You might be happy to hear that Yiddish is alive and well, if you know where to look.
In the secular Jewish world, there is more and more interest in the revival of Yiddish literature, theater, etc. Yiddish clubs are still popular among senior citizens and you might even be able to take a class through your local Jewish community center.
Yiddish is also still an important language in the Orthodox world, both in the yeshivas and among the Chassidim. While the American yeshivas primarily use English, many venerable scholars in the US and Israel speak Yiddish, so it's sort of a common language used among scholars.
And in the major Chassidic communities in America, there are tens of thousands of American-born people who speak Yiddish as their primary language, believe it or not.
I don't think Yiddish will become extinct, simply because it's such a great language for expressing certain ideas, as evidenced by the many Yiddish words that have become part of American English. However, I think that it will be more spoken and not written, so many people won't be able to read it. Today you mostly see Yiddish written in English instead of Yiddish characters.
Re:Authors Website with some examples from the boo
on
Google Hacks
·
· Score: 1
You can also read Rael Dornfest's blog. He is the author of the very cool blosxom app.
Sounds like the benefits of viewing stories before the/. effect kicks in only apply if there is a small number of subscribers. The more subscribers, the more slashdotting a link takes even before the story goes live. If the goal is to have everyone subscribe, then you just wind up with a pre-/. effect. So the more subscribers, the less incentive to subscribe. Or something like that.
There seems to be a lot of disagreement between spammers and their victims on what exactly is "spam". Lots of spammers claim that it's not spam as long as [it's not commercial | it's not porn | I bought an opt-in list | etc]. Some users don't mind diet pill ads but hate herbal viagra.
What do you consider spam? Is it unsolicited commercial email? Unsolicited bulk email? What about chain letters forwarded to you by your Aunt Ethel? Any successful legal solution will depend on a good definition.
I tend to have a lot more trouble with my mouse in terms of repetetive stress.
What I'd love is a mouse that's shaped like a pen. Here's how my dream mouse would work: you would grip it like a pen, click the buttons with your forefinger and thumb and make a simple drawing motion on the mouse pad to move the cursor. To select, you would hold down the button and draw like you were using a highlighter to highlight text in a book. It seems to me that the motions of writing are much more natural than any mouse or trackball I've ever used, and also more intuitive.
It's such a simple thing that I'm sure someone has made one already, but I haven't been able to find it. Has anyone ever seen a mouse like this?
Re:hmm... I wonder if it will be kosher...
on
Lab-Grown Steak
·
· Score: 2
IANAR and the following is not to be taken as a religious ruling. It's just my own speculation.
From the article it sounds like the meat is grown from samples taken from an actual animal. If the grown meat could be considered a derivative of the original meat, as with any other food derivative, than it might be kosher. But if the original was not kosher then the derivative may not be kosher.
Food technology is very complex, as are the kosher laws, so check with your Rabbi.
I got a spam that asked me to go to change-ebay.com because some fraud was suspected with my ebay account. The email was obviously a spam, since it wasn't even sent to the address I used on ebay.
Pinged change-ebay.com, and it resolved to an address that was obviously not ebay. The site was an exact copy of the ebay login page. Looked at the source code of the site, and it was a form that, on submit, emailed the ebay username and password to some scam artist and then forwarded the user to the real ebay home page.
I notified ebay through their tech support form and the scam site was down within hours. Not a word of thanks or warning posted from ebay though. They're probably dealing with hundreds of these scams.
The Linux Cookbook: Tips and Techniques for Everyday Use
by Michael Stutz
PART ONE: Working With Linux # Introduction # What Every Linux User Knows # The Shell # The X Window System
PART TWO: Files # Files and Directories # Sharing Files # Finding Files # Managing Files
PART THREE: Text # Viewing Text # Text Editing # Grammar and Reference # Analyzing Text # Formatting Text # Searching Text # Typesetting and Word Processing # Fonts
"Ode to Joy" is a poem written by Schiller. Beethoven used the poem as the lyrics for the fourth movement of the symphony, which is the choral section and most famous part of the symphony. The symphony also has three other movements, so it's not really accurate to refer to the whole symphony no. 9 as "Ode to Joy."
</pedantry>
Phew. Now that's off my chest, you can continue about your business.
Anyone remember when AOL used to send out floppy disks? I got through my last few years of college without having to buy floppies, because I got them free from AOL. Now those were useful.
Yes, the point of trademark laws is to protect the name consumers have come to know a product by. Thus, it should protect Phoenix (Mozilla) before Phoenix Technologies, as most consumers know of Phoenix (Mozilla) but have never heard of Phoenix Technologies.
Huh? Are you actually saying that the USPTO should award trademarks to the more popular|bigger|more powerful guy regardless of who had the product name first?
Try substituting the name of your favorite Big Corporation for "Phoenix" in that statement and see if you still agree with it. Just for fun, lets try, oh I don't know, "Warner".
Thus, it should protect Warner (Time Warner) before Warner Technologies, as most consumers know of Warner (Time Warner) but have never heard of Warner Technologies.
How does that sound now?
So let me emend the previous statement: the point of trademark laws is to protect the name consumers will come to know a product by. That makes more sense, since names are usually trademarked when they are first used, before anyone has heard of them.
You think that two companies shouldn't be allowed to have names that sound alike, such as "Widget" and "Blodget"?
No, I was suggesting that people will contact the company called "Widget" about a product called "Widget" even if the product "Widget" is made by a company called "Blodget". I guess this wasn't clear enough from the dialogue, but I guarantee that many people who've worked in the tech support trenches have had conversations like that.
Like I said, trademarks should benefit the consumer. Many of us have come to know Phoenix (Mozilla) by that name. Now Phoenix Technologies wants them to rename it. That will only confuse people who want to download Phoenix (Mozilla). So, how is this helping the consumer?
Um, isn't that the point of trademarks? To protect the name that consumers have come to know a product by?
Anyway, it's most likely the Phoenix Technologies people are annoyed because people have been going to their site to download Phoenix, or calling their tech support line for support. I like the Phoenix browser and it's a pain if they have to change the name. My point was that it's better to have a unique name, regardless of trademark laws.
If what you're proposing would be allowed, I'd still make sure that no one else in my industry is using my product name. Differentiation is a Good Thing.
If it's within the same industry, people will get confused. Trust me on this. If you've ever had to handle tech support calls from irate users demanding support for a product made by a different company, you know how frustrating that can be.
"I'm sorry sir, but you'll need to contact Widget Internet. We're Blodget Technologies." "But it says here on your web site that you provide support for Widget." "Sir, if you're having problems with your Internet service, than you need to contact your service provider." "That's not you? Your web site says that you provide computer connections." *sigh* "I'm sorry for the confusion, sir. The Widget that we support is a product that connects two computers, but that's a very different thing from an ISP like Widget Internet." etc., etc.
Kitchen computing was also discussed
here. Lots of interesting ideas here.
I'd still love to have a kitchen system that would combine a recipe database, grocery list, ingredients inventory, meal planning programs, etc. The individual components all exist, but I don't know of any project that has linked them all together. A console like that in the kitchen would be wonderful.
This is a great book about the Macarthur fellows and the fellowship program, and about creative thinking in general. It contains a series of interviews with forty fellows and tries to understand how they get their ideas.
But if you want to lobby, good luck. The Macarthur process is set up to prevent lobbying. The nominees are secretly chosen by a secret group of nominaters drawn from a diverse group of people noted in their fields. The best way to get a Macarthur grant is to be known in your field for doing good, interesting work. So I think that Linus or Larry Wall actually have a good chance to get one, one of these years.
don't belong to a party (although I guess that means I can vote in any primary)
Yeah, that would be nice wouldn't it? Unfortunately, I'm pretty sure that you can only vote in a primary if you're a registered member of the party. Maybe they'll let you change your registration, but probably not in time for the primary.
You might want to change and belong to a party, especially if you live in a district that is heavily Democratic or Republican. Where I live, the Democratic primary is the election and if you aren't registered Democrat you're basically throwing away your vote. Sad but true.
Ya know, if you want to change laws, signing petitions addressed to "The United States Government" is not the way to do it. The US is a representative democracy. Write letters to your congress people, talk to them about your issues, and, for crying out loud, primary elections are Tues. Sept. 10. Vote, people, VOTE!
``Free source software has a long history of playing catch-up to proprietary software.''
Just curious: why do you disagree with this statement? As others have noted, the majority of open source software is described as "an open source version of [insert proprietary software name here]". Even GNU was meant to be a free replacement for Unix.
The current GPL is full of legalese because the FSF's lawyers go over it with a fine tooth comb. You're probably right that they wouldn't want to change the language.
But it makes the GPL so much easier to understand, doesn't it? If the FSF doesn't like it, why doesn't the writer submit it to the OSI as a new license? I'd use it.
Slashdot Mirror
You might be happy to hear that Yiddish is alive and well, if you know where to look.
In the secular Jewish world, there is more and more interest in the revival of Yiddish literature, theater, etc. Yiddish clubs are still popular among senior citizens and you might even be able to take a class through your local Jewish community center.Yiddish is also still an important language in the Orthodox world, both in the yeshivas and among the Chassidim. While the American yeshivas primarily use English, many venerable scholars in the US and Israel speak Yiddish, so it's sort of a common language used among scholars.
And in the major Chassidic communities in America, there are tens of thousands of American-born people who speak Yiddish as their primary language, believe it or not.
I don't think Yiddish will become extinct, simply because it's such a great language for expressing certain ideas, as evidenced by the many Yiddish words that have become part of American English. However, I think that it will be more spoken and not written, so many people won't be able to read it. Today you mostly see Yiddish written in English instead of Yiddish characters.
You can also read Rael Dornfest's blog. He is the author of the very cool blosxom app.
Sounds like the benefits of viewing stories before the /. effect kicks in only apply if there is a small number of subscribers. The more subscribers, the more slashdotting a link takes even before the story goes live. If the goal is to have everyone subscribe, then you just wind up with a pre-/. effect. So the more subscribers, the less incentive to subscribe. Or something like that.
There seems to be a lot of disagreement between spammers and their victims on what exactly is "spam". Lots of spammers claim that it's not spam as long as [it's not commercial | it's not porn | I bought an opt-in list | etc]. Some users don't mind diet pill ads but hate herbal viagra.
What do you consider spam? Is it unsolicited commercial email? Unsolicited bulk email? What about chain letters forwarded to you by your Aunt Ethel? Any successful legal solution will depend on a good definition.
What platform will he run on?
*GROAN*
That looks very promising! They're marketing it for graphics use, though. How is it with text? Copy and paste, etc?
What I'd love is a mouse that's shaped like a pen. Here's how my dream mouse would work: you would grip it like a pen, click the buttons with your forefinger and thumb and make a simple drawing motion on the mouse pad to move the cursor. To select, you would hold down the button and draw like you were using a highlighter to highlight text in a book. It seems to me that the motions of writing are much more natural than any mouse or trackball I've ever used, and also more intuitive.
It's such a simple thing that I'm sure someone has made one already, but I haven't been able to find it. Has anyone ever seen a mouse like this?
From the article it sounds like the meat is grown from samples taken from an actual animal. If the grown meat could be considered a derivative of the original meat, as with any other food derivative, than it might be kosher. But if the original was not kosher then the derivative may not be kosher.
Food technology is very complex, as are the kosher laws, so check with your Rabbi.
I got a spam that asked me to go to change-ebay.com because some fraud was suspected with my ebay account. The email was obviously a spam, since it wasn't even sent to the address I used on ebay.
Pinged change-ebay.com, and it resolved to an address that was obviously not ebay. The site was an exact copy of the ebay login page. Looked at the source code of the site, and it was a form that, on submit, emailed the ebay username and password to some scam artist and then forwarded the user to the real ebay home page.
I notified ebay through their tech support form and the scam site was down within hours. Not a word of thanks or warning posted from ebay though. They're probably dealing with hundreds of these scams.
"Ode to Joy" is a poem written by Schiller. Beethoven used the poem as the lyrics for the fourth movement of the symphony, which is the choral section and most famous part of the symphony. The symphony also has three other movements, so it's not really accurate to refer to the whole symphony no. 9 as "Ode to Joy."
</pedantry>
Phew. Now that's off my chest, you can continue about your business.Anyone remember when AOL used to send out floppy disks? I got through my last few years of college without having to buy floppies, because I got them free from AOL. Now those were useful.
Huh? Are you actually saying that the USPTO should award trademarks to the more popular|bigger|more powerful guy regardless of who had the product name first?
Try substituting the name of your favorite Big Corporation for "Phoenix" in that statement and see if you still agree with it. Just for fun, lets try, oh I don't know, "Warner".
How does that sound now?So let me emend the previous statement: the point of trademark laws is to protect the name consumers will come to know a product by. That makes more sense, since names are usually trademarked when they are first used, before anyone has heard of them.
No, I was suggesting that people will contact the company called "Widget" about a product called "Widget" even if the product "Widget" is made by a company called "Blodget". I guess this wasn't clear enough from the dialogue, but I guarantee that many people who've worked in the tech support trenches have had conversations like that.
Um, isn't that the point of trademarks? To protect the name that consumers have come to know a product by?
Anyway, it's most likely the Phoenix Technologies people are annoyed because people have been going to their site to download Phoenix, or calling their tech support line for support. I like the Phoenix browser and it's a pain if they have to change the name. My point was that it's better to have a unique name, regardless of trademark laws.
If it's within the same industry, people will get confused. Trust me on this. If you've ever had to handle tech support calls from irate users demanding support for a product made by a different company, you know how frustrating that can be.
"I'm sorry sir, but you'll need to contact Widget Internet. We're Blodget Technologies."
"But it says here on your web site that you provide support for Widget."
"Sir, if you're having problems with your Internet service, than you need to contact your service provider."
"That's not you? Your web site says that you provide computer connections."
*sigh* "I'm sorry for the confusion, sir. The Widget that we support is a product that connects two computers, but that's a very different thing from an ISP like Widget Internet."
etc., etc.
I'd still love to have a kitchen system that would combine a recipe database, grocery list, ingredients inventory, meal planning programs, etc. The individual components all exist, but I don't know of any project that has linked them all together. A console like that in the kitchen would be wonderful.
Funny you mention that on the same day that the New York Times does an article about Slashdot. Gotta admit, /. is becoming more mainstream everyday.
This is a great book about the Macarthur fellows and the fellowship program, and about creative thinking in general. It contains a series of interviews with forty fellows and tries to understand how they get their ideas.
Anyone want to write a /. review?
But if you want to lobby, good luck. The Macarthur process is set up to prevent lobbying. The nominees are secretly chosen by a secret group of nominaters drawn from a diverse group of people noted in their fields. The best way to get a Macarthur grant is to be known in your field for doing good, interesting work. So I think that Linus or Larry Wall actually have a good chance to get one, one of these years.
Yeah, that would be nice wouldn't it? Unfortunately, I'm pretty sure that you can only vote in a primary if you're a registered member of the party. Maybe they'll let you change your registration, but probably not in time for the primary.
You might want to change and belong to a party, especially if you live in a district that is heavily Democratic or Republican. Where I live, the Democratic primary is the election and if you aren't registered Democrat you're basically throwing away your vote. Sad but true.
Ya know, if you want to change laws, signing petitions addressed to "The United States Government" is not the way to do it. The US is a representative democracy. Write letters to your congress people, talk to them about your issues, and, for crying out loud, primary elections are Tues. Sept. 10. Vote, people, VOTE!
And it could even work without the DOJ step. Linux inherits the earth because Linux is just better :).
"The GNU Project was launched in 1984 to develop a complete Unix-like operating system..."
I think that RMS named it GNU's Not Unix to make sure no one would get confused.
Just curious: why do you disagree with this statement? As others have noted, the majority of open source software is described as "an open source version of [insert proprietary software name here]". Even GNU was meant to be a free replacement for Unix.
But it makes the GPL so much easier to understand, doesn't it? If the FSF doesn't like it, why doesn't the writer submit it to the OSI as a new license? I'd use it.