You asked a question. I answered it. I didn't provide any endorsment of their system nor praise it as a viable business model.
That aside, many of the.torrent site operators who do ask for 'donations' do seem to get some. Obviously not from you. Definately not from me -- but unless they are lying, my answer would me "Yes, I do think (some) people actually donate money".
If you frequented many of the torrent sites, you'd see many 'beg' for 'donations' to help pay connectivity costs -- or to upgrade that pesky server that always seems to be going down. Just click of the friendly PayPal link right in the corner. Isn't it easy?
As for a "grift", if you can operate a computer, I'm sure you can operate a dictionary.
I recall 'back in the day(tm)' several email services which you could send an email with a URL in the subject and it would return the web page to you in a reply (a -la a lynx like format). That was -- what? 10 years ago?
I've used 19k, 14.4k and even 4800 baud modems to connect to the net and browsed comfortably. Something as simple as unchecking the box [DOWNLOAD GRAPHICS] (or whatever setting your browser uses) will accomplish this.
What kind of 'slowness' are we taking here? 110 baud?
How many Lexmark inkjet printers will be around in a decade? How many ink cartridges could you go through in that time?
I'm no fan of Lexmark, but I must admit I have a Lexmark 2050 which I got back in 1996 -- and it's still running fine. Not quite 10 years, but it's coming up quick. Unlike newer cartidges by them, these are easily refillable. And I do so quite often at very little cost.
That said, if I didn't have access to a Canon IR5000 and Canon IR3200 (color laser) at work, I'd replace this thing in a heart beat.
keeping VHF for the time being and killing off UHF? I can still see VHF TV being handy for EBS (or whatever they are calling it now) -- not to mention in many urban areas, broadcast TV works fine and is a good backup when cable TV is out and/or for portable TVs (Sony Watchman).
Could be fun to open UHF to the public for amature low power broadcasts for a while, too.
I know what you are trying to reference, but you are totally missing the point. The reason why the penalties are so great is the absolute danger to the US economy 'funny money' represents. Bilking a few thousand employees is bad -- but no where near as bad as a complete collapse of a nations economy (US or otherwise).
That said, there should be MUST stiffer penalties for corporate fraud.
I agree -- At least on general principle. I think we differ on degree.
I would suggest that if the water heater problem were noted before any real damage took place and the home owner was notified of the problem and it was corrected, then you are absolutly right. If, however, the damage already occured, or took place AFTER the home owner KNEW of the problem and failed to take care of it in a timely manner (what ever 'timely' means), then they should be liable.
The same should hold true for misconfigured servers. Notification when possible -- held responsible for damages when not. Of course, you suggest a "few" unsolicited emails are nothing to get our panties in a bunch about and I agree -- if however we are talking about a huge volume where significate resources are necessary to deal with the issue...
NASA's budget is around 14 billion USD/year. A healthy chunk of that goes to administration and payrol. Most NASA projects are on a shoe-string budget -- whatever money this project gets will most likely be at the expense of others.
Wouldn't it be his responsibility to make sure it's not misconfigured beforehand? Wouldn't I be open a lawsuit if I poorly installed a waterheater in my house which ended up flooding my neighbors basement? Surely I couldn't say "Sorry -- I didn't know that valve was open", could I?
How did the United States become a democracy? Because Spain decided that its rights were being violated, marched in, and set up a puppet government, along with installing a forced set of Spanish values and exploiting US natural resources?
How is is that Japan becaome a democracy? Because the US marched in, set up a puppet government, installed a forced set of western values?
The US has a far darker history of racial problems than most nations do.
I really take issues with these et tu falacies. The US has a history of racial problems -- it also has a history of correcting them.
And a "far" darker history than "most" nations"? Please. American's are pikers compaired to what the europeans did to africa, india, the middle east. Africa alone has such a dirty history of tribal issues and slavery -- unfortunately, by 'history' here, we mean last week.
Just give me a break. Because someone once owned a gun doesn't mean they cant EVER speak up about gun-control.
My only advice is when forming opinion, avoid equivication.
How can a country with an abominable human-rights record and the world's largest stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction, not to mention a nasty habit of invading places and seriously fucking them up, call any country "unfriendly" or "just plain mean"?
Human-Rights violations? At least CITE some examples and provide some type of comparison to declare it "abominable". Kind of hard to debate 'pot shots'.
Why is it an issue that the US has stockpiles of WMDs? Doesn't the UN address this and attempt to keep other countries from aquiring/developing them?
"...nasty habit of invading places and seriously fucking them up"... yeah. Like France, Germany and Japan. BOY they are hurting, huh?
You mean this? You need to learn what a General Assembly resolution is before you try and make that arguement. It's not valid. There's a difference between a GA resoltion and the NPT. At least take the time to LEARN how the UN works (or fails to work) before you post.
As an American, I say "what fucking business is it of ours?" Not a single one of the so-called 'threats to national security' is any threat at all, if we just mind our own goddamned business and stop trying to impose a 'Pax Americana' on the rest of the world.
I wish I lived in a world as simple as yours. I truly do.
However, as an American, I agree with you. America as an empire a bad idea. But America does have and will look out for it's interests -- so long as the American people want us to. Just as every other country looks out for it's interests. Why should the US be different?
Yay! I love equivocation! Like painting a 'hitler' mustache on GW! BOY, that was FUN! And we ALL know that GW is starving countless americans, has his own torture chamber, diging mass graves outside the whitehouse mall. Yah! equivocation is such FUN!
Do me a favor. Read the UN charter on nuclear proliferation -- THEN comment about why the US has nukes and why North Korea shouldn't. Jeez.
Ignoring* a "evil" country/regime/place worked fine in the case of USA vs. Soviet Union.
Yeah. We ignored them. Sure.
Ever hear of the Cuban Missle Crisis? We had a gun on their temple for over 40 years -- and they had one on ours.
We did EVERYTHING we could to force them in to economic ruin. "Ignoring" was never an option.
Cuba: Castro still rules...Do I really need to say more?
Yeah. Say more. Like the part where Cuba suffers from such an economic burden that it can in no way be a threat to the US.
Iraq: 600000 childrens dead under the sanctions; didn't work, Instead they strnghtened Saddams regime.
While luxury palaces were built and funds skimmed off the "oil for food" programs. Yeah, that was the USs fault. It did do quite a bit to keep them from rebuilding their miltary to any great degree.
Libia: I would call it even. Sanctions have crippled their economy, but Ghadaffi still in power.
See Cuba.
But what I don't like about about your rethoric is that you try to limit the possible actions USA can take against other countries into two possibillities
Then you missed my point. I said AFTER diplomacy fails. What I dont like about YOUR rethoric is that diplomacy seems to be the ONLY option. It's not.
When you do that, you and everyone following your rhetoric fail to see that there are other options; such as trying to work out a deal trough UN.
And the UN is so good at working things out, huh? There's a huge number of dead in Rwanda, the Balkens, Ivory Coast, etc... that might disagree with you -- were they alive to voice their opinion. The UN is a good place to TRY and work out deals, but it's not the END of the road when it fails.
12 years of the UN unwillingness to either hard pressure Iraq or otherwise force Iraq to disarm should be a CLEAR example of this. 17 resolutions... 17. A piece of paper doesn't do anything to destroy poison gas -- but 250,000 highly armed soldiers sure do.
Put up with the sanctimonious, self-centered, illegally invading arrogance because you have no choice.
Be careful what you wish for. America provides more in economic aid, more in trade, more in technology than the rest of the world combined. If we leave 'the rest of (you) the fuck alone', who's going to fill that void? Because TREATIES work BOTH ways. It's not the USs job to look after the interests of the world BEFORE ITS OWN INTERESTS. Neither is it the job of ANY OTHER government to look after the USs interest before theirs. Instead, the decided to look to line their own pockets with iraqi oil. "Money for Food Program". Yeah, right.
You say "sanctimony". I say "charity", "grants", "loans", "imbalanced trade".
You say "self-centered". I say "self interest". Is it self centered to try and make sure we come out on top whenever possible? Who would deliberatly sabotage themselves?
You say "illegally invading". Read the cease fire agreement from the first Gulf war. I don't need a note from my local police chief to cross the street, nor did the US need the UN to sanction what the US did. Maybe if the French, Germans, Chinese and Russians put as much PRESSURE on IRAQ to comply with the previous 17 SANCTIONS, the WAR wouldn't have been necessary. UN? Please. It's the League of Nations II.
Diplomacy *IS* the use of pressure. And if you believe that anyone in a position to make policy in the listed nations are "...truely socially conscious persons caring that the world is a better place for every one", I have no idea what to say to you.
Apartheid? Communism?
There are too many examples where diplomatic and economic pressure worked. Sometimes the other 'guys' don't give a rats ass about our 'express(ing) our own problems'. When they do, diplomacy works. When they don't, you move on to something that *DOES* work.
How about a network security specialist with the medical field in mind? You'll not only need to have good tech skills, but you'll need to be familiar with the paperwork and documenting necessary to keep your employeer HIPAA compliant -- you'll also need to understand all the various regulatory and licencing boards you'll need to comply with (CAP, HIPAA to name a few). As a net/sys admin of a medium sized medical lab, my skills have been in great demand lately. I'm unable to sub-contract to competing labs (gentleman's agreement between me and my current boss), but I can and DO take contract work for dr's offices (vision, dental and medical).
You need to remember, many of the potential employeers out there have little or NO tech experience. They are going on faith that you know what you say you know. However, if you ALSO possess skills they need and *DO* understand, you'll fair a lot better. (unfortunately, it means customizing resumes for each potential employeer).
It accumulates on the slider bars of printers causing more frequent head-jams and can coat the paper feeder rubber making it less 'tacky'. Also, smoke can accumulate on and shorten the life of PC fans.
Both these occur over time and might not be directly attributed to the fan/paper feeder/whatever failure. Just a contributing factor.
re: carbon sinks: The data I've read is anywhere from 1.5-2 billion tons per year absorbed to as little as 350-700 million tons absorbed. The US produces about 1.3-1.5 billion tons per year.
Sources -- I wish I could find a link to a Princton study done in 1998 -- but there's a newer study which lists the 350-700 million tons absorbed figure for the carbon sinks and references the original study. Google for 'united states carbon sink' and you'll find it.
SOOOO... I wouldn't say I have 'no data whatsoever'. I would say that the data available is still incomplete or 100% accurate but certainly indicates that a significate percentage(and possibly all) carbon produced in the US is reabsorbed.
ps, if I'm 20 million in the hole, I'm broke. I might have some cool stories to tell of my spending days, but I'm broke.
The problem with advocating doing nothing since we really know very little about climate change (while true) is that we're not really doing nothing, we're continuing to grow our emissions.
Why do you assume since the US is against Kyoto that wants to do nothing? How about trying to find what the US policy IS on attempting to reduce emissions? HINT: it's not 'do nothing'.
You also suggest that any economic hardships will be minor -- I seriously question that.
Slashdot Mirror
You asked a question. I answered it. I didn't provide any endorsment of their system nor praise it as a viable business model.
.torrent site operators who do ask for 'donations' do seem to get some. Obviously not from you. Definately not from me -- but unless they are lying, my answer would me "Yes, I do think (some) people actually donate money".
That aside, many of the
-jhon
If you frequented many of the torrent sites, you'd see many 'beg' for 'donations' to help pay connectivity costs -- or to upgrade that pesky server that always seems to be going down. Just click of the friendly PayPal link right in the corner. Isn't it easy?
As for a "grift", if you can operate a computer, I'm sure you can operate a dictionary.
Looking for a problem.
I recall 'back in the day(tm)' several email services which you could send an email with a URL in the subject and it would return the web page to you in a reply (a -la a lynx like format). That was -- what? 10 years ago?
I've used 19k, 14.4k and even 4800 baud modems to connect to the net and browsed comfortably. Something as simple as unchecking the box [DOWNLOAD GRAPHICS] (or whatever setting your browser uses) will accomplish this.
What kind of 'slowness' are we taking here? 110 baud?
-jhon
That said, if I didn't have access to a Canon IR5000 and Canon IR3200 (color laser) at work, I'd replace this thing in a heart beat.
-jhon
keeping VHF for the time being and killing off UHF? I can still see VHF TV being handy for EBS (or whatever they are calling it now) -- not to mention in many urban areas, broadcast TV works fine and is a good backup when cable TV is out and/or for portable TVs (Sony Watchman).
Could be fun to open UHF to the public for amature low power broadcasts for a while, too.
I know what you are trying to reference, but you are totally missing the point. The reason why the penalties are so great is the absolute danger to the US economy 'funny money' represents. Bilking a few thousand employees is bad -- but no where near as bad as a complete collapse of a nations economy (US or otherwise).
That said, there should be MUST stiffer penalties for corporate fraud.
I agree -- At least on general principle. I think we differ on degree.
I would suggest that if the water heater problem were noted before any real damage took place and the home owner was notified of the problem and it was corrected, then you are absolutly right. If, however, the damage already occured, or took place AFTER the home owner KNEW of the problem and failed to take care of it in a timely manner (what ever 'timely' means), then they should be liable.
The same should hold true for misconfigured servers. Notification when possible -- held responsible for damages when not. Of course, you suggest a "few" unsolicited emails are nothing to get our panties in a bunch about and I agree -- if however we are talking about a huge volume where significate resources are necessary to deal with the issue...
NASA's budget is around 14 billion USD/year. A healthy chunk of that goes to administration and payrol. Most NASA projects are on a shoe-string budget -- whatever money this project gets will most likely be at the expense of others.
14 billion might sound like a lot, but it's not.
Wouldn't it be his responsibility to make sure it's not misconfigured beforehand? Wouldn't I be open a lawsuit if I poorly installed a waterheater in my house which ended up flooding my neighbors basement? Surely I couldn't say "Sorry -- I didn't know that valve was open", could I?
-jhon
You glue a dime, a nickle and three pennies together with crazy glue. Not many vending machines take them, though -- they are kind of thick.
Oh yeah. It did.
And a "far" darker history than "most" nations"? Please. American's are pikers compaired to what the europeans did to africa, india, the middle east. Africa alone has such a dirty history of tribal issues and slavery -- unfortunately, by 'history' here, we mean last week.
Just give me a break. Because someone once owned a gun doesn't mean they cant EVER speak up about gun-control.
My only advice is when forming opinion, avoid equivication.
Why is it an issue that the US has stockpiles of WMDs? Doesn't the UN address this and attempt to keep other countries from aquiring/developing them?
"...nasty habit of invading places and seriously fucking them up"... yeah. Like France, Germany and Japan. BOY they are hurting, huh?
You mean this? You need to learn what a General Assembly resolution is before you try and make that arguement. It's not valid. There's a difference between a GA resoltion and the NPT. At least take the time to LEARN how the UN works (or fails to work) before you post.
However, as an American, I agree with you. America as an empire a bad idea. But America does have and will look out for it's interests -- so long as the American people want us to. Just as every other country looks out for it's interests. Why should the US be different?
Yay! I love equivocation! Like painting a 'hitler' mustache on GW! BOY, that was FUN! And we ALL know that GW is starving countless americans, has his own torture chamber, diging mass graves outside the whitehouse mall. Yah! equivocation is such FUN!
Do me a favor. Read the UN charter on nuclear proliferation -- THEN comment about why the US has nukes and why North Korea shouldn't. Jeez.
Ever hear of the Cuban Missle Crisis? We had a gun on their temple for over 40 years -- and they had one on ours.
We did EVERYTHING we could to force them in to economic ruin. "Ignoring" was never an option.
Yeah. Say more. Like the part where Cuba suffers from such an economic burden that it can in no way be a threat to the US.While luxury palaces were built and funds skimmed off the "oil for food" programs. Yeah, that was the USs fault. It did do quite a bit to keep them from rebuilding their miltary to any great degree.See Cuba.Then you missed my point. I said AFTER diplomacy fails. What I dont like about YOUR rethoric is that diplomacy seems to be the ONLY option. It's not.And the UN is so good at working things out, huh? There's a huge number of dead in Rwanda, the Balkens, Ivory Coast, etc... that might disagree with you -- were they alive to voice their opinion. The UN is a good place to TRY and work out deals, but it's not the END of the road when it fails.
12 years of the UN unwillingness to either hard pressure Iraq or otherwise force Iraq to disarm should be a CLEAR example of this. 17 resolutions... 17. A piece of paper doesn't do anything to destroy poison gas -- but 250,000 highly armed soldiers sure do.
You say "sanctimony". I say "charity", "grants", "loans", "imbalanced trade".
You say "self-centered". I say "self interest". Is it self centered to try and make sure we come out on top whenever possible? Who would deliberatly sabotage themselves?
You say "illegally invading". Read the cease fire agreement from the first Gulf war. I don't need a note from my local police chief to cross the street, nor did the US need the UN to sanction what the US did. Maybe if the French, Germans, Chinese and Russians put as much PRESSURE on IRAQ to comply with the previous 17 SANCTIONS, the WAR wouldn't have been necessary. UN? Please. It's the League of Nations II.
"Arrogance"? Jeez.
Diplomacy *IS* the use of pressure. And if you believe that anyone in a position to make policy in the listed nations are "...truely socially conscious persons caring that the world is a better place for every one", I have no idea what to say to you.
Apartheid? Communism?
There are too many examples where diplomatic and economic pressure worked. Sometimes the other 'guys' don't give a rats ass about our 'express(ing) our own problems'. When they do, diplomacy works. When they don't, you move on to something that *DOES* work.
There are three basic ways you can deal with a country that is unfriendly or just plain mean -- once diplomatic pressure fails.
(1) Ignore them (Has little effect al la China)
(2) Sanctions (Cuba, Iraq, Libia)
(3) War
Do you have any suggestions? Remember, "dealing" with people goes both ways. All the worlds problems aren't the fault of the US.
How about a network security specialist with the medical field in mind? You'll not only need to have good tech skills, but you'll need to be familiar with the paperwork and documenting necessary to keep your employeer HIPAA compliant -- you'll also need to understand all the various regulatory and licencing boards you'll need to comply with (CAP, HIPAA to name a few). As a net/sys admin of a medium sized medical lab, my skills have been in great demand lately. I'm unable to sub-contract to competing labs (gentleman's agreement between me and my current boss), but I can and DO take contract work for dr's offices (vision, dental and medical).
You need to remember, many of the potential employeers out there have little or NO tech experience. They are going on faith that you know what you say you know. However, if you ALSO possess skills they need and *DO* understand, you'll fair a lot better. (unfortunately, it means customizing resumes for each potential employeer).
It accumulates on the slider bars of printers causing more frequent head-jams and can coat the paper feeder rubber making it less 'tacky'. Also, smoke can accumulate on and shorten the life of PC fans.
Both these occur over time and might not be directly attributed to the fan/paper feeder/whatever failure. Just a contributing factor.
re: carbon sinks: The data I've read is anywhere from 1.5-2 billion tons per year absorbed to as little as 350-700 million tons absorbed. The US produces about 1.3-1.5 billion tons per year.
Sources -- I wish I could find a link to a Princton study done in 1998 -- but there's a newer study which lists the 350-700 million tons absorbed figure for the carbon sinks and references the original study. Google for 'united states carbon sink' and you'll find it.
SOOOO... I wouldn't say I have 'no data whatsoever'. I would say that the data available is still incomplete or 100% accurate but certainly indicates that a significate percentage(and possibly all) carbon produced in the US is reabsorbed.
ps, if I'm 20 million in the hole, I'm broke. I might have some cool stories to tell of my spending days, but I'm broke.
You also suggest that any economic hardships will be minor -- I seriously question that.