I'm extremely glad and grateful that the US fought Communism, because Communism really is fundamentally at odds with liberty and human rights (it is, by definition, and if you don't see that, you have to learn more about it, and keep learning more about it). I wish the US would continue to fight Communism, because the threat never ended when the Cold War ended... the Marxist mentality continues to spread.
I shudder to imagine what the world would be like now if we had not had the US to help hold back Communism. Pause and consider that for a moment. Nobody else fought like they did.
I'm grateful they helped hold back Communism here in Africa via proxy wars... I would probably be living in a Communist state right now if they hadn't, as the Russians tried their damndest to spread that poison here.
I hate to barge in on the fun here, but after years of calling them "Micro$haft" and "Windoze" and lame outdated jokes about Bob and Clippy, not to mention the massive FUD campaign against Vista
You had me up until this point --- but come on, Vista is its own FUD!
I'm not saying it's perfect, but normalised against its size, the US is a mild-mannered mouse, a smiling puppy. It's not too hard to start imagining what any of those countries - and many more - would do if they had as much military power as the US... I guarantee you, it would absolutely not look pretty for the world. We can thank G-d that only the US has the power the US has. I live in Africa and we have the most horrific mad raging dictators in any direction you can throw a stone - I can list any number of countries nearby here that are FAR more "aggressive" than the US, they just don't have the power to do all that much harm with it.
Actually people SHOULD all push the envelope of being as rude and uncooperative as possible through procedures that rightfully should not exist --- if enough people helped the process to become so unwieldy as to be impractical, they'd be FORCED to tone down on the requirements/procedures. Submissive cooperative people are actually harmful and irresponsible citizens, because they are basically trying their hardest to make invasive unnecessary breaches of rights as easy and inexpensive as possible to perform. A responsible citizen is one who stands by and defends what's right in terms of constitutional principles - and that means, amongst others, being belligerent when the situation calls for it. It's a coward who backs down and allows the constitution to be spat on. It's your freedoms that those "grouchy people" are standing up for in this case, in case you didn't realise.
Last I checked, there were a whole bunch of candidates and parties to choose from.
Again, if people for some reason decide that they're going to collectively ignore all but two of the options, then that is still their voluntary choice.
"Elected" officials is the key word... people keep voting them in, so what's the problem? If you vote in somebody that doesn't care about your opinion, you're going to get somebody that doesn't care about your opinion. It isn't rocket science. These people aren't appointed by the Queen of England, they're appointed by the people.
I dunno, it just seems we're a bit heavy on the science experiments and little to slow on the Yankee Ingenuity these days.
That is probably at least partially due to the government blocking solar projects, e.g.: http://www.motherjones.com/blue_marble_blog/archives/2008/07/8850_blm-solar-energy-freeze.html... now, they later reversed this, but consider what kind of impact these kinds of flip-floppy now-you-can't now-you-can policies have on investment. If you were investing in solar, which is risky enough as it is, you would probably want to avoid countries that seem to change their mind every few months about whether they're even going to allow developments to go forth (yeah I realise on public land but this still affects investors etc.).
For example, my round trip commute is 64 miles. Even in my VW Golf TDI I'm still looking at about 1.5 gallons a day and that's if I go straight to and from work. Going to a theater is a 40 mile round trip. Going to a large grocery is a 36 mile trip.
Holy Nuts, 36 miles to a grocery store, do you live in the middle of nowhere, or have zoning laws gone that beserk? Is this typical in the US?
A lot of the tourists are from European countries where the underground train systems tend to be cheaper so they assume it'll be cheap in the UK too. Then they get gouged. I even *warned* a colleague of mine how expensive it was but he didn't want to listen to me, then came back 'SHOCKED I tell you' about how he got ripped off paying four pounds for a ticket, and telling everyone over and over, 'four pounds!'... hey I said get an oyster card... so sometimes stupid deserves what it gets.
You are completely correct. But what we also need to realise, as horrible as this might sound, is that sometimes we can't protect children... and we need to just come to terms with that, and get over it. The world is a crazy and random place and every now and then, some bad shit is going to happen to a child - it DOES NOT MEAN we need massive amounts of laws protecting against every possible bad thing that could ever happen to any child anywhere.
There seems to be this kind of knee-jerk reaction where every time some child comes to harm in some unusual borderline-case almost freak-accident type of situation, everyone screams for new laws (even if it's some one in a trillion chance incident), which invariably, step-by-step, remove more and more rights.
Nobody is 100% safe, and yes that's super-scary, but if you want false comfort to feel better then go get it at church not via the legal system.
The only logical end-point to this reasoning is the dystopic vision of just having the state raise all children in special sanitised padded establishments where they're only allowed to come into contact with government-approved information or people or ideas or objects.
> You are kidding... right? But look at that moderation!
Admittedly, I *was* joking, well, half-joking, but I'm not complaining;). I was however also trying to make a general point that sometimes education level X in some field REALLY isn't good enough - usually it is, but sometimes you can get things disastrously wrong if you rely on lower education levels as often things get over-simplified. For example, I recall learning at various stages in my education that water firstly was able to conduct electricity (simplistic view told to children so they don't electrocute themselves), then wasn't (ah, only if its impure), then later was able to (ah, dielectric breakdown).
The problem with the lower levels is that you usually don't know what you don't know.
For certain important things it is critical you do not rely on anything less than post-graduate level studies. My gut feel says something like messing with the climate and oceans on a global scale might be one of them.
As for chemistry I have no clue, it's not my field.
Utter nonsense. Apart from the obvious massive differences in approach to quality between MS and Apple, it's actually primarily about competition; companies generally stay in line when there are true competitive pressures. If the industry manages to become competitive (we're not there yet but it's certainly improved over five years ago) then there'll be fewer reasons to 'hate' any particular company, market forces will help make sure they behave. The current trend towards improved support for Web standards is just one example. If we end up with say 15% Linux, 30% Apple, 30% MS, 10% Androi, 15% 'other', that would be a good balance - things like interoparability will be literally forced by the market, and they'll also be forced to actually improve and debloat their respective products.
We don't hate MS "because they're big", that's what marketers want you to think. We hate them because of their unethical abuse of their dominant market position to push inferior products which we've had to suffer with for years.
The day they change their attitude and start producing quality standards-based products, is the day we start liking them, no matter their size - it's really as simple as that.
... but 100 of them in a virtual cluster -- that overhead really adds up.
Maybe, but I think a far more important impetus for them to try de-bloat and lighten up is Windows Mobile - currently there's talk about convergence between mobile platforms and PCs (and the convergence will probably be pushed from the 'wrong' direction from their perspective, i.e. the phones, where it's harder to abuse heavy dominance) - I think they see the biggest longer-term threat as being Google Android (and the fact that it's Java-based, like the iPhone and BluRay, only makes it worse).
The fact that MS's front page is today pushing Windows Mobile in a big way adds further confirmation of this for me. Cellphones are the next big 'platform war'. They've been trying for ages though to make a decent Windows Mobile and have mostly just floundered.
I agree, but we must prepare ourselves for the fact that the next version of windows will probably be much better
I've been around a while now and have honestly been listening to people meagerly express this hope about literally every major release of Windows since Windows 3.1, to the point that it's now hilarious. And no matter how many times we go through this well-worn pattern, people never, ever seem to learn. It's as if MS's whole business model is premised on the "maybe the next version will be better" carrot-n-stick - "just stick with us long enough". I suppose the new version of the phrase must be 'fool me once, fool me again and again and again'.
Slashdot Mirror
Please, just name (and shame) the company ... what's with "BigBoxStoreA"?! You're "CapnStank" on slashdot, think they're gonna sue ya or something?
I'm extremely glad and grateful that the US fought Communism, because Communism really is fundamentally at odds with liberty and human rights (it is, by definition, and if you don't see that, you have to learn more about it, and keep learning more about it). I wish the US would continue to fight Communism, because the threat never ended when the Cold War ended ... the Marxist mentality continues to spread.
I shudder to imagine what the world would be like now if we had not had the US to help hold back Communism. Pause and consider that for a moment. Nobody else fought like they did.
I'm grateful they helped hold back Communism here in Africa via proxy wars ... I would probably be living in a Communist state right now if they hadn't, as the Russians tried their damndest to spread that poison here.
I hate to barge in on the fun here, but after years of calling them "Micro$haft" and "Windoze" and lame outdated jokes about Bob and Clippy, not to mention the massive FUD campaign against Vista
You had me up until this point --- but come on, Vista is its own FUD!
I'm not saying it's perfect, but normalised against its size, the US is a mild-mannered mouse, a smiling puppy. It's not too hard to start imagining what any of those countries - and many more - would do if they had as much military power as the US ... I guarantee you, it would absolutely not look pretty for the world. We can thank G-d that only the US has the power the US has. I live in Africa and we have the most horrific mad raging dictators in any direction you can throw a stone - I can list any number of countries nearby here that are FAR more "aggressive" than the US, they just don't have the power to do all that much harm with it.
Vista's memory usage is actually a good thing, because it uses it for precaching much used applications.
Oh that's why Vista is so fast --- oh wait, it's not.
Speaking for myself: Just make quality software, and compete on quality rather than rely on strategy to compensate for lousy quality.
Somehow I doubt that most Muslims have the goal of "invading" the Western World
Go to YouTube and search for 'undercover mosque'.
Actually people SHOULD all push the envelope of being as rude and uncooperative as possible through procedures that rightfully should not exist --- if enough people helped the process to become so unwieldy as to be impractical, they'd be FORCED to tone down on the requirements/procedures. Submissive cooperative people are actually harmful and irresponsible citizens, because they are basically trying their hardest to make invasive unnecessary breaches of rights as easy and inexpensive as possible to perform. A responsible citizen is one who stands by and defends what's right in terms of constitutional principles - and that means, amongst others, being belligerent when the situation calls for it. It's a coward who backs down and allows the constitution to be spat on. It's your freedoms that those "grouchy people" are standing up for in this case, in case you didn't realise.
"would peace break out all over when the worlds biggest and most aggressive country"
What on earth makes you think the US is the "most aggressive country" ... ? That is beyond absurd.
They don't generally cost $12 either.
Last I checked, there were a whole bunch of candidates and parties to choose from.
Again, if people for some reason decide that they're going to collectively ignore all but two of the options, then that is still their voluntary choice.
"Elected" officials is the key word ... people keep voting them in, so what's the problem? If you vote in somebody that doesn't care about your opinion, you're going to get somebody that doesn't care about your opinion. It isn't rocket science. These people aren't appointed by the Queen of England, they're appointed by the people.
Not to mention that other benefit that it'll actually likely save you money.
I dunno, it just seems we're a bit heavy on the science experiments and little to slow on the Yankee Ingenuity these days.
That is probably at least partially due to the government blocking solar projects, e.g.: http://www.motherjones.com/blue_marble_blog/archives/2008/07/8850_blm-solar-energy-freeze.html ... now, they later reversed this, but consider what kind of impact these kinds of flip-floppy now-you-can't now-you-can policies have on investment. If you were investing in solar, which is risky enough as it is, you would probably want to avoid countries that seem to change their mind every few months about whether they're even going to allow developments to go forth (yeah I realise on public land but this still affects investors etc.).
For example, my round trip commute is 64 miles. Even in my VW Golf TDI I'm still looking at about 1.5 gallons a day and that's if I go straight to and from work. Going to a theater is a 40 mile round trip. Going to a large grocery is a 36 mile trip.
Holy Nuts, 36 miles to a grocery store, do you live in the middle of nowhere, or have zoning laws gone that beserk? Is this typical in the US?
A lot of the tourists are from European countries where the underground train systems tend to be cheaper so they assume it'll be cheap in the UK too. Then they get gouged. I even *warned* a colleague of mine how expensive it was but he didn't want to listen to me, then came back 'SHOCKED I tell you' about how he got ripped off paying four pounds for a ticket, and telling everyone over and over, 'four pounds!' ... hey I said get an oyster card ... so sometimes stupid deserves what it gets.
False dilemma, what causes the MOST harm to children is laws that whittle away at the rights and liberties of everyone in society! ;)
You are completely correct. But what we also need to realise, as horrible as this might sound, is that sometimes we can't protect children ... and we need to just come to terms with that, and get over it. The world is a crazy and random place and every now and then, some bad shit is going to happen to a child - it DOES NOT MEAN we need massive amounts of laws protecting against every possible bad thing that could ever happen to any child anywhere.
There seems to be this kind of knee-jerk reaction where every time some child comes to harm in some unusual borderline-case almost freak-accident type of situation, everyone screams for new laws (even if it's some one in a trillion chance incident), which invariably, step-by-step, remove more and more rights.
Nobody is 100% safe, and yes that's super-scary, but if you want false comfort to feel better then go get it at church not via the legal system.
The only logical end-point to this reasoning is the dystopic vision of just having the state raise all children in special sanitised padded establishments where they're only allowed to come into contact with government-approved information or people or ideas or objects.
> You are kidding... right? But look at that moderation!
Admittedly, I *was* joking, well, half-joking, but I'm not complaining ;). I was however also trying to make a general point that sometimes education level X in some field REALLY isn't good enough - usually it is, but sometimes you can get things disastrously wrong if you rely on lower education levels as often things get over-simplified. For example, I recall learning at various stages in my education that water firstly was able to conduct electricity (simplistic view told to children so they don't electrocute themselves), then wasn't (ah, only if its impure), then later was able to (ah, dielectric breakdown).
The problem with the lower levels is that you usually don't know what you don't know.
For certain important things it is critical you do not rely on anything less than post-graduate level studies. My gut feel says something like messing with the climate and oceans on a global scale might be one of them.
As for chemistry I have no clue, it's not my field.
All integers are divisible by two. I presume you mean divisible by two AND that have a whole number as result.
That's why we ask people with more than a sophomore chemistry level.
And why is "Chinese language" a "WARNING"? Might it scare children or is it NSFW or what?
Utter nonsense. Apart from the obvious massive differences in approach to quality between MS and Apple, it's actually primarily about competition; companies generally stay in line when there are true competitive pressures. If the industry manages to become competitive (we're not there yet but it's certainly improved over five years ago) then there'll be fewer reasons to 'hate' any particular company, market forces will help make sure they behave. The current trend towards improved support for Web standards is just one example. If we end up with say 15% Linux, 30% Apple, 30% MS, 10% Androi, 15% 'other', that would be a good balance - things like interoparability will be literally forced by the market, and they'll also be forced to actually improve and debloat their respective products.
We don't hate MS "because they're big", that's what marketers want you to think. We hate them because of their unethical abuse of their dominant market position to push inferior products which we've had to suffer with for years.
The day they change their attitude and start producing quality standards-based products, is the day we start liking them, no matter their size - it's really as simple as that.
Maybe, but I think a far more important impetus for them to try de-bloat and lighten up is Windows Mobile - currently there's talk about convergence between mobile platforms and PCs (and the convergence will probably be pushed from the 'wrong' direction from their perspective, i.e. the phones, where it's harder to abuse heavy dominance) - I think they see the biggest longer-term threat as being Google Android (and the fact that it's Java-based, like the iPhone and BluRay, only makes it worse).
The fact that MS's front page is today pushing Windows Mobile in a big way adds further confirmation of this for me. Cellphones are the next big 'platform war'. They've been trying for ages though to make a decent Windows Mobile and have mostly just floundered.
I've been around a while now and have honestly been listening to people meagerly express this hope about literally every major release of Windows since Windows 3.1, to the point that it's now hilarious. And no matter how many times we go through this well-worn pattern, people never, ever seem to learn. It's as if MS's whole business model is premised on the "maybe the next version will be better" carrot-n-stick - "just stick with us long enough". I suppose the new version of the phrase must be 'fool me once, fool me again and again and again'.