The whole point of Celebrity is to fascinate in these people off-screen. I'm sorry, but artificial celebs who are brought to life for a film, simply do not have an 'out of character' capability. Any attempt at one would be an act itself.
A.C. (Artificial Celebs, not Anon Cowards:) ) also lack the real world problems that real celebs have. They don't go into rehab, shoot people in night clubs or get caught with prostitutes. Any 'news' of Max Headroom punching out a paparazzi would be a blatant publicity stunt.
Further, none of these A.C. have their own personalities.. They're all based on the human. Bart Simpson may have fans, but there's a woman's voice and a writer's words behind that.
Anyone who would see an A.C. as a true celeb is out of touch with reality, and is doing the work of all those fascist freaks who want to define 'acceptible content' for us, protect us from ourselves, raise our kids for us, and tell us what we should be thinking.
If someone can't tell the difference between Dr. Aki and Nicole Kidman, then they just might think that killing 102 people in 30 minutes is OK, since Arnold and Sly do it all the time, and that Ozzy really does think that suicide is a Good Idea.
I don't see why that would be necessary. I don't see a connection.
It isn't necessary. There is not connection. There is also no connection between Federal speed limits and Interstate Highway maintenance cost subsidies for States, yet, strangely, the funding was held back for certain States until they adopted the 'suggested' speed limits. Interesting, that.
How does regulation keep it affordable?
You're expecting this to be clearly logical. It is, but not in the straightforward sense. There is still much the government can do to make the interaction between cable and telephone providers (and the overlap in services they can provide) simple or difficult. To get what they want, cable cos and telcos will need to give the Fed what it wants. Simple extortion.
Do what we say, or men with guns shut you down.
It won't ever be that dramatic and transparent. Denied permits, tax audits, unrealistic appeal deadlines, etc. will kill off non-compliance.
"No Mr. ISP CEO, you can not string your fiber-optic line across or under a Highway.. What? The data is encrypted? Encryption is a munition, and so you must be a terrorist.."
You like tax-free shopping on the Internet? You will disclose your personal information.
You want regulations that keep bandwidth affordable? You will accept government monitoring of your private communicaton.
You want to be/stay in business as an access provider? You will log everything and make those logs available on a whim.
If I've already paid admission, and can't get knick-knacks and food from anywhere but their shops, why should Disney care if I come for the attractions, or the Wireless?
After I've bought my ticket, I'm IN the park. IIRC, the rides don't cost anything but time after that. I'd much rather check tomorrows weather on my Pilot, plan out my next day at Epcot while in line at Magic Kingdom's Pirates of the Carribean, and just shoot out a quickie "Wish you were here" email over lunch, than have to wait until I get home to do these things.
It's not about 'enjoying the park'. It's about the cost of providing the additional service. It's always about the MONEY. This is DISNEY people.. They have a Copyright on FUN, remember?
There would be no issue at all here if this program was something that had to be manually installed. If the FBI got a warrant to enter a suspect's home, install a 'tap' on his PC, and then retrieve the data, there would be no issue.
Any criminal savvy enough to detect that sort of intrusion is also savvy enough to detect and subvert Magic Lantern. Hell, if I had something to hide, I'd keep it away from the networks, on an encrypted drive, wired to destroy the data if I failed to log in correctly - and I am NOT a criminal mastermind.
All ML does, by being a Trojan, is get non-criminal technologists pissed off over civil rights and such.
Sure, it may make the 'tap' easier to set up remotely (does it really? only with very ignorant criminals I think) and to pull data off as it's being generated, so that a logfile can't be easily found (but anyone with something to hide is likely to be sniffing their own packets anyway, no?).
There's something else going on here. It could be about testing the waters for industry compliance to Federal backdoors (PGP anyone?). It could be to increase the anxiety level of technologically inept/newbie potential terrorists.
The publicity level of this strikes me as a diversionary tactic, because the technological aspects of ML are surely defeatable (we can look at our own packets down to the bit after all) and the audacity of it (Big Brother factor) is sure to kill it.. The next step is to have each cell phone sold with a listening device that the FBI could turn on remotely. Even the technologically ignorant would not stand up for that, or for this.
Thoughts upon the parsing of the code
on
Lineo Frees CP/M
·
· Score: 1
[code]
10 RUN DOS .
.
[code]
Hmmm, so Microsoft swiped this, and evolved it, and now all MS OSes are based on it? Interesting...
Foresaw space flight and the space race, the Pill, DNA paternity testing, FAX machines, and several other things.. It's been a while since I've read it.
There is an old addage in CS.. Good programmers write lots of code, and great programmers steal lots of code.
(Of course the distinction needs to be drawn between programming and 'true' CS/Information Theory etc, but you get the point)
The thing is, CS education treats programming too much like English - code may be 'speach', but it is not an essay. Yes, outright copying of code is still plagiarism, since you did not do your own work, but...
In the 'real world' you rarely find a situation when people solve the same problem in parallel.. So comparing implementations for 'originality' is not an issue. 'Parallel' problem solving should only be used in introductory courses. After you know the language/concept (around the upper 200 level classes) you should not have many 'solo' projects.
Instead, most projects should be solved by the group, and should be large enough to include a 'project management' component as part of the assignment. The problem should be too large for an individual to address in the time given - barring brilliance. Forced decomposition of the problem, division of the work into separate tasks, accountability on how well each part is done.. These are the things that will make for a successful team project.
Should cooperation be restricted? Not at all, but everyone should have their own area of responsibility.. You can have teams that compete, but better yet, involve the whole class and rotate responsibility.. Allow students to assign roles to themselves, and watch top coders, and star organizers emerge..
Idealistic? Sure.. Will some lazy bums slip through the cracks by riding on the coat-tails of their more talented and industrious peers? Of course.. All systems can be circumvented unless you want a full-time TA watching each student.
So what? These people will only do themselves a disservice in the 'real world' by demonstrating incompetence if they choose the wrong field - or, well, hey, what's wrong with coordinating and pilfering the efforts of others, as long as the job gets done?
If the coders can't make the pieces fit, but someone else can, that someone is a valuable asset to a company.
How many of the Linux developers out there have rewritten the kernel from scratch, just to add a feature? Everyone stands on the shoulders of those who came before.
Ah, so we have found the fatal flaw in the Open Source movement then.. Pride.
Information may want to be Free, but will only be freed if the one letting it loose gets to take credit for doing so? That's hardly the idealism we've come to expect from the Linux crowd - though I do agree to a degree about the peer review.
Peer review can still be had however, if the originator can argue for the implementation without disclosing that they are in fact the source of the information.
Whatever happenned to scientific idealism? Doing the work for the benefit of mankind?
A TRUE hero is one who makes the sacrifice without even thinking of the recognition - in fact, one who realizes that he might be branded a traitor, or never acknowledged for his deeds, is a bigger hearo than anyone who is welcomed home to a ticker-tape parade.
Anonimous submissions to the papers, inside, unnamed sources and subsequent 'expert' analysis have taken down Presidents..
Why don't people anonimously submit this sort of thing (cracks, weaknesses, bug reports) to news sources?
Would the papers be liable for printing someone elses 'approach', without necessarily verifying it's correctness first? After all, Deep Throat wasn't named to be right, he only gave 'hints' about Watergate...
I could see The Register, the Motley Fool, the Washington Post, or maybe just some online news source (ahem, slashdot, ahem) printing 'suggestions' from anonimous sources... And as 'reputable' guardians of Liberty (*sigh*) they would be able to claim the need to protect the identities of the submitters in order to maintain their 'professionalism', or some such...
How about it slashdot? Set up a PO Box where people could send neat stuff without a return address..
Ok, so here's what I'm thinking...
Under the DMCA, it is against the law to circumvent content protection schemes? Or is it against the law to disseminate such information?
In either case, the HDCP crack isn't being released, but 'a pretty good hint' has been given. Now, how 'good' must a 'hint' be before it violates the DMCA?
Say the 64 bit backdoor key to some encryption scheme is found to be 83A2FA8F.. Is it a 'good hint' to tell the word that the key is probably somewhere between 83A2FA80 and 83A2FA90? How about 83A20000 and 83A2FFFF?
We've seen DeCSS implemented in so many ways, not only machine executable but transcribable, artistic, and as a frigging Haiku even...
What makes the publication of a crack into a 'hint'? Could I just rattle off the source code, prefixed with a 'something like' and followed by a 'maybe', and be safe from persecution? Could I draw a few easily understood diagrams? Invent my own words for 'array', 'pointer', etc..
What if, as a 'hint', I tell only part of the implementation to one person, and part to another, and part to another?
Remember high-school? Did your teachers ever give 'hints'? Isn't that cheating? What if an employee of a company issued and unofficial 'hint', when they depart the payroll?
Some of the kids will be a lot sharper than you think. Be aware and prepared to rebuild a system or two if you go hands-on.
Don't go into heavy detail, remember the age group. See if you can hook your examples into something they might have had to do for class. The continuity will help overcome the fear of the 'new'.
Make it fun, but keep the fun constrained. I let the students play LAN games, but figured out that starting out with that would be real tough to reel in. If you'll have a LAN available, offer games as a wrap-up and reward.
If you have internet available, online scavenger hunts can be fun. Do your homework. They'll learn about using search engines, scanning for useful leads.. Supervise, else they'll find things you didn't expect them to.
Try to show a variety of uses for the technology. Graphics are always cool, especially animations. Music is a real good attention getter. They probably won't comprehend databases, and spreadsheets and word processing is a skill, not an interesting thing.
Explain saving information. Teach them about directories, and finding files, and openning them from applications vs from the Win Explorer. I'm constantly surprised at how many people don't grasp the concept of applications, folders, files...
Have them write a letter in something like Word.. Show them the basics - fonts and sizes, bold and italic, colored text.. Better yet, for that age group, let them make cards, flyers, something of interest that they can relate to. Supervise, lest you end up with 'gangsta props' and unpleasantness - these are teens and don't think much. Let them print things to take home.
Few will care, but run them through a spreadsheet. Show them some simple formulas, preferably within a familiar context. I used sale adverts... i.e. %20 off of whatever price is what?
Try to cram in some ethics, sideways if you have to. You're going to show them a powerful tool, and hopefully interest them enough that they will try to learn more on their own. Show them a little responsibility. Give each a diskette, and explain the importance of personal data and information.
Not to blind anyone when I suddenly pull the blinders aside, but, would non-geek technophobes care at all? Would they even OWN a Tivo?
As this reads, this 'upgrade' attempts to mainstream the geek technophilic black sheep into the rest of the ignorant flock. From a business perspective, it makes perfect sense.. Why should a select few get some benefit of the product that Tivo does not yet SELL to everyone?
Sorry, but the technocratic elite is getting it's wings clipped once again. Not unlike the myth of Icarus, really.. We should be used to it by now.
And in other news, Old Navy, a subsidiary of the clothing store The Gap, has begun collecting statistics on it's customers, and turning these over to The Gap's management for follow-up action.
Contact information on customers who purchase more than one shirt, sweater or jacket, without at the same time buying shorts, pants or a skirt, will be contacted by The Gap with special offers for these items.
The Gap's management claims that this will greatly reduce the problem of public nudity and indecency, which is sure to result from too many customers owning only the top portion of a complete Gap Brand outfit.
An un-named, but high ranking, Gap Official was quoted as saying " We at The Gap feel that it would be indecent, nay! Immoral, for all those people to prance around in Old Navy shirts without matching Gap Khakis! We're just trying to protect the children. "
Slashdot's parent company hosts K5. They know K5's bandwidth and traffic tolerance. They should have mirrored the article instead of taking K5 out for the count.
As it stands, K5 is unavailable to it's regular readers, in all it's articles, because Rusty said something semi-intelligent and everyone wants to come and see for themselves.
Slashdot, please consider mirroring content in cases where you know you will cripple the original site.
I left/. for K5 so I could have worthwhile articles to my relative self, and now the barbarian horde has torn the gates off the hinges! Heathens! Animals!
To think that I would have to come to slashdot to read Kuro5hin content!! I feel dirty somehow... It's like going to a frat-house to talk to the smart girls! Feh! Bastards!
Pass the beer funnel! Light a fart! Oogle the smart chicks! *BELCH!*
First off, Napster is complying with a court order. If you like Napster, then you should be happy that this seemingly impossible task is being done via CDDB.
Second, right or wrong, the RIAA has legal claim to their Copyrighted material. If you want to knowingly circumvent that claim, then you need to lose the hypocrisy and admit that you are a thief. If you own those albums, rip 'em yourself you lazy bastage!
Third, Napster has served it's purpose. By comparison to the present alternatives, Napster is crude, inflexible and clunky. Let it go! Don't let nostalgia and hype keep your neophile spirit bound to a dead horse.
Fouth, Napster doesn't love you anymore. As soon as Napster started pulling usernames, well before they signed with Bertlemann, and WELL before this development, they had gone over to the 'other side'. In fact, as soon as they incorporated and IPOd, their reason for being changed. Grass roots my arse! They're a business.
If you don't like the computer industry, why did you choose this major?
You absolutely do not have to work in the IT industry to get a job. Specifically, you don't have to work for a computer company or a dot-com. You could work for the IT department, or any internal computer oriented group, at any large company. In-house applications and info-sys jobs are plentiful, but sort of hidden from the top-level glance of new grads. And if you really hate IT so much, make sure they offer educational aid.. Work a while while you retool for something more interesting to you. No sense being unhappy.
Have you put much effort into the online IT job search systems like Monster? They're great if you are willing to relocate.
Have you spoken with any area head-hunters and temp agencies? Their leads run much deeper than even those of academic placement services. A good head-hunter should be able to line up a few entry level jobs in the area, maybe a few internships of trial-hires.
I have no idea what you could have done wrong, with the exception of expecting to have a wreath of laurels crammed up your butt sideways upon graduation. If you go through school and then expect to make 6 figures just for showing up by noon, you should have been a lawyer.
I worked 30+ hour weeks to put myself through a State university in the mid-90's. No loans, and job experience to boot. I was not too full of myself to live with my family for the duration of College, I saw it as an investment. It kept me away from the alcoholic drug abusers.
Half my professors spoke Ingrish just fine, they helped me focus on the ideas, not prejudice. Half were Ph.D's, they taught me respect for thought and foresight. Half had left the IT industry to teach, because they were tired of the rat race, they taught me balance and that it was ok to walk away from pain. I learned useful things.
No class I ever took in CS exceeded 25 students. None exceeded 25% non-English-fluents. None had more than 5 women in it. None depended on a Microsoft product the upgrade of which would render my education void. I learned assembler and Lisp, and I use neither professionally. However, I know the difference between data and algorithms.
I had a $40k/annum job in place months before graduation - and they paid for my Masters. Upon earning that, they gave me a 50% raise. I don't live in the bizzaro world of Silicon Valley, so my salary is VERY lucrative at this point.
NASDAQ doesn't bother me much since I don't have stock options. I have actual benefits and keep my investments private. I don't work for a company that sells things which don't exist. I don't have to rip my guts out to make good on some marketters delusion. And my job doesn't depend on whether or not some Wall Street compulsive gambler freak took enough Tums.
A nice MS Outlook bug would be a great delivery mechanism for such a 'virus'. But why do harm in the first place? Let's not to any damage. Simply piggy-back off of the Melissa worm concept to put a few different versions of DeCSS on EVERYONE's computer.
MPAA vs the World? I don't think so. But maybe them the MPAA could sue Microsoft to get all those nasty little security 'features' fixed.
"two many nuclear submarines"
"deterrants"
"why not pout this money into things "
"chgance"
"Can you imagine in 65 million years a new intelligence trying to figure out killed our species out? "
"it was there own weapons"
"military assests"
Frankly, if the funds are diverted from NASA's excessive spending and into basic education then I have no problem with a few cut-backs.;)
Slashdot Mirror
The whole point of Celebrity is to fascinate in these people off-screen. I'm sorry, but artificial celebs who are brought to life for a film, simply do not have an 'out of character' capability. Any attempt at one would be an act itself.
:) ) also lack the real world problems that real celebs have. They don't go into rehab, shoot people in night clubs or get caught with prostitutes. Any 'news' of Max Headroom punching out a paparazzi would be a blatant publicity stunt.
A.C. (Artificial Celebs, not Anon Cowards
Further, none of these A.C. have their own personalities.. They're all based on the human. Bart Simpson may have fans, but there's a woman's voice and a writer's words behind that.
Anyone who would see an A.C. as a true celeb is out of touch with reality, and is doing the work of all those fascist freaks who want to define 'acceptible content' for us, protect us from ourselves, raise our kids for us, and tell us what we should be thinking.
If someone can't tell the difference between Dr. Aki and Nicole Kidman, then they just might think that killing 102 people in 30 minutes is OK, since Arnold and Sly do it all the time, and that Ozzy really does think that suicide is a Good Idea.
I don't see why that would be necessary. I don't see a connection.
It isn't necessary. There is not connection. There is also no connection between Federal speed limits and Interstate Highway maintenance cost subsidies for States, yet, strangely, the funding was held back for certain States until they adopted the 'suggested' speed limits. Interesting, that.
How does regulation keep it affordable?
You're expecting this to be clearly logical. It is, but not in the straightforward sense. There is still much the government can do to make the interaction between cable and telephone providers (and the overlap in services they can provide) simple or difficult. To get what they want, cable cos and telcos will need to give the Fed what it wants. Simple extortion.
Do what we say, or men with guns shut you down.
It won't ever be that dramatic and transparent. Denied permits, tax audits, unrealistic appeal deadlines, etc. will kill off non-compliance.
"No Mr. ISP CEO, you can not string your fiber-optic line across or under a Highway.. What? The data is encrypted? Encryption is a munition, and so you must be a terrorist.."
You like tax-free shopping on the Internet? You will disclose your personal information.
You want regulations that keep bandwidth affordable? You will accept government monitoring of your private communicaton.
You want to be/stay in business as an access provider? You will log everything and make those logs available on a whim.
If I've already paid admission, and can't get knick-knacks and food from anywhere but their shops, why should Disney care if I come for the attractions, or the Wireless?
After I've bought my ticket, I'm IN the park. IIRC, the rides don't cost anything but time after that. I'd much rather check tomorrows weather on my Pilot, plan out my next day at Epcot while in line at Magic Kingdom's Pirates of the Carribean, and just shoot out a quickie "Wish you were here" email over lunch, than have to wait until I get home to do these things.
It's not about 'enjoying the park'. It's about the cost of providing the additional service. It's always about the MONEY. This is DISNEY people.. They have a Copyright on FUN, remember?
Why is this thing a Trojan?
There would be no issue at all here if this program was something that had to be manually installed. If the FBI got a warrant to enter a suspect's home, install a 'tap' on his PC, and then retrieve the data, there would be no issue.
Any criminal savvy enough to detect that sort of intrusion is also savvy enough to detect and subvert Magic Lantern. Hell, if I had something to hide, I'd keep it away from the networks, on an encrypted drive, wired to destroy the data if I failed to log in correctly - and I am NOT a criminal mastermind.
All ML does, by being a Trojan, is get non-criminal technologists pissed off over civil rights and such.
Sure, it may make the 'tap' easier to set up remotely (does it really? only with very ignorant criminals I think) and to pull data off as it's being generated, so that a logfile can't be easily found (but anyone with something to hide is likely to be sniffing their own packets anyway, no?).
There's something else going on here. It could be about testing the waters for industry compliance to Federal backdoors (PGP anyone?). It could be to increase the anxiety level of technologically inept/newbie potential terrorists.
The publicity level of this strikes me as a diversionary tactic, because the technological aspects of ML are surely defeatable (we can look at our own packets down to the bit after all) and the audacity of it (Big Brother factor) is sure to kill it.. The next step is to have each cell phone sold with a listening device that the FBI could turn on remotely. Even the technologically ignorant would not stand up for that, or for this.
[code]
10 RUN DOS
.
.
[code]
Hmmm, so Microsoft swiped this, and evolved it, and now all MS OSes are based on it? Interesting...
[more code]
.
.
10000 X = Random(256)
.
.
[mode code]
I wonder if any of this ancient legacy stuff is still around in the new versions of Windows..
[even more code]
.
.
20000 IF( X = 128)
20001 GOTO 50000
20002 ELSE
20003 GOTO 10000
[even more code]
What an odd piece of code.. I wonder what it does.
[end of code]
.
.
49999 END DOS
50000 CRASH DOS
[end of code]
Childhood's End by Clarke, written in the 50's.
Foresaw space flight and the space race, the Pill, DNA paternity testing, FAX machines, and several other things.. It's been a while since I've read it.
It's definitelly one for the reading list though.
From the women I've spoken with,
the tongue is much more effective
when used for writting cursive..
Sure, it takes a bit longer,
but makes the message more personal,
and that is greatly appreciated.
There is an old addage in CS.. Good programmers write lots of code, and great programmers steal lots of code.
(Of course the distinction needs to be drawn between programming and 'true' CS/Information Theory etc, but you get the point)
The thing is, CS education treats programming too much like English - code may be 'speach', but it is not an essay. Yes, outright copying of code is still plagiarism, since you did not do your own work, but...
In the 'real world' you rarely find a situation when people solve the same problem in parallel.. So comparing implementations for 'originality' is not an issue. 'Parallel' problem solving should only be used in introductory courses. After you know the language/concept (around the upper 200 level classes) you should not have many 'solo' projects.
Instead, most projects should be solved by the group, and should be large enough to include a 'project management' component as part of the assignment. The problem should be too large for an individual to address in the time given - barring brilliance. Forced decomposition of the problem, division of the work into separate tasks, accountability on how well each part is done.. These are the things that will make for a successful team project.
Should cooperation be restricted? Not at all, but everyone should have their own area of responsibility.. You can have teams that compete, but better yet, involve the whole class and rotate responsibility.. Allow students to assign roles to themselves, and watch top coders, and star organizers emerge..
Idealistic? Sure.. Will some lazy bums slip through the cracks by riding on the coat-tails of their more talented and industrious peers? Of course.. All systems can be circumvented unless you want a full-time TA watching each student.
So what? These people will only do themselves a disservice in the 'real world' by demonstrating incompetence if they choose the wrong field - or, well, hey, what's wrong with coordinating and pilfering the efforts of others, as long as the job gets done?
If the coders can't make the pieces fit, but someone else can, that someone is a valuable asset to a company.
How many of the Linux developers out there have rewritten the kernel from scratch, just to add a feature? Everyone stands on the shoulders of those who came before.
Ah, so we have found the fatal flaw in the Open Source movement then.. Pride.
Information may want to be Free, but will only be freed if the one letting it loose gets to take credit for doing so? That's hardly the idealism we've come to expect from the Linux crowd - though I do agree to a degree about the peer review.
Peer review can still be had however, if the originator can argue for the implementation without disclosing that they are in fact the source of the information.
Whatever happenned to scientific idealism? Doing the work for the benefit of mankind?
A TRUE hero is one who makes the sacrifice without even thinking of the recognition - in fact, one who realizes that he might be branded a traitor, or never acknowledged for his deeds, is a bigger hearo than anyone who is welcomed home to a ticker-tape parade.
Anonimous submissions to the papers, inside, unnamed sources and subsequent 'expert' analysis have taken down Presidents..
Why don't people anonimously submit this sort of thing (cracks, weaknesses, bug reports) to news sources?
Would the papers be liable for printing someone elses 'approach', without necessarily verifying it's correctness first? After all, Deep Throat wasn't named to be right, he only gave 'hints' about Watergate...
I could see The Register, the Motley Fool, the Washington Post, or maybe just some online news source (ahem, slashdot, ahem) printing 'suggestions' from anonimous sources... And as 'reputable' guardians of Liberty (*sigh*) they would be able to claim the need to protect the identities of the submitters in order to maintain their 'professionalism', or some such...
How about it slashdot? Set up a PO Box where people could send neat stuff without a return address..
Ok, so here's what I'm thinking...
Under the DMCA, it is against the law to circumvent content protection schemes? Or is it against the law to disseminate such information?
In either case, the HDCP crack isn't being released, but 'a pretty good hint' has been given. Now, how 'good' must a 'hint' be before it violates the DMCA?
Say the 64 bit backdoor key to some encryption scheme is found to be 83A2FA8F.. Is it a 'good hint' to tell the word that the key is probably somewhere between 83A2FA80 and 83A2FA90? How about 83A20000 and 83A2FFFF?
We've seen DeCSS implemented in so many ways, not only machine executable but transcribable, artistic, and as a frigging Haiku even...
What makes the publication of a crack into a 'hint'? Could I just rattle off the source code, prefixed with a 'something like' and followed by a 'maybe', and be safe from persecution? Could I draw a few easily understood diagrams? Invent my own words for 'array', 'pointer', etc..
What if, as a 'hint', I tell only part of the implementation to one person, and part to another, and part to another?
Remember high-school? Did your teachers ever give 'hints'? Isn't that cheating? What if an employee of a company issued and unofficial 'hint', when they depart the payroll?
The REAL jabber has the /. user id: 13196
Read this article.
Some of the kids will be a lot sharper than you think. Be aware and prepared to rebuild a system or two if you go hands-on.
Don't go into heavy detail, remember the age group. See if you can hook your examples into something they might have had to do for class. The continuity will help overcome the fear of the 'new'.
Make it fun, but keep the fun constrained. I let the students play LAN games, but figured out that starting out with that would be real tough to reel in. If you'll have a LAN available, offer games as a wrap-up and reward.
If you have internet available, online scavenger hunts can be fun. Do your homework. They'll learn about using search engines, scanning for useful leads.. Supervise, else they'll find things you didn't expect them to.
Try to show a variety of uses for the technology. Graphics are always cool, especially animations. Music is a real good attention getter. They probably won't comprehend databases, and spreadsheets and word processing is a skill, not an interesting thing.
Explain saving information. Teach them about directories, and finding files, and openning them from applications vs from the Win Explorer. I'm constantly surprised at how many people don't grasp the concept of applications, folders, files...
Have them write a letter in something like Word.. Show them the basics - fonts and sizes, bold and italic, colored text.. Better yet, for that age group, let them make cards, flyers, something of interest that they can relate to. Supervise, lest you end up with 'gangsta props' and unpleasantness - these are teens and don't think much. Let them print things to take home.
Few will care, but run them through a spreadsheet. Show them some simple formulas, preferably within a familiar context. I used sale adverts... i.e. %20 off of whatever price is what?
Try to cram in some ethics, sideways if you have to. You're going to show them a powerful tool, and hopefully interest them enough that they will try to learn more on their own. Show them a little responsibility. Give each a diskette, and explain the importance of personal data and information.
The REAL jabber has the /. user id: 13196
As this reads, this 'upgrade' attempts to mainstream the geek technophilic black sheep into the rest of the ignorant flock. From a business perspective, it makes perfect sense.. Why should a select few get some benefit of the product that Tivo does not yet SELL to everyone?
Sorry, but the technocratic elite is getting it's wings clipped once again. Not unlike the myth of Icarus, really.. We should be used to it by now.
The REAL jabber has the /. user id: 13196
Contact information on customers who purchase more than one shirt, sweater or jacket, without at the same time buying shorts, pants or a skirt, will be contacted by The Gap with special offers for these items.
The Gap's management claims that this will greatly reduce the problem of public nudity and indecency, which is sure to result from too many customers owning only the top portion of a complete Gap Brand outfit.
An un-named, but high ranking, Gap Official was quoted as saying " We at The Gap feel that it would be indecent, nay! Immoral, for all those people to prance around in Old Navy shirts without matching Gap Khakis! We're just trying to protect the children. "
The REAL jabber has the /. user id: 13196
As it stands, K5 is unavailable to it's regular readers, in all it's articles, because Rusty said something semi-intelligent and everyone wants to come and see for themselves.
Slashdot, please consider mirroring content in cases where you know you will cripple the original site.
Thank you.
The REAL jabber has the /. user id: 13196
To think that I would have to come to slashdot to read Kuro5hin content!! I feel dirty somehow... It's like going to a frat-house to talk to the smart girls! Feh! Bastards!
Pass the beer funnel! Light a fart! Oogle the smart chicks! *BELCH!*
The REAL jabber has the /. user id: 13196
The REAL jabber has the /. user id: 13196
The REAL jabber has the /. user id: 13196
First off, Napster is complying with a court order. If you like Napster, then you should be happy that this seemingly impossible task is being done via CDDB.
Second, right or wrong, the RIAA has legal claim to their Copyrighted material. If you want to knowingly circumvent that claim, then you need to lose the hypocrisy and admit that you are a thief. If you own those albums, rip 'em yourself you lazy bastage!
Third, Napster has served it's purpose. By comparison to the present alternatives, Napster is crude, inflexible and clunky. Let it go! Don't let nostalgia and hype keep your neophile spirit bound to a dead horse.
Fouth, Napster doesn't love you anymore. As soon as Napster started pulling usernames, well before they signed with Bertlemann, and WELL before this development, they had gone over to the 'other side'. In fact, as soon as they incorporated and IPOd, their reason for being changed. Grass roots my arse! They're a business.
The REAL jabber has the /. user id: 13196
You absolutely do not have to work in the IT industry to get a job. Specifically, you don't have to work for a computer company or a dot-com. You could work for the IT department, or any internal computer oriented group, at any large company. In-house applications and info-sys jobs are plentiful, but sort of hidden from the top-level glance of new grads. And if you really hate IT so much, make sure they offer educational aid.. Work a while while you retool for something more interesting to you. No sense being unhappy.
Have you put much effort into the online IT job search systems like Monster? They're great if you are willing to relocate.
Have you spoken with any area head-hunters and temp agencies? Their leads run much deeper than even those of academic placement services. A good head-hunter should be able to line up a few entry level jobs in the area, maybe a few internships of trial-hires.
The REAL jabber has the /. user id: 13196
I worked 30+ hour weeks to put myself through a State university in the mid-90's. No loans, and job experience to boot. I was not too full of myself to live with my family for the duration of College, I saw it as an investment. It kept me away from the alcoholic drug abusers.
Half my professors spoke Ingrish just fine, they helped me focus on the ideas, not prejudice. Half were Ph.D's, they taught me respect for thought and foresight. Half had left the IT industry to teach, because they were tired of the rat race, they taught me balance and that it was ok to walk away from pain. I learned useful things.
No class I ever took in CS exceeded 25 students. None exceeded 25% non-English-fluents. None had more than 5 women in it. None depended on a Microsoft product the upgrade of which would render my education void. I learned assembler and Lisp, and I use neither professionally. However, I know the difference between data and algorithms.
I had a $40k/annum job in place months before graduation - and they paid for my Masters. Upon earning that, they gave me a 50% raise. I don't live in the bizzaro world of Silicon Valley, so my salary is VERY lucrative at this point.
NASDAQ doesn't bother me much since I don't have stock options. I have actual benefits and keep my investments private. I don't work for a company that sells things which don't exist. I don't have to rip my guts out to make good on some marketters delusion. And my job doesn't depend on whether or not some Wall Street compulsive gambler freak took enough Tums.
The REAL jabber has the /. user id: 13196
MPAA vs the World? I don't think so. But maybe them the MPAA could sue Microsoft to get all those nasty little security 'features' fixed.
Just a thought.
The REAL jabber has the /. user id: 13196
"deterrants"
"why not pout this money into things "
"chgance"
"Can you imagine in 65 million years a new intelligence trying to figure out killed our species out? "
"it was there own weapons"
"military assests"
Frankly, if the funds are diverted from NASA's excessive spending and into basic education then I have no problem with a few cut-backs. ;)
The REAL jabber has the /. user id: 13196