I recently read that New York City's entitlements policy, bloated "public service" sector, fiscal irresponsibility and system of governance were key in bringing on the bankruptcy of the 70s.
Could this be a case of the tree not falling far from the apple?
The remedies in the 70s included fiscal conservatism, cutting entitlements, dealing with corruption and going after crime.
Rather than raising taxes to enable business-as-usual to continue unabated, maybe it's time state officials considered wielding the same scalpel used in the past to the body of the state today.
"Quoting a 1907 statement by President Theodore Roosevelt -- "the only way in which a navy can ever be made efficient is by practice at sea" -- the high court's five-member conservative majority said lower courts had improperly restricted naval exercises off Southern California."
Nineteen.Oh.Fscking.Seven? That was the jumping off point for the courts decision?
This only goes to show that political fossils are alive and well, and engaging in the intelligent design of national policy in the 21st century.
Which just goes to show, this isn't about Microsoft improving its OS or bringing out new and compelling features, it's about keeping revenue streams flowing to OEMs and peripheral manufacturers.
This also shows a massive disconnect with their target audience as:
1) Most people view their computer as an appliance, something that shouldn't need upgrades or outright replacements every two years.
2) Marketing needs to be complemented with education. You can't sell computers like they were washers and dryers, with Joe Sixpack plugging naked Windows PCs into the interwebs, clicking for free pr0n, mp3z and the like, and *not* engineer in security first. No one should expect the buying public to subscribe to the most common solution put forward, particularly given #1, above and #3, below.
3) People are living in fear in the current economic climate. Both hardware and software vendors need to realize this and act accordingly, not like it's still the boom years before the dotcom bust.
My take?
MS should hunker down, really rewrite things in such a way that the OS is leaner, more secure, works with a less demanding hardware set, has features that really mean something to the common user, quit putting in backdoor DRM, and rein in those quarterly earnings expectations.
If you actually go to the site [yeah, I know, this is/.], scroll down to the bottom of the page and look, you'll see a link for GSA Transition Directory. Click it.
On the next page is a link to Organizational Chart. Clicking it will download a PDF of the transitional team org chart, and guess what?
At the very top of the first page of said chart, the first entry is, THE CONSTITUTION.
So I would think that their involvement, as well as that of Nortel and other network gear OEMs, is more desirable than that of Application/OS/Search companies.
"Mass. man was arrested because he refused to leave a meeting until the school reached a compromise about teaching his child (a practicing Mormon) to accept gay marriage. The school didn't compromise."
Nor should they have.
It is nonsensical to think that any minority is entitled to a "compromise", "right of expression", etc., etc., etc., in an publicly funded institution, in contravention of the law of the land.
If that parent was so adamant that his child not be "subjected" to gay marriage "teachings", he is free to home school the child, or send them to a private school. He is also free to move to another state whose religious beliefs more closely mirror his own.
Anything else only serves to further fracture public education into ever tinier islets of political/religious/ethnic correctness to appease someones desires, rather than actually educating the students.
Is it any wonder we continue to fall behind other industrialized nations in educational rankings?
"If that's happening (which the study didn't seem to address in any way), then it's the physician's fault"
Oh reeeeeeally?
"I would certainly hope that my physician would check for published negative studies before using some off-label experimental treatment on me."
Have you spent any time in a doctors office? I mean from the backend? Examine how the physicians time (let alone that of their staff) is allocated.
60% or more is tied up in administrative tasks that:
C.T.A.s from lawsuits
Are for compliance with a local/state/federal mandate or regulation
Fulfill byzantine insurer or governmental stipulations so that they can paid for doing their job
Ensure that all of the above t's are crossed and i's are dotted
The remaining 40% is allocated to patients and patient tasks, but is probably subject capitation, or other "cost effectiveness" measures.
Which leads us to the drug company reps, those wonderful marketing guys/gals who weasel their way in in the small slices of time in between all the rest to tell our doctors all about the latest and greatest wonder compound, leave samples of the same, touting how much better life will be for both them and their patients if only they prescribe it on a regular basis.
And you "hope" those health care professionals will make time to read negative study results over listening to a live pretty person who shows up on their door promising positive results.
Cost of the last major hurricane, $22 billion. Cost of the existing "martial involvements", $12.3 billion per month. Cost of the "largest bailout in history", $700 billion.
Silly congress critters who think they still have tax payer funds to fritter away... priceless.
"No one seems to be trying to defend or explain why Internet radio is being hit so much harder than satellite or broadcast."
Why do either, when all that would serve to do is draw attention to the disparity, and invite enough consideration that the real aim become apparent? Which is to strangle a nascent medium in order to have control over it.
Consider FIOS. Massive pipes to the doorstep, geeks rejoice. If anyone had said at that time that Verizon would be getting into the television business most would have snickered, but isn't that what Verizon is now advertising? And AT&T, didn't they run off all the small to medium DSL colocation, only to finally birth U[gh!]-Verse?
Could this be a reason net neutrality be such a hot button issue with the lobbyist set?
This isn't about "paying the artists", it's about supporting dinosaurian business models, control, and another round of vertical integration, with a "Clear Channel of the Web" as the end result.
Try going to multiple Linksys devices (WRT54Gs come to mind) with the same self-signed certificate.
This is what you'll see:
You have received an invalid certificate. Please contact the server administrator or email correspondent and give them the following information:
Your certificate contains the same serial number as another certificate issued by the certificate authority. Please get a new certificate containing a unique serial number.
(Error code: sec_error_reused_issuer_and_serial)
You'll only be able to set up an exception for the first one, the rest of them... so sorry so sad... unless you manually dump the certificate each time.
FF2 did not have this "feature", you could set multiple exceptions and not have to worry about it again.
Total PITA if you're working with residential users.
at the entrance of the Movie Trading Company® where I live.
I had a bad disc from a library loan once, took it there, chatted up one of the staff and they buffed it up to a playable state for free.
I imagine that a small gratuity on your part would go a long way to having a minimal stack done the same way.
Caveat: Do as other posters suggest, first attempt a rip using CDParanoia & EAC, just in case the machine munches the irreplaceable originals (it's known to happen).
Reading the article left me with more of the sense that the author lamented the social aspects of USENET, now supplanted by more glamorous (and ad supported) counterparts.
It's the decline in peering, particularly at the ISP level, due to binaries that he points to as the final nail in the coffin.
While he decries the proliferation of binary traffic as anathema, the last paragraph sums it up thus: "It's hard to completely kill off something as totally decentralized as Usenet; as long as two servers agree to share the NNTP protocol, it'll continue on in some fashion."
And therein lies the truth. As long as some "old schoolers" refuse to be seduced by the web frontends for social ties, or insist on using text to distribute binary materials, you can be sure the USENET will be with us for some time to come, "child safety advocates" notwithstanding.
Slashdot Mirror
I recently read that New York City's entitlements policy, bloated "public service" sector, fiscal irresponsibility and system of governance were key in bringing on the bankruptcy of the 70s.
Could this be a case of the tree not falling far from the apple?
The remedies in the 70s included fiscal conservatism, cutting entitlements, dealing with corruption and going after crime.
Rather than raising taxes to enable business-as-usual to continue unabated, maybe it's time state officials considered wielding the same scalpel used in the past to the body of the state today.
Print link.
And a damned interesting read, no matter your political stripe.
Given that the new paradigm is "Reduce, reuse, recycle", how does a multiscreen, multi-projector, multi-everything system reduce my carbon footprint?
No, really, I'm curious.
From the Seattle Post Intelligencer:
"Quoting a 1907 statement by President Theodore Roosevelt -- "the only way in which a navy can ever be made efficient is by practice at sea" -- the high court's five-member conservative majority said lower courts had improperly restricted naval exercises off Southern California."
Nineteen.Oh.Fscking.Seven? That was the jumping off point for the courts decision?
This only goes to show that political fossils are alive and well, and engaging in the intelligent design of national policy in the 21st century.
Which just goes to show, this isn't about Microsoft improving its OS or bringing out new and compelling features, it's about keeping revenue streams flowing to OEMs and peripheral manufacturers.
This also shows a massive disconnect with their target audience as:
1) Most people view their computer as an appliance, something that shouldn't need upgrades or outright replacements every two years.
2) Marketing needs to be complemented with education. You can't sell computers like they were washers and dryers, with Joe Sixpack plugging naked Windows PCs into the interwebs, clicking for free pr0n, mp3z and the like, and *not* engineer in security first. No one should expect the buying public to subscribe to the most common solution put forward, particularly given #1, above and #3, below.
3) People are living in fear in the current economic climate. Both hardware and software vendors need to realize this and act accordingly, not like it's still the boom years before the dotcom bust.
My take?
MS should hunker down, really rewrite things in such a way that the OS is leaner, more secure, works with a less demanding hardware set, has features that really mean something to the common user, quit putting in backdoor DRM, and rein in those quarterly earnings expectations.
Then world will say "Thank you!".
If you actually go to the site [yeah, I know, this is /.], scroll down to the bottom of the page and look, you'll see a link for GSA Transition Directory. Click it.
On the next page is a link to Organizational Chart. Clicking it will download a PDF of the transitional team org chart, and guess what?
At the very top of the first page of said chart, the first entry is, THE CONSTITUTION.
I for one take that as a Good Sign®.
In short, there's hope.
can *never* be erased!
Mwah-ha-ha-ha-ha!
They were largely responsible for the Great Firewall of China.
So I would think that their involvement, as well as that of Nortel and other network gear OEMs, is more desirable than that of Application/OS/Search companies.
"Mass. man was arrested because he refused to leave a meeting until the school reached a compromise about teaching his child (a practicing Mormon) to accept gay marriage. The school didn't compromise."
Nor should they have.
It is nonsensical to think that any minority is entitled to a "compromise", "right of expression", etc., etc., etc., in an publicly funded institution, in contravention of the law of the land.
If that parent was so adamant that his child not be "subjected" to gay marriage "teachings", he is free to home school the child, or send them to a private school. He is also free to move to another state whose religious beliefs more closely mirror his own.
Anything else only serves to further fracture public education into ever tinier islets of political/religious/ethnic correctness to appease someones desires, rather than actually educating the students.
Is it any wonder we continue to fall behind other industrialized nations in educational rankings?
A device to scrub methane, since it's almost 100x as efficient at holding heat (see entry for GWP) than CO2, and major non biological sources seem to be venting it in mass quantities.
Saw UK, but no US. Is that a feature, a flaw, or something to work around?
"If that's happening (which the study didn't seem to address in any way), then it's the physician's fault"
Oh reeeeeeally?
"I would certainly hope that my physician would check for published negative studies before using some off-label experimental treatment on me."
Have you spent any time in a doctors office? I mean from the backend? Examine how the physicians time (let alone that of their staff) is allocated.
60% or more is tied up in administrative tasks that:
C.T.A.s from lawsuits
Are for compliance with a local/state/federal mandate or regulation
Fulfill byzantine insurer or governmental stipulations so that they can paid for doing their job
Ensure that all of the above t's are crossed and i's are dotted
The remaining 40% is allocated to patients and patient tasks, but is probably subject capitation, or other "cost effectiveness" measures.
Which leads us to the drug company reps, those wonderful marketing guys/gals who weasel their way in in the small slices of time in between all the rest to tell our doctors all about the latest and greatest wonder compound, leave samples of the same, touting how much better life will be for both them and their patients if only they prescribe it on a regular basis.
And you "hope" those health care professionals will make time to read negative study results over listening to a live pretty person who shows up on their door promising positive results.
Mod reply up! That's f*ckin' *funny*!
It's the RIAATithe©.
It's not like we've had any keys lost lately.
Cost of the last major hurricane, $22 billion.
Cost of the existing "martial involvements", $12.3 billion per month.
Cost of the "largest bailout in history", $700 billion.
Silly congress critters who think they still have tax payer funds to fritter away... priceless.
History? You want history? Here's epidemiological history for ya.
Or:
4) They liked the money the Diebold lobbyists contributed to their reelection war chests.
It's been in development "for years" and there's no Apple version?
Blizzard had that from the get-go, so does Spore.
Looks like EA needs to catch a clue, since some estimates of planned purchases of name brand computers now have Mac approaching 30%.
That looks like a potentially large chunk of revenue to be losing out on.
"No one seems to be trying to defend or explain why Internet radio is being hit so much harder than satellite or broadcast."
Why do either, when all that would serve to do is draw attention to the disparity, and invite enough consideration that the real aim become apparent? Which is to strangle a nascent medium in order to have control over it.
Consider FIOS. Massive pipes to the doorstep, geeks rejoice. If anyone had said at that time that Verizon would be getting into the television business most would have snickered, but isn't that what Verizon is now advertising? And AT&T, didn't they run off all the small to medium DSL colocation, only to finally birth U[gh!]-Verse?
Could this be a reason net neutrality be such a hot button issue with the lobbyist set?
This isn't about "paying the artists", it's about supporting dinosaurian business models, control, and another round of vertical integration, with a "Clear Channel of the Web" as the end result.
Try going to multiple Linksys devices (WRT54Gs come to mind) with the same self-signed certificate.
This is what you'll see:
You have received an invalid certificate. Please contact the server administrator or email correspondent and give them the following information:
Your certificate contains the same serial number as another certificate issued by the certificate authority. Please get a new certificate containing a unique serial number.
(Error code: sec_error_reused_issuer_and_serial)
You'll only be able to set up an exception for the first one, the rest of them... so sorry so sad... unless you manually dump the certificate each time.
FF2 did not have this "feature", you could set multiple exceptions and not have to worry about it again.
Total PITA if you're working with residential users.
Or at least they pay the most $$$ to the corrupt politicians who are once again giving our @sses away so they can cling to a position in Washington.
Support college radio, it'll be the last bastion of any real venue variety in very short order.
at the entrance of the Movie Trading Company® where I live.
I had a bad disc from a library loan once, took it there, chatted up one of the staff and they buffed it up to a playable state for free.
I imagine that a small gratuity on your part would go a long way to having a minimal stack done the same way.
Caveat: Do as other posters suggest, first attempt a rip using CDParanoia & EAC, just in case the machine munches the irreplaceable originals (it's known to happen).
Good luck with your project.
Reading the article left me with more of the sense that the author lamented the social aspects of USENET, now supplanted by more glamorous (and ad supported) counterparts.
It's the decline in peering, particularly at the ISP level, due to binaries that he points to as the final nail in the coffin.
While he decries the proliferation of binary traffic as anathema, the last paragraph sums it up thus: "It's hard to completely kill off something as totally decentralized as Usenet; as long as two servers agree to share the NNTP protocol, it'll continue on in some fashion."
And therein lies the truth. As long as some "old schoolers" refuse to be seduced by the web frontends for social ties, or insist on using text to distribute binary materials, you can be sure the USENET will be with us for some time to come, "child safety advocates" notwithstanding.
I plead "No coffee in a fit of pique" for the lapse!
You are correct on both counts, of course. : )