Who paid your minimum wage as a subway wage slave? The subway customers... most of whom weren't minimum wage workers themselves. Take away the minimum wage, and the employers go on a "race to the bottom" of what the employment market will bear.
In the absence of a social benefit, in a place where all the resources are controlled by the rich, and in the presence of a desperate need to eat and feed your family.... the bottom can be very very very low indeed.
So it is clear who pays for a lack of social benefit, the very poor, and the lower middle class exposed to increased crimes of desperation.
Taxes being generally redistributive, means the upper middle class pays for the social benefit. (The super rich generally, having the most options, generally escape quite a lot of taxation.) (My current favourite economics related Author is Nicolas Nassim Taleb, author of "The Black Swan" http://www.fooledbyrandomness.com/) As he points out, wealth, unlike weight, is from Extremistan.... the wealth of the richest person in a randomly selected group significantly affects the average.
The fact you made it from India to Chicago means you are rich. Rich in strength, talent and drive. So you probably would have done quite well (relatively speaking) in India or anywhere. ie. You are intrinsically fortunate, but spare a thought for your children, they may perhaps not be...
I suspect an engineer does better than an economist.
An economist dreams that fancy accounting can fix things, an engineer tends to think in terms of conservation laws, reservoirs and pressures.
What's the end game?
I'm not sure, the things I have been reading about China suggests it may not be what Americans think it is...
You see China is Old. China is old old old and utterly massive.
It has basically been way overpopulated and resource depleted since about 1900....
America is just waking up to thoughts of Resource Depletion.
China has been living them for over a century.
Now you have sold your real world economy to a mammoth hungry maw for dreams of "Intellectual Property". (Something the Chinese only believe in if the wind is in their favour)
Last I heard the Chinese had bankrolled a grand shopping spree....what they buy will be very very interesting...
Look, you have your economy in hock. China has much more than enough dollars. So the time has come to Pay up in hard goods or your currency suddenly isn't worth the paper its printed on.
Yup, it's way too late for worrying....
You yanks should move on a little towards the PANIC NOW stage.
Ipv6 adoption will be lead by whoever can give me, cheapest, a static IP address for every mobile, personal and embedded device I own / create / deliver.
(Hint for the clueless: The NEO1973 is the first open cell phone, early developers already have the phones in their hands, mass production scheduled for September 2007. Open Moko is the linux based distro that runs on it...)
Make him write out by hand v1ag^ and c1al1$ the correct way once for every email he ever sent out with them spelt the wrong way...
Or worse, make him actual _take_ the pills his has being trying to flog....while he is in prison of course....then either way the results will be just revenge...
And invest all his money in all those exciting "sure thing" stocks...
It is on a chain that goes way up to the roof......and some pipes.......this used to be a factory......compressed air? Sprinkler valve? What?
I don't know.
I wonder, I wonder.
Other people wonder.
Maybe it has been pulled many times? Maybe someone will pull it and sprinkle all the PCs? Maybe someone pulls it and we all get flushed down the intertubes. (Funny, my kids have never seen a toilet with a chain)
Life is full of little puzzlements.
(It all goes wrong tomorrow, IT WASN'T ME! I HAVE RESISTED TEMPTATION FOR YEARS NOW!)
Case 1, first time I met a Mac, stuffed stiffy (small format floppy to you yanks) into drive, copied data off, search for button to eject stiffy, press nearest, Mac resets.
Mac had only software eject, the small beige button next to the stiffy drive was the reset.
Case 2, Mind killing migraine, pain like knifes been driven into my eyeballs, looking for place to plug USB device into, missed usb port and plugged it into the reset button....
Richard Stallman of the Free
Software Foundation devised, in addition to some marvelous
software, the GNU General Public License (GPL for short). Or
the CopyLeft it is sometimes called.
It is quite a revolutionary document, using the "copyright"
tool to to protect your right to use free software.
Unfortunately using copyright to protect free software is a lot
like using a Jackal to guard the hens.
In fact, various inconveniences relating to this have resulted
in modifications such as the LGPL (Library General Public
License) and more recently the NPL (Netscape Public
License)
I call these matters mere inconveniences, the real damage will
occur when the Jackal's, (sorry, I mean lawyers), actually get
to test the GPL in court for the first time.
Thus enter my version.
Its very simple.
Entirely consistent.
Completely unrestrictive.
Easy to apply.
The "No problem Bugroff" license is as follows...
The answer to any and every question relating to the copyright,
patents, legal issues of Bugroff licensed software is....
Sure, No problem. Don't worry, be happy. Now bugger
off.
All portions of this license are important..
"Sure, no problem." Gives you complete freedom. I mean
it. Utterly complete. A bit of a joke really. You have
complete freedom anyway.
"Don't worry, be happy." Apart from being good advice and a
good song, it also says:- No matter what anyone else says or
does, you still have complete freedom.
Now bugger off. The only way to get rid of pushy Jackals is
to ignore them and not feed them. The GPL is just begging
somebody to take it to court. Can't you just see it. Exactly
the same thing that happened when some twit (not Linus)
registered Linux as his own personal trademark. People got
upset, started a fund, and hired, off all ruddy things, a
Jackal to try and defend the chicken! Who really benefits from
this trademark / patent / copyright thing anyway? The
lawyers. Who made it up in the first place? The lawyers.
OK so the last part of the license sounds a bit harsh, but
seriously folks, if you are a:-
Lawyer asking these legalese questions... You should go off
and learn an honest trade that will actually contribute to
life instead of draining it.
Programmer asking these legalese questions... You have
amazingly powerful tools in your hands and mind, use them to
ask and answer the worthwhile questions of life, the universe
and everything. Stop mucking about with such legal nonsense
and get back to programming.
User/reader asking these question... Don't worry. Go off
and be happy. Have fun. Enjoy what has been created for
you.
http://www.google.co.nz/search?q=google+"market+sh are" and you will get 651000 answers!
At least until Google spiders this comment, in which case you will get 651001.
But you can always trust the 1st answer, this is Google you know.:-)
Richard Stallman of the Free
Software Foundation devised, in addition to some marvelous
software, the GNU General Public License (GPL for short). Or
the CopyLeft it is sometimes called.
It is quite a revolutionary document, using the "copyright"
tool to to protect your right to use free software.
Unfortunately using copyright to protect free software is a lot
like using a Jackal to guard the hens.
In fact, various inconveniences relating to this have resulted
in modifications such as the LGPL (Library General Public
License) and more recently the NPL (Netscape Public
License)
I call these matters mere inconveniences, the real damage will
occur when the Jackal's, (sorry, I mean lawyers), actually get
to test the GPL in court for the first time.
Thus enter my version.
Its very simple.
Entirely consistent.
Completely unrestrictive.
Easy to apply.
The "No problem Bugroff" license is as follows...
The answer to any and every question relating to the copyright,
patents, legal issues of Bugroff licensed software is....
Sure, No problem. Don't worry, be happy. Now bugger
off.
All portions of this license are important..
"Sure, no problem." Gives you complete freedom. I mean
it. Utterly complete. A bit of a joke really. You have
complete freedom anyway.
"Don't worry, be happy." Apart from being good advice and a
good song, it also says:- No matter what anyone else says or
does, you still have complete freedom.
Now bugger off. The only way to get rid of pushy Jackals is
to ignore them and not feed them. The GPL is just begging
somebody to take it to court. Can't you just see it. Exactly
the same thing that happened when some twit (not Linus)
registered Linux as his own personal trademark. People got
upset, started a fund, and hired, off all ruddy things, a
Jackal to try and defend the chicken! Who really benefits from
this trademark / patent / copyright thing anyway? The
lawyers. Who made it up in the first place? The lawyers.
OK so the last part of the license sounds a bit harsh, but
seriously folks, if you are a:-
Lawyer asking these legalese questions... You should go off
and learn an honest trade that will actually contribute to
life instead of draining it.
Programmer asking these legalese questions... You have
amazingly powerful tools in your hands and mind, use them to
ask and answer the worthwhile questions of life, the universe
and everything. Stop mucking about with such legal nonsense
and get back to programming.
User/reader asking these question... Don't worry. Go off
and be happy. Have fun. Enjoy what has been created for
you.
Go there with the highest resolution satellite image prints you can lay your sticky hands on.
Use a GPS, make sure you can feed it off 12V car and whatever the local power is.
Make sure the technology level you are bringing in is appropriate to the technology the people can afford. Sure you may be able to tell them exactly where Village A is in lat/lon. They know which path to take / which taxi minibus to take anyway. Have you really helped them?
Often the problems are a _lot_ more basic. Getting clean water to the house. Low tech user servicable pumps are often better than latest greatest sealed units. Desposing of waste safely, preferably in a field fertilizing manner. High yielding and disease resistant crops that require no agrichem would be handy. Vitamin supplements for the kids.
Do the air ticket open market test. Go to the local largish town. Go to the market place. Often they are absolutely fascinating places. Mentally spend the price of your air ticket, at that market, on things the local people you care about need for a healthier, safer better fed life.
Find out what it takes to find,prescribe,buy a bog standard antibiotic effective against common problems in the area. eg. Amoxylin.
Frightening, wasn't that?
Watch the mercede-benz crowd arrive at the airport. Where do they go? What are they doing? Why are they so rich in a land that is so poor? (Hint: Don't watch too closely, it is hazardous to your health.)
Slashdot Mirror
I know now to avoid PC World like the plague.
But I still need to know which make / model, it's unlikely to be a problem on just one machine. So do tell.
Who paid your minimum wage as a subway wage slave? The subway customers... most of whom weren't minimum wage workers themselves. Take away the minimum wage, and the employers go on a "race to the bottom" of what the employment market will bear.
In the absence of a social benefit, in a place where all the resources are controlled by the rich, and in the presence of a desperate need to eat and feed your family.... the bottom can be very very very low indeed.
So it is clear who pays for a lack of social benefit, the very poor, and the lower middle class exposed to increased crimes of desperation.
Taxes being generally redistributive, means the upper middle class pays for the social benefit. (The super rich generally, having the most options, generally escape quite a lot of taxation.) (My current favourite economics related Author is Nicolas Nassim Taleb, author of "The Black Swan" http://www.fooledbyrandomness.com/) As he points out, wealth, unlike weight, is from Extremistan.... the wealth of the richest person in a randomly selected group significantly affects the average.
The fact you made it from India to Chicago means you are rich. Rich in strength, talent and drive. So you probably would have done quite well (relatively speaking) in India or anywhere. ie. You are intrinsically fortunate, but spare a thought for your children, they may perhaps not be...
Having lived in a third world country with no minimum wage and no social benefit, and now in a second world country with both.... I can say...
You are being slightly "economical" with the truth.
A minimum wage and no livable benefit is against poor peoples interests.
A minimum wage and a livable social benefit makes a huge difference.
I know some nice garbage heaps for you to pick whilst you sort out your logic.
An economist dreams that fancy accounting can fix things, an engineer tends to think in terms of conservation laws, reservoirs and pressures.
What's the end game?
I'm not sure, the things I have been reading about China suggests it may not be what Americans think it is...
You see China is Old. China is old old old and utterly massive.
It has basically been way overpopulated and resource depleted since about 1900....
America is just waking up to thoughts of Resource Depletion.
China has been living them for over a century.
Now you have sold your real world economy to a mammoth hungry maw for dreams of "Intellectual Property". (Something the Chinese only believe in if the wind is in their favour)
Last I heard the Chinese had bankrolled a grand shopping spree....what they buy will be very very interesting...
Yup, it's way too late for worrying....
You yanks should move on a little towards the PANIC NOW stage.
Was walking out and seeing the fat "Anti-Piracy Enforcement" sign on the door.
Yeah, you're right. Probably providers in Asia.
(Hint for the clueless: The NEO1973 is the first open cell phone, early developers already have the phones in their hands, mass production scheduled for September 2007. Open Moko is the linux based distro that runs on it...)
Open Moko blog roll
Open moke wiki
Moisture is more dangerous than Nukes!
A New Zealand mother who needed an electric oxygen pump to breathe died after a utility company cut the power to her home because she owed them 168.40 New Zealand dollars (US$122; euro90), her family said Wednesday.
READ CAREFULLY. By reading this post you agree, on behalf of your employer, to release me from all obligations and waivers arising from any and all NON-NEGOTIATED agreements, licenses, terms-of-service, shrinkwrap, clickwrap, browsewrap, confidentiality, non-disclosure, non-compete and acceptable use policies ("BOGUS AGREEMENTS") that I have entered into with your employer, its partners, licensors, agents and assigns, in perpetuity, without prejudice to my ongoing rights and privileges. You further represent that you have the authority to release me from any BOGUS AGREEMENTS on behalf of your employer.
Of course you read the EULA.
And then click on the "Fuck Off" button.
It's the one labeled "I Accept" but everyone on the planet knows the words "I Accept" means "Fuck Off".
It's Universal Standard Engrish now.
And to any trolls replying to this post, allow me to be the first to say...."I Accept"
Apparently in Latvian "Vista" means "Hen". I dare say they will "lay" into them for that. Or hatch another name.....
Make him write out by hand v1ag^ and c1al1$ the correct way once for every email he ever sent out with them spelt the wrong way... Or worse, make him actual _take_ the pills his has being trying to flog....while he is in prison of course....then either way the results will be just revenge... And invest all his money in all those exciting "sure thing" stocks...
Rest of World to US: Your attitude is noted and remembered.
...on the way to the toilets.
...and some pipes.... ...this used to be a factory... ...compressed air? Sprinkler valve? What?
It is on a chain that goes way up to the roof...
I don't know.
I wonder, I wonder.
Other people wonder.
Maybe it has been pulled many times? Maybe someone will pull it and sprinkle all the PCs? Maybe someone pulls it and we all get flushed down the intertubes. (Funny, my kids have never seen a toilet with a chain)
Life is full of little puzzlements.
(It all goes wrong tomorrow, IT WASN'T ME! I HAVE RESISTED TEMPTATION FOR YEARS NOW!)
Case 1, first time I met a Mac, stuffed stiffy (small format floppy to you yanks) into drive, copied data off, search for button to eject stiffy, press nearest, Mac resets.
Mac had only software eject, the small beige button next to the stiffy drive was the reset.
Case 2, Mind killing migraine, pain like knifes been driven into my eyeballs, looking for place to plug USB device into, missed usb port and plugged it into the reset button....
Richard Stallman of the Free Software Foundation devised, in addition to some marvelous software, the GNU General Public License (GPL for short). Or the CopyLeft it is sometimes called.
It is quite a revolutionary document, using the "copyright" tool to to protect your right to use free software.
Unfortunately using copyright to protect free software is a lot like using a Jackal to guard the hens.
In fact, various inconveniences relating to this have resulted in modifications such as the LGPL (Library General Public License) and more recently the NPL (Netscape Public License)
I call these matters mere inconveniences, the real damage will occur when the Jackal's, (sorry, I mean lawyers), actually get to test the GPL in court for the first time.
Thus enter my version.
Its very simple.
Entirely consistent.
Completely unrestrictive.
Easy to apply.
The "No problem Bugroff" license is as follows...
The answer to any and every question relating to the copyright, patents, legal issues of Bugroff licensed software is....
Sure, No problem. Don't worry, be happy. Now bugger off.
All portions of this license are important..
OK so the last part of the license sounds a bit harsh, but seriously folks, if you are a :-
Are these just trolls figuring it would easy to spark a Linux/Bsd or XBsd vs YBsd flamewar here...
Or is there a deeper reason for the dissension that I'm not aware of.
If it's just trolls, they and the moderators are working unusually hard at fighting each other.
Fascinating, I have just done it again and got only 645000. So maybe it is falling....
http://www.google.co.nz/search?q=google+"market+sh are" and you will get 651000 answers!
At least until Google spiders this comment, in which case you will get 651001.
But you can always trust the 1st answer, this is Google you know. :-)
Don't worry, be happy.
Now bugger off!
Richard Stallman of the Free Software Foundation devised, in addition to some marvelous software, the GNU General Public License (GPL for short). Or the CopyLeft it is sometimes called.
It is quite a revolutionary document, using the "copyright" tool to to protect your right to use free software.
Unfortunately using copyright to protect free software is a lot like using a Jackal to guard the hens.
In fact, various inconveniences relating to this have resulted in modifications such as the LGPL (Library General Public License) and more recently the NPL (Netscape Public License)
I call these matters mere inconveniences, the real damage will occur when the Jackal's, (sorry, I mean lawyers), actually get to test the GPL in court for the first time.
Thus enter my version.
Its very simple.
Entirely consistent.
Completely unrestrictive.
Easy to apply.
The "No problem Bugroff" license is as follows...
The answer to any and every question relating to the copyright, patents, legal issues of Bugroff licensed software is....
Sure, No problem. Don't worry, be happy. Now bugger off.
All portions of this license are important..
OK so the last part of the license sounds a bit harsh, but seriously folks, if you are a :-
Use a GPS, make sure you can feed it off 12V car and whatever the local power is.
Make sure the technology level you are bringing in is appropriate to the technology the people can afford. Sure you may be able to tell them exactly where Village A is in lat/lon. They know which path to take / which taxi minibus to take anyway. Have you really helped them?
Often the problems are a _lot_ more basic. Getting clean water to the house. Low tech user servicable pumps are often better than latest greatest sealed units. Desposing of waste safely, preferably in a field fertilizing manner. High yielding and disease resistant crops that require no agrichem would be handy. Vitamin supplements for the kids.
Do the air ticket open market test. Go to the local largish town. Go to the market place. Often they are absolutely fascinating places. Mentally spend the price of your air ticket, at that market, on things the local people you care about need for a healthier, safer better fed life.
Find out what it takes to find,prescribe,buy a bog standard antibiotic effective against common problems in the area. eg. Amoxylin.
Frightening, wasn't that?
Watch the mercede-benz crowd arrive at the airport. Where do they go? What are they doing? Why are they so rich in a land that is so poor? (Hint: Don't watch too closely, it is hazardous to your health.)
They may be highly cited for the simple reason they were obviously wrong to the authors of the contradicting study.
This study says nothing about that larger proportion of papers that are subtly wrong...