What you describe works only when the people doing it have some scruples. The sites you mention obviously do, they found a different way to support themselves when the ads became annoying to their readers
But, and this is a big but, what would happen when the proffesional AD guys saw this method was an effective way to do buisiness?
At least banner ads are better than a PBS style pledge drive. Think of the fun, every half hour or every 50th hit the sites content gets replaced by a plea for money (this story made possible by viewers like you, please donate so we can continue to bring you banner free news and entertainment)
True enough, my reply was badly worded.
The point I was trying to make was that people think in terms of there being an goal or destination to evolution when there is not, it just happens.
Spot on.
I think that most people are used to seeing the *tree* of evolution that ends with humans at the top and assume that the whole point of the deal was to end up with us.
Thats probably also the reason a lot of people don't like the theory. They just are not happy to find out that we are not the pinnacle of creation, that spot has to go to bacteria since they have been found (thriving) just about everywhere on and in the planet.
Wow these guys are really looking to the future for this stuff. They are not limiting themselves to mere aircraft. They also posted this research about future spacecraft.
They also claim that they have set the world speed record for a chamaign cork (40 km/s) here (bottom)
I already have enough problems with sites that try to detect my browser because I use Opera. What will this do to the people who are using text to speech browsers? Do we really want to cut off access to our web sites to the blind (for example) when specialized browsers are used?
Most of the things they want to do with the latest and greatest browsers are flash and glitter anyway. More time should be spent making the content better and more accessable, not excluding people because they are not using the browser of a sites choice.
Want to make a site look pretty, fine. But seperate the content from the layout, then the content (ie. important bit) is still viewable if a browser does not know what to do with your flashy layout.
Ahh, my little linux box. It seems like I built you only yesterday, and now here you are dating (dataing?)
Hey wait, I did build you yesterday, switch to runlevel 1 now missy your not ready for this yet.
CAST has a tool available for download which will scan entire sites and give a report on it's accessablity.
This could be used to cull the pages that are already acceptable.
Several times in the past when DCMA, copyright, IP, etc... issues have been grumbled about here the point has been raised that Joe Q. Public could care less and does not understand that his rights are being chipped away at.
Well Joe Q. Public understands libraries, if you are looking for a way to explain to someone just how evil some of this stuff is, use this as an example.
Look for any games that are open ended, any game you can't really *win*.
The simulations have been mentioned (SimCity, The Sims) and role playing (D&D, Traveller, Ultima Online, Everquest).
Games that use differnt peoples input to create the outcome like the old mad libs. Or how about simulators like Flight Simulator. No points or scoring, but for many fun.
Hell, I think ding-dong-ditchit even fits.
They had single purpose, easy to use devices years ago. Some were called typewriters.
If you take away the extensibility of computer then you end up with a very frustrating device that is always second guessing your actions (like auto-replace in Office).
The applications should be easy to use, but the OS, at least in my opinion, should not try to hide the machine behind a pretty curtain. I like OSX you can get behind the curtain when you need to.
I have Linux running on my Sony Vaio PCG-F580
(PIII 650, 64Mb RAM, 11Gb HD, Neo Magic MagicMedia256XL+ video card, DVD, Yamaha DS-XG sound)
Setup was easy, the only tweak needed was with X11 and it was well documented here. The Yamaha sound card was not supported when I installed, but it is now. There is an excellent site with information on all sorts of laptop setups here and a HOW-TO at LDP.
This has been out for some time, didn't you see the documentary 'Real Genius'? Apparently the first test firing involved a house filled with popcorn, a real snafu. Hackers were allegedly invloved but this was never proven.
We saw what happened when lawers got ahold of paper ballots during a close election, just imagine what a field day they will have if the voting is done using computers. Many people don't trust computers to begin with, if this system ever gets used the media will have a field day.
I think that the asteroids are a good place to start. To make space exploration commonplace it needs to be made commercially viable. People quickly loose interest in launches that are made for scientific reasons and start demanding that the government stop 'wasting' their tax dollars on it ( look at the later Apollo missions ). But Joe Public is much more willing to spend money on space if they can get rich off it.
The problem with getting rich off planetary exploraiton is that you have to boost the stuff you want back off the surface. That is expensive, but asteroids have very weak gravity wells so getting stuff off them is not much of a problem. If we can get a regular trade in asteroid materials going then it would help develop the interest and technology (and money) needed for planetary exploration.
Let's face it, to us, sending manned missions to Mars sounds like science fiction. But to someone who has spent the last 15 years with the Aacme Asteroid Minning Company it may just be the next step to take to keep your stockholders happy.
We do have to do something about it, but I don't think contacting our congress people will do much in the long run. Joe Public tends to view the open source community as 'hackers', and/or semi dangerous. Since there are more Joe Publics than us, the congress people will tend to listen to the silence from them and give credence to the copy protection schemes.
We need to work on convincing the management at the corporations we work for (or with) that this will impact their bottom lines. We need to stress how much more IT support will cost when ghosting is not an option (or at least all new software will be required). Then the companies will complain, and they have a much better chance of being listened to.
"We follow all the rules and regulations, and we've had full compliance with the law," Nace said, describing the 17 e-mail messages he says he sends over his two T1 lines each second. "All they have to do is say, 'we want off the list,' and they're off."
He even admits he gets nasty phone calls and death threats but still insists this is a good way to advertise. Yep, it sure sounds like he is generating a lot of good will towards his comapny this way. What really gets me is he (and those like him) honestly do not see the problem, he just sees spam as a way to cheaply reach a whole lotta people. So we get to help foot the bill for his advertising.
Other ISPs that spend money for excess capacity to handle the spam e-mail -- up to 40 percent of traffic -- bear the financial burden, a burden eventually passed on to consumers, he said.
Nace takes exception to being called a spammer
This kind of mind set is actually worse than the blatently obvious scams and porn spam since his kind will lobby that his use of unsolicited e-mail is a legitimate and respectable way to do buisiness and should be protected.
This is a win/win (no pun intended)situation for the companies pushing UCITA. They know that the laws if passed would never stand up to challenges in court and would end up being modified. But then the modified versions of the law would have firmer legal ground based on the original court challenges. So by asking for the absurd they are sure to get at least some of the restrictions they want and can build from there.
Slashdot Mirror
You can get the ODBC drivers here
and we thought they were fools for giving a $1000 dollars for each forward, they were just testing BETA.
But, and this is a big but, what would happen when the proffesional AD guys saw this method was an effective way to do buisiness?
The point I was trying to make was that people think in terms of there being an goal or destination to evolution when there is not, it just happens.
I think that most people are used to seeing the *tree* of evolution that ends with humans at the top and assume that the whole point of the deal was to end up with us.
Thats probably also the reason a lot of people don't like the theory. They just are not happy to find out that we are not the pinnacle of creation, that spot has to go to bacteria since they have been found (thriving) just about everywhere on and in the planet.
They also claim that they have set the world speed record for a chamaign cork (40 km/s) here (bottom)
Most of the things they want to do with the latest and greatest browsers are flash and glitter anyway. More time should be spent making the content better and more accessable, not excluding people because they are not using the browser of a sites choice.
Want to make a site look pretty, fine. But seperate the content from the layout, then the content (ie. important bit) is still viewable if a browser does not know what to do with your flashy layout.
Prognosticator to the geeks
Hey wait, I did build you yesterday, switch to runlevel 1 now missy your not ready for this yet.
"....landing a man made object on a rocky body or a plurality of bodies which are affected by the gravity of the earth [terra]."
They are also objecting to the use of their symbol R in asteroid, so to comply news outlets should report: Near lands on asteoid
This could be used to cull the pages that are already acceptable.
If there is ever a RMS look-alike contest, I win.
Don't know if I should be happy or not
Well Joe Q. Public understands libraries, if you are looking for a way to explain to someone just how evil some of this stuff is, use this as an example.
The simulations have been mentioned (SimCity, The Sims) and role playing (D&D, Traveller, Ultima Online, Everquest).
Games that use differnt peoples input to create the outcome like the old mad libs. Or how about simulators like Flight Simulator. No points or scoring, but for many fun.
Hell, I think ding-dong-ditchit even fits.
If you take away the extensibility of computer then you end up with a very frustrating device that is always second guessing your actions (like auto-replace in Office).
The applications should be easy to use, but the OS, at least in my opinion, should not try to hide the machine behind a pretty curtain. I like OSX you can get behind the curtain when you need to.
(PIII 650, 64Mb RAM, 11Gb HD, Neo Magic MagicMedia256XL+ video card, DVD, Yamaha DS-XG sound)
Setup was easy, the only tweak needed was with X11 and it was well documented here. The Yamaha sound card was not supported when I installed, but it is now.
There is an excellent site with information on all sorts of laptop setups here and a HOW-TO at LDP.
At least it will be a fun ride.
The problem with getting rich off planetary exploraiton is that you have to boost the stuff you want back off the surface. That is expensive, but asteroids have very weak gravity wells so getting stuff off them is not much of a problem. If we can get a regular trade in asteroid materials going then it would help develop the interest and technology (and money) needed for planetary exploration.
Let's face it, to us, sending manned missions to Mars sounds like science fiction. But to someone who has spent the last 15 years with the Aacme Asteroid Minning Company it may just be the next step to take to keep your stockholders happy.
We need to work on convincing the management at the corporations we work for (or with) that this will impact their bottom lines. We need to stress how much more IT support will cost when ghosting is not an option (or at least all new software will be required). Then the companies will complain, and they have a much better chance of being listened to.
He even admits he gets nasty phone calls and death threats but still insists this is a good way to advertise. Yep, it sure sounds like he is generating a lot of good will towards his comapny this way. What really gets me is he (and those like him) honestly do not see the problem, he just sees spam as a way to cheaply reach a whole lotta people. So we get to help foot the bill for his advertising .
Other ISPs that spend money for excess capacity to handle the spam e-mail -- up to 40 percent of traffic -- bear the financial burden, a burden eventually passed on to consumers, he said.
Nace takes exception to being called a spammer
This kind of mind set is actually worse than the blatently obvious scams and porn spam since his kind will lobby that his use of unsolicited e-mail is a legitimate and respectable way to do buisiness and should be protected.
This is a win/win (no pun intended)situation for the companies pushing UCITA. They know that the laws if passed would never stand up to challenges in court and would end up being modified. But then the modified versions of the law would have firmer legal ground based on the original court challenges. So by asking for the absurd they are sure to get at least some of the restrictions they want and can build from there.
Seems I have read about this before. A mouse guiding humans, after a long search, to the question to the answer of life, the universe and everything.