I live in Europe, and we have had names for our streets since... Well, since the streets were placed there. And I can tell you that we're not hopelessly getting lost all the time. The human brain is quite capable of linking names to places... The human brain is, however the grid system is rather handy. For example "4242 Don't Panic St. South". Odds are it's 42 blocks south of city center, with the nearest cross street being 42nd. No grid system is perfect, there are almost always hills, ravines, rivers, lakes, junk in the way.
One can learn the streets of a city, but an intelligent syntax and order are there to help out those who are not so intimately familiar with your city. A good layout a person without a map can establish direction of travel and ever be hopelessly lost, well for the most part.
Eh? Can you explain in more detail what you mean (are you being serious)? I'm not in.fi but I can understand where the parent is coming from. Mobiles are used in social networking, both text and voice. If you don't have one, you are not able to be social on the same level and are seen as a luddite. Not like your North American luddite who uses a rotary phone as a form of protest or avoiding the tone phone fee. You won't be invited to impromptu events as you have to be home to get messages. It wouldn't be so bad if you could text landlines.
I agree. PAy Phone that I felt did much better before deregulation. The issue was that the companies using the COCOTS systems gave more money per call* to the landlord. Of course they didn't take care of the phones, and the good service you used to get went away.
* -wikipedia seems to have some data on this subject
I'll have to refresh my self on the history of payphones, but this sounds about right. The late 90s I observed that I could no longer use a calling card from many payphones. This is likely due to what you describe, more cash going toward the landlord. The price of using the landline issued calling card went up to the point it was dollars per call even for a local call.
As far as my memory goes, it was those blasted GTE phones at rest areas which gave me the most grief.
I remember pay phones at their best between 1990 and 1997. There was a deal in my area where you could call anyone in the state for $1.00 on the local telco phone. This was when a quarter would give you a call.
However the end was neigh shortly after 1995 when your regular payphone started being replaced by 3rd parties. No longer could dial 0 to report that your landline was not working, the operator was somewhere else and had no idea how to assist you.
And not to speak of the variable rate to make a call. I remember I tried to make a call cross the US/Canada border in 2001 or so. In the past I expected such a call to cost dollars. The phone demanded $52.xx IIRC and even worse the operator phoned back asking me to deposit $52.xx. Not like I had enough quarters on me. But it wasn't 'SO' bad there were calling cards, some which even accept recharge via credit card. $5.00 to make a given call.
But now the payphones are fewer and far between. And while it sucks a pay-as-you-go phone is the more attractive option... unless you are out of range.
Payphones were generally phased out years ago, with only a handful left in the very centre of Helsinki for tourists. There is a payphone in Turku on the UTU campus, or so i'm told.
I have a friend there who was likely the last person to get a cell phone.
I have no cellphone. I used payphones three time this year, definitely under $4 in total. Your idea forces me to plan ahead and buy $95 + tax of stuff periodically during the course of the year. It sucks. The side benefit is one can have a emergency phone for pennies and make a call in a pinch. Everyone should have such a phone in the car.
But, the sticker is the tracphone seems to require landline activation, well unless you can just buy an additional card and activate it that way.
I'm with you, I like pay phones. They are good things to have in an emergency. But they are obsolete and hard to find.
Do you genuinely think that the cable cost 10$ to produce ? not when if I buy 250 or more (or buy any number at university discount) I can get them for £2.20 each (ex VAT). I was crunching the numbers, looks like about 1/10th of a pound of copper is used per 6 ft of Centronics wire. This is assuming 28 AWG and data here.
Last I looked copper was about $3.00/lb
I know it's not the whole picture of production of a cable, but you can't avoid the cost of metal.
user@ubuntubox:~$ what r u user@ubuntubox:~$ sup What, you don't already have such aliases setup? Hell when I was running MS-dos I had such.bat files such as "goway" for reboot.
*I know from having previously worked at CompUSA (#787, Minnetonka, MN) that the markup was at least 10-fold on printer cables, which far, far, exceeded the margin on the printers - or just about anything else in the store except for CD jewel cases. Cables have always been a high markup item. CompUSA doesn't own the monopoly on this concept.
As for a 10-fold increase $1.99 for the belkin non IEEE 1284 certified bi-directional cable would suggest that's an accurate statement. I don't know how different these two cables are, other than the text suggesting that you get twisted pairs and extra shielding.
My experience with printer cables is limited to that $20 I bought in the 1980s, a ribbon cable with crimp on connectors, and others picked up 2nd hand in a bin.
But the copyright always belongs to someone, even if they have licensed that right widely. AFAIK you can release a work and wave all copyrights. IMNAL however I learned much from the the Creation Science Evangelism attempt to assert DMCA rights on material Kent Hovind (Dr. Dino) waved copyrights to. It would seem in the US you reassert your rights but AFAIK you can release a work directly into the pubic domain.
But this would not apply to most open source software.
Your failing for the mis-representative sample fallacy. Like immigrants, the ones that make it to our shores tend to be the top half of the quality bell curve. We don't run into the other half because no one cares enough to sub/dub/import/torrent it.... There is a lot of crappy anime too. I'm sure there is a lot of crappy anime. I never said there wasn't. But anime in general tends to be quality and taken very seriously. Part of what got my interested in anime were series such as Starblazers and Robotech (the Macross Saga) which were excellent series. The major key in most anime series is taking the time to create a story arc. The same reason I enjoyed Farscape, Babylon 5, House, and others. On top of that, series tend to not be canned on a whim, so a choice to watch a series usually results in seeing all the creator wants you to see. This doesn't always work out well as something like InuYasha spun off from the manga and wasn't continued in it's anime form.
Also the trend for reality TV and crappy programming made me choose to explore imports again.
But I do understand where you are coming from. I use to think the BBC had to be the best thing on earth, but that was due to the fact that PBS only imported the really good stuff. They produce a ton of crap as well, just the good stuff tends tends to make you think everything is good. I can only explain why I like anime. I understand not everyone can agree, and I can respect that.
But I don't believe all immigrants are the best the nation has to offer.
And I don't just mean like "hentai" anime that is ACTUALLY porn. From my understanding hentai is hardcore, really hardcore. I don't have a taste for it, esp tentacle sex.
Anime in general is not porn. Yakitate Japan for example. It centers around the idea of "Furansupan" (French Bread), "doitsupan" (German rye-based bread), "itariapan" (Italian bread), all exist. So a boy blessed with solar hands perfect for kneading bread decides to create a bread for the Japanese people, a Ja-pan.
This is something not likely to be licensed in the US.
I never really got it what the draw of anime is, can someone please enlighten me ? Plot, character development, basically anime tends to be quality entertainment. They are not like american cartoons which AFAIK are still affected by the McCarthy era standards. Anime tends to stand on it's own as well as much life action television. It's hard to explain, and I never fully understood why anime is taken so seriously by the creators. I have always thought of it like this, japan is relatively small country, and that being so I *think* they resort to anime as it requires less surface area to create.
But if it's not your bag, it's not your bag. If you want to give it a fair chance, The ADV re-dub of Macross is actually really good. This is not the American Dub of Robotech.
You need to watch the UK show "School of Rock" or "Rock School" or whatever it's called with Gene Simmons. His passion for the music comes across much more strongly than through makeup and big hair. Still, Gene Simmons is a pretty shitty bass player and an even worse vocalist, but I'll take all the classic KISS hits over the likes of shitty glam-rock bands of the mid 80s (Poison, Winger, Warrant, White Lion and the likes). He could have a passion for music I'm unaware of. I see only the enterprise. I do have some respect for the gent as he like others rather jump started the glam-rock scene, not that I like the scene. The few tracks i've listened to recently are at least OK, but lack a certain level of substance.
Don't get me wrong, I know who these guys are. I was given their set of four solo albums, given as they were sold in record store discount bins with the selling point "they might be valuable one day". To give you some idea, Def Leopard Pyromania was something ubiquitous; almost everyone had a copy of that tape somewhere. These solo albums were more often than not returned. I still have them, but it's not like anyone wants them. I have no idea what they sound like, not like I haven't heard anything by them, they are just bland with the exception of their makeup and marketing. They sort of symbolize what I dislike about the direction music went toward the late 70s early 80s, all hair and no substance.
Making the claim "it's all about the music" is rather ludicrous coming from these guys as I've never seen any evidence they actually love music. But as far as all glam no rock bands go, they do get some respect for making a buck all these years, though IMHO they hung around just long enough to be RETRO.
But you can rather tell who's "all about the music" and "who's all about the marketing" by seeing if they have their vids on YouTube or not. Billy Joel is a good example. Same age as Gene Simmons but has most of his music vids on YT. KISS not at all. I would rather see Joel in concert than KISS any day of the week even if they did a super intense pyrotechnic show.
Secondly: If Mac OS can be made by hobbyists to work well with non-Apple hardware, suddenly Apple finds that every PC OEM on the planet has just become an Apple-cloning company. Something similar [wikipedia.org] almost destroyed Apple some years ago, they're not about to make the same mistake again. I don't know about the corporate perspective on this issue. As a user perspective I liked the clones that came out. They did suffer from the beige box style, but they worked, offered good bang for the buck, and were upgradeable. IIRC there were cases like the LC III where it the system was underclocked, and a general policy to do their best to sell last years CPU for today's prices.
Whether it was a good or bad choice, had apple continued with the clone program odds are I would own a clone.
Re your wearing out issue... If you adjust the weight of the needle right (and no, it's really not that hard) and use a decent one, then you'll be able to play your records for at least as long as your CDs. Remember, CDs deteriorate as well - they don't even have to be played to get all messed up! As long as you treat your LPs reasonably, they'll last for a loooong time - at least, I have some records that are way older than myself (26 yrs) and they play just fine. Besides, CDs can't be treated all that bad either, without rendering them unplayable... Well, regardless a well played record will wear out, perhaps prematurely due to user incompetence. On top of that, you have styli to replace, and belts if you don't have a direct drive. On top of that, you better keep them at a good temp, I remember as a child all my muppet show discs warped. I'll agree vinyl takes much abuse yet still remains somewhat playable, but CDs play well play after play. And on top of that you have issues with grounding, and picking up random electrical noise. And on top of that, you can't easily have a multi disc turntable. Well some did exist for the consumer market but staking vinyl trashes them and you can only play the A sides.
But all of this is nothing in contrast to the modern generation of buy, rip, play. With vinyl, you have to rip in real time and it's a very bulky standard.
While I do have some nostalgia for vinyl, and I do have a couple of discs which sound better in their vinyl incarnation, I welcome the hassle free CD. With CD, it sounds really good on cheap equipment.
"No, I'm not interested in your battery club." That was a while ago. I don't understand why anyone would give up the chance at free batteries. On top of the free batteries I got a Christmas card every year for $50.00 until 1998 or so.
As far as being a used car lot, well yes. Though they did clear out their phonograph parts and speakers recently.
The last TMBG show they offered their latest release on vinyl. I thought about picking it up as it would be novel. However, vinyl is rather bulky, a 33 1/3 has to be flipped mid play. I do have a turn table but needles are spendy suckers. So while cool, I had to say no.
The only real complaint is cover art was nicer on 12 by 12, but I would hope that next generation music discs will take advantage of HD resolution and go for a virtual flyleaf.
They can not legally make such a request. The retaillers refusing cash will be getting in a crapload of trouble when people start forcing the issue. I would like to agree with you, in fact I thought so my self, but TFA has a link to the Department of the Treasurey stating otherwise. It would seem that while debts public or private cash is legal tender, goods and services on the other hand are another matter. It looks like they don't have to sell you the phone. Whether you can still pay cash for your service before it hits debt status is an interesting question.
I'm not going to agree AT&T and Apple, their actions are borderline classist, but looks like it's legal.
I would bet that there are places in the UK where people typically don't have either mobile phones or microwave ovens I know people who don't own microwave ovens for health reasons. But the funny thing is, they also own mobile phones.
The US is so big and there is so much variety, they can afford to be a bit more insular than the rest of us I guess:) I had this dialog last night. You ask your average American where they catch their news they say Local news here, National news here. International? What's that.
I think the opinion of the UK is tainted by films in the 80s which joked about the popularity of cable TV.
Reason 1: I'm not sure there is a requirement to be removed from the gene pool permanently. Reason 2: I believe Darwin's theory had more to do with the success of breeding: less offspring, not no offspring. Going to jail should in theory reduce the number of kids this guy is likely to have. In theory. 1) I'm combing though the site and while most are given posthumously, there are a couple of non-fatal nominees who were permanently removed from the gene pool. 2) To be successful at breeding, humans not need to have many children.
This being said, calling tech support to support stolen goods is not universally stupid. I wouldn't do it but low paid employees are really not all that likely to actually care. I imagine it's rather common. The secret service monitoring the calls isn't something one could really foresee.
Federal prison does not allow conjugal visits Thanks for the detail. I was not aware the feds didn't permit this and according to what I could google, this is a federal crime.
However being 32/33 presently, 10 years isn't enough time to totally remove one self from the gene pool presuming he serves the full 10 years.
I don't think the breeding he's going to be doing in a federal prison will have much effect on the gene pool. Conjugal visits are often permitted in the States under certain conditions. Besides 10 years isn't long enough to be totally isolated from the possibility of breeding, esp when you take into account the likelihood of parole.
Slashdot Mirror
One can learn the streets of a city, but an intelligent syntax and order are there to help out those who are not so intimately familiar with your city. A good layout a person without a map can establish direction of travel and ever be hopelessly lost, well for the most part.
PAy Phone that I felt did much better before deregulation. The issue was that the companies using the COCOTS systems gave more money per call* to the landlord. Of course they didn't take care of the phones, and the good service you used to get went away.
I'll have to refresh my self on the history of payphones, but this sounds about right. The late 90s I observed that I could no longer use a calling card from many payphones. This is likely due to what you describe, more cash going toward the landlord. The price of using the landline issued calling card went up to the point it was dollars per call even for a local call.
As far as my memory goes, it was those blasted GTE phones at rest areas which gave me the most grief.
Payphone directory has some data on the subject.
I remember pay phones at their best between 1990 and 1997. There was a deal in my area where you could call anyone in the state for $1.00 on the local telco phone. This was when a quarter would give you a call.
However the end was neigh shortly after 1995 when your regular payphone started being replaced by 3rd parties. No longer could dial 0 to report that your landline was not working, the operator was somewhere else and had no idea how to assist you.
And not to speak of the variable rate to make a call. I remember I tried to make a call cross the US/Canada border in 2001 or so. In the past I expected such a call to cost dollars. The phone demanded $52.xx IIRC and even worse the operator phoned back asking me to deposit $52.xx. Not like I had enough quarters on me. But it wasn't 'SO' bad there were calling cards, some which even accept recharge via credit card. $5.00 to make a given call.
But now the payphones are fewer and far between. And while it sucks a pay-as-you-go phone is the more attractive option... unless you are out of range.
I have a friend there who was likely the last person to get a cell phone.
But, the sticker is the tracphone seems to require landline activation, well unless you can just buy an additional card and activate it that way.
I'm with you, I like pay phones. They are good things to have in an emergency. But they are obsolete and hard to find.
not when if I buy 250 or more (or buy any number at university discount) I can get them for £2.20 each (ex VAT). I was crunching the numbers, looks like about 1/10th of a pound of copper is used per 6 ft of Centronics wire. This is assuming 28 AWG and data here.
Last I looked copper was about $3.00/lb
I know it's not the whole picture of production of a cable, but you can't avoid the cost of metal.
user@ubuntubox:~$ sup What, you don't already have such aliases setup? Hell when I was running MS-dos I had such
As for a 10-fold increase $1.99 for the belkin non IEEE 1284 certified bi-directional cable would suggest that's an accurate statement. I don't know how different these two cables are, other than the text suggesting that you get twisted pairs and extra shielding.
My experience with printer cables is limited to that $20 I bought in the 1980s, a ribbon cable with crimp on connectors, and others picked up 2nd hand in a bin.
But this would not apply to most open source software.
Also the trend for reality TV and crappy programming made me choose to explore imports again.
But I do understand where you are coming from. I use to think the BBC had to be the best thing on earth, but that was due to the fact that PBS only imported the really good stuff. They produce a ton of crap as well, just the good stuff tends tends to make you think everything is good. I can only explain why I like anime. I understand not everyone can agree, and I can respect that.
But I don't believe all immigrants are the best the nation has to offer.
Anime in general is not porn. Yakitate Japan for example. It centers around the idea of "Furansupan" (French Bread), "doitsupan" (German rye-based bread), "itariapan" (Italian bread), all exist. So a boy blessed with solar hands perfect for kneading bread decides to create a bread for the Japanese people, a Ja-pan.
This is something not likely to be licensed in the US.
But if it's not your bag, it's not your bag. If you want to give it a fair chance, The ADV re-dub of Macross is actually really good. This is not the American Dub of Robotech.
Don't get me wrong, I know who these guys are. I was given their set of four solo albums, given as they were sold in record store discount bins with the selling point "they might be valuable one day". To give you some idea, Def Leopard Pyromania was something ubiquitous; almost everyone had a copy of that tape somewhere. These solo albums were more often than not returned. I still have them, but it's not like anyone wants them. I have no idea what they sound like, not like I haven't heard anything by them, they are just bland with the exception of their makeup and marketing. They sort of symbolize what I dislike about the direction music went toward the late 70s early 80s, all hair and no substance.
Making the claim "it's all about the music" is rather ludicrous coming from these guys as I've never seen any evidence they actually love music. But as far as all glam no rock bands go, they do get some respect for making a buck all these years, though IMHO they hung around just long enough to be RETRO.
But you can rather tell who's "all about the music" and "who's all about the marketing" by seeing if they have their vids on YouTube or not. Billy Joel is a good example. Same age as Gene Simmons but has most of his music vids on YT. KISS not at all. I would rather see Joel in concert than KISS any day of the week even if they did a super intense pyrotechnic show.
Whether it was a good or bad choice, had apple continued with the clone program odds are I would own a clone.
But all of this is nothing in contrast to the modern generation of buy, rip, play. With vinyl, you have to rip in real time and it's a very bulky standard.
While I do have some nostalgia for vinyl, and I do have a couple of discs which sound better in their vinyl incarnation, I welcome the hassle free CD. With CD, it sounds really good on cheap equipment.
As far as being a used car lot, well yes. Though they did clear out their phonograph parts and speakers recently.
The last TMBG show they offered their latest release on vinyl. I thought about picking it up as it would be novel. However, vinyl is rather bulky, a 33 1/3 has to be flipped mid play. I do have a turn table but needles are spendy suckers. So while cool, I had to say no.
The only real complaint is cover art was nicer on 12 by 12, but I would hope that next generation music discs will take advantage of HD resolution and go for a virtual flyleaf.
I'm not going to agree AT&T and Apple, their actions are borderline classist, but looks like it's legal.
I think the opinion of the UK is tainted by films in the 80s which joked about the popularity of cable TV.
Reason 2: I believe Darwin's theory had more to do with the success of breeding: less offspring, not no offspring. Going to jail should in theory reduce the number of kids this guy is likely to have. In theory. 1) I'm combing though the site and while most are given posthumously, there are a couple of non-fatal nominees who were permanently removed from the gene pool.
2) To be successful at breeding, humans not need to have many children.
This being said, calling tech support to support stolen goods is not universally stupid. I wouldn't do it but low paid employees are really not all that likely to actually care. I imagine it's rather common. The secret service monitoring the calls isn't something one could really foresee.
However being 32/33 presently, 10 years isn't enough time to totally remove one self from the gene pool presuming he serves the full 10 years.