Only removing what the government wants removed is supporting censorship.
No, you're confusing constitutional issues with dictionary definitions here. The government is the only entity barred from censorship by the first amendment of the constitution. Censorship, however, is still censorship whether it's done by the FCC with TV, Google with a blog, or your boss with the company newsletter.
Actually, De Beers is terrified. Over the last decade, they have pushed "genuine diamonds". Cool. A good jeweler and a bit testing could determine the difference between natural and artificial.
No, there is no non-destructive* way to reliably tell man made diamond from mined based on any material characteristics. The only way even a "good jeweler" can tell the difference is by checking for the official De Beers registry number laser etched on one of the facet edges. All part of their "genuine diamond" propaganda campaign. "Fake" diamonds are not registered.
* mass spectrometry might do it by detecting certain trace elements, but in the end all diamonds are nothing more than tetrahedrally bonded carbon.
There's a reason why imitations (exempli gratia: CGI) lack that je ne sais quoi: we are unable to reproduce the complexity of naturally occuring systems.
There is no difference whatsoever between a mined diamond and a man-made one (other than that the man made ones have fewer flaws). The is no "je ne sais quoi" that distinguishes one from the other. The reason man-made diamonds can't get traction is that the mined diamond suppliers have a very tight grip on the supply channel and synthetic diamonds are not available in large enough quantities for any large gem buyer to risk losing his place as a De Beers sightholder. The threat to the diamond mining industry is very real, though. De Beers is actively promoting the propaganda that man-made diamonds aren't "real"-- despite the fact that they're generally of higher quality in terms of clarity and uniformity.
Nope. It's primarily hyperbole. Pulled straight out of my ass. A quick look at the breakdown by department of the federal budget pretty much confirms that I'm not far off though. Doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that $2 billion apiece for a bomber designed to drop nukes on the Soviet Union, or paying agri-business to not grow various crops (thus keeping the price unnaturally high), or promising every man woman and child in the country a "retirement" payment via a program* that was only designed to support those dispossessed by things like bank failures and Enron style fund-plundering are the kind of colossal waste of money that positively dwarf even a generously defined subset of federal programs that might be considered "critical economic infrastructure". Seriously, things like education, labor, transportation, justice-- they barely account for %15 of the federal budget, even if you resort to the cheap trick of imagining Social Security is somehow entirely separate from the federal budget.
* good old Social Security, which they keep pretending is a "trust fund", when in reality all that's in there is a stack of IOU's-- Treasury bonds, representing a portion of the federal debt. The only thing this "trust fund" is invested in is the growth of future tax receipts.
Have you visited a country without a centralized government? Their roads ARE crumbling to dust. And there is a definite shortage of private corporations building infrastructure. It's not speculative - it's fact.
What you describe above is a country with no government. I don't think we should dissolve all government. I think small government, with as much power as possible devolved to the lowest levels, is the ideal solution. Schools will continue to exist without Federal Ed frog-marching them around to the latest federal song (a tv... no, a computer on every desk!); roads will continue to be built without Federal DOT threatening to take states' allowances away for not making all their speed signs say "55"; Police will still be hired without Federal DOJ giving them handouts in exchange for a promise to arrest more underage drinkers.
There are some things best done by government and not left to the quarterly whims of corporate greed.
Sorry. I don't know why I wrote "private enterprise" there-- probably (perversely) because I'm as sick of hearing it as you are. I don't think corps would build quality roads or schools without public oversight either. I was thinking "cooperative enterprise", directed by very local representative or democratic government. Large federal government is mostly bad. It takes a big chunk of our money and gives us back not nearly what we paid for. That's all I'm saying.
Since the government is already produces nothing tangible and operates as a net drain on the economy anyway
It's fascinating how this particular piece of right-wing propaganda has become gospel through sheer repetition. When you add up the cumulative value of roads, schools, firehouses, ports and other government-sponsored projects it is most defintely NOT a net drain on the economy. Quite the contrary - it drives the economy.
It's fascinating how this particular piece of left-wing propaganda has become gospel through sheer refusal to see the government for what it is. When you add up the value of the individual investment that could have been made with all those tax dollars had the government not siphoned it off to build a bridge to nowhere in Alaska, and send me and my friends to get shot at and occasionally killed in horrible places like Afghanistan, it's not that hard to conclude that government is not the most efficient mechanism for well-targeted economic stimulation. The first 20% of the tax bill obviously helps the economy, keeping roads, schools, yadda yadda, etc. running; but the remaining 80%? We get maybe fifteen cents benefit on the dollar for that crap-- if we're lucky. Admittedly, the "net drag" presumes that private enterprise would step in and provide all those economy-boosting bits of infrastructure. This may be overly optimistic, but it's a speculative fiction that's no more absurd than the socialists' apparent belief that without a large, centralized government the roads would crumble to dust and everyone would forget how to read.
How the fuck do you think the cutting-edge stuff at defense contractors gets protected?
That's right, exactly the same way as the government does it. Compartmentalisation and Need To Know.
And who's ultimately footing the bill at the defense contractor for this giant bureaucratic ball and chain that we drag around? Uncle Sugar, of course. I think we're both arguing from the same position. Applying government-style security in a non-government corporate environment is a giant waste for an org that needs to maintain efficiency and profitability.
Wouldn't having datacenters switch over to DC power and then just using a massive battery backup system help with this? Or batteries more exspensive than having generators.
I'd still keep a few generators in backup, but woulnd't you need less of them with DC?
Batteries don't have nearly the power density of diesel fuel. The only advantage to battery backup is that it's instantaneous. Most datacenters DO have a battery system, but its purpose is merely to span the gap between the loss of mains power and backup generator startup.
So you are saying that having two smaller generators instead of one large one doubles the risk of power failure?
Doubles the risk of a show-stopper failure in the backup system, yes. Twin engine aircraft are required to be able to fly with one engine out for this very reason. A crude way to visualize it is that the MTBF rates are like unto the chance of rolling a Critical Failure in [your favorite RPG]. One generator rolls the dice every (x) amount of time, and TWO generators is essentially rolling the dice TWICE every (x) amount of time. Odds of rolling a critical failure statistically double.
Add to that the changes and parts necessary to change engines geared to creating propulsion to engines geared to creating electricity.
Indulging in some Railroad Pedantry here, but locomotives use a diesel driven generator to drive electric motors at the drive wheels. You could, with a little jury-rigging, conceivably plop a diesel locomotive down next to your building and wire it up to your electrical main switch gear and just start it up...
The part that I don't undestand is this: Why do they need just one generator? If you're having difficulties obtaining a 2Mw unit, wouldn't it make sense to get two smaller units? You'd waste a bit of extra space, but you'd have redundancy that a single genearator couldn't offer.
Remember the old aeronautical engineering maxim of "twin engine planes have twice the rate of engine trouble as single engine planes". Point being, that sort of "redundancy" is only a net gain if you can actually "fly" with one of your engines dead. If these datacenters require more than 1 megawatt, two 1 megawatt generators is actually a liability. The companion maxim to the above is "It's better to put all your eggs in one basket, so long as you've made sure you've got a REALLY STRONG basket."
A friend in the Government once told me that after the Pollard spy scandal the Government rethought the way it handled clearances. So now there is a discreet pool of clearances. There's no reason why a company, new, mature, huge, or small shouldn't be able to institute a similar policy in terms of access.
As a holder of a TS clearance and former military intelligence goon, I can tell you that there are PLENTY of reasons why a private company shouldn't implement a similar policy. The primary problem is that it introduces a huge amount of bureaucratic "friction" to anything you do. By my estimate, I spent about 20% of my time as an analyst dealing with the various forms of "hoop jumping" required to get anything done with heavily classified and compartmentalized information. For example, I might want to ask a guy specializing in "compartment A" stuff about something, but if the material I'm working with contains "compartment B" intel, I have to try to either a) try to recompile the material to omit "B" intel while still making sense (tedious, takes time, might not even be possible); or b) get him signed off with "B" clearance (takes even longer, might not even be possible). Since the government is already produces nothing tangible and operates as a net drain on the economy anyway, this massive waste is just more of the same. In a corporate environment, though, a government-style security policy would be a monstrous drain on productivity and, in turn, profitability.
Should they demand that the employer purchase the code signing certificate as part of the accommodation for the disability?
That would be an excellent idea.
Bullshit. That requires the customer to supply a signing key for the product, but the product cannot even be created and tested until the developer has a signing key. Catch-22.
Another is simply not to upgrade to Vista.
This is a vacuous and impertinent answer, like the doctor saying "well then don't turn your arm that way if it hurts". What do you do when the vertical market software requires Vista? Or when the entire company has already upgraded to Vista? You're not answering the question, you're just avoiding it with handwaves.
This has nasty implications for hobbyists who design custom assistive input devices for people with disabilities
No. Join the rest hobby programmers and go Ubuntu. Free as in freedom to write whatever you want.
Hey fucktard, he's talking about people who make hardware for third parties who are using windows. The developer switching to linux isn't going to get linux installed on the computers his clients are trying to use. Learn to fucking read.
You are right. However, if you do something to harm yourself, then at some point, the State has to care for you.
Are you on welfare because of your cocaine habit? Then you are stealing.
Are you in the hospital because you had an opium overdose? Then you are stealing.
Did you get into a car accident because you were reaching for some fries? Then you are stealing.
Did you go to prison because you shot someone in a drug-deal-gone-bad? Then you are stealing?
There are many social and private services supporting our way of life. We have to work to pay for those services. When I work and pay tax to support your final months of lung cancer, then you have taken something from me.
That's a pretty ridiculous stretch of the concept of "theft". By your own lame definition, senior citizens who were too dumb to save for their retirement because they didn't realize that the intended purpose of Social Security was to help those who'd lost their retirement savings due to financial disaster (Great Depression, Enron, S&L failure, etc), well, they're just as guilty of "stealing" as the junkie who gets a ride to the county hospital when he OD's. Calling it "stealing" is a laughably amateurish way of trying to absolve our government (and by extension, us) of our ignorance of the Laws of Unintended Consequences. If you want cokeheads out of the welfare rolls, well then get the eligibility rules changed. Quit vilifying the little guy for legitimately standing on the sidewalk with a basket when politicians are stupid enough (or smart enough!) to stand on the rooftops pouring down buckets of money. You need to stop masturbating over idiotic misapplications of the term "stealing" and accept that the real villain here is a giant monolithic government that has convinced people that it should take care of all our problems (in exchange for a little more taxation).
"Irish" isn't a race, it's a geographical origin-- like "African". And for those who think "African" means "black", you need to take a look at an Algerian, an Afrikaans speaking Boer, and an Egyptian...
Many countries have used nuclear weapons? If your a geek, your not a very knowledgeable one. As for the US nuking of Japan, it was certainly justified.
BOOLEAN LOGIC dumbfuck! The post above was all about BOOLEAN LOGIC and it STILL went over your empty head. Let me spell it out for you: the set of "many countries" is comprised of countries who have either used nuclear devices OR have used poison gas as a weapon. The US is included in that set. Germany is included. France is included. Britain is included. Iraq is included.
Not to mention the fact that the martial training...How to gauge the danger of a situation... To listen to your instincts when they tell you something is off about a situation.
Indeed, this is the most valuable thing I got from my various martial arts training: when fighting happens, I am invariably somewhere else*. I had a Yang-Style Martial Tai Chi sifu who liked to say that the only way to really win a fight is not to get in one in the first place.
* except when good ol' Uncle Sugar sent my reserve unit to Afghanistan, but I had very little input in that decision...
I have a lot of respect for Steve Wozniak. I don't begrudge the guy a joke or two, but when you are writing up a review for publication, heroin-cultivation seems a bit beyond the pale, even if you want to just let the pot issue slide on the assumption he's from a different era. Not my intent to rally the pitch-fork wielding villagers to burn him out of his castle, just pointing out something from the article that made me pause.
Not to hijack the thread into a drug war debate, but I'm not sure why you vilify opium. Nearly all of the problems with heroin are an outgrowth of its prohibition. It's addictive, sure, but unlike meth or crack it doesn't ruin your life. Plenty of life-long heroin addicts currently using methadone and holding down respectable jobs. The trouble comes from 1) OD's due to highly variable purity on the black market, 2) hepatitis/AIDS/etc. due to irrational control over the sale of hypodermic delivery components, 3) crime to support what would otherwise be a cheap habit, were it not for the price gouging inherent to the black market.
know he's never been the CEO type, but for the inventor of the MAC and a former teacher, I thought this was a bit crass. I wouldn't want to publish an app with someone who thought this was an appropriate public pronouncement.
Sorry, I don't see the crassness. Someone suggests a good app might be a "virtual plant" and, while other judges patronizingly say "Mac users would love this", he points out that a virtual plant is just plain stupid on its face. Seriously, it's a damn productivity meter that "rewards" you for being a good little worker bee by looking like a healthy plant! THe idea is that it'd encourage the slothful to work harder, but in reality only the already productive will keep the thing around, and the slothful (like me) will delete it after getting tired of looking at a dying plant reminding us that we're lazy. I think Steve was just being blunt and offering amusing ways in which such a concept might actually be appealing.
A virtual plant? That's about as pointless as a virtual bicycle.
(Also, it's "Mac" not "MAC", and Woz didn't create it, he created the original Apple/Apple II systems-- singlehandedly)
I'm going out on a limb here and stating that I like the article and found it very useful and informative. There are plenty of.NET developers in this world and I am one of them. I also love Mac OSX and it is great to see a semi-detailed and informative account of someone who set up the very environment I have been researching as a possible development platform. A large part of the applications the author uses on OSX and Windows is exactly what I would be using in the same setup.
It will be very beneficial to me when I finally get this platform set up to test the memory allocation in the manner the author describes, and assuming I don't take the plunge and get a Mac Pro, 2GB RAM will be the amount of RAM I choose for the Macbook Pro. After reading the article I can now purchase a new Mac and know that I can do everything I'm wanting.
You should write a blog, like the guy in the article. You managed to stretch "As a.NET developer who wants to develop within OSX, I am pleased to see how it can be done" into two long, boring paragraphs.
Slashdot Mirror
back to typing with one hand...
* mass spectrometry might do it by detecting certain trace elements, but in the end all diamonds are nothing more than tetrahedrally bonded carbon.
* good old Social Security, which they keep pretending is a "trust fund", when in reality all that's in there is a stack of IOU's-- Treasury bonds, representing a portion of the federal debt. The only thing this "trust fund" is invested in is the growth of future tax receipts.
What you describe above is a country with no government. I don't think we should dissolve all government. I think small government, with as much power as possible devolved to the lowest levels, is the ideal solution. Schools will continue to exist without Federal Ed frog-marching them around to the latest federal song (a tv... no, a computer on every desk!); roads will continue to be built without Federal DOT threatening to take states' allowances away for not making all their speed signs say "55"; Police will still be hired without Federal DOJ giving them handouts in exchange for a promise to arrest more underage drinkers.
Sorry. I don't know why I wrote "private enterprise" there-- probably (perversely) because I'm as sick of hearing it as you are. I don't think corps would build quality roads or schools without public oversight either. I was thinking "cooperative enterprise", directed by very local representative or democratic government. Large federal government is mostly bad. It takes a big chunk of our money and gives us back not nearly what we paid for. That's all I'm saying.
This is a vacuous and impertinent answer, like the doctor saying "well then don't turn your arm that way if it hurts". What do you do when the vertical market software requires Vista? Or when the entire company has already upgraded to Vista? You're not answering the question, you're just avoiding it with handwaves.
* except when good ol' Uncle Sugar sent my reserve unit to Afghanistan, but I had very little input in that decision...
A virtual plant? That's about as pointless as a virtual bicycle.
(Also, it's "Mac" not "MAC", and Woz didn't create it, he created the original Apple/Apple II systems-- singlehandedly)