It's different because DNA contains a lot more information about you than a fingerprint does. Sure they are using it *only* for identification today, what about tomorrow?
This is done in the Netherlands. when I was there 6 years ago... many establishments had "no cell phone" stickers on the windows, and would enforce the policy. It was popular with restaurants, coffee shops and bars.
This argument is a non starter and you know it. I would dare even say it is strawman.
in particular: 1) many times we are charged per cable subscriber... WELL, perhaps you should leverage your powerful lobbies to change this? What? If you changed that it would reduce your profit? Ohhh, thought so. So you have no incentive to "not piss off your customer" because you are a) effectively a monopoly, b) this model serves to your advantage since it allows you to make a higher percentage of profit for each subscriber. Nice try, not buying it.
2) Don't you think these bills fluctuate enough already? How about this: forget the package discounts, let me pick my channels a la carte and I'll pay full price for each channel I want. You say the technology is there but the providers are to blame... Did they coerce your poor company into these contracts? So basically, you are screwing the customer and the advertiser? How are the actual "number of eyes" allocated, by subscriber? hmmmm.... Sounds like a conspiracy between you and the provider more than anything else, to insure you both maximize your profit....
On average I would suspect that 80% of the people watch less than 20% of the channels that are shoved down their throat in order to get the handful they actually watch. (I mean seriously, why do I have to have the Hallmark channel to get Comedy Central?)... This legislation is long overdue.
The dept. I work for develops software tools (IT/WEB/DATABASE/ETC) and the developers have been on "flex time" and are allowed to work remotely at their own discretion. This is extremely convenient; We are also a small team with a large charter and are consistently top performers and are considered essential and successful to the departments we support. This is a very effective model, but it does require some getting used to, especially since we are a "global" company and office hours are really 24/7. It is very convenient to be able to work from home and be as productive as I am at the office, especially when my car is in the shop (as it is now)... I am lucky to work for a manager that understands and embraces this.
It may have something to do with the lack of emotional communication: voice inflection and facial expressions are not translated over the normal medium of web communication, text. We pick up a lot of our social and attraction queues from these. In the case of romance, smell plays a big part in attraction, also not transmitted via the web. This might be the basis for the social stigma. While intellectually there are advantages to this method of communication, socially it is handicapping and that is likely naturally recognized by even the least astute computer user.
I once had a very grumpy old man call me to get help installing his internet dialing software from his new ISP. The instructions were clearly printed on the Disk's label: Goto Start, then Run. Type a:\install.exe. click OK. He had no trouble following these instructions over the phone for me again, at which point an error appeared (paraphrased) "Disk is not in drive...".
Me: is the disk in the drive sir? Him: No, the instructions did not say to put the disk in the drive. Me: (checks instructions) Certainly not sir. Please put the disk in the drive and let's try again. Him: What the hell? Why don't the instructions say that? (obivously embarrassed) Me: I don't write the instructions sir, I think they assumed you would know to put the disk in the drive. I'll let them know they may need to update the labels. Him: This is stupid! (hangs up)
We quantify to scale and sometimes we scale to discover who we can either despise on the high end or disdain on the low. It's human nature and to an extent we always do this automatically; We all need someone to love/admire, to aspire to; as well as someone to hate/despise, to inspire us to do better.
Your example is somewhat contrived and lacks detail, for example: what job are these folks competing for that this type of testing imbalances, and why doesn't the guy with 40 years of programming experience know these so called vocabulary words? Attitude, intelligence and experience are often the determining factor when making important hiring decisions at higher levels, such as a position that someone with 40 years of programming experience (which should speak for itself) would seek. Your example also has little to do with the actual tests described (they were not, for example, vocabulary tests, more like cognitive recognition tests from what I saw). Obviously companies that are paying you to know about how to work a computer would rather pay a bit more to test you first, than a lot more over time to (attempt) to train you. It's a sad fact in these days of equality, but some people are still smarter than others, and as long as that's true (~forever) we'll want to figure out who those people are and hire them.
This is an industry full of undeserved egos (myself included)... and many of us have draconian standards for judging the intelligence of others. I recall many a colleague lamenting the stupidity of a medical doctor that called into technical support with a minimal level of computer literacy. Bottom line... computer literacy is likely something that can very well be quantified and measured in a certain space or class of skills/problems. Just as math skills, etc... but I agree with your basic point, attitude, education, intelligence and experience should be the key factors, but how do you measure them over a larger group to determine who's going to be the best?
I'm only responding this way since this was modded Insightful and is obviously poorly thought out insipid FUD. Let's not vilify companies because they are trying to make more money by hiring the best low level workers. If you hate testing because you are bad at it, fine, just say that. However berating a test you've never taken and know nothing about based on the idea that testing is bad just demonstrates your own lack of experience.
Seems to me that Nintendo's biggest competitor in the handheld game space is themselves. Why not release a system to compete with the GBA at a higher price point?
My understanding is that these "cheats", especially on a console, are testing codes... why would these be left accessible or even in the game on release? I can understand leaving them in for single player games, it really doesn't matter that much, but does this not seem like a horrible oversight for the developer of a competitive online multiplayer game to leave these in?
Ok, I'll admit it, FFX is not a D&D style game in the sense that you can create your own characters, etc. But it does fall into that genre from the perspective of a fantasy game with magic and monsters and so forth. I'm not really familiar with any console RPG games that really let you develop you own character, likening back to say "A Bard's Tale". In fact, most of these types of games seem to be limited to the PC HW rather than consoles. It is, however, an RPG in the classic console RPG sense, which is the feeling I took away from the original request. Obviously you have a different interpretation.
There, I tried to make the argument anyway, what do you think?
Slashdot Mirror
According to CSI MIAMI... it shouldn't matter since they can always enhance the quality of the video on the fly.
It's different because DNA contains a lot more information about you than a fingerprint does. Sure they are using it *only* for identification today, what about tomorrow?
This is done in the Netherlands. when I was there 6 years ago... many establishments had "no cell phone" stickers on the windows, and would enforce the policy. It was popular with restaurants, coffee shops and bars.
This argument is a non starter and you know it. I would dare even say it is strawman.
in particular: 1) many times we are charged per cable subscriber... WELL, perhaps you should leverage your powerful lobbies to change this? What? If you changed that it would reduce your profit? Ohhh, thought so. So you have no incentive to "not piss off your customer" because you are a) effectively a monopoly, b) this model serves to your advantage since it allows you to make a higher percentage of profit for each subscriber. Nice try, not buying it.
2) Don't you think these bills fluctuate enough already? How about this: forget the package discounts, let me pick my channels a la carte and I'll pay full price for each channel I want. You say the technology is there but the providers are to blame... Did they coerce your poor company into these contracts? So basically, you are screwing the customer and the advertiser? How are the actual "number of eyes" allocated, by subscriber? hmmmm.... Sounds like a conspiracy between you and the provider more than anything else, to insure you both maximize your profit....
On average I would suspect that 80% of the people watch less than 20% of the channels that are shoved down their throat in order to get the handful they actually watch. (I mean seriously, why do I have to have the Hallmark channel to get Comedy Central?)... This legislation is long overdue.
The dept. I work for develops software tools (IT/WEB/DATABASE/ETC) and the developers have been on "flex time" and are allowed to work remotely at their own discretion. This is extremely convenient; We are also a small team with a large charter and are consistently top performers and are considered essential and successful to the departments we support. This is a very effective model, but it does require some getting used to, especially since we are a "global" company and office hours are really 24/7. It is very convenient to be able to work from home and be as productive as I am at the office, especially when my car is in the shop (as it is now)... I am lucky to work for a manager that understands and embraces this.
It may have something to do with the lack of emotional communication: voice inflection and facial expressions are not translated over the normal medium of web communication, text. We pick up a lot of our social and attraction queues from these. In the case of romance, smell plays a big part in attraction, also not transmitted via the web. This might be the basis for the social stigma. While intellectually there are advantages to this method of communication, socially it is handicapping and that is likely naturally recognized by even the least astute computer user.
my 2 cents...
I once had a very grumpy old man call me to get help installing his internet dialing software from his new ISP. The instructions were clearly printed on the Disk's label: Goto Start, then Run. Type a:\install.exe. click OK. He had no trouble following these instructions over the phone for me again, at which point an error appeared (paraphrased) "Disk is not in drive...".
Me: is the disk in the drive sir?
Him: No, the instructions did not say to put the disk in the drive.
Me: (checks instructions) Certainly not sir. Please put the disk in the drive and let's try again.
Him: What the hell? Why don't the instructions say that? (obivously embarrassed)
Me: I don't write the instructions sir, I think they assumed you would know to put the disk in the drive. I'll let them know they may need to update the labels.
Him: This is stupid! (hangs up)
The word you were looking for was quantify.
We quantify to scale and sometimes we scale to discover who we can either despise on the high end or disdain on the low. It's human nature and to an extent we always do this automatically; We all need someone to love/admire, to aspire to; as well as someone to hate/despise, to inspire us to do better.
Your example is somewhat contrived and lacks detail, for example: what job are these folks competing for that this type of testing imbalances, and why doesn't the guy with 40 years of programming experience know these so called vocabulary words? Attitude, intelligence and experience are often the determining factor when making important hiring decisions at higher levels, such as a position that someone with 40 years of programming experience (which should speak for itself) would seek. Your example also has little to do with the actual tests described (they were not, for example, vocabulary tests, more like cognitive recognition tests from what I saw). Obviously companies that are paying you to know about how to work a computer would rather pay a bit more to test you first, than a lot more over time to (attempt) to train you. It's a sad fact in these days of equality, but some people are still smarter than others, and as long as that's true (~forever) we'll want to figure out who those people are and hire them.
This is an industry full of undeserved egos (myself included)... and many of us have draconian standards for judging the intelligence of others. I recall many a colleague lamenting the stupidity of a medical doctor that called into technical support with a minimal level of computer literacy. Bottom line... computer literacy is likely something that can very well be quantified and measured in a certain space or class of skills/problems. Just as math skills, etc... but I agree with your basic point, attitude, education, intelligence and experience should be the key factors, but how do you measure them over a larger group to determine who's going to be the best?
I'm only responding this way since this was modded Insightful and is obviously poorly thought out insipid FUD. Let's not vilify companies because they are trying to make more money by hiring the best low level workers. If you hate testing because you are bad at it, fine, just say that. However berating a test you've never taken and know nothing about based on the idea that testing is bad just demonstrates your own lack of experience.
Yanni!
Seems to me that Nintendo's biggest competitor in the handheld game space is themselves. Why not release a system to compete with the GBA at a higher price point?
At least you've got a private office. Spoiled Brat! ;-)
My understanding is that these "cheats", especially on a console, are testing codes... why would these be left accessible or even in the game on release? I can understand leaving them in for single player games, it really doesn't matter that much, but does this not seem like a horrible oversight for the developer of a competitive online multiplayer game to leave these in?
Ok, I'll admit it, FFX is not a D&D style game in the sense that you can create your own characters, etc. But it does fall into that genre from the perspective of a fantasy game with magic and monsters and so forth. I'm not really familiar with any console RPG games that really let you develop you own character, likening back to say "A Bard's Tale". In fact, most of these types of games seem to be limited to the PC HW rather than consoles.
It is, however, an RPG in the classic console RPG sense, which is the feeling I took away from the original request. Obviously you have a different interpretation.
There, I tried to make the argument anyway, what do you think?
For your criteria, three of the latest (last 2 years) and greatest games I've ever played in these genres are on the PS2
- action game where I can play a spy or a soldier?
METAL GEAR SOLID 2
- driving game where I can race around in cool cars?
GRAND TURISMO 3 (There is simply nothing finer, yet...)
- D&D style game so I can re-live my pubescent RPG days?
FINAL FANTASY X
As an aside you should also check out "Grand Theft Auto: Vice City", "Sly Cooper and the Thevious Racoonus" and "ICO".