When programmers start giving away their time, and effort, it makes their time and effort worth less.
Lets say I get together with a group, and as a team, we make a seriously kickass program. Next generation database server or something. Give it away as Free software. With well commented code, clear design documents.
How much is our time worth? How much would you pay to have one of us (a skilled developer with proven teamwork/colloboration and software engineering) on YOUR company's team?
Repetitive manual tasks allow my mind to wander and lets me think of interesting things to do. These days I'm just so mentally exhausted from work I just come home, stare slackjawed at the monitor, and hit reload on/. every 15 minutes or so
from customer left outer join
bill on bill.custId = customer.custid left outer join
paytobill on paytobill.billId = bill.billId
A double left outer join doesn't work in every case though. My example wasn't good enough to show this particular case, but what if you need to left outer join three tables A, B, and C, where the only index is A.id. Depending on the nature of the tables, you can end up making it impossible to use aggregate functions on this query correctly. If you join A-B first, and B has two rows for every A, your intermediate table contains two copies of every A. Joining (A-B) to C then ends up doubling the number of C rows used, since they are joined to the doubled A row. Sure, you could use two seperate queries (A-B and A-C) but since I first came across this particular problem on a host that charged per-transaction, I was rather miffed that I was instantly doubling my charges.
Ok, lets say you have an invoice system that maintains "customer"s, "bill"s, and "payment"s in seperate tables. The relationships are as follows: One customer to many bills and many payments. A seperate table "paytobill" (with an amount field) is used to link bills and payments as some customers may make a single payment covering several bills, or several payments to cover a single bill (like a payment plan).
Now, give me a report showing every customer, and the most recent bill that each customer owes money on (if they have any), and how much they owe. Using strictly these tables (ie no fields that are updated by a trigger) it is incredibly hairy. Your choices are pretty much to execute a query on "paytobill" inside a loop from "customer left outer join bill", or to do something really hairy like this (postgres syntax) (we'll assume that bill.id is ascending:
select c.name, bq.billdate, bq.cost-coalesce(pq.amount,0) as unpaid from customer c left outer join (select b.customerid, b.billdate, b.cost from bill b where b.id=(select max(bm.id) from bill bm where bm.customerid=b.customerid and b.paid='f') ) bq on bq.customerid=c.id left outer join (select b.customerid,SUM(pb.amount) as amount from paytobill pb join bill b on pb.billid=b.id where b.id=(select max(bm.id) from bill bm where bm.customerid=b.customerid and b.paid='f') group by b.customerid) pq on pq.customerid=c.id
Not pretty, is it? Now, look at how that could be done with less language and more readability by adding a single keyword and slightly redefining the syntax:
select c.name, b.billdate, b.owes-coalesce(sum(p.amount),0) as unpaid from (customer c LIMITED left outer join (bill b LIMITED left outer join paytobill p on p.billid=b.id GROUP BY b.id, b.billdate, b.owes) on c.id=b.customerid ORDER BY b.billdate DESC LIMIT 1)
Here, its clear that we're joining "bill" and "paytobill" and collapsing that table immediately to generate sum(p.amount). Then, we order this collapsed table on date, and left outer join against "customer", BUT we only take one row from the collapsed table for each customer (if it speeds the join, we could even ditch those unused rows now to further shrink the table). Drawbacks include the use of () to clarify what grouping and limit we mean. Even though the LIMITED keyword could mean that the next GROUP BY/LIMIT keyword belongs to the join, what if both were used, without a WHERE clause to indicate where the joins ended and the main query began?
The query planner would have to be able to identify the request for SUM(p.amount) as being related to the GROUPed limited join. The planner would then create the intermediary table and calculate the aggregate values on that table using the given group by. Then the query planner would order the intermediary table and join it with the customer table, selecting from zero to the limit number of right-hand rows for each left-hand-row The syntax above makes it fairly clear what the query planner should be doing.
The command in SQL would involve a nested loop [select max(...)...] (two, if the planner wasn't smart enough to recognize that the two copies of it are identical, which most won't be since they are in seperate branches of a left outer join) (it's possible that a brilliant query planner might be able to make the jump and create an intermediary table of <bill.customerid,MAX(bill.id)> for reference in both branches of the query). In addition, unless you have a brilliant query planner, you'll end up working with potentially very large intermediate tables.
They're defined as subdomains of.new.net. So that site you just registered is really "www.mygoatpr0n.xxx.new.net"
Take a look at their FAQ. To get this to work in linux, you add new.net to your hosts' file's search path, which makes it so if something fails to resolve, it tries again with.new.net added to the end.
ICANN's move doesn't spell trouble for new.net immediately, but the namespace will start to break down when a real www.mygoatpr0n.xxx appears (causing the.new.net version to never be attempted).
Huh? Are the hordes of programmers going to drop everything and go 3-D? I don't think so.
You're talking about a group of programmers who weren't doing anything for linux, who are now. That can only improve Linux. At worst case, they produce nothing and we maintain the status quo.
Linux is about choice, not about being the best damn desktop possible (though, thanks to the wonders of choice and "apt-get install best-damn-desktop" it could still be possible). Developers choose what to work on, users choose what to use. Things nobody uses will eventually no longer be developed.
Don't forget, a 3D desktop has considerable technical merit. Do you have any idea of the amount of 3D-on-Linux development you're writing off as useless because it doesn't fit your narrow worldview? I don't suppose you include games in your desktop worldview, do you? 3D games?
I'll echo AC's response about your heroism. Not only does egress filtering save the internet, it will help cut your costs by dropping obvious trash packets before they hit your upstream provider.
(This is why the big backbones don't do it for you, why should they cut down on billable bandwidth used?;)
If every ISP in the world did this, there wouldn't be much need for any other kind of regulation. If you're being naughty, its traceable back to at least your ISP (you could be spoofing some other customer's IP). The ISP could then use a bit more restrictive filtering to track down who is being naughty, and perhaps pick up whoever is trying to control them.
getting their printout and then feeding a slip of paper of the same size back in so they can vote again without destroying their original.
By counting the number of sheets turned in by the user. If someone tries to stuff 10 sheets into their little privacy envelope, you smack them around and undo their excess votes.
Or better yet, use equipment that can both read and write and verify that the machine is going to destroy the paper it just made?
And on top of all of that, have you started egress filtering to drop spoofed packets as they leave your network? Packets from a DSL customer in kentuky addressed from.tw are a sure sign that the Evil Bit should be set.
It would go a long way in deflating DDoS attacks quickly.
where, pray tell, can one find the Windows binaries for this wonderful piece of software?
Cygwin.
There is a native windows port with threading done by a Japanese company (non-free, though), and its apparently expected that it will be translated back into english sometime soon.
I don't understand why Dish has to pay Viacom to carry them
The submitter says it all:
"I, for one, will be switching to DirecTV if they don't get this figured out."
Dish is buying content that appeals to their subscribers and can draw more subscribers. It is more symbiotic than just a distribution system. Viacom gets viewership, Dish network gets something to sell.
a sentence like "we've been set up" is very simple, because it uses little words, whereas many who have English as a second language would find it difficult to understand.
In that case you just have to be more clear. Perhaps you should say:
While they have been very willing to let anyone decode mp3s (charging royalties only for the encoders), there is nothing to keep them from announcing tomorrow that no more mp3 players can be made or released without this new DRM technology.
And that they want a nickel for every download of a player.
Given that the current status of copyright on broadcast media is that its for private use only (ie, its not legal for you to record something and re-display it publicly), I think that Apple can use this.
However, the question is still "did they pay eminem at all?"
Why forcefully regluate things like this when a free market would naturally provide each consumer with what _they_ want?
We were looking just last week at evaluating VoIP solutions for some of our clients. It never even crossed my mind to ask if you could or couldn't make a 911 call from them.
So what happens when joe slightlybetterthanaverage hears about these voip phones that are all the rage and that means he can replace his phone line completely and just go with the cablemodem? He can call his neighbor, he can call his mom, he can call in sick to work, but if his daugher falls down the stairs, he can't call 911? I bet he'd want 911 service, but given that he can call anyone else, why would he even think to ask?
It seems to me that if you can dial the number "911" on the device (ie, something somewhere connects you to the POTS), it should connect you to some number that can appropriately handle an emergency, since this is a major expectation that most Americans will have from their phone.
I missed out on this stage. I could have bailed out of college and gotten a major sysadmin position working with a friend easily, but I decided to stick to college and get a degree.
Of course, who knows what would have happened if I had left (some of the friends' companies are still there, some aren't). I know where I am now: stuck with a degree with what appears to me to be of limited value. (At least I have a job, $40k a year codemonkey for a small company).
Ah, but if I had left... I could be a citizen of another country now (several friends at ISPs in Europe). I could have an $80k/yr job and no problem scraping money together to get the certs to "prove" I know my stuff. Or heck, I could be unemployed after a year or so, but I could go back to school for a different degree (a year would probably have paid off my loans, assuming I didn't leave the country).
This may be an SFQ, but shouldn't the application choose its own look and feel?
I suspect that the outcome of this is a little less worrisome then you think. I really have no idea what this means, but I've been thinking of something along these lines with X for a while now, which may or may not be what Y is doing.
Currently to draw an input box in X, at the protocol level there is a lot of work -- lines must be drawn, areas filled with color, a font must be selected, and any existing text must be entered in. Subwindows for accepting user input are defined, events to control focus, mouse, and keyboard are captured and transferred back and forth. GTK hides this from the programmer by defining a function to call to do all that for the user, but all of this is done on the local GTK library in the client, either by rendering into a pixmap and transmitting the whole pixmap to the server, or by breaking it down into the above mentioned components and transmitting those instructions.
Now, imagine if the X server itself was linked to GTK. That entire protocol stream of traffic can be reduced to a single command "draw a gtk text box here of this size with this starting text in this font" many of which can be defaults. Beyond just the savings in that initial display of the widget, the number of events can be drastically cut down as the server-side gtk library now handles the events that deal strictly with the operation of the widget. The end result is something like HTML and javascript. You could define a dropdown box which only has one event with the client software after the initial construction: "onchange". All of the clicking and picking items could be done within the server itself.
The biggest issue with this is making sure that the existing protocol never changes, only grows by adding new items (thus gtk-client 1.1 will work with gtk-server 1.2, just not use all the 1.2 features), otherwise versions everywhere must match or the thing goes down in flames.
Your point being? The Wired article quotes people in the administration who seem to indicate that the events that the UCS claim to have happened did in fact take place. Of the lead analysis panel: "I'm sure there were other reasons for the change". Other reasons indeed.
The fact is, Bush's Administration is undergoing a major credibility crisis. Excising scientific research is not how to go about fixing it.
Consequently, you have to be able to back up claims you make on your return with paperwork.
So basically what you're saying is you're fine with being guilty of tax evasion until you prove yourself innocent. Thats fine, there's people who have no problem with that. The problem is with the hassle of proving yourself innocent. Do you possess every little receipt and stub and statement for the past year? How about the past decade? I can't even keep track of these little pieces of paper for the past day. What if the system is wrong in a way you don't have a piece of paper for. Can you prove or disprove that $8k crack deal that never happened?
My personal take on this system is that I'd be fine with it where I lived under the following conditions:
1) The system is entirely public - if all of the data used is coming from public databases, then I don't see it causing any more privacy damage than the public databases are already causing.
2) The system is accurate - Is there enough information to make appropriate decisions? If all the TaxMan sees is the unreported $20k deposit, and not that the money came from taxfree bonds, then this system is too stupid to waste my money on.
3) The system is correctable - If the furniture store shows my $1000 bed purchase as $10000, can I have that corrected before the TaxMan cometh? If not, the system is fatally crippled, as none of my receipts and stubs would prove that I didn't pay $10000. (I could prove I bought a bed for $1k, but that would still show a $10k transaction that wasn't represented).
4) The system is transparent - I should have the right to know what will cause me to be audited. You can take that as "im an evil tax evader" or not, but given Joe Innocent, don't you think they would like to know what steps they must take to not be treated as a criminal? Secret rules leave the system open to malice and persecution: "Yeah, the system says you have to audit my neighbor who'se dog crapped in my lawn this morning"
If these 4 conditions are met, then I have a reasonable expectation that the system is trustworthy to behave in the expected fashion and that I won't need to save every scrap of paper in a big box (I have two 2 cubic feet boxes for the 2003 year containing receipts, invoices, pay stubs, utility bills, credit card statements, bank statements, etc. Being able to say I can trust the system to get it right will save me a lot of shelf space)
And that is exactly how supply side ('trickle down') economics worked.
Maybe trickle down would work better in the US if we didn't have all that money vanishing back into the government. Would also work better if companies wouldn't be hoarding it (how many billions does microsoft have in non-circulating cash reserves?) It would work even better if people didn't pretend that putting the money in savings at the bank somehow "creates" money through loans (which only create debt). It would work miracles if that government-sanctioned pyramid scheme we call the stock market was overhauled (the money you put in rarely goes to the company you're investing in, instead it goes to fatten some investor's retirement).
So yeah, in a poor, communist country where you can save someone from starvation by hiring them on as a live in servant for just over a dollar a day, trickle down works pretty good. I'd love to see someone try that in the US, with or without illegal immigrants filling the position.
(Of course, if you read the part of the interview that talks about the company stores and McDonalds, you'd realize that the most of that money is trickling is back into the company's pocket, hardly conducive to your argument supporting it)
We had one of these at work for "testing" our software to see how tablet-accessible it is (we complained at the time that there was no real point to this, as the whole thing could be done by mousing through the program. The boss took the thing home in the end so now we know what the real point was).'
Your points are pretty good but I'd like to add the stylus itself as a gripe, even after calibration we had problems with its behavior, especially around the edges of the screen (making using scrollbars difficult to do). The stylus was also not quite at one pixel resolution, many times you would hold it to the screen to try to right click (the button on the stylus was nonfunctional) and the pointer would twitch back and forth rapidly between two pixels.
And what meaning would that be? "I'm willing to spend a few thousand dollars on you"? Buy her a nice car, it will have a purpose and cost way more than some piddling little ring. Buy a house, you're going to be making a family theoretically, you'll want a place to live, right?
There are plenty of better ways to show that you're willing to spend money on someone (how exactly does this relate to love again?) that are actually useful, or that could be just as, if not more, romantic (Paris for two for a week?)
Slashdot Mirror
When programmers start giving away their time, and effort, it makes their time and effort worth less.
Lets say I get together with a group, and as a team, we make a seriously kickass program. Next generation database server or something. Give it away as Free software. With well commented code, clear design documents.
How much is our time worth? How much would you pay to have one of us (a skilled developer with proven teamwork/colloboration and software engineering) on YOUR company's team?
Think about that.
Repetitive manual tasks allow my mind to wander and lets me think of interesting things to do. These days I'm just so mentally exhausted from work I just come home, stare slackjawed at the monitor, and hit reload on /. every 15 minutes or so
Ha. learn something new every day. I had no idea of that.
Sorry for wasting everyone's time with that example.
(sorry about the not-indented code)
Ok, lets say you have an invoice system that maintains "customer"s, "bill"s, and "payment"s in seperate tables. The relationships are as follows: One customer to many bills and many payments. A seperate table "paytobill" (with an amount field) is used to link bills and payments as some customers may make a single payment covering several bills, or several payments to cover a single bill (like a payment plan).
Now, give me a report showing every customer, and the most recent bill that each customer owes money on (if they have any), and how much they owe. Using strictly these tables (ie no fields that are updated by a trigger) it is incredibly hairy. Your choices are pretty much to execute a query on "paytobill" inside a loop from "customer left outer join bill", or to do something really hairy like this (postgres syntax) (we'll assume that bill.id is ascending:Not pretty, is it? Now, look at how that could be done with less language and more readability by adding a single keyword and slightly redefining the syntax:Here, its clear that we're joining "bill" and "paytobill" and collapsing that table immediately to generate sum(p.amount). Then, we order this collapsed table on date, and left outer join against "customer", BUT we only take one row from the collapsed table for each customer (if it speeds the join, we could even ditch those unused rows now to further shrink the table). Drawbacks include the use of () to clarify what grouping and limit we mean. Even though the LIMITED keyword could mean that the next GROUP BY/LIMIT keyword belongs to the join, what if both were used, without a WHERE clause to indicate where the joins ended and the main query began?
The query planner would have to be able to identify the request for SUM(p.amount) as being related to the GROUPed limited join. The planner would then create the intermediary table and calculate the aggregate values on that table using the given group by. Then the query planner would order the intermediary table and join it with the customer table, selecting from zero to the limit number of right-hand rows for each left-hand-row The syntax above makes it fairly clear what the query planner should be doing.
The command in SQL would involve a nested loop [select max(...)...] (two, if the planner wasn't smart enough to recognize that the two copies of it are identical, which most won't be since they are in seperate branches of a left outer join) (it's possible that a brilliant query planner might be able to make the jump and create an intermediary table of <bill.customerid,MAX(bill.id)> for reference in both branches of the query). In addition, unless you have a brilliant query planner, you'll end up working with potentially very large intermediate tables.
They're defined as subdomains of .new.net. So that site you just registered is really "www.mygoatpr0n.xxx.new.net"
.new.net added to the end.
.new.net version to never be attempted).
Take a look at their FAQ. To get this to work in linux, you add new.net to your hosts' file's search path, which makes it so if something fails to resolve, it tries again with
ICANN's move doesn't spell trouble for new.net immediately, but the namespace will start to break down when a real www.mygoatpr0n.xxx appears (causing the
But this is not what Linux needs right now.
Huh? Are the hordes of programmers going to drop everything and go 3-D? I don't think so.
You're talking about a group of programmers who weren't doing anything for linux, who are now. That can only improve Linux. At worst case, they produce nothing and we maintain the status quo.
Linux is about choice, not about being the best damn desktop possible (though, thanks to the wonders of choice and "apt-get install best-damn-desktop" it could still be possible). Developers choose what to work on, users choose what to use. Things nobody uses will eventually no longer be developed.
Don't forget, a 3D desktop has considerable technical merit. Do you have any idea of the amount of 3D-on-Linux development you're writing off as useless because it doesn't fit your narrow worldview? I don't suppose you include games in your desktop worldview, do you? 3D games?
will there be a version of this without the network adapter and harddrive, or a version of FFXI without it?
I'll echo AC's response about your heroism. Not only does egress filtering save the internet, it will help cut your costs by dropping obvious trash packets before they hit your upstream provider.
;)
(This is why the big backbones don't do it for you, why should they cut down on billable bandwidth used?
If every ISP in the world did this, there wouldn't be much need for any other kind of regulation. If you're being naughty, its traceable back to at least your ISP (you could be spoofing some other customer's IP). The ISP could then use a bit more restrictive filtering to track down who is being naughty, and perhaps pick up whoever is trying to control them.
getting their printout and then feeding a slip of paper of the same size back in so they can vote again without destroying their original.
By counting the number of sheets turned in by the user. If someone tries to stuff 10 sheets into their little privacy envelope, you smack them around and undo their excess votes.
Or better yet, use equipment that can both read and write and verify that the machine is going to destroy the paper it just made?
And on top of all of that, have you started egress filtering to drop spoofed packets as they leave your network? Packets from a DSL customer in kentuky addressed from .tw are a sure sign that the Evil Bit should be set.
It would go a long way in deflating DDoS attacks quickly.
where, pray tell, can one find the Windows binaries for this wonderful piece of software?
Cygwin.
There is a native windows port with threading done by a Japanese company (non-free, though), and its apparently expected that it will be translated back into english sometime soon.
Damn, I knew I should have tried harder to fail English.
I don't understand why Dish has to pay Viacom to carry them
The submitter says it all:
"I, for one, will be switching to DirecTV if they don't get this figured out."
Dish is buying content that appeals to their subscribers and can draw more subscribers. It is more symbiotic than just a distribution system. Viacom gets viewership, Dish network gets something to sell.
a sentence like "we've been set up" is very simple, because it uses little words, whereas many who have English as a second language would find it difficult to understand.
In that case you just have to be more clear. Perhaps you should say:
Someone set us up the bomb
While they have been very willing to let anyone decode mp3s (charging royalties only for the encoders), there is nothing to keep them from announcing tomorrow that no more mp3 players can be made or released without this new DRM technology.
And that they want a nickel for every download of a player.
to distribute them to the public for private use
Given that the current status of copyright on broadcast media is that its for private use only (ie, its not legal for you to record something and re-display it publicly), I think that Apple can use this.
However, the question is still "did they pay eminem at all?"
Why forcefully regluate things like this when a free market would naturally provide each consumer with what _they_ want?
We were looking just last week at evaluating VoIP solutions for some of our clients. It never even crossed my mind to ask if you could or couldn't make a 911 call from them.
So what happens when joe slightlybetterthanaverage hears about these voip phones that are all the rage and that means he can replace his phone line completely and just go with the cablemodem? He can call his neighbor, he can call his mom, he can call in sick to work, but if his daugher falls down the stairs, he can't call 911? I bet he'd want 911 service, but given that he can call anyone else, why would he even think to ask?
It seems to me that if you can dial the number "911" on the device (ie, something somewhere connects you to the POTS), it should connect you to some number that can appropriately handle an emergency, since this is a major expectation that most Americans will have from their phone.
We THEN go to our friends
I missed out on this stage. I could have bailed out of college and gotten a major sysadmin position working with a friend easily, but I decided to stick to college and get a degree.
Of course, who knows what would have happened if I had left (some of the friends' companies are still there, some aren't). I know where I am now: stuck with a degree with what appears to me to be of limited value. (At least I have a job, $40k a year codemonkey for a small company).
Ah, but if I had left... I could be a citizen of another country now (several friends at ISPs in Europe). I could have an $80k/yr job and no problem scraping money together to get the certs to "prove" I know my stuff. Or heck, I could be unemployed after a year or so, but I could go back to school for a different degree (a year would probably have paid off my loans, assuming I didn't leave the country).
This may be an SFQ, but shouldn't the application choose its own look and feel?
I suspect that the outcome of this is a little less worrisome then you think. I really have no idea what this means, but I've been thinking of something along these lines with X for a while now, which may or may not be what Y is doing.
Currently to draw an input box in X, at the protocol level there is a lot of work -- lines must be drawn, areas filled with color, a font must be selected, and any existing text must be entered in. Subwindows for accepting user input are defined, events to control focus, mouse, and keyboard are captured and transferred back and forth. GTK hides this from the programmer by defining a function to call to do all that for the user, but all of this is done on the local GTK library in the client, either by rendering into a pixmap and transmitting the whole pixmap to the server, or by breaking it down into the above mentioned components and transmitting those instructions.
Now, imagine if the X server itself was linked to GTK. That entire protocol stream of traffic can be reduced to a single command "draw a gtk text box here of this size with this starting text in this font" many of which can be defaults. Beyond just the savings in that initial display of the widget, the number of events can be drastically cut down as the server-side gtk library now handles the events that deal strictly with the operation of the widget. The end result is something like HTML and javascript. You could define a dropdown box which only has one event with the client software after the initial construction: "onchange". All of the clicking and picking items could be done within the server itself.
The biggest issue with this is making sure that the existing protocol never changes, only grows by adding new items (thus gtk-client 1.1 will work with gtk-server 1.2, just not use all the 1.2 features), otherwise versions everywhere must match or the thing goes down in flames.
Your point being? The Wired article quotes people in the administration who seem to indicate that the events that the UCS claim to have happened did in fact take place. Of the lead analysis panel: "I'm sure there were other reasons for the change". Other reasons indeed.
The fact is, Bush's Administration is undergoing a major credibility crisis. Excising scientific research is not how to go about fixing it.
Consequently, you have to be able to back up claims you make on your return with paperwork.
So basically what you're saying is you're fine with being guilty of tax evasion until you prove yourself innocent. Thats fine, there's people who have no problem with that. The problem is with the hassle of proving yourself innocent. Do you possess every little receipt and stub and statement for the past year? How about the past decade? I can't even keep track of these little pieces of paper for the past day. What if the system is wrong in a way you don't have a piece of paper for. Can you prove or disprove that $8k crack deal that never happened?
My personal take on this system is that I'd be fine with it where I lived under the following conditions:
1) The system is entirely public - if all of the data used is coming from public databases, then I don't see it causing any more privacy damage than the public databases are already causing.
2) The system is accurate - Is there enough information to make appropriate decisions? If all the TaxMan sees is the unreported $20k deposit, and not that the money came from taxfree bonds, then this system is too stupid to waste my money on.
3) The system is correctable - If the furniture store shows my $1000 bed purchase as $10000, can I have that corrected before the TaxMan cometh? If not, the system is fatally crippled, as none of my receipts and stubs would prove that I didn't pay $10000. (I could prove I bought a bed for $1k, but that would still show a $10k transaction that wasn't represented).
4) The system is transparent - I should have the right to know what will cause me to be audited. You can take that as "im an evil tax evader" or not, but given Joe Innocent, don't you think they would like to know what steps they must take to not be treated as a criminal? Secret rules leave the system open to malice and persecution: "Yeah, the system says you have to audit my neighbor who'se dog crapped in my lawn this morning"
If these 4 conditions are met, then I have a reasonable expectation that the system is trustworthy to behave in the expected fashion and that I won't need to save every scrap of paper in a big box (I have two 2 cubic feet boxes for the 2003 year containing receipts, invoices, pay stubs, utility bills, credit card statements, bank statements, etc. Being able to say I can trust the system to get it right will save me a lot of shelf space)
And that is exactly how supply side ('trickle down') economics worked.
Maybe trickle down would work better in the US if we didn't have all that money vanishing back into the government. Would also work better if companies wouldn't be hoarding it (how many billions does microsoft have in non-circulating cash reserves?) It would work even better if people didn't pretend that putting the money in savings at the bank somehow "creates" money through loans (which only create debt). It would work miracles if that government-sanctioned pyramid scheme we call the stock market was overhauled (the money you put in rarely goes to the company you're investing in, instead it goes to fatten some investor's retirement).
So yeah, in a poor, communist country where you can save someone from starvation by hiring them on as a live in servant for just over a dollar a day, trickle down works pretty good. I'd love to see someone try that in the US, with or without illegal immigrants filling the position.
(Of course, if you read the part of the interview that talks about the company stores and McDonalds, you'd realize that the most of that money is trickling is back into the company's pocket, hardly conducive to your argument supporting it)
We had one of these at work for "testing" our software to see how tablet-accessible it is (we complained at the time that there was no real point to this, as the whole thing could be done by mousing through the program. The boss took the thing home in the end so now we know what the real point was).'
Your points are pretty good but I'd like to add the stylus itself as a gripe, even after calibration we had problems with its behavior, especially around the edges of the screen (making using scrollbars difficult to do). The stylus was also not quite at one pixel resolution, many times you would hold it to the screen to try to right click (the button on the stylus was nonfunctional) and the pointer would twitch back and forth rapidly between two pixels.
And what meaning would that be? "I'm willing to spend a few thousand dollars on you"? Buy her a nice car, it will have a purpose and cost way more than some piddling little ring. Buy a house, you're going to be making a family theoretically, you'll want a place to live, right?
There are plenty of better ways to show that you're willing to spend money on someone (how exactly does this relate to love again?) that are actually useful, or that could be just as, if not more, romantic (Paris for two for a week?)