I'd be protesting if the jerks moved close enough to disturb me with their off-key calls to prayer. It's damned rude. (Yes, I feel the same way about church bells, vibro-bass thumping cars, harleys with those pipes and all that.) Your right to religious freedom does not extend to my ears.
Truth is "discovered" while lies and fiction must be "created." You are confusing "truth" with point of view. Point of view is often refracted heavily through a lens of emotion.
You missed my group. My autistic tendencies prevent me from understanding or appreciating social traditions so I set about trying to make sense of what people do through analysis. It started when I couldn't understand why girls and boys didn't like each other and expanded when people tried to tell me about god and jesus and zeus and all those.
Religion requires emotional commitment to work. My emotions don't work the same way. I can't "feel it is true" the way other people can. I am essentially immune to religious influence. And since there are no REAL reasons to believe, I don't.
Nothing will change the mind of the religious. "Belief is more powerful than fact" Google it for loads of studies on the subject.
What openly mocking does is help to prevent NEW people from becoming religious. Converts are often more zealous than people born into it. But if they think it's ridiculous from the beginning, they may resist better. Also, people born into religion? Unless the parents are both zealous and convincing, the children are also ripe for religious programming prevention.
Religion is a social construct and like all social constructs, they are popular and unpopular. Religion just has to be made to be unpopular.
I don't think we need "medical insurance" for general use in the first place.
1. More money should be spent on prevention and better food standards in the US. We have some REALLY crappy standards. 2. Once prevention and standards are better addressed, the need for "constant" medical attention for so many will be gone leaving mostly weird cases, child birth and random emergencies. 3. Once demand for medical care drops the medical insurance industry shrinks to what it once was. 4. On top of that, the pharmaceutical industry would also shrink and their patents would expire without being replaced with something newer and more dangerous.
People like to think they live better lives because of increased medical care and technology. I changed two things in my life have have only gotten sick once in the past 25 years. ONCE and it lasted about 8-12 hours... (I slept it off so I don't know how long it really lasted.) What'd I change? I stopped drinking milk and I stopped being too focused on being "sanitary" all over the place. Suddenly my immune system was doing its job and I was happier and more energetic. Also, I stay away from too much corn and sources of extreme carbohydrates. (That's what I mean by prevention and better standards.) (Isn't it weird that we shove more corn down people's throats than any other place on earth and our diabetes rates are also out of control? I know... correlation/causation. Still. I avoid it when I know it's there and I'm healthier because of it.)
One of the big problems we have in the US is that people don't want to control their own lives. They just don't. They feel much more comfortable being a victim and blaming and complaining. Worse is people somehow feel empowered because they have the right to complain despite having less right or ability to do anything meaningful about it. And they go on eating what they eat which, incidentally, is NOT what we ate 25 years ago; not even close and living by standards and ideals created in the 80s when living in debt stopped being a sin.
Yes. People always look at me like I'm crazy when I say I don't spend money I don't have. But our debt-financed lifestyles are at the core of our problems and that includes the medical industry. When we are spending someone else's money, it's a lot easier to spend. People don't feel a connection between what they spend on credit and what they have to pay back. And people don't feel a connection between what they pay to insurance companies and what they (don't) get back. And people have been taking the social security scam up the ass for decades and decades. (I will be lucky to get back 15% of what I paid in to social security...LUCKY) We have absolutely horrible and wasteful systems in place -- things people have given up complaining about. I don't enter debt contracts easily. I don't. I have less stuff yet still more "stuff I don't need." Life's just not so bad as people think without all the excess.
We need less industry because industry serves its interests first and foremost.
Commercial business can never be and has never been trustworthy when it comes to public safety. Everything from coal mining, gas/oil drilling, "fracking" all the way to nuclear energy requires safety and EVERY industry, when left to their own, has shown they will favor cost cutting/profit increasing over safety. EVERY time. We've seen coal miners killed. We've seen the "strange earthquakes" around areas where fracking has been going on. We've seen the whole BP oil spill issue. We saw Chernobyl (a name which literally means "nuclear disaster" to most people now) and now we are experiencing Fukushima.
It's all safety related and it's all because people didn't want to spend enough money on safety. Keep in mind that there is ANOTHER nuclear plant no too far from Fukushima which survived the same tsunami specifically because the wall was higher and stronger. It wasn't because they never expected a tsunami so large. They were advised to build as large in Fukushima as well. They didn't... or so I'm told.
Nuclear safety. There is NOTHING more important. Nothing.
Having some direct experience with both the culture and government of Japan and of the nuclear industry, I can say [opine] that the Japanese government is completely incapable of handling the task.
If you ask me, I say send the US NRC over to Japan to take the situation over and train Japan's NRC to operate in the same way as the US NRC.
The US NRC is a royal pain in the ass. But they are that for a very good reason. And believe me when I tell you, they aren't just up in the utilities' faces, they are up in EVERYONE connected faces. The Japanese regulatory agency will ONLY communicate with the Japanese utilities and not the manufacturers of equipment, not the people who did construction or planning or any of it. So for the Japanese regulatory agency to ignore those other factors? It convinces me they aren't prepared to see a much larger picture when it comes to nuclear safety.
I am told this aspect of the Japanese nuclear regulatory agency is changing, but I'll believe it when I see it.
Meanwhile, the Japanese habit of never saying more than they should and always holding back information leads me to believe it's actually worse than the mainstream media will say and likely MUCH worse.
Nuclear safety isn't just local. It's not just national. It's a global concern. And if some group of people internationally were to say "hey, this is a global concern. Let's make a global nuclear regulatory agency" I would actually agree to the idea simply because the danger knows no borders. And believe me when I say it's not easy for me to be in favor of -- I am against global government in general. Completely.
I wonder if, under our current model of exchange based interaction, we can sustain ourselves?
In the natural world, we fight over resources for survival. We are limited by those resources. That's still essentially true however we've added more to the puzzle.
Now we use a medium of exchange. It is no longer just hard work in exchange for things. Someone invented money, which at first, seemed like a great idea. However, it also invented a means by which people could store value in a symbolic form. This enabled people who could negotiate the ability to use those skills instead of using physical labor. This is an interesting advancement. And as we see, those who accumulated great amounts of symbolic wealth also accumulated a great deal of power... power to enslave us all in fact. And not only do they own the symbolic wealth, they own the resources too. End game.
So every time I hear about new tech replacing jobs, the first thing I hear is "people should adapt and find new and better ways if earning symbolic wealth." This is somewhat true. Somewhat. But let's say a technology arrived which enabled completely self-sustaining and self-replicating robots all controlled by one person... me, for example. Well, these robots can do anything. They can be my army and take over all of the physical resources. They can be my workers and build all the things I need or could desire. And of course, I have a small collection of the best minds working for me who can out-invent anyone else.
So I have dominated the world with self-sustaining and self-replicating robots. I need no one to work and there is nothing left for anyone else to do. What now? I could send my robots out to kill everyone which would assure me of dominance...until I die or find a way to be immortal. Or I could send my robots out into the world and instruct them to serve all of mankind allowing them a life of leisure for all eternity.
In that situation, which way do you think a global elite will take things? Kill all humans? Or peace and prosperity for all of mankind? I think we all know enough about human nature to rule out the second option. And we all see that the more things are automated, the less we need people... at all.
Now, we are obviously a long, long way from the ultimate end-game I described above. But you can see how bad things can get because man's current inability to see beyond his lust for power and [symbolic] wealth results in an on-going cycle of death, misery, tyranny, tragedy and destruction with sharp controls and limits on human advancement and especially in freedom.
That dream world of "Star Trek" where man kind outgrew the need of money? It's completely unimaginable and it would, of course, require massive revolutions of the French variety to rid ourselves of people who would seek to limit and control everyone.
"They took our jobs!!" It's a very valid concern. Some areas of growth and adaptation are not accessible to everyone. This means people can and will inevitably suffer and even die from the the decisions of others. And we simply lack what we need in order to provide for those who cannot provide for themselves. Everything is measured in symbolic wealth and now it's a problem.
Think about it. Our symbolic wealth system is the measure of everything we use and do. We could be colonizing space right now and even teraforming Mars. Why aren't we? If you said "because it costs too much" you'd be right but then I ask "what is cost?" Yeah... it's that symbolic wealth we measure everything by. And no one will give up their anything without the exchange of symbolic wealth. Want my steel? It's cost ya. Want my rare earth minerals? More symbolic wealth please...
We're literally held back by our system of greed. Literally. And because we haven't found effective ways to defend ourselves against nature such as "angry sun gods" and falling rocks from space and because we haven't figured out how to escape this planet to live on other plan
Seems to me that it is a spiritual quest more than a software project. Let's decide what the spiritual focus is and file some paperwork forgetting this ridiculous tax crap.
There's a lot of failure to spread around. But let's say that "once upon a time" there was a school for dogs. And someone tried to put a cat through the school hoping they could get a well trained cat out of it. The problem with that was that (1) the school only knew how to train dogs and (2) cats can learn but not the same things or in the same way as dogs.
Yes, I am saying the school and methods are unsuitable for the people being taught. They are a completely different people. They will not become European or American because they were taught in that way. That experiment failed long, long ago. "Everyone is equal." "Everyone is the same." "Everyone has the same potential." It's a lie. We all know it's a lie. Let's accept it and move on. I'll never be a celebrated athlete. We never have problems dealing with that reality. Why do we think that intellectual potential is any different?
No, you're right... they were kinda dirty from the get-go, but I didn't know it yet at the time. Looking back, I see things differently than I did. I was attempting to reflect what I liked about Microsoft at that time more than to create an evaluation on them. My evaluation of them is as it is today -- they are dirt and screw up everything they try to do. I mean seriously. What the hell is Sharepoint supposed to be?! I get that business all over uses it and all that, but geez! It's web but it isn't? It's just another way of Microsoft showing they haven't learned anything from all of their failures.
Anyway, I once loved Microsoft. All they need to do is start over.
Okay, so I'm a clearly-labelled "Microsoft Hater." I haven't always been this way. I got really comfortable with Win3.11 and then Win95 came out I experienced a level of computer excitement I haven't had since I started using OS-9 level two. (I am still quite fond of OS-9 though... just been a very long time.) I loved what Microsoft did. The advancements were terrific and long-awaited and all the precious knowledge I had acquired and accumulated over the various versions of DOS and Windows still applied so I was still relevant and loyal.
But then Microsoft started souring things. They tried to take over Java... tried and failed. They started pulling some extremely dirty stunts with their "partners" and such to the point it harmed so many other out there. I couldn't see those immoral acts without my opinion changing about the company behind the products. Some people just saw money and work. I have always seen more and I can't unsee it. When I see an OS user interface or go over source code or anything that goes into the design and engineering of such systems, I don't just see objects, I see ideas and what people were thinking when they put it all together which invariably results in a sense of knowing something about the people behind the creation of all of these things. For me, it was pretty easy to tell when something was a cludge or if real planning and design work went into things or how much respect one party had for another when parties worked together on a project. To me all of those things were the human element of what came together in creating these things. I may be pretty unaffected by fine art, but when I saw what when into computing back in the earlier days, I found myself quite moved by some of the things I saw. It was my world.
Microsoft slowly destroyed my world and all the things I loved about it. Microsoft started out making really cool things but when they really started getting big, they were increasingly about destroying others and less about creating cool things. If you want to understand why a Microsoft hater hates, I think my case is pretty clear by now.
And a new Microsoft could also rekindle all the new and cool things all over again. Sure, it may not be a "wise business decision." Most cool things aren't. But I think we're all ready for something really new and cool. We aren't going to get it from Apple. Google and Android is pretty much levelled off already as far as I can tell. A new Microsoft holds an opportunity within itself to recapture the love and awe it once had. So why haven't they done it already?
There are lots of brands and symbols people identify themselves with. Schools, sports, Apple iThings, politics, religion and lots, lots more. And if you dislike any of these things, you just made an enemy of someone because that is 'their identity.'
It's ridiculous to me... all these "symbol minded people." Perhaps it's my autistic tendencies or something else, but I just can't get behind the things other people get behind. What I see is a bunch of people getting behind a symbol with which they mutually identify and then they all start acting and thinking the same ways.
Whatever the source, most of these things are choices people make. This includes religion. I once had a discussion about religious discrimination with a muslim female who defended her religion and the practices of blending religion and government... and how she thought it was perfectly okay to have religious government.... until, that is, she is not free to do her religious things. She acted as if religion was not a choice. I ended the conversation quickly with "if religion isn't a choice, then it's not faith is it?" She agreed and shut up.
When I lived in the DC area, the first thing that struck me was how many people asked me if I had a clearance. It was all about having a clearance and working on government projects there. It was kind of sickening to me to realize that -- all these people trying to suck at the government teat. And my impression was that no one was interested in working hard, doing a good job or doing anything interesting at all. It was about having government work and making large amounts of money. (Lack of enthusiasm is one of many key problems with government wouldn't you agree?)
And for government to be a driving factor in industry...? Any industry? It's also the sign of a problem... problems really. We know what we get when we mix military and industry -- a system that destroys people, property and nations for profit -- one where there can be no world peace because in order to sustain that business model, trouble must always be stirred up somewhere at all times. Do the words "invented threats" ring any bells or strike any chords?
As if the US military industrial complex isn't enough of a problem for the world (because you know the US isn't supposed to have a standing army by law) we also have the spy industry to deal with... it has always been there, but spies historically keep a low profile. These days, not so much.
I no longer take the human rights thing seriously when coming from my country. Until they start following the constitution, this country is completely dysfunctional. In the past, when something was declared/ruled as unconstitutional, it mean "you're done. cease doing it." For some reason, it doesn't mean that any longer. Now it's just "yeah? so?"
Storieslikethese sicken me when it comes to how they are effectively ignored and swept under the rug. This case was criminally prosecuted only because there was a lot of money involved and it was students and not the staff.
If people are going to spend ridiculously high costs for schooling, they need to know that it's not going to support criminals like those at Winston-Salem.
It's mass transit without the masses. Imagine your own personal bus, taxi or train. Mass transit is good for many people because it enables travel without so much stress... or at least without the same type of stress and certainly less danger. But among the problems of mass transit is the crowding and congestion which often accompanies more dense populated areas.
I think having HOV lanes replaced with "Automated" lanes, self driving cars are likely to take you anywhere you need to go, respond to traffic problems by dynamically re-routing and generally even out the flow of traffic all over. Even if a driver decides not to participate in the use of self-driving cars, when there are enough self-driving cars, it will likely benefit the non-participants as well.
One caveat is the fact that non-participants will see it as a license to be an even bigger asshole than they were to "other drivers." They would be bigger because they would drive rudely around machines which would, ostensibly, not be offended... (the passengers might though... imagine cutting off a self-driving car and how it might respond)
There are probably a lot of scary scenarios which I haven't considered, but I recall batman movies and the self-driving batmobile and how that could be really useful. A car that will let you get out at your destination then drive away to park somewhere? Awesome... especially if you can notify your car that you are waiting to be picked up and have it arrive in a few moments. There's a lot of awesome there... and some scary.
Their claim clearly has no merit and is intended to censor. In addition to filing a counter-suit, we should Steissand effect their sorry asses. Throwing threats around like that should not be tollerated.
I heartily expect the GMO, patent encumbered rice will be rejected all over. Nothing says "our rice will weed out your rice and sue you into slavery" quite like this.
Slashdot Mirror
I'd be protesting if the jerks moved close enough to disturb me with their off-key calls to prayer. It's damned rude. (Yes, I feel the same way about church bells, vibro-bass thumping cars, harleys with those pipes and all that.) Your right to religious freedom does not extend to my ears.
BTW, truth is not personal.
Truth is "discovered" while lies and fiction must be "created." You are confusing "truth" with point of view. Point of view is often refracted heavily through a lens of emotion.
You missed my group. My autistic tendencies prevent me from understanding or appreciating social traditions so I set about trying to make sense of what people do through analysis. It started when I couldn't understand why girls and boys didn't like each other and expanded when people tried to tell me about god and jesus and zeus and all those.
Religion requires emotional commitment to work. My emotions don't work the same way. I can't "feel it is true" the way other people can. I am essentially immune to religious influence. And since there are no REAL reasons to believe, I don't.
Nothing will change the mind of the religious. "Belief is more powerful than fact" Google it for loads of studies on the subject.
What openly mocking does is help to prevent NEW people from becoming religious. Converts are often more zealous than people born into it. But if they think it's ridiculous from the beginning, they may resist better. Also, people born into religion? Unless the parents are both zealous and convincing, the children are also ripe for religious programming prevention.
Religion is a social construct and like all social constructs, they are popular and unpopular. Religion just has to be made to be unpopular.
I don't think we need "medical insurance" for general use in the first place.
1. More money should be spent on prevention and better food standards in the US. We have some REALLY crappy standards.
2. Once prevention and standards are better addressed, the need for "constant" medical attention for so many will be gone leaving mostly weird cases, child birth and random emergencies.
3. Once demand for medical care drops the medical insurance industry shrinks to what it once was.
4. On top of that, the pharmaceutical industry would also shrink and their patents would expire without being replaced with something newer and more dangerous.
People like to think they live better lives because of increased medical care and technology. I changed two things in my life have have only gotten sick once in the past 25 years. ONCE and it lasted about 8-12 hours... (I slept it off so I don't know how long it really lasted.) What'd I change? I stopped drinking milk and I stopped being too focused on being "sanitary" all over the place. Suddenly my immune system was doing its job and I was happier and more energetic. Also, I stay away from too much corn and sources of extreme carbohydrates. (That's what I mean by prevention and better standards.) (Isn't it weird that we shove more corn down people's throats than any other place on earth and our diabetes rates are also out of control? I know... correlation/causation. Still. I avoid it when I know it's there and I'm healthier because of it.)
One of the big problems we have in the US is that people don't want to control their own lives. They just don't. They feel much more comfortable being a victim and blaming and complaining. Worse is people somehow feel empowered because they have the right to complain despite having less right or ability to do anything meaningful about it. And they go on eating what they eat which, incidentally, is NOT what we ate 25 years ago; not even close and living by standards and ideals created in the 80s when living in debt stopped being a sin.
Yes. People always look at me like I'm crazy when I say I don't spend money I don't have. But our debt-financed lifestyles are at the core of our problems and that includes the medical industry. When we are spending someone else's money, it's a lot easier to spend. People don't feel a connection between what they spend on credit and what they have to pay back. And people don't feel a connection between what they pay to insurance companies and what they (don't) get back. And people have been taking the social security scam up the ass for decades and decades. (I will be lucky to get back 15% of what I paid in to social security...LUCKY) We have absolutely horrible and wasteful systems in place -- things people have given up complaining about. I don't enter debt contracts easily. I don't. I have less stuff yet still more "stuff I don't need." Life's just not so bad as people think without all the excess.
We need less industry because industry serves its interests first and foremost.
Commercial business can never be and has never been trustworthy when it comes to public safety. Everything from coal mining, gas/oil drilling, "fracking" all the way to nuclear energy requires safety and EVERY industry, when left to their own, has shown they will favor cost cutting/profit increasing over safety. EVERY time. We've seen coal miners killed. We've seen the "strange earthquakes" around areas where fracking has been going on. We've seen the whole BP oil spill issue. We saw Chernobyl (a name which literally means "nuclear disaster" to most people now) and now we are experiencing Fukushima.
It's all safety related and it's all because people didn't want to spend enough money on safety. Keep in mind that there is ANOTHER nuclear plant no too far from Fukushima which survived the same tsunami specifically because the wall was higher and stronger. It wasn't because they never expected a tsunami so large. They were advised to build as large in Fukushima as well. They didn't... or so I'm told.
Nuclear safety. There is NOTHING more important. Nothing.
Having some direct experience with both the culture and government of Japan and of the nuclear industry, I can say [opine] that the Japanese government is completely incapable of handling the task.
If you ask me, I say send the US NRC over to Japan to take the situation over and train Japan's NRC to operate in the same way as the US NRC.
The US NRC is a royal pain in the ass. But they are that for a very good reason. And believe me when I tell you, they aren't just up in the utilities' faces, they are up in EVERYONE connected faces. The Japanese regulatory agency will ONLY communicate with the Japanese utilities and not the manufacturers of equipment, not the people who did construction or planning or any of it. So for the Japanese regulatory agency to ignore those other factors? It convinces me they aren't prepared to see a much larger picture when it comes to nuclear safety.
I am told this aspect of the Japanese nuclear regulatory agency is changing, but I'll believe it when I see it.
Meanwhile, the Japanese habit of never saying more than they should and always holding back information leads me to believe it's actually worse than the mainstream media will say and likely MUCH worse.
Nuclear safety isn't just local. It's not just national. It's a global concern. And if some group of people internationally were to say "hey, this is a global concern. Let's make a global nuclear regulatory agency" I would actually agree to the idea simply because the danger knows no borders. And believe me when I say it's not easy for me to be in favor of -- I am against global government in general. Completely.
I wonder if, under our current model of exchange based interaction, we can sustain ourselves?
In the natural world, we fight over resources for survival. We are limited by those resources. That's still essentially true however we've added more to the puzzle.
Now we use a medium of exchange. It is no longer just hard work in exchange for things. Someone invented money, which at first, seemed like a great idea. However, it also invented a means by which people could store value in a symbolic form. This enabled people who could negotiate the ability to use those skills instead of using physical labor. This is an interesting advancement. And as we see, those who accumulated great amounts of symbolic wealth also accumulated a great deal of power... power to enslave us all in fact. And not only do they own the symbolic wealth, they own the resources too. End game.
So every time I hear about new tech replacing jobs, the first thing I hear is "people should adapt and find new and better ways if earning symbolic wealth." This is somewhat true. Somewhat. But let's say a technology arrived which enabled completely self-sustaining and self-replicating robots all controlled by one person... me, for example. Well, these robots can do anything. They can be my army and take over all of the physical resources. They can be my workers and build all the things I need or could desire. And of course, I have a small collection of the best minds working for me who can out-invent anyone else.
So I have dominated the world with self-sustaining and self-replicating robots. I need no one to work and there is nothing left for anyone else to do. What now? I could send my robots out to kill everyone which would assure me of dominance...until I die or find a way to be immortal. Or I could send my robots out into the world and instruct them to serve all of mankind allowing them a life of leisure for all eternity.
In that situation, which way do you think a global elite will take things? Kill all humans? Or peace and prosperity for all of mankind? I think we all know enough about human nature to rule out the second option. And we all see that the more things are automated, the less we need people ... at all.
Now, we are obviously a long, long way from the ultimate end-game I described above. But you can see how bad things can get because man's current inability to see beyond his lust for power and [symbolic] wealth results in an on-going cycle of death, misery, tyranny, tragedy and destruction with sharp controls and limits on human advancement and especially in freedom.
That dream world of "Star Trek" where man kind outgrew the need of money? It's completely unimaginable and it would, of course, require massive revolutions of the French variety to rid ourselves of people who would seek to limit and control everyone.
"They took our jobs!!" It's a very valid concern. Some areas of growth and adaptation are not accessible to everyone. This means people can and will inevitably suffer and even die from the the decisions of others. And we simply lack what we need in order to provide for those who cannot provide for themselves. Everything is measured in symbolic wealth and now it's a problem.
Think about it. Our symbolic wealth system is the measure of everything we use and do. We could be colonizing space right now and even teraforming Mars. Why aren't we? If you said "because it costs too much" you'd be right but then I ask "what is cost?" Yeah... it's that symbolic wealth we measure everything by. And no one will give up their anything without the exchange of symbolic wealth. Want my steel? It's cost ya. Want my rare earth minerals? More symbolic wealth please...
We're literally held back by our system of greed. Literally. And because we haven't found effective ways to defend ourselves against nature such as "angry sun gods" and falling rocks from space and because we haven't figured out how to escape this planet to live on other plan
You must understand the whole idea is to show theists what they look like in the mirror.
No. That's actually the thing. We aren't supposed to have a standing army... one that is sitting around being prepared.
I always thought that when you wage war, they are supposed to consult with Congress first.
Seems to me that it is a spiritual quest more than a software project. Let's decide what the spiritual focus is and file some paperwork forgetting this ridiculous tax crap.
There's a lot of failure to spread around. But let's say that "once upon a time" there was a school for dogs. And someone tried to put a cat through the school hoping they could get a well trained cat out of it. The problem with that was that (1) the school only knew how to train dogs and (2) cats can learn but not the same things or in the same way as dogs.
Yes, I am saying the school and methods are unsuitable for the people being taught. They are a completely different people. They will not become European or American because they were taught in that way. That experiment failed long, long ago. "Everyone is equal." "Everyone is the same." "Everyone has the same potential." It's a lie. We all know it's a lie. Let's accept it and move on. I'll never be a celebrated athlete. We never have problems dealing with that reality. Why do we think that intellectual potential is any different?
Wait'll you see what Las Vegas does when I go there and lose a butt-load of money!
They just give it all back and then some for making me wait for so long.
No, you're right... they were kinda dirty from the get-go, but I didn't know it yet at the time. Looking back, I see things differently than I did. I was attempting to reflect what I liked about Microsoft at that time more than to create an evaluation on them. My evaluation of them is as it is today -- they are dirt and screw up everything they try to do. I mean seriously. What the hell is Sharepoint supposed to be?! I get that business all over uses it and all that, but geez! It's web but it isn't? It's just another way of Microsoft showing they haven't learned anything from all of their failures.
Anyway, I once loved Microsoft. All they need to do is start over.
Okay, so I'm a clearly-labelled "Microsoft Hater." I haven't always been this way. I got really comfortable with Win3.11 and then Win95 came out I experienced a level of computer excitement I haven't had since I started using OS-9 level two. (I am still quite fond of OS-9 though... just been a very long time.) I loved what Microsoft did. The advancements were terrific and long-awaited and all the precious knowledge I had acquired and accumulated over the various versions of DOS and Windows still applied so I was still relevant and loyal.
But then Microsoft started souring things. They tried to take over Java... tried and failed. They started pulling some extremely dirty stunts with their "partners" and such to the point it harmed so many other out there. I couldn't see those immoral acts without my opinion changing about the company behind the products. Some people just saw money and work. I have always seen more and I can't unsee it. When I see an OS user interface or go over source code or anything that goes into the design and engineering of such systems, I don't just see objects, I see ideas and what people were thinking when they put it all together which invariably results in a sense of knowing something about the people behind the creation of all of these things. For me, it was pretty easy to tell when something was a cludge or if real planning and design work went into things or how much respect one party had for another when parties worked together on a project. To me all of those things were the human element of what came together in creating these things. I may be pretty unaffected by fine art, but when I saw what when into computing back in the earlier days, I found myself quite moved by some of the things I saw. It was my world.
Microsoft slowly destroyed my world and all the things I loved about it. Microsoft started out making really cool things but when they really started getting big, they were increasingly about destroying others and less about creating cool things. If you want to understand why a Microsoft hater hates, I think my case is pretty clear by now.
And a new Microsoft could also rekindle all the new and cool things all over again. Sure, it may not be a "wise business decision." Most cool things aren't. But I think we're all ready for something really new and cool. We aren't going to get it from Apple. Google and Android is pretty much levelled off already as far as I can tell. A new Microsoft holds an opportunity within itself to recapture the love and awe it once had. So why haven't they done it already?
We know why... I just wish they would.
There are lots of brands and symbols people identify themselves with. Schools, sports, Apple iThings, politics, religion and lots, lots more. And if you dislike any of these things, you just made an enemy of someone because that is 'their identity.'
It's ridiculous to me... all these "symbol minded people." Perhaps it's my autistic tendencies or something else, but I just can't get behind the things other people get behind. What I see is a bunch of people getting behind a symbol with which they mutually identify and then they all start acting and thinking the same ways.
Whatever the source, most of these things are choices people make. This includes religion. I once had a discussion about religious discrimination with a muslim female who defended her religion and the practices of blending religion and government... and how she thought it was perfectly okay to have religious government.... until, that is, she is not free to do her religious things. She acted as if religion was not a choice. I ended the conversation quickly with "if religion isn't a choice, then it's not faith is it?" She agreed and shut up.
When I lived in the DC area, the first thing that struck me was how many people asked me if I had a clearance. It was all about having a clearance and working on government projects there. It was kind of sickening to me to realize that -- all these people trying to suck at the government teat. And my impression was that no one was interested in working hard, doing a good job or doing anything interesting at all. It was about having government work and making large amounts of money. (Lack of enthusiasm is one of many key problems with government wouldn't you agree?)
And for government to be a driving factor in industry...? Any industry? It's also the sign of a problem... problems really. We know what we get when we mix military and industry -- a system that destroys people, property and nations for profit -- one where there can be no world peace because in order to sustain that business model, trouble must always be stirred up somewhere at all times. Do the words "invented threats" ring any bells or strike any chords?
As if the US military industrial complex isn't enough of a problem for the world (because you know the US isn't supposed to have a standing army by law) we also have the spy industry to deal with... it has always been there, but spies historically keep a low profile. These days, not so much.
I wish that was funny.
I no longer take the human rights thing seriously when coming from my country. Until they start following the constitution, this country is completely dysfunctional. In the past, when something was declared/ruled as unconstitutional, it mean "you're done. cease doing it." For some reason, it doesn't mean that any longer. Now it's just "yeah? so?"
Baby boomers are the next "national security threat."
If you think you don't have a boss, then you're doing it wrong. You have many.
Government is your boss in part. Each customer you do work for is your boss.
Stories like these sicken me when it comes to how they are effectively ignored and swept under the rug. This case was criminally prosecuted only because there was a lot of money involved and it was students and not the staff.
If people are going to spend ridiculously high costs for schooling, they need to know that it's not going to support criminals like those at Winston-Salem.
It's mass transit without the masses. Imagine your own personal bus, taxi or train. Mass transit is good for many people because it enables travel without so much stress... or at least without the same type of stress and certainly less danger. But among the problems of mass transit is the crowding and congestion which often accompanies more dense populated areas.
I think having HOV lanes replaced with "Automated" lanes, self driving cars are likely to take you anywhere you need to go, respond to traffic problems by dynamically re-routing and generally even out the flow of traffic all over. Even if a driver decides not to participate in the use of self-driving cars, when there are enough self-driving cars, it will likely benefit the non-participants as well.
One caveat is the fact that non-participants will see it as a license to be an even bigger asshole than they were to "other drivers." They would be bigger because they would drive rudely around machines which would, ostensibly, not be offended... (the passengers might though... imagine cutting off a self-driving car and how it might respond)
There are probably a lot of scary scenarios which I haven't considered, but I recall batman movies and the self-driving batmobile and how that could be really useful. A car that will let you get out at your destination then drive away to park somewhere? Awesome... especially if you can notify your car that you are waiting to be picked up and have it arrive in a few moments. There's a lot of awesome there... and some scary.
Their claim clearly has no merit and is intended to censor. In addition to filing a counter-suit, we should Steissand effect their sorry asses. Throwing threats around like that should not be tollerated.
I heartily expect the GMO, patent encumbered rice will be rejected all over. Nothing says "our rice will weed out your rice and sue you into slavery" quite like this.