World War II, if you watch enough of the History Channel, boiled down to quantity winning over quality. Our Sherman Tanks, for example, were utter crap compared to the Panzer and Tiger tanks. But, the USA was able to build a lot of them and they were simple and cheap. The Panzer and Tiger, however, were built in small numbers because they were complex machines.
Germany was 10 years ahead of the USA technologically. But, Germany wasn't able to build to the quantity needed to fight an industrial giant like the USA, especially while we were bombing their industrial capacity to zero (and losing 60% of our aircraft to do it).
It is sad that USA is now following Germany's example. We are building overly complex, hugely expensive equipment that cannot be easily field serviced, and building them in limited numbers because we cannot afford them in great quantity.
Eventually, even though we are 10 years ahead of every opponent technologically, someone will be able to over-run us in a drawn out war simply by having great numbers of simpler, cheaper equipment, and a lot of it.
And I think we all know who's the industrial giant now, that can produce great quantities of material quickly and cheaply.....
Come on all you Ron Paul supporters, let's hear it. We *should* be able to buy Canadian drugs at 1/10 the price of what we're being ripped off in the USA for the same crap.
And before you bring up safety/prescriptions/handling/lifethreating issues as a factor, consider this: We buy food from China, which has far less controls regarding safety than Canada does.
That Apple Juice you're buying in Walmart? Madde from Chinese grown Apples. Who knows what those apples were exposed to, what toxins are in the ground the were grown in, how they were handled/processed and what else the factory that makes this juice also makes?
The Apple Juice you buy in Walmart could be as deadly, or even more deadly than any Canadian Pharmacy or drug "internet purchase".
The *ONLY* reason that drugs are as heavily regulated as they are in this country is to protect Corporate interests (aka BigPharma). There is NO OTHER reason. Any other excuse you've been given by the talking heads on TV is window dressing.
And if we had a real free market economy, sure, some people would die, but that's the way free market economies work. Frankly, that's the way this economy works as well, regulated or not.
Think about how many people die because they are denied health care due to insurance rates, or they can't afford the medication they've been prescribed.
No matter which way you go, people are going to die, that's just a reality. But to say that you're saving lives by not allowing Canadian Pharmacies to sell in the USA is a complete lie.
So leeme get this straight... I have a stock photo from a photo company showing a young white guy in a white shirt and tie sitting at a desk smiling. Behind him is a black lady in a pant-suit outfit and an older grey-haired white guy in a full suit. Basically, your very standard business stock photo. Used *everywhere*.
So, if I hire some models and shoot something similar, but say, the black girl is the one sitting, and they are different models (it would be nearly impossible to find the original models anyhow), it's still an infringement on the original copyright because they are "in an office setting" or "similar composition" or because a judge arbitrarily sees three generic businesspeople in a photo and concludes that I'm ripping off the original photo???
Seriously, WTF???
I can see two stock photo houses clubbing each other to death with lawyers over that. I mean, every stock photo house the same generic photos, all just slightly different from the other guy's photos.
Clearly, this is infringement, and could tie up the legal system for so long, no actual criminal cases could find time to be tried. Murder suspects will die of old age awaiting their trial date.
I mean, every website will be blocked, or will be too afraid of lawsuits to post anything other than a blank page, and even when they do post material, some submarine patent or copyright troll will sue or have them taken down.
Even this website, Slashdot will be taken down because it LINKS to a copyrighted news story. Google will be useless, because every website can be copyrighted, and you can't link to copyrighted material.
So, the web will be entirely destroyed. The whole purpose of it -- to SHARE documents, will be lost in a sea of litigation over "intellectual property".
And by "other people" you're talking about delusional, self-centered, narcissistic assholes? I mean seriously, put yourself in her shoes for a moment, do you really want people like *me* hitting on you?
Jeeze, I might totally be disrespecting her because she's as bright as a 40-watt, but at the same time, I'm not assuming that every woman out of my league is wanting me to hit on her.
They were displaying a prototype of this 2 years ago at the NY Auto Show held at the Javits Center... My friend and I are standing by it, and we're trying to guess how much electronics are crammed into the thing, and my friend says "I'll bet it runs Linux"... So the booth babe next to us turns and says 'No, it runs on electricity!"
We thanked her for her insightful information, took three steps and then started laughing hysterically.
OK, lemme get this straight... At Megaupload.com, some people do something illegal on the site, and the entire company is shut down, kaput, without even a trial.
Now here's a story about insider trading, which I assume is also something illegal... Why isn't the company they worked for ALSO shut down?
It seems to me that we have two standards of 'justice' in this country. And if you're a rich white guy, that system is a lot more lenient.
I'm concerned about this "broadcasting" thing. Are they going to require we follow FCC guidelines concerning what we can "broadcast" on our wifi routers?
And once they start controlling the "name" we can broadcast, how about the content we can "broadcast"? Will it be illegal to stream "pr0n" over WiFi because that violates FCC rules?
And if a trucker on a CB Radio has his handle as "queer-killer", or makes a statement regarding how racist, or anti-semetic, or homophobic he is, are they going to investigate it as a hate crime? Or just some bored trucker mouthing off to fellow bored truckers?
And why is CB radio protected free speech, but WiFi routers are not? Is it because the government and law authorities don't understand those scary computer hackers? Is it because anything more high-tech than a fax machine is misunderstood and feared by grey-haired fat white guys in suits that got elected only because they paid off the right people?
Gee if we're going to start investigating and prosecuting people based on what they name their wifi hotspot, how about a few other things we should be looking into:
#1) "US Chamber of Commerce" - This is a corporate lobbying group, NOT a government entity. Yet, its name is intentionally meant to mislead people.
#2) "The Learning Channel" - The only thing you can learn on TLC is just how vapid and brain-numbing reality TV is.
#3) "Department of Justice" - The DoJ really needs to change its name. There is no "justice" in the USA, that should be abundantly clear. We have a legal system, not a justice system.
While the SOPA protest yesterday was effective, today's action by the DoJ was basically a big "fuck you" to due process and working within the system.
So fine, you want a war, you got one. For every site they take down, we need to take down 5 or 10, and not just for one day, for as long as is possible.
The time to be peaceful and work within the system is obviously over. Occupy Wall Street was nowhere near as effective as Arab Spring, and that's because we were not throwing Molotov Cocktails and shooting cops.
Ok, we got the message. No matter how hard we try and work within the system, you will CHANGE the system to be to our disadvantage.
So fuck you. Now it's war, complete with the cocktails and shootings, until things really do change.
And what about the legitmate content that Megaupload was holding? No mention of that by the media... Nope, shut down, no trial, no jury, just executioner.
Isn't that nice?
That's like taking down Flickr because some of the photos are copyrighted... Of course, those photos are worth a billion dollars (wink,wink), so it's perfectly OK then to inconvenience the other 34 million people who had legitimate stuff on the site.
If any of you were hosting legitimate material on Megaupload, and you've now lost access, I suggest immediately filing class action against the government.
Reality #1) Population is exploding, especially in urban areas -- population density is increasing, and roads are not getting any better, in fact, they are getting worse.
Reality #2) There's no money to fix or improve roads, government spending is being cut like crazy, and on state and local levels, everyone is bankrupt, so there will be no improvements to roads or to public transit systems.
This will lead to greater and greater traffic snarls, especially during mass migration periods (i.e. Rush hour, holidays, weekends) -- so since you're going to be trapped in the car going noplace, burning up what little fuel we have left, your car is going to become your temporary "home" so it might as well have all the infotainment it can provide.
Those of us on Motorcycles/Scooters who try to avoid the great snarls of traffic by being on two-wheels will be mowed down by texting, virtual reality, and cafe-table reserving drivers, who won't even notice our bodies being ripped asunder, thanks to input from everything except the car itself....
I've been attending "industry-only" events for decades. All you need is a business card, which as you know, you can have made at Staples for $20 or less. You tell then you're a "buyer" or something like that, and they let you in, no questions asked.
Heck, last time I attended CES you were able to pick up your badge AT THE AIRPORT in Vegas. Hows that for convenience? I was able to have a badge handed to me before I could locate my luggage.
I see a huge second hand market developing on eBay for "dumb" TVs in the future. Eventually, people will be come frustrated when their Sony Playstation 6 resfuses to display to their Samsung "smart" TV, because Samsung "upgraded" the firmware to no longer work with Sony products due to a contractual dispute between the two companies.
And don't think this won't happen. Remember how Sony "improved" the Playstation3 by REMOVING the "Other OS" feature? A feature that they advertised on the box and people paid good money for, and was removed due to a management decision?
If you don't think that won't happen to your "smart" TV, you're naive and stupid and deserve what you get.
Once this kind of crap takes hold, people will long for the days their TVs just displayed stuff... And on Slashdot, someone will mention this, followed by 'now get off my lawn"
Let's say I throw a superbowl party. I know, this is slashdot, nobody here knows what the superbowl is...
It's a big TV event with food, beer, and an unknown number of people, since some might show up and others may bring a GF or a friend.
Now, I've got my 3-D TV and four sets of glasses. Oh, and did I mention that half of my friends already wear glasses, so wearing these 3-D glasses on top of their existing glasses is a PITA?
Now, for the final essay answer on this quiz: How many pairs of glasses do I need to purchase for a Superbowl party?
I find it so ironic that the USA is threatening a country that essentially found this side of the planet (admittedly, there were already people living here, but those indigenous populations are usually ignored by history books).
Secondly, exactly what items from Spain will stop being in Walmart if a trade embargo goes into place? And with "globalization", all Spain has to do is ship via a third party in a preferred trading partner status, like China or Canada.
And lastly, America is a failing empire. Apart from having a big military that they are borrowing heavily from the Chinese to pay for, they are no longer a threat. Rome lasted much, much longer, and was managed far better than the USA. A shame really.
The number or programmers who cut their teeth on the C=64 is huge. The number of people who did hardware hacks is enormous.
But what's most impressive about the Commodore 64 is the number of people who continue to use it, or pieces of it to this day. The SID chip is still used by electronic musicians, and the number of people who either emulate the machine on other hardware or create new hardware to expand it's original capabilities is simply astounding.
While the exact number of C=64's sold is debatable (some say 33 million, others about 21 million), it's clearly the "Model T" (or Volkswagen Beetle) of computers, having sold MORE than any other single "PC" model, ever.
You do realize that MS has been selling XP licenses as recently as 3 years ago?
So, if we go with your analogy, that's like Ford CONTINUING to sell the Model T from 1902 to 2008, and then suddenly cutting off all spare parts, safety recalls, tires, heck, they won't even sell you gas for the car because they want to FORCE you to buy a Ford Focus, which they will end of life before you've put 100,000 miles on the car or even paid it off.
Frankly, my next PC isn't going to run Windows *at all* - I'm seriously either going for Linux on the desktop or I'm going to use an iPad (or something similar) as my desktop (with an external keyboard, these devices aren't bad), as I'm quickly realizing that what I do with a desktop machine is mostly to login to other machines.
Fine. So GoDaddy hasn't *currently* done anything that affects you or your business.
But when they do, what are you going to do?
You may find that you NO LONGER have a voice about it, because GoDaddy's new EULA specifies that they now own the domains you've paid or done something equally unethical, but now entirely legal because you let them get away with it.
If you continue to support a bunch of crooks, don't be surprised then when they steal from you. And don't complain to us either, because we'll be saying "I told you so".
In the financial industry, it's becoming modus operandi to only retain email for a 6-month period and then after that it's destroyed. We're being told that if something is important, we're going to be given a "15 month" folder to keep it in, after which, it will then be destroyed.
There's an internal effort to reduce paper waste as well, so we're being told to not print emails. So basically, they are hoping we can commit everything to grey-matter, even though I deal with hundreds of documents a day.
I fear we are moving towards a corporate version of Fahrenheit 451.
Slashdot Mirror
World War II, if you watch enough of the History Channel, boiled down to quantity winning over quality. Our Sherman Tanks, for example, were utter crap compared to the Panzer and Tiger tanks. But, the USA was able to build a lot of them and they were simple and cheap. The Panzer and Tiger, however, were built in small numbers because they were complex machines.
Germany was 10 years ahead of the USA technologically. But, Germany wasn't able to build to the quantity needed to fight an industrial giant like the USA, especially while we were bombing their industrial capacity to zero (and losing 60% of our aircraft to do it).
It is sad that USA is now following Germany's example. We are building overly complex, hugely expensive equipment that cannot be easily field serviced, and building them in limited numbers because we cannot afford them in great quantity.
Eventually, even though we are 10 years ahead of every opponent technologically, someone will be able to over-run us in a drawn out war simply by having great numbers of simpler, cheaper equipment, and a lot of it.
And I think we all know who's the industrial giant now, that can produce great quantities of material quickly and cheaply.....
Come on all you Ron Paul supporters, let's hear it. We *should* be able to buy Canadian drugs at 1/10 the price of what we're being ripped off in the USA for the same crap.
And before you bring up safety/prescriptions/handling/lifethreating issues as a factor, consider this: We buy food from China, which has far less controls regarding safety than Canada does.
That Apple Juice you're buying in Walmart? Madde from Chinese grown Apples. Who knows what those apples were exposed to, what toxins are in the ground the were grown in, how they were handled/processed and what else the factory that makes this juice also makes?
The Apple Juice you buy in Walmart could be as deadly, or even more deadly than any Canadian Pharmacy or drug "internet purchase".
The *ONLY* reason that drugs are as heavily regulated as they are in this country is to protect Corporate interests (aka BigPharma). There is NO OTHER reason. Any other excuse you've been given by the talking heads on TV is window dressing.
And if we had a real free market economy, sure, some people would die, but that's the way free market economies work. Frankly, that's the way this economy works as well, regulated or not.
Think about how many people die because they are denied health care due to insurance rates, or they can't afford the medication they've been prescribed.
No matter which way you go, people are going to die, that's just a reality. But to say that you're saving lives by not allowing Canadian Pharmacies to sell in the USA is a complete lie.
So leeme get this straight... I have a stock photo from a photo company showing a young white guy in a white shirt and tie sitting at a desk smiling. Behind him is a black lady in a pant-suit outfit and an older grey-haired white guy in a full suit. Basically, your very standard business stock photo. Used *everywhere*.
So, if I hire some models and shoot something similar, but say, the black girl is the one sitting, and they are different models (it would be nearly impossible to find the original models anyhow), it's still an infringement on the original copyright because they are "in an office setting" or "similar composition" or because a judge arbitrarily sees three generic businesspeople in a photo and concludes that I'm ripping off the original photo???
Seriously, WTF???
I can see two stock photo houses clubbing each other to death with lawyers over that. I mean, every stock photo house the same generic photos, all just slightly different from the other guy's photos.
Clearly, this is infringement, and could tie up the legal system for so long, no actual criminal cases could find time to be tried. Murder suspects will die of old age awaiting their trial date.
The internet will be so useful!
I mean, every website will be blocked, or will be too afraid of lawsuits to post anything other than a blank page, and even when they do post material, some submarine patent or copyright troll will sue or have them taken down.
Even this website, Slashdot will be taken down because it LINKS to a copyrighted news story. Google will be useless, because every website can be copyrighted, and you can't link to copyrighted material.
So, the web will be entirely destroyed. The whole purpose of it -- to SHARE documents, will be lost in a sea of litigation over "intellectual property".
And then we can all go back to playing outside.
Smart car is a two-seater only. How could there be three occupants in a Smart car?
And by "other people" you're talking about delusional, self-centered, narcissistic assholes? I mean seriously, put yourself in her shoes for a moment, do you really want people like *me* hitting on you?
Jeeze, I might totally be disrespecting her because she's as bright as a 40-watt, but at the same time, I'm not assuming that every woman out of my league is wanting me to hit on her.
They were displaying a prototype of this 2 years ago at the NY Auto Show held at the Javits Center... My friend and I are standing by it, and we're trying to guess how much electronics are crammed into the thing, and my friend says "I'll bet it runs Linux"... So the booth babe next to us turns and says 'No, it runs on electricity!"
We thanked her for her insightful information, took three steps and then started laughing hysterically.
What's the first thing with any new tech? Porn! So, 3D printers will be used to make sex toys.
OK, lemme get this straight... At Megaupload.com, some people do something illegal on the site, and the entire company is shut down, kaput, without even a trial.
Now here's a story about insider trading, which I assume is also something illegal... Why isn't the company they worked for ALSO shut down?
It seems to me that we have two standards of 'justice' in this country. And if you're a rich white guy, that system is a lot more lenient.
I'm concerned about this "broadcasting" thing. Are they going to require we follow FCC guidelines concerning what we can "broadcast" on our wifi routers?
And once they start controlling the "name" we can broadcast, how about the content we can "broadcast"? Will it be illegal to stream "pr0n" over WiFi because that violates FCC rules?
And if a trucker on a CB Radio has his handle as "queer-killer", or makes a statement regarding how racist, or anti-semetic, or homophobic he is, are they going to investigate it as a hate crime? Or just some bored trucker mouthing off to fellow bored truckers?
And why is CB radio protected free speech, but WiFi routers are not? Is it because the government and law authorities don't understand those scary computer hackers? Is it because anything more high-tech than a fax machine is misunderstood and feared by grey-haired fat white guys in suits that got elected only because they paid off the right people?
Gee if we're going to start investigating and prosecuting people based on what they name their wifi hotspot, how about a few other things we should be looking into:
#1) "US Chamber of Commerce" - This is a corporate lobbying group, NOT a government entity. Yet, its name is intentionally meant to mislead people.
#2) "The Learning Channel" - The only thing you can learn on TLC is just how vapid and brain-numbing reality TV is.
#3) "Department of Justice" - The DoJ really needs to change its name. There is no "justice" in the USA, that should be abundantly clear. We have a legal system, not a justice system.
While the SOPA protest yesterday was effective, today's action by the DoJ was basically a big "fuck you" to due process and working within the system.
So fine, you want a war, you got one. For every site they take down, we need to take down 5 or 10, and not just for one day, for as long as is possible.
The time to be peaceful and work within the system is obviously over. Occupy Wall Street was nowhere near as effective as Arab Spring, and that's because we were not throwing Molotov Cocktails and shooting cops.
Ok, we got the message. No matter how hard we try and work within the system, you will CHANGE the system to be to our disadvantage.
So fuck you.
Now it's war, complete with the cocktails and shootings, until things really do change.
And what about the legitmate content that Megaupload was holding? No mention of that by the media... Nope, shut down, no trial, no jury, just executioner.
Isn't that nice?
That's like taking down Flickr because some of the photos are copyrighted... Of course, those photos are worth a billion dollars (wink,wink), so it's perfectly OK then to inconvenience the other 34 million people who had legitimate stuff on the site.
If any of you were hosting legitimate material on Megaupload, and you've now lost access, I suggest immediately filing class action against the government.
Reality #1) Population is exploding, especially in urban areas -- population density is increasing, and roads are not getting any better, in fact, they are getting worse.
Reality #2) There's no money to fix or improve roads, government spending is being cut like crazy, and on state and local levels, everyone is bankrupt, so there will be no improvements to roads or to public transit systems.
This will lead to greater and greater traffic snarls, especially during mass migration periods (i.e. Rush hour, holidays, weekends) -- so since you're going to be trapped in the car going noplace, burning up what little fuel we have left, your car is going to become your temporary "home" so it might as well have all the infotainment it can provide.
Those of us on Motorcycles/Scooters who try to avoid the great snarls of traffic by being on two-wheels will be mowed down by texting, virtual reality, and cafe-table reserving drivers, who won't even notice our bodies being ripped asunder, thanks to input from everything except the car itself....
I've been attending "industry-only" events for decades. All you need is a business card, which as you know, you can have made at Staples for $20 or less. You tell then you're a "buyer" or something like that, and they let you in, no questions asked.
Heck, last time I attended CES you were able to pick up your badge AT THE AIRPORT in Vegas. Hows that for convenience? I was able to have a badge handed to me before I could locate my luggage.
But, it diagnoses everyone who's ever even HEARD of a "tricorder" with A.D.D.
I see a huge second hand market developing on eBay for "dumb" TVs in the future. Eventually, people will be come frustrated when their Sony Playstation 6 resfuses to display to their Samsung "smart" TV, because Samsung "upgraded" the firmware to no longer work with Sony products due to a contractual dispute between the two companies.
And don't think this won't happen. Remember how Sony "improved" the Playstation3 by REMOVING the "Other OS" feature? A feature that they advertised on the box and people paid good money for, and was removed due to a management decision?
If you don't think that won't happen to your "smart" TV, you're naive and stupid and deserve what you get.
Once this kind of crap takes hold, people will long for the days their TVs just displayed stuff... And on Slashdot, someone will mention this, followed by 'now get off my lawn"
Let's say I throw a superbowl party. I know, this is slashdot, nobody here knows what the superbowl is...
It's a big TV event with food, beer, and an unknown number of people, since some might show up and others may bring a GF or a friend.
Now, I've got my 3-D TV and four sets of glasses. Oh, and did I mention that half of my friends already wear glasses, so wearing these 3-D glasses on top of their existing glasses is a PITA?
Now, for the final essay answer on this quiz: How many pairs of glasses do I need to purchase for a Superbowl party?
I find it so ironic that the USA is threatening a country that essentially found this side of the planet (admittedly, there were already people living here, but those indigenous populations are usually ignored by history books).
Secondly, exactly what items from Spain will stop being in Walmart if a trade embargo goes into place? And with "globalization", all Spain has to do is ship via a third party in a preferred trading partner status, like China or Canada.
And lastly, America is a failing empire. Apart from having a big military that they are borrowing heavily from the Chinese to pay for, they are no longer a threat. Rome lasted much, much longer, and was managed far better than the USA. A shame really.
The number or programmers who cut their teeth on the C=64 is huge. The number of people who did hardware hacks is enormous.
But what's most impressive about the Commodore 64 is the number of people who continue to use it, or pieces of it to this day. The SID chip is still used by electronic musicians, and the number of people who either emulate the machine on other hardware or create new hardware to expand it's original capabilities is simply astounding.
While the exact number of C=64's sold is debatable (some say 33 million, others about 21 million), it's clearly the "Model T" (or Volkswagen Beetle) of computers, having sold MORE than any other single "PC" model, ever.
And here I was, thinking that "Japanese Iambic pentameter" was a dead language....
You do realize that MS has been selling XP licenses as recently as 3 years ago?
So, if we go with your analogy, that's like Ford CONTINUING to sell the Model T from 1902 to 2008, and then suddenly cutting off all spare parts, safety recalls, tires, heck, they won't even sell you gas for the car because they want to FORCE you to buy a Ford Focus, which they will end of life before you've put 100,000 miles on the car or even paid it off.
Frankly, my next PC isn't going to run Windows *at all* - I'm seriously either going for Linux on the desktop or I'm going to use an iPad (or something similar) as my desktop (with an external keyboard, these devices aren't bad), as I'm quickly realizing that what I do with a desktop machine is mostly to login to other machines.
Fine. So GoDaddy hasn't *currently* done anything that affects you or your business.
But when they do, what are you going to do?
You may find that you NO LONGER have a voice about it, because GoDaddy's new EULA specifies that they now own the domains you've paid or done something equally unethical, but now entirely legal because you let them get away with it.
If you continue to support a bunch of crooks, don't be surprised then when they steal from you. And don't complain to us either, because we'll be saying "I told you so".
"If a company I worked implemented that I would find a discrete way to save my email off of my computer."
Doing so would be grounds for termination.
In the financial industry, it's becoming modus operandi to only retain email for a 6-month period and then after that it's destroyed. We're being told that if something is important, we're going to be given a "15 month" folder to keep it in, after which, it will then be destroyed.
There's an internal effort to reduce paper waste as well, so we're being told to not print emails. So basically, they are hoping we can commit everything to grey-matter, even though I deal with hundreds of documents a day.
I fear we are moving towards a corporate version of Fahrenheit 451.