I'm not sure I would want to put in place something that would encourage designers to make quick fixes. Once the build breaks the "lava lamp penalty" would encourage a designer to keep the lamp from bubbling rather than spend the time to fix the break in the best and safest manner (i.e. one that may take an hour longer.)
Does your build environment allow you to debug, build, and test a loadbuild break in the time it takes a lava lamp to heat up?
All this discussion of constraints and monitoring is really moot. As much as we would wish different the market forces will drive the direction these machines evolve.
If it is possible and money can be made by doing it it will be done. It can be slowed down, agencies can try to monitor it, but if large sums of money are available to be made, someone will do it.
There are many examples: drugs, nuclear technology, biotech, genetic engineering, piracy, porn, etc.
If that many cameras are taking pictures every 15 feet they'll end up with enough data, combined with aerial photos, to do some awesome 3-D modeling of these cities.
I can think of dozens of fun applications that could use this database.
There is a neat applet at Physics 2000 that lets you simulate the interference pattern in a two slit experiment. It also lets you cange the distance between the two slits in real-time. Cool.
Air pollution is not strictly a recent phenomenon
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· Score: 5, Informative
There is a common misperception that air pollution is a recent thing.
1661 -- John Evelyn writes "Fumifugium, or the Inconvenience of the Aer and Smoake of London Dissipated" to propose remedies for London's air pollution problem. These include large public parks and lots of flowers. http://users.synflux.com.au/~ant/Evelyn/fumifug.ht ml http://www.accd.edu/sac/english/bailey/evelyn.htm
"The immoderate use of, and indulgence to, sea-coale in the city of London exposes it to one of the fowlest inconveniences and reproaches that can possibly befall so noble and otherwise incomparable City... Whilst they are belching it forth their sooty jaws, the City of London resembles the face rather of Mount Aetna, the Court of Vulcan... or the suburbs of Hell [rather] than an assembly of rational creatures..."
In his diary, Evelyn writes in 1684 that smoke was so severe "hardly could one see across the street, and this filling the lungs with its gross particles exceedingly obstructed the breast, so as one would scarce breathe."
In the Middle Ages London air was so polluted by smoke from coal fires that in 1273 Edward I passed a law banning coal burning in an attempt to curb smoke emissions. In 1306 a Londoner was tried and executed for breaking this law. Despite this, pollution was not checked, and on one occasion in 1578 Elizabeth I refused to enter London because there was so much smoke in the air. Smoke killed vegetation and ruined clothes, and the acid in it corroded buildings.
I always wondered if this early pollution may have contributed to Europe's mini-ice age
I've been doing this for a while. Since most radio stations are on line I set up a scheduled task (cron job for the so inclined) to launch a browser at the appropriate time to the appropriate URL.
In my case I want a copy of a few public radio shows that played the night before and are archived at NPR. But this works for radio shows too. Since this is all happening at 3am I have the sound turned down.
I use Audio Grabber to record the file and convert it to an MP3. I pop in a CD-R when I get up and before my coffee is done I have a CD to take to the gym that contains the subset of news I want to hear when I want to hear it.
Still working on automating the CD-R creation. Gotta teach the cat to put the CD-R in the tray without scratching it.
I have seen many small businesses (especially small businesses in fact) that have been convinced to put up a web site and then it just sits there and collects dust. I can't count the number of times I go to a site and find out of date event lists and calendars, or menus that don't reflect the current offerings, or even directions and phone numbers that are no longer valid.
Just HAVING a web site is not enough. Many small businesses are done a disservice when they are pulled into the modern world, convinced to put up a web site by some hi-tech evangelist, and then abandoned as the real (but boring) work of updating and maintaining the site sets in.
In a related story, JoE riPPer announces that the full set with fan commentaries will be available on alt.binaries.movies.divx three days earlier on November first. The RIAA, citing this as an example, projects the collapse of the movie industry. Kaaza denies that any of its users would purposely make the films available though it may be used to distribute authorized backups. Richard Stallman and Al Gore both claim credit.
Software development is not going to go away. So you have to look at the skills that will be needed in the future as automation increases and more coding is sent offshore.
At the heart of software development is defining the problem and examining the alternative solutions that could be implemented. These are not skills that will likely be automated and based on my experience with offshore development not likely to be outsourced anytime soon.
There is a lot more to software than knowing a few languages and coding elegantly.
Spamming already exists on the gray fringes of legality/ethicality (is that a word?) I can't imagine that charging a penny a letter would slow down a dedicated spammer at all. They'd simply send them without paying and continue to spoof / hide / relocate as required.
This, like many laws aimed at criminals, would make things marginally more inconvenient for honest people while ignoring the criminals.
Spamming already exists on the gray fringes of legality/ethicality (is that a word?) I can't imagine that charging a penny a letter would slow down a dedicated spammer at all. They'd simply send them without paying and continue to spoof / hide / relocate as required.
This, like many laws aimed at criminals, would make things marginally more inconvenient for honest people while ignoring the criminals.
Slashdot Mirror
His other book Incident Response covers what to do once you've been attacked.
Hmm. I wonder if it has a chapter on finger pointing and avoiding blame?
I'm not sure I would want to put in place something that would encourage designers to make quick fixes. Once the build breaks the "lava lamp penalty" would encourage a designer to keep the lamp from bubbling rather than spend the time to fix the break in the best and safest manner (i.e. one that may take an hour longer.)
Does your build environment allow you to debug, build, and test a loadbuild break in the time it takes a lava lamp to heat up?
All this discussion of constraints and monitoring is really moot. As much as we would wish different the market forces will drive the direction these machines evolve.
If it is possible and money can be made by doing it it will be done. It can be slowed down, agencies can try to monitor it, but if large sums of money are available to be made, someone will do it.
There are many examples: drugs, nuclear technology, biotech, genetic engineering, piracy, porn, etc.
If that many cameras are taking pictures every 15 feet they'll end up with enough data, combined with aerial photos, to do some awesome 3-D modeling of these cities.
I can think of dozens of fun applications that could use this database.
There is a neat applet at Physics 2000 that lets you simulate the interference pattern in a two slit experiment. It also lets you cange the distance between the two slits in real-time. Cool.
This from Environmental History Timeline:
1661 -- John Evelyn writes "Fumifugium, or the Inconvenience of the Aer and Smoake of London Dissipated" to propose remedies for London's air pollution problem. These include large public parks and lots of flowers. http://users.synflux.com.au/~ant/Evelyn/fumifug.h
"The immoderate use of, and indulgence to, sea-coale in the city of London exposes it to one of the fowlest inconveniences and reproaches that can possibly befall so noble and otherwise incomparable City... Whilst they are belching it forth their sooty jaws, the City of London resembles the face rather of Mount Aetna, the Court of Vulcan... or the suburbs of Hell [rather] than an assembly of rational creatures..."
In his diary, Evelyn writes in 1684 that smoke was so severe "hardly could one see across the street, and this filling the lungs with its gross particles exceedingly obstructed the breast, so as one would scarce breathe."
And this from Air Pollution:
In the Middle Ages London air was so polluted by smoke from coal fires that in 1273 Edward I passed a law banning coal burning in an attempt to curb smoke emissions. In 1306 a Londoner was tried and executed for breaking this law. Despite this, pollution was not checked, and on one occasion in 1578 Elizabeth I refused to enter London because there was so much smoke in the air. Smoke killed vegetation and ruined clothes, and the acid in it corroded buildings.
I always wondered if this early pollution may have contributed to Europe's mini-ice age
I'm sure that ten minutes after the service is offered there will be a utility to block the ads like AdShield does in most browser ads today.
You just KNOW this is going to go down in the books as PROOF of
In situations like this I try to catch the offending person's eye and with a sad expression shake my head no. It very often works.
As the price of technology falls the cost of adding new features is so marginal that there is little to lose by adding them.
However when people go shopping for new phones and compare lists of features there is a lot to lose if thos features are not there.
If they can forge a header they can forge the postage.
Come on, the spammer has already shown an low regard for the law anyway.
I've been doing this for a while. Since most radio stations are on line I set up a scheduled task (cron job for the so inclined) to launch a browser at the appropriate time to the appropriate URL.
In my case I want a copy of a few public radio shows that played the night before and are archived at NPR. But this works for radio shows too. Since this is all happening at 3am I have the sound turned down.
I use Audio Grabber to record the file and convert it to an MP3. I pop in a CD-R when I get up and before my coffee is done I have a CD to take to the gym that contains the subset of news I want to hear when I want to hear it.
Still working on automating the CD-R creation. Gotta teach the cat to put the CD-R in the tray without scratching it.
I have seen many small businesses (especially small businesses in fact) that have been convinced to put up a web site and then it just sits there and collects dust. I can't count the number of times I go to a site and find out of date event lists and calendars, or menus that don't reflect the current offerings, or even directions and phone numbers that are no longer valid.
Just HAVING a web site is not enough. Many small businesses are done a disservice when they are pulled into the modern world, convinced to put up a web site by some hi-tech evangelist, and then abandoned as the real (but boring) work of updating and maintaining the site sets in.
In a related story, JoE riPPer announces that the full set with fan commentaries will be available on alt.binaries.movies.divx three days earlier on November first. The RIAA, citing this as an example, projects the collapse of the movie industry. Kaaza denies that any of its users would purposely make the films available though it may be used to distribute authorized backups. Richard Stallman and Al Gore both claim credit.
Software development is not going to go away. So you have to look at the skills that will be needed in the future as automation increases and more coding is sent offshore.
At the heart of software development is defining the problem and examining the alternative solutions that could be implemented. These are not skills that will likely be automated and based on my experience with offshore development not likely to be outsourced anytime soon.
There is a lot more to software than knowing a few languages and coding elegantly.
Spamming already exists on the gray fringes of legality/ethicality (is that a word?) I can't imagine that charging a penny a letter would slow down a dedicated spammer at all. They'd simply send them without paying and continue to spoof / hide / relocate as required.
This, like many laws aimed at criminals, would make things marginally more inconvenient for honest people while ignoring the criminals.
Spamming already exists on the gray fringes of legality/ethicality (is that a word?) I can't imagine that charging a penny a letter would slow down a dedicated spammer at all. They'd simply send them without paying and continue to spoof / hide / relocate as required.
This, like many laws aimed at criminals, would make things marginally more inconvenient for honest people while ignoring the criminals.
The sky...was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel.
I love that line. It would be a great start to a poem.