10) IRS doesn't manage to complete remediation efforts. On second thought...
9) IRS manages to complete remediation efforts
8) Hotels booked solid, Antichrist's family forced to sleep in a manger
7) The election of anyone currently running for the presidency of the United States
6) Electrical power fails on Jan 2cd when survivalists simultaneously switch off their kerosene generators
5) The Artist Formerly Known As Prince realizes the futility of a career entirely based on "1999", goes insane, burns down World Trade Center in Minneapolis, gets bodyslammed by Gov. Ventura
4) Rising mound of Y2K memorabilia towers over United States, topples, raises sea level 2 feet when it falls into the Pacific, drowns Antarctic penguins and Tokyo
3) Feuding geeks arguing over merits of KDE/Gnome/EMACS/vi/GTK/Motif/GNU/Linux/*BSD/blah/b leh inadvertently trip button marked 'Doomsday Device', unable to blame End of World on Bill Gates
2) God certifies the Universe Y2K-compliant, inadvertently forgets nearby meteor storm, is sued by rampaging trial lawyers, points out Acts of Me exemption clause
1) Entire planet shuts down when Jan 1st is declared World Hangover Day
Top 10 Surprises in Microsoft's New Internet Strategy
10) Competitors now to be broiled in lemon butter before being swallowed whole 9) Software will be offered as services, due Microsoft's stellar performance in the service department 8) Windows refund requests to be considered by an additional layer of management before being rejected 7) Brand-new innovative network computing device bears no resemblance whatsoever to Sun's network computing devices 6) Windows2000 slogan announced -- Windows2000: Not Just the Kitchen Sink 5) Bill Gates' charitable contributions not directly tied to Microsoft's PR engine 4) Plan to increase worker productivity by allowing play of Civ:CTP during coffee breaks 3) Plan to dock all workers playing Linux version of Civ:CTP during said coffee breaks 2) Customers who sign up for 3 years of MSN to get free PC, rebate, small Carribean island 1) There's a strategy!
It is with feelings of profound ambivalence that I read the press release....
Slashdot has been my #1 favorite site for years now, and the character of its free-wheeling conversation and deep-think geek info has been the greatest part of it. I was happy for Rob and Jeff when/. was acquired, because I appreciate the cost and effort that goes into running this crazy place.
But with the dust yet to settle on the legal aspect of the net, I have to question whether it will have an effect on the/. I know and love. From the perspective of Andover, no doubt, an IPO will be heaven-sent, a greatly needed infusion of cash.
What happens if traffic on Slashdot decreases? Will shareholders insist on a format change to drive ad impressions up?
If stock price plummets, shareholders will eventually hold the company accountable. I do not see any way to avoid ramifications to/. itself.
Moreover, neo-fascistic legislation has yet to run its course on the net. What happens when a 12 year-old's mother sees him reading Anonymous Coward flame-drivel, and sues Andover for child endangerment? (Could this bring even more moderation changes?)
In the end, though, I wish Andover the best. And I hope that when all is said and done,/. will retain the qualities that made it great.
Why are geek girls so hard to find? The IT field is one of the most interesting, dynamic and exciting in the world today! Why aren't women interested in computer science? If there really is no societal pressure involved, is something biologically different with women's brains? As a female geek myself, I'd have to say I think it has more to do with education and the expectations of our status-conscious culture.
Just like males, we go through the pressure cooker of high school, with all the emphasis on conformity and appearance that implies. Even worse, girls in my high school were routinely encouraged (both by teachers and other students) to take algebra instead of trig, trig instead of calculus. And if you plan to major in a scientific field in college, you really need to start in high school. It can mean the difference between majoring in electrical engineering or information management. Women seem to get "steered" into less math-rigorous fields.
The result? Whenever I meet a geek guy and start talking about my computer-related interests, his eyes goggle out as though he's found the Promised Land.
Hmm, well, where I work we have our share of supercomputers -- massively parallel -- think millions of 8-bit RISC processors all chugging away. They are great at simulating fluid and aero dynamics. Each processor calculates the path of a molecule. Of course, each processor is limited in and of itself. There are no ALUs/FPUs etc. (Go play Quake on something else.)
The future of this field is very, very exciting. Fluid-state supercomputers. Each bit corresponds to a specific molecule. Our next purchase will feature a _billion_ processors. Drool.
Of course, the difficulty comes in programming the damned thing. I suspect the same holds true for neural nets.
Enough of all these boring, lame-ass hurricane names. Brett, Mitch, blah blah blah. We need a little more originality....
Top 20 Things Iain M. Banks Would Name Hurricane Floyd
20. Hurricane Mild Inconvenience 19. Hurricane Looter-Friendly 18. Hurricane Net Congestion 17. Hurricane Wildly Overrated 16. Hurricane So Much For Subtlety 15. Hurricane This, Too, Shall Pass 14. Hurricane Flying Shrapnel 13. Hurricane We're Not In Kansas Anymore 12. Hurricane Rotating Cow 11. Hurricane Huddling In The Basement 10. Hurricane Hissy Fit 9. Hurricane That's It, We're Moving To Wisconsin 8. Hurricane Doing Unto Others 7. Hurricane The Movie 6. Hurricane Hurried Evacuation 5. Hurricane I Didn't Know My Car Could Swim 4. Hurricane Slashdot Effect 3. Hurricane What I Did On My Summer Vacation 2. Hurricane We're All Going To Die 1. Hurricane Warrior Princess
Well, I can sympathize with the "stigma" and the feeling of having to prove oneself female. On the other hand, you have to admit that when you feature faceless photos of yourself wearing mid-calf black leather boots with stiletto heels (and blond hair that looks suspiciously wig-like) there are bound to be some questions raised. Hell, I am a female geek, and I simply can't imagine myself doing such a thing. For some reason, a person whose garments are furnished by Frederick's of Hollywood just doesn't seem genuinely geek-like to me. (On the other hand, I have been known to don black negligee`s and six-inch heels on occasion;) But when I'm hacking, I dress for comfort.)
The other factor that makes me suspicious is the drastic change in the artistic quality of the strip since its beginning. Granted that some of the characters are obviously rotoscoped (or something similar) from photographs. Compare first strip to last Thursday. Even the lettering has changed.
I think it's certainly possible that Nitrozac is misleading readers WRT gender. OTOH, who really cares what sex she is? (Besides all those geeks with crushes on her. Sad. Deeply deeply sad.)
I'd like to go out with you, but I need to defragment my hard drive.
9) Antichrist crashed party, demanded blood sacrifices to the Satan-spawn of Baal. 8) Panicing day-traders fleeing the inflationary wrath of Alan Greenspan caused a run on the dollar 7) Today's date actually expressed as 090999, thus disappointing a bunch of Y2K nuts hoping for a warm-up 6) Ricky Martin stole the MTV video award from Weird Al Yankovic, thanks to shameless ballot stuffing 5) Stayed at home working on computer to avoid superstitious fanatics, motherboard overheated, magic smoke came out.:( 4) Spilled hemlock all over myself at the coven swap-meet 3) "friends" is a re-run tonight 2) Couldn't play the new Dreamcast due to nuclear melt-down of national electric grid 1) That darn asteroid!
Top 7 Most Surprising Facts about Driver's License Photos
7) Illegal immigrants and terrorists segment of population most likely to get legitimate driver's licenses 6) Uncle Billy-Bob now more likely to stop bumming rides; learn to drive 5) Privacy concerns overstated due to overwhelming public appeal of having complete strangers gawk at your license photo 4) Police officers will continue to mistake your photo for your evil twin Volkar. 3) Criminals less likely to steal your particular identity if vast number is available in one place 2) Government less likely to raise taxes thanks to revenue gained by selling image database 1) Unflattering license photos show how people really look
Top 5 Reasons Microsoft Is Glad Linux Will Support up to 4G of RAM
5) Office 2000 memory requirements now supported by Linux, making port much easier. 4) Enhances sales potential of Windows 2000 -- WINE now able to run W2K under Linux. 3) Yet another fun Linux feature to deny and obfuscate. 2) Can complain before tech-unclued journalists about Linux's memory requirements -- 4G compared to W2K's 128M. 1) Now that Linux supports 4G of RAM, it will be competition on the everyday Joe's desktop, thus making MS-DOJ trial irrelevant.
Why can't a government be useful for something for a change? If I wanted my personal data sold to the highest bidder, I'd sell it myself. I don't personally mind the lack of privacy so much as the fact that someone else is getting rich on my data -- without my permission. Instead of outlawing vaguely-defined net obscenities and swear words, how about actually protecting citizens? (And I hate spam as much as the next person. I feel it should be covered under the telecom act which banned fax spam. Especially email that attempts to sell items or pornography -- how would you feel if your kid got email like that? At least if it's on the web they have to actively seek it out. Spam is target-blind and you should have to opt-in to receive it.)
I'd like to see some legislation outlawing the sale or share of personal data by corporations without consent or compensation.
This is exploitation, pure and simple. You can't even opt out of giving your information to a state or federal government.
Amazing, your story mirrors my own to a large extent. I was hometaught from grades 4-10 and then went to college. I am not certain being homeschooled has much to do with my current geekly state; I still hung out with the neighbor kids after school and participated in things like community swim teams and high school marching band. In fact I'm pretty grateful to my parents because I am sure they saved me a ton of peer-inspired adolescent angst and ridicule. Now after I spend 10 hours a day in front of a computer I can go home, call up my few geekly friends, have fun. (My only complaint now is that it is so hard to meet geek guys! Where are they? Playing with their toys I guess.) I feel my life is uncluttered by social competition and status, which is probably a major reason I'm so into technology, unlike a lot of females. Maybe our mass market culture never much of a chance to drill conformity into me because I was hometaught.
Someday I hope to have children, and I hope that I have the chance to send them to a school where they won't be bullied for being different if they want to be different. If that means I have to telecommute at night to teach them during the day, so be it.:)
I just had to laugh when I saw the 'rotation' pic. It looks more like a tilt-a-wheel than a high-tech cubicle.
Much cooler than the than the 'backstation'. And the 4 flat panels on the upscale model look so nifty. If this thing is only $5.5k, where is all the money going on that $6300 'alien furniture technology' chair? I guess they have to pay their alien consultants for their expertise and travel time.
My main peeve with the wireless desktop is the way capslock magically turns itself on -- you hit capslock to turn it off, which somehow doesn't toggle it, thus forcing you to hit capslock yet another time. I like the idea of keyboard by radio, it just seems too slow and and undocumented feature-full. I don't know if the infrared versions work any better. I would suppose that having to keep them in a straight line would be a pain.
I likewise haven't noticed any problems with the wireless mouse, but then I don't use it that often.
It has cut down on the desktop clutter, but I still have a rat's nest of wires behind my pc.
*imagines future where the only wires are the electrical cables* Heck, why settle? Solar-powered pcs (thus forcing all geeks to get a tan).
Ah yes, the computer chair of the future. I can just picture myself sacked out on one of these during those 20 hour code stints. The 'recline' picture looks a bit dangerous though; I wonder if there is some kind of mount for the monitor. It would be pretty non-ergonomic to have a 21" crt come crashing down on your face. Also I'm presuming the computer itself must sit off to the side somewhere -- nice how they don't show all the messy wires in the photos:) (I prefer my logitech wireless desktop anyway. Though I don't like the way the keyboard drops letters when I type too fast. And if I had one of those chairs the wireless mouse might just slide off the desktop while in 'recline'.)
So, +points for somewhat fulfilling a long-standing fantasy in futuresque form, -points for chintzy ad copy. "Although crusing in 'warp drive', please allow 6-8 weeks" for delivery. Indeed.
Anyone else think that a Laz-E-Boy in front of a computer desk (or maybe a wall-mounted flat panel monitor) would be just as good?
Yeah, but the stranglehold MS has on office suite software (can you say fundamental utility) really gives them a huge opportunity to hijack anything that walks by. Call it an example of a known monopolist leveraging dominance in one area to gain control of another market segment.
Meanwhile businesses are shackled to proprietary formats which force them to upgrade to the Latest, Greatest Version every two years. SGML -- or rather, open standards -- are the answer. I seriously doubt Talking Moon is 100% truthful when it says O2K will faithfully implement XML for its native file formats. Imagine, if that were the case, it would make importing/exporting Office documents nearly trivial for competitors like StarOffice or Applixware. And the company that calls a 50 meg web browser indivisable from its operating system is much more devious than that.
But the ABM zealot in me would rather die than see bloated MS crap running on top of my beloved slackware (or any other [Gnu/]Linux). Hopefully this rumour is just more of the same old FUD.
This sounds more like Bill G's '12 Steps to Microsoft Co-dependency' than anything that would actually be useful to a business manager. From the book: "Email is the killer app of the future". Are these the words of a visionary, or of a crafty billionaire eager to sell more copies of MS Exchange Server and BackOffice? And the mass media will spoon-feed this out-dated crap to the ignorant public, many of whom believe Bill Gates and Microsoft are responsible for the personal computer, the GUI, and the internet (which, as we all know, is synonymous with the web). Excuse me while I vomit.
Slashdot Mirror
10) IRS doesn't manage to complete remediation efforts. On second thought...
b leh inadvertently trip button marked 'Doomsday Device', unable to blame End of World on Bill Gates
9) IRS manages to complete remediation efforts
8) Hotels booked solid, Antichrist's family forced to sleep in a manger
7) The election of anyone currently running for the presidency of the United States
6) Electrical power fails on Jan 2cd when survivalists simultaneously switch off their kerosene generators
5) The Artist Formerly Known As Prince realizes the futility of a career entirely based on "1999", goes insane, burns down World Trade Center in Minneapolis, gets bodyslammed by Gov. Ventura
4) Rising mound of Y2K memorabilia towers over United States, topples, raises sea level 2 feet when it falls into the Pacific, drowns Antarctic penguins and Tokyo
3) Feuding geeks arguing over merits of KDE/Gnome/EMACS/vi/GTK/Motif/GNU/Linux/*BSD/blah/
2) God certifies the Universe Y2K-compliant, inadvertently forgets nearby meteor storm, is sued by rampaging trial lawyers, points out Acts of Me exemption clause
1) Entire planet shuts down when Jan 1st is declared World Hangover Day
10) Competitors now to be broiled in lemon butter before being swallowed whole
9) Software will be offered as services, due Microsoft's stellar performance in the service department
8) Windows refund requests to be considered by an additional layer of management before being rejected
7) Brand-new innovative network computing device bears no resemblance whatsoever to Sun's network computing devices
6) Windows2000 slogan announced -- Windows2000: Not Just the Kitchen Sink
5) Bill Gates' charitable contributions not directly tied to Microsoft's PR engine
4) Plan to increase worker productivity by allowing play of Civ:CTP during coffee breaks
3) Plan to dock all workers playing Linux version of Civ:CTP during said coffee breaks
2) Customers who sign up for 3 years of MSN to get free PC, rebate, small Carribean island
1) There's a strategy!
It is with feelings of profound ambivalence that I read the press release....
/. was acquired, because I appreciate the cost and effort that goes into running this crazy place.
/. I know and love. From the perspective of Andover, no doubt, an IPO will be heaven-sent, a greatly needed infusion of cash.
/. itself.
/. will retain the qualities that made it great.
Slashdot has been my #1 favorite site for years now, and the character of its free-wheeling conversation and deep-think geek info has been the greatest part of it. I was happy for Rob and Jeff when
But with the dust yet to settle on the legal aspect of the net, I have to question whether it will have an effect on the
What happens if traffic on Slashdot decreases? Will shareholders insist on a format change to drive ad impressions up?
If stock price plummets, shareholders will eventually hold the company accountable. I do not see any way to avoid ramifications to
Moreover, neo-fascistic legislation has yet to run its course on the net. What happens when a 12 year-old's mother sees him reading Anonymous Coward flame-drivel, and sues Andover for child endangerment? (Could this bring even more moderation changes?)
In the end, though, I wish Andover the best. And I hope that when all is said and done,
Why are geek girls so hard to find? The IT field is one of the most interesting, dynamic and exciting in the world today! Why aren't women interested in computer science? If there really is no societal pressure involved, is something biologically different with women's brains? As a female geek myself, I'd have to say I think it has more to do with education and the expectations of our status-conscious culture.
Just like males, we go through the pressure cooker of high school, with all the emphasis on conformity and appearance that implies. Even worse, girls in my high school were routinely encouraged (both by teachers and other students) to take algebra instead of trig, trig instead of calculus. And if you plan to major in a scientific field in college, you really need to start in high school. It can mean the difference between majoring in electrical engineering or information management. Women seem to get "steered" into less math-rigorous fields.
The result? Whenever I meet a geek guy and start talking about my computer-related interests, his eyes goggle out as though he's found the Promised Land.
The future of this field is very, very exciting. Fluid-state supercomputers. Each bit corresponds to a specific molecule. Our next purchase will feature a _billion_ processors. Drool.
Of course, the difficulty comes in programming the damned thing. I suspect the same holds true for neural nets.
If you thought that was sad, try this.
I'd like to go out with you, but the girls and I are having a quakefest.
Top 20 Things Iain M. Banks Would Name Hurricane Floyd
20. Hurricane Mild Inconvenience
19. Hurricane Looter-Friendly
18. Hurricane Net Congestion
17. Hurricane Wildly Overrated
16. Hurricane So Much For Subtlety
15. Hurricane This, Too, Shall Pass
14. Hurricane Flying Shrapnel
13. Hurricane We're Not In Kansas Anymore
12. Hurricane Rotating Cow
11. Hurricane Huddling In The Basement
10. Hurricane Hissy Fit
9. Hurricane That's It, We're Moving To Wisconsin
8. Hurricane Doing Unto Others
7. Hurricane The Movie
6. Hurricane Hurried Evacuation
5. Hurricane I Didn't Know My Car Could Swim
4. Hurricane Slashdot Effect
3. Hurricane What I Did On My Summer Vacation
2. Hurricane We're All Going To Die
1. Hurricane Warrior Princess
The other factor that makes me suspicious is the drastic change in the artistic quality of the strip since its beginning. Granted that some of the characters are obviously rotoscoped (or something similar) from photographs. Compare first strip to last Thursday. Even the lettering has changed.
I think it's certainly possible that Nitrozac is misleading readers WRT gender. OTOH, who really cares what sex she is? (Besides all those geeks with crushes on her. Sad. Deeply deeply sad.)
I'd like to go out with you, but I need to defragment my hard drive.
9) Antichrist crashed party, demanded blood sacrifices to the Satan-spawn of Baal. :(
8) Panicing day-traders fleeing the inflationary wrath of Alan Greenspan caused a run on the dollar
7) Today's date actually expressed as 090999, thus disappointing a bunch of Y2K nuts hoping for a warm-up
6) Ricky Martin stole the MTV video award from Weird Al Yankovic, thanks to shameless ballot stuffing
5) Stayed at home working on computer to avoid superstitious fanatics, motherboard overheated, magic smoke came out.
4) Spilled hemlock all over myself at the coven swap-meet
3) "friends" is a re-run tonight
2) Couldn't play the new Dreamcast due to nuclear melt-down of national electric grid
1) That darn asteroid!
7) Illegal immigrants and terrorists segment of population most likely to get legitimate driver's licenses
6) Uncle Billy-Bob now more likely to stop bumming rides; learn to drive
5) Privacy concerns overstated due to overwhelming public appeal of having complete strangers gawk at your license photo
4) Police officers will continue to mistake your photo for your evil twin Volkar.
3) Criminals less likely to steal your particular identity if vast number is available in one place
2) Government less likely to raise taxes thanks to revenue gained by selling image database
1) Unflattering license photos show how people really look
5) Office 2000 memory requirements now supported by Linux, making port much easier.
4) Enhances sales potential of Windows 2000 -- WINE now able to run W2K under Linux.
3) Yet another fun Linux feature to deny and obfuscate.
2) Can complain before tech-unclued journalists about Linux's memory requirements -- 4G compared to W2K's 128M.
1) Now that Linux supports 4G of RAM, it will be competition on the everyday Joe's desktop, thus making MS-DOJ trial irrelevant.
(Darn Excite, slashdotted again.)
Why can't a government be useful for something for a change? If I wanted my personal data sold to the highest bidder, I'd sell it myself. I don't personally mind the lack of privacy so much as the fact that someone else is getting rich on my data -- without my permission. Instead of outlawing vaguely-defined net obscenities and swear words, how about actually protecting citizens? (And I hate spam as much as the next person. I feel it should be covered under the telecom act which banned fax spam. Especially email that attempts to sell items or pornography -- how would you feel if your kid got email like that? At least if it's on the web they have to actively seek it out. Spam is target-blind and you should have to opt-in to receive it.)
I'd like to see some legislation outlawing the sale or share of personal data by corporations without consent or compensation.
This is exploitation, pure and simple. You can't even opt out of giving your information to a state or federal government.
Amazing, your story mirrors my own to a large extent. I was hometaught from grades 4-10 and then went to college. I am not certain being homeschooled has much to do with my current geekly state; I still hung out with the neighbor kids after school and participated in things like community swim teams and high school marching band. In fact I'm pretty grateful to my parents because I am sure they saved me a ton of peer-inspired adolescent angst and ridicule. Now after I spend 10 hours a day in front of a computer I can go home, call up my few geekly friends, have fun. (My only complaint now is that it is so hard to meet geek guys! Where are they? Playing with their toys I guess.) I feel my life is uncluttered by social competition and status, which is probably a major reason I'm so into technology, unlike a lot of females. Maybe our mass market culture never much of a chance to drill conformity into me because I was hometaught.
:)
Someday I hope to have children, and I hope that I have the chance to send them to a school where they won't be bullied for being different if they want to be different. If that means I have to telecommute at night to teach them during the day, so be it.
Just some random thoughts.
I just had to laugh when I saw the 'rotation' pic. It looks more like a tilt-a-wheel than a high-tech cubicle.
Much cooler than the than the 'backstation'. And the 4 flat panels on the upscale model look so nifty. If this thing is only $5.5k, where is all the money going on that $6300 'alien furniture technology' chair? I guess they have to pay their alien consultants for their expertise and travel time.
My main peeve with the wireless desktop is the way capslock magically turns itself on -- you hit capslock to turn it off, which somehow doesn't toggle it, thus forcing you to hit capslock yet another time. I like the idea of keyboard by radio, it just seems too slow and and undocumented feature-full. I don't know if the infrared versions work any better. I would suppose that having to keep them in a straight line would be a pain.
I likewise haven't noticed any problems with the wireless mouse, but then I don't use it that often.
It has cut down on the desktop clutter, but I still have a rat's nest of wires behind my pc.
*imagines future where the only wires are the electrical cables* Heck, why settle? Solar-powered pcs (thus forcing all geeks to get a tan).
Ah yes, the computer chair of the future. I can just picture myself sacked out on one of these during those 20 hour code stints. The 'recline' picture looks a bit dangerous though; I wonder if there is some kind of mount for the monitor. It would be pretty non-ergonomic to have a 21" crt come crashing down on your face. Also I'm presuming the computer itself must sit off to the side somewhere -- nice how they don't show all the messy wires in the photos :) (I prefer my logitech wireless desktop anyway. Though I don't like the way the keyboard drops letters when I type too fast. And if I had one of those chairs the wireless mouse might just slide off the desktop while in 'recline'.)
So, +points for somewhat fulfilling a long-standing fantasy in futuresque form, -points for chintzy ad copy. "Although crusing in 'warp drive', please allow 6-8 weeks" for delivery. Indeed.
Anyone else think that a Laz-E-Boy in front of a computer desk (or maybe a wall-mounted flat panel monitor) would be just as good?
Yeah, but the stranglehold MS has on office suite software (can you say fundamental utility) really gives them a huge opportunity to hijack anything that walks by. Call it an example of a known monopolist leveraging dominance in one area to gain control of another market segment.
Meanwhile businesses are shackled to proprietary formats which force them to upgrade to the Latest, Greatest Version every two years. SGML -- or rather, open standards -- are the answer. I seriously doubt Talking Moon is 100% truthful when it says O2K will faithfully implement XML for its native file formats. Imagine, if that were the case, it would make importing/exporting Office documents nearly trivial for competitors like StarOffice or Applixware. And the company that calls a 50 meg web browser indivisable from its operating system is much more devious than that.
But the ABM zealot in me would rather die than see bloated MS crap running on top of my beloved slackware (or any other [Gnu/]Linux). Hopefully this rumour is just more of the same old FUD.
This sounds more like Bill G's '12 Steps to Microsoft Co-dependency' than anything that would actually be useful to a business manager. From the book: "Email is the killer app of the future". Are these the words of a visionary, or of a crafty billionaire eager to sell more copies of MS Exchange Server and BackOffice? And the mass media will spoon-feed this out-dated crap to the ignorant public, many of whom believe Bill Gates and Microsoft are responsible for the personal computer, the GUI, and the internet (which, as we all know, is synonymous with the web). Excuse me while I vomit.