very act of relinquishing ALL of your sovereignty to a single individual, and then expecting that individual to be your saviour, is the very heart of America's problem. Vote for Hillary, Ron Paul, or whoever...that won't make any difference. The only thing that IS going to make any kind of difference is when you stop expecting *whoever* holds the Presidency to act as your parent, and make every single decision for you that you should be making yourselves.
Is it even possible for any of you to get it into whatever you use in place of a brain that your entire democratic system no longer functions? Are you totally incapable of seeing that, or are you simply too afraid to accept it, because you know that if you do, you will have to revolt after that if you plan to survive?
Let Bush or whoever else is President at the time start running the death camps that they've been building...it will simply be the evolutionary process at work. You're so unutterably fucking stupid and servile that you being alive is doing more harm than good to the rest of the planet anyway. My guess is you'll still be sitting in front of your fucking TV sets watching Paris Hilton when the Blackwater mercs show up at your door to drag you off to the camps.
So let them come and kill you. America will be getting exactly what it deserves. You've already shown that even right down to the very last, most grievous extreme of tyranny, that you're going to be good, passive little Germans, and you're not going to fight back, but rather wait your turn quietly and patiently to be processed like the worthless, submissive livestock that you're choosing to be...so you do not deserve to survive.
My mother has a maltese terrier/poodle cross that she's had for years, and is utterly obsessive about...I've always said that the main reason why she loves it so much is because it is able to relate to her intellectually.
;)
The single main reason why I've always hated canines myself isn't because of a lack of intelligence...on that score, they're fine. Said intelligence however is hamstrung by a tendency towards chronic emotional codependency. People call that loyalty, when in reality in most cases it's just that the dog's a wimp.
I'm a cat person. Put a cat's food down, give it a small amount of attention once in a while, and the rest of the time it will do its' own thing and leave me alone. If I could find a dog like that, my opinion on them might change.
Shadowrun wasn't purely about urban environments. You had Tir Tairngire, Ireland, Australia, and so on. Mt Rainier in America was also used as the setting for one of the novels I read.
Yes, I hope someone does something intelligent with the property, in terms of games. If that meant an MMORPG, I'd play it, if they had the same people working on it that they had doing the fiction/artwork for the rulebooks and they got the vibe right.
Personally, I'd want an SR2 setting...I used to have that rulebook, and I feel that with SR3 and after they screwed things up a bit.
The single main thing about SR that saddened me a bit was when I read on William Gibson's blog that he hated it, since the SR novels were actually what led me to read (or perhaps try to read would be a more honest way of saying it) Neuromancer. To me it seemed fairly obvious that the Shadowrun character Dodger was inspired by the Dixie Flatline...they're very very similar.
...when the entirety of the legislative branch at least is at the age where they should rightfully be in nursing homes, not in the halls of government. I can't remember the last time I saw a bio page for a US senator where the photo didn't look like that of a re-animated corpse.
There needs to be a legal prohibition against anyone holding political office over the age of 40. Churchill was right when he said that the mind's proclivity towards fascism generally increases with age. The single main problem with nearly anyone associated with American politics is that they are of a sufficiently advanced age that their brain has begun to literally decompose inside their head.
...because the sooner the mask really comes off, the dictatorship becomes official, and the government starts rounding up by the thousands people it doesn't like, to be carted off for "processing," the sooner a sufficiently large majority will finally mobilise and attempt to start fighting back. The sheep currently living in America aren't going to do that until it's completely undeniable that they will die if they don't; right now, there's still sufficient room for denial, debate about whether it's really happening, and to sit down and watch really important things like what Paris Hilton is doing this week.
Another bright side to look at in all of this is that while he might not have signed the Kyoto agreement, starting next year, Bush is finally going to start doing something to ease the amount of pressure America is putting on the environment. Once he's imprisoned and/or gassed half the population, the country's ecological footprint will shrink considerably.
"You'd better watch out,
You'd better not cry,
You'd better not pout,
I'm telling you why.
Fascism is coming, to town.
They're making a list,
They're checking it twice,
They're going to find out who's naughty and nice,
Fascism is coming, to town.
They see you when you're sleeping,
They know when you're awake.
You'll be water-boarded if you're bad,
So be good, for goodness' sake!
The demons in the Beltway,
Will have a jubilee,
They'll build a network of death camps,
That from orbit you could see.
With concrete warehouses,
Big chlorine drums,
Blackwater mercs,
Wielding all kinds of guns,
Fascism is coming, to town.
So you'd better get out,
While you still can fly,
You'd better leave fast,
I'm telling you why.
Fascism is coming, to town.
I mean the goose-stepping man,
With the clipped moustache,
He's coming to town!"
...how these are always violations of the "spirit" rather than the letter of the GPL? ;)
"Well, you're making source available, but...but...you're not a member of the cult, and you don't believe that RMS should be worshipped as God! DIE!"
'When you buy an OS from Microsoft, not only you can't fix it, but it has had years of being skewed by one single entity's sense of the market. It doesn't matter how competent Microsoft -- or any individual company -- is, it's going to reflect that fact. In contrast, look at where Linux is used. Everything from cellphones and other small embedded computers that people wouldn't even think of as computers, to the bulk of the biggest machines on the supercomputer Top-500 list. That is flexibility.'
The above has been in use since 1999. It needs to be retired. "We're not Microsoft," alone isn't going to cut it for much longer. If Linux advocates keep trying to use that line to the exclusion of all else, they'll eventually find that it isn't Microsoft they'll be competing with...it's Apple. That is one battle that they can't hope to win. OSX is both UNIX based, and with close-to-mainstream user friendliness. Next to that, people have no incentive to use Linux at all.
If you dont believe that Afghnaistan and Iraq is one part of a multi-faceted approach to the fundamental "who rules dilema", then you should pack your bags and get the fuck out and take Alec Baldwin with you, you dopes!
This isn't rational argument. It's pure aggression. Can you perhaps take a deep breath, try and calm down a bit, and then explain your position without all the aggro and swearing? You might be a bit more likely to get people to listen to you, then.
First you say that Wikileaks is a bad idea, and then you say that they're not leaking anything that can't be found out easily by anyone. Can you explain that?
Also...Can you explain to me why you think governmental secrecy is important/beneficial?
Time and again arguments like "national pride", "respect"(WTF?), "useful skills" and of course "manhood"(LOL)
The other thing of course about the manhood argument in Bush's context is its' degree of inconsistency.
I heard about a soldier giving a speech at a high school in the US where he told some student to, "be a man." The immediate response that came to mind was, "what, you mean the way Bush and Cheney were when they dodged?"
Nobody should IMHO be using WW2 as justification for feeling warm and fuzzy over anyone who is idiotic enough to go to Iraq. WW2 was a very different conflict, in a very different time. Sure, back then people were fighting for the continuation of the free world...but back then, such was actually *worth* potentially getting yourself killed for. Also, back then the human race itself was something worth preserving...these days, that's nowhere near as certain as it once was.
Soldiers or vets are perfectly free in my own mind to deride me as a snot-nosed civilian who will die without ever having put my own head on the block; fine, guilty as charged. My point though is that there's *another* snot-nosed civilian currently sitting in the White House, who also has never put himself in the firing line, who even with that, orders you to go and get yourselves killed in a war that has zero relevance or benefit for you personally, and which exists in its' entirety to make said civilian and others like him a whole lot more wealthy...and you listen to him, go and do it, and then expect people to applaud this incredible gullibility if you happen to survive the experience.
Something else I read once, and which I try and apply if there's ever a scenario where it's relevant, (even if the only real place where it happens is World of Warcraft) is that the only type of commander who's worth anything at all is one who never, ever orders anyone under him to do anything that he isn't willing to do himself.
Next time you go to think of Bush as your Commander in Chief, stop and ask yourselves...Do you really think, given the opportunity, he'd willingly be there dodging bullets with you in Fallujah or Kirkuk?
I don't believe in the war with Iraq, however, I did what I believe was the right thing to do for my country.
Something I don't understand...Americans will go and die or be maimed where Bush tells them to, and see it as serving their country...Do you never think however that it would possibly be a much more effective service of said country by defending it from Bush?
I honestly do wonder how much longer Americans are going to allow their leaders to abuse them before they realise that...that surely service of country means defending the country from tyrants within it, even more urgently than those in other countries.
Fuck all of you smash capitalism and imperialist war with international socialist revolution.
;-)
Ummm...I'm fairly sure one of the things Veteran's Day would mark is the winning of the Cold War.
Seriously guys...this sort of extreme Marxist ranting and foaming at the mouth is really getting old. Are any of you truly naive and idiotic enough to believe that we'd be any better off in a Marxist scenario?
What he's saying is that he thinks businesses want to dual boot, basically...in terms of running different operating systems...and that they also want no-brainer deployment with the types of hand-holding contracts from IBM and RedHat that they've always wanted.
Business as usual, to a large extent...although he actually isn't saying anything negative about Linux. He's saying that he thinks businesses want diversity of operating systems, based on what they're doing...and Linux can benefit from that.
Solution: copy recorded music to your heart's content. Bleed em dry.
The only problem with that idea is that it won't work. The reason why is people like Jessica Simpson and Britney Spears. Sure, their music sucks, but they're much, much bigger stars than the Trent Reznors and Radioheads of the world, sadly.
People like Britney don't need talent...any at all...to be able to make money for the machine. She didn't contribute anything other than her face and maybe her voice to her music; the rest was produced by other people. She didn't write lyrics, she didn't do any of it.
As long as there are blondes available who, on seeing them, teenagers wish they could fuck, the RIAA and the people they really represent will continue making money...because that is the commodity that really makes them money, not music. It's a flesh trade.
Japan != the entire world. Given the amount of commonality much of Japanese culture presumably has with that of America and Europe at least, claiming that the PC is dying world wide because business is slow in Japan is an entirely unsupportable statement.
;)
I find it vexatious when it is assumed that the trends operating within one particular country are going to somehow magically become universal.
I for one intend to be a desktop dinosaur for as long as possible. Their architecture is a lot more transparent than that of laptops, (meaning they're a lot easier to fix or upgrade) they're a lot cheaper, and the degree of versatility I get with my desktop isn't equalled by anything else.
You might be able to play games and watch DVDs with the newest consoles; you can also do word processing with a Palm. However, you can't do word processing on a PS2, or gaming/DVDs on a handheld. If you want a machine where you can do any of those things, a PC is pretty much the only way to go. My own philosophy is that stated by Robert Heinlein, to be honest; Specialisation is for insects.
Another of the endless, agonisingly pretentious, navel-gazing "state of the gaming industry," articles. Spare us, Zonk.
Something about a specific game I don't mind reading...but the GameSpot droids staring deeply and intently into their belly buttons isn't something I need to be notified about every time it happens. Just like the physical variety, mental masturbation isn't a good spectator sport.
There are some conspiracy theories I do understand, but the "Google is evil," one is one I've always had a bit of difficulty following.
They've got a ton of services, yes...but I can't think of a single one which doesn't have competitors that I'm entirely free to use the moment I feel like it. If I don't like gmail, I can easily use something else. If I don't like Google itself, I can easily use Yahoo, MSN Live, or any number of others. So the fact is, they're not a monopoly at all...and I actually find their services extremely beneficial and useful, personally.
I know it's been said before, but I have to ask...
Where's the lock-in? I can't see it.
I hated Buffy. A Lot.
I get the feeling that this was a much more standard reaction than a lot of people realise. Sarah Michelle was very much an acquired taste; people seemed to either really love her, or really hate her...no two ways about it.
To me she was a method actor in exactly the same sense as William Shatner, David Hasselhoff, or Keanu Reeves; in the sense that she played the same individual...herself...no matter what the character's name was. For Buffy, that worked, because the personality was almost an exact match for the character...which was essentially a study of the Aries/Pisces contrast; or in non-astrological terms, a personality with a hard, fairly militaristic exterior, and a soft, much more vulnerable interior. It shows up very clearly, both in the actor's chart, and in the character's portrayal at times on the show...especially during her involvement with Angel.
I'm not saying I always liked her much either...but I understood the dichotomy. It was present in Angel's case as well, although in his case it wasn't really interesting because said dichotomy was more or less expected from a male in his position. What made it so interesting in Buffy's case is that she was female.
I think it could be safely said that in a universal sense, Angel was also a much more likeable/accessible character than Buffy, particularly for males. That was the other thing for me that actually made watching Buffy worthwhile at times...that I actually had to struggle a bit mentally to understand her position in order to be able to sympathise with her. She usually had reasons for behaving the way she did, from the perspective of her own logical/cognitive framework; sometimes it was just said model that wasn't immediately obvious.
...is why anyone is still bothering to edit Wikipedia? The claim of being a site that anyone can edit is a flat lie; the site got taken over by pedantic assholes over a year ago. I occasionally still look things up on it, but I made my last edit in May.
Wikipedia is a haven for beaurecratic idiot savants, and atheist fundamentalists of a kind who would make Richard Dawkins look objective. These are people who are utterly devoid of any other reason to exist whatsoever, and therefore derive whatever tenuous sense of self-worth they have from editing the wiki themselves, and ensuring the number of other people capable of successfully editing is kept to the smallest number possible, in order to maintain their own "prestige," and the wiki's "credibility," the latter being a source of continual, gnawing insecurity to said individuals. In other words, one great big closed, elitist, back-slapping circle jerk; exactly the thing that they spuriously claim to have avoided.
Seriously...if you want to host wiki-based content, do yourself a huge favour and host a copy of MediaWiki privately somewhere. You might think that idea sucks in terms of not getting any exposure...but your material isn't going to get any exposure either when it gets deleted from Wikipedia, with the claim that said material doesn't conform to their inane policy, when the reality in most cases is simply that they disagree with what you're writing.
Sorry, Jimbo...You had a great idea...but unfortunately, as most ideas do, yours had a fatal, head on collision with human nature.
Prince represents one fairly extreme (and minority, it should also be said) end of the spectrum as far as intellectual property is concerned. At the other end you've got people like Trent Reznor with the comments he made at his concert recently, literally telling people to pirate his music.
The moral of the story here is that if you're selecting artists to listen to, it might actually be a good idea to try and find out what their individual stance on enforcement is. Some are going to be like Prince, or Metallica. Others are going to be like Trent Reznor. Most, I suspect, will fall somewhere in between, in the sense that while they won't mind fair use to a degree similar to what has traditionally existed with radio, they will still, in the end, quite rightfully expect people to buy CDs of their music. However, I also believe that enforcement needs to be the responsibility of the artist themselves, and not middlemen organisations like the RIAA...because very often the middlemen organisations hold views which are not representative of everyone that they claim to represent.
One other thing I'd actually like to see some acts offering is the possibility of legal indemnity to individuals who can be proven to have bought copies of their music. In other words, if you buy a copy of a given artist's music, for a contract to exist between you and said artist specifying exactly what it is that you are or are not legally allowed to do with the music you've bought, and as long as you operate within those guidelines, you won't get sued. Different artists are going to have different perspectives on that, so said contracts would actually need to be extremely individual in nature. I'm also not talking about something exactly the same as a software license here, either. I would want to see something where people actually had to provide individual signatures that were recorded along with the date of purchase; not something clickthrough that is untraceable, unenforceable, and can thus be brushed off.
Someone like Prince would obviously be fairly strict; private, individual listening/viewing only, with no reproduction or secondary performance allowed of any kind whatsoever. At the other end of the spectrum you'd likely get people who'd be willing, once you've paid them, to let you do whatever you wanted, up to and including the creation of derivative works.
What's the Slashbot/atheist/rationalist/skeptic/debunker's perspective on EVP? That the people doing it/listening to it are mentally ill? ;)
People who do advocate the GPL in whatever form are likely going to continue to do so. People who don't, won't.
I used to engage in schizoid ranting about this topic, and admittedly still do, from time to time...but the thing that I've at least tried to realise is that when you're dealing with a cult of the same type as say Amway or the Church of Scientology, (which IMHO the FSF and its' followers are) if you don't agree with their belief system, you can make any kind of appeal you like, and it isn't going to make any difference whatsoever.
People need IMHO to realise that about the FSF. If one of them or their followers tries to sell you on the idea of the GPL or act as an apologist for it, realise that you're dealing with a cultist. Fact is irrelevant. Logic is irrelevant. The only thing in their mind that is relevant is you becoming an additional member of the Collective. (The euphemistic references to such as a "community" is the proverbial spoonful of sugar which they hope will cause the dogmatic medicine to go down easier)
Likewise, if you're attempting to argue with them that any of the more permissive licenses are inherently less restrictive than the GPL, you truly might as well not bother. Mind control is utterly impervious to any kind of reasoned argument which you might be able to construct. Forcible deprogramming might work, but any attempt at rational argument won't.
What can we do about this? Only one thing; route around it. As far as FOSS is concerned, use anything and everything we can that isn't associated with the FSF at all. I can remember feeling enormously encouraged when reading about OpenBSD's attempts at integrating and developing another C compiler. The C compiler has long been the last major piece of the puzzle necessary to having an open source operating system that isn't affiliated with the Stallmanite cult in any way whatsoever.
In the 1800's the family dined at the dinner table.
In the 1940's the family dined around the radio.
In the 1960's the family dined around the television.
In the 2000's, single members of the family eat dinner in front of individual computer monitors in seperate rooms, and communicate via MSN. Either that, or the family doesn't exist at all, and the individual simply eats in front of the computer alone.