Wait, Wal-Mart still has competitors? I guess there are still businesses in some parts of the world that haven't been crushed by Wal-Mart's dominance. Give it a decade or so, and soon you will have forgotten all about this "Rema 1000".
Not really. Walmart is trying hard to increase its market share in Germany, and they lose a lot of money doing it--their system doesn't work here.
Existing discounters of various types just have a better clue of what people want. Some have a very low number of products, but are cheapest. Then there are all types of super markets with a larger product line. The Walmart "we carry everything" strategy doesn't work. They have too much competition, IMO. They are not cheaper than the competition, they're not faster, they don't have more products you wouldn't get elsewhere. No reason to buy at Walmart.
The grandparent post is absolutely correct in upholding the conclusion that "[the PTC] don't speak for Americans everywhere", and that this organization should at least cease to project that particular misconception - of pretending to speak on behalf of a community united in moral outrage.
They are a lobbying group. Their view of the world is fairly narrow-minded. Of course they make themselves appear bigger than they are.
I almost entirely agree with what the grandparent said in his letter--I only disagree with the act of writing and sending it. It will not impress the PTC at all. They know about their real size, and they see themselves surrounded by sleaze.
Instead, letters should be sent to the FCC explaining how you see things differently from the PTC. That is not a complaint, obviously, but it puts things in perspective. Maybe more importantly, send messages to TV stations and advertising companies. Those are the places where PTC does lobby, too.
I hate the new proportional font they adopted for messages. Usenet is meant to be looked at in a fixed-width font! Proportional fonts totally screw up lovingly crafted sigs, ascii art, and so on.
I can't understand how anyone who reads a lot of articles can live with fixed-width fonts. It's so unpleasant to look at them. Good screen fonts like Verdana make it much more convenient to read a lot on the screen.
As for ASCII art or correct display of signatures--I don't care about that.
With GG I don't mind the fixed-width font, because I only read articles which were search results--rarely more than 10 or 20 at a time.
I like the Wikipedia project, but at least there I understand where the contributions come from: people who (think that they) understand a particular topic. I'm not quite sure how that is supposed to work with news with the exception of copying (rewriting) what you get from regular news sources. Do Wikinews editors read news.google.com regularly and write summaries? I haven't found anything on that in the German tutorial. We'll just have to wait and see.
Just because you don't like their way of conducting business doesn't mean you can do what you want on their site. You always have the option of sueing them for whatever you want, but not being okay with their behaviour doesn't entitle you to do anything you like.
I am a bit astonished though that there has never been any kind of legal action against Google Groups (that I have heard of). Maybe their "nuke posts" options is all they have to do to be legal under US jurisdiction?
All valid points, but I think grandparent was asking why a mail/news client has to be integrated with the browser.
Obviously, it doesn't have to. It's nice for average users to have everything in one package, I guess. They don't want to spend time investigating the pros and cons of different clients the way/. users probably do.
They're not official, so well-maintained newsservers don't carry them. But the group comp.databases exists, so there is group for MySQL and PostgreSQL in the comp hierarchy.
Back when Deja was doing badly people started projects to collect Usenet data. When Google Groups went online, they were abandoned after a while. Might be a good idea to revive the idea, even if Google Groups does not screw up. Just to have an alternative. Everybody stores a couple of groups, one mbox file per month. A big distributed data collection which can be used as the basis for another Usenet search engine.
I was wondering what alternatives do we have for searching the groups? Are there any other players out there?
No.
Another thought: I only regularly search a number of select groups that mirror my interests. Is there anyway I can download ALL of the threads for a particular newsgroup over the last year say? This might not take up so much space for some of the groups I use. Then I could have a nice local copy that i can search myself.
Is such a thing: a) possible? b) legal?
Possible: Sure. Just set up a local news server and make it download the groups you're interested in.
Legal: Certainly. It's only for your private use, after all. Google Groups even seems to survive doing it for the public
Given that BT requires a link to a.torrent, how hard is it for companies to send a C&D to the ISP/owner of any site hosting illegal.torrent links?
The.torrent file may not be illegal, as others have pointed out. But what about the seed version of the file with the actual content? Isn't a URL to that file stored in the.torrent? So, to rephrase your question: Why don't they send the ISP hosting that file a C&D?
The democrats need to start presenting canidates that people like (Dean), instead of canidates that they think will "win" (Kerry). And don't ask me why the democrats don't think popular canidates with a large grass-roots movement behind them won't win, because I really don't know.
But that's what most analyses came up with after election day - maybe that particular wisdom will not be forgotten three years from now. Having someone, preferably a Southerner, who will appeal to the large demographic that is not comfortable with a supposedly snobby New England liberal like Kerry. Hillary Clinton will have a hard time in 2008 for exactly that reason.
They also may track by IP address, because after trying many of the above pg=n URLs, now I get a lot of 52x52 Image Not Available GIFs, even for URLs which *previously* worked!
I already get that after having viewed only four or five pages. Then again, I'm using a proxy, maybe my "net neighbors" are testing this, too.
No, certain sites are banned because they have proven to break German laws when it comes to hate speech etc. Banning an entire subject, e.g. based on words, would be another thing. I find the current situation stupid nonetheless, but that's another issue.
BTW, I don't think anyone in North Korea has access to the Internet, with the exception of a few higher-ups who can indeed read anything because they run the place.
But if North Korea really wanted to attack the US, why would they use a missile whose source can be detectable when they could just sneak a missile on one of the thousands of Chinese ships that come to the US each year that go virtually unsearched by customs?
That only works for a first strike, not so good for retaliation, a response every head of state (especially the crazy ones like Kim-il-Jong - or was that the father's name? - anyway...) likes to have.
It's a general problem for a president or any high-ranking executive official to get good advice. It's the same for science as for any other area. Sometimes they succeed, sometimes not. So the only sincere answer a politician can give is "I'll have to try, in each case". The president rarely does the selection of people who will give advice. His staff will have to make sure that people with a clear agenda stay out. Unless they want to push that agenda, but then they do not seek advice but simply want to emphasize that the direction they've taken is supported by renowned expert X.
However, both Bush and Kerry emphasize that they want to make it easier again to attract smart foreign students, at least according to this SPIEGEL article (in German). In the time since 9/11 it has become extremely hard to get into the country, and not only for students that match certain profiles. Even if you're a white female Christian from Northern Europe there were quite a few obstacles.
Slashdot Mirror
Wait, Wal-Mart still has competitors? I guess there are still businesses in some parts of the world that haven't been crushed by Wal-Mart's dominance. Give it a decade or so, and soon you will have forgotten all about this "Rema 1000".
Not really. Walmart is trying hard to increase its market share in Germany, and they lose a lot of money doing it--their system doesn't work here.
Existing discounters of various types just have a better clue of what people want. Some have a very low number of products, but are cheapest. Then there are all types of super markets with a larger product line. The Walmart "we carry everything" strategy doesn't work. They have too much competition, IMO. They are not cheaper than the competition, they're not faster, they don't have more products you wouldn't get elsewhere. No reason to buy at Walmart.
The grandparent post is absolutely correct in upholding the conclusion that "[the PTC] don't speak for Americans everywhere", and that this organization should at least cease to project that particular misconception - of pretending to speak on behalf of a community united in moral outrage.
They are a lobbying group. Their view of the world is fairly narrow-minded. Of course they make themselves appear bigger than they are.
I almost entirely agree with what the grandparent said in his letter--I only disagree with the act of writing and sending it. It will not impress the PTC at all. They know about their real size, and they see themselves surrounded by sleaze.
Instead, letters should be sent to the FCC explaining how you see things differently from the PTC. That is not a complaint, obviously, but it puts things in perspective. Maybe more importantly, send messages to TV stations and advertising companies. Those are the places where PTC does lobby, too.
Anyway, I hate the new interface, and I think it could hurt Google.
Only if a new Usenet archive competitor materializes. Until then, they have a monopoly. Sad, but true.
I hate the new proportional font they adopted for messages. Usenet is meant to be looked at in a fixed-width font! Proportional fonts totally screw up lovingly crafted sigs, ascii art, and so on.
I can't understand how anyone who reads a lot of articles can live with fixed-width fonts. It's so unpleasant to look at them. Good screen fonts like Verdana make it much more convenient to read a lot on the screen.
As for ASCII art or correct display of signatures--I don't care about that.
With GG I don't mind the fixed-width font, because I only read articles which were search results--rarely more than 10 or 20 at a time.
There is no reasonable expectation that by posting to Usenet I allow any company to store reproduce my posts longer than, say, a few months.
Or, let's say, a few decades. The time span is absolutely arbitrary. I don't see why any one should be the default.
I like the Wikipedia project, but at least there I understand where the contributions come from: people who (think that they) understand a particular topic. I'm not quite sure how that is supposed to work with news with the exception of copying (rewriting) what you get from regular news sources. Do Wikinews editors read news.google.com regularly and write summaries? I haven't found anything on that in the German tutorial. We'll just have to wait and see.
Just because you don't like their way of conducting business doesn't mean you can do what you want on their site. You always have the option of sueing them for whatever you want, but not being okay with their behaviour doesn't entitle you to do anything you like.
I am a bit astonished though that there has never been any kind of legal action against Google Groups (that I have heard of). Maybe their "nuke posts" options is all they have to do to be legal under US jurisdiction?
Imagine how easy it would be for 5 or 10 large usenet companies to come under fire and be shutdown. Down goes usenet.
That may be true for binaries, but "regular" text groups are distributed on way more servers.
But how do you get large amounts of Usenet data that is older than, say, a year?
All valid points, but I think grandparent was asking why a mail/news client has to be integrated with the browser.
/. users probably do.
Obviously, it doesn't have to. It's nice for average users to have everything in one package, I guess. They don't want to spend time investigating the pros and cons of different clients the way
They're not official, so well-maintained newsservers don't carry them. But the group comp.databases exists, so there is group for MySQL and PostgreSQL in the comp hierarchy.
Back when Deja was doing badly people started projects to collect Usenet data. When Google Groups went online, they were abandoned after a while. Might be a good idea to revive the idea, even if Google Groups does not screw up. Just to have an alternative. Everybody stores a couple of groups, one mbox file per month. A big distributed data collection which can be used as the basis for another Usenet search engine.
Only a while ago? I can't remember ever seeing a Path: line in the article headers at Google Groups. I always found that annoying.
A few lines of perl later, you have your own copy, a few months of bandwidth later.
It violates their ToS. Even if you don't care about that, they have mechanisms in place to prevent leeching - you get banned after a while.
I was wondering what alternatives do we have for searching the groups? Are there any other players out there?
No.
Another thought: I only regularly search a number of select groups that mirror my interests. Is there anyway I can download ALL of the threads for a particular newsgroup over the last year say? This might not take up so much space for some of the groups I use. Then I could have a nice local copy that i can search myself.
Is such a thing: a) possible? b) legal?
Possible: Sure. Just set up a local news server and make it download the groups you're interested in.
Legal: Certainly. It's only for your private use, after all. Google Groups even seems to survive doing it for the public
I find it weird that James Cameron was replaced by "Director of Titanic" at all. IMO you don't have to explain on /. who James Cameron is.
My campus has recieved several take down notices this year from external organizations.
If I'm not totally mistaken, each and every campus receives many such notices every month.
Given that BT requires a link to a .torrent, how hard is it for companies to send a C&D to the ISP/owner of any site hosting illegal .torrent links?
.torrent file may not be illegal, as others have pointed out. But what about the seed version of the file with the actual content? Isn't a URL to that file stored in the .torrent? So, to rephrase your question: Why don't they send the ISP hosting that file a C&D?
The
The democrats need to start presenting canidates that people like (Dean), instead of canidates that they think will "win" (Kerry). And don't ask me why the democrats don't think popular canidates with a large grass-roots movement behind them won't win, because I really don't know.
But that's what most analyses came up with after election day - maybe that particular wisdom will not be forgotten three years from now. Having someone, preferably a Southerner, who will appeal to the large demographic that is not comfortable with a supposedly snobby New England liberal like Kerry. Hillary Clinton will have a hard time in 2008 for exactly that reason.
They also may track by IP address, because after trying many of the above pg=n URLs, now I get a lot of 52x52 Image Not Available GIFs, even for URLs which *previously* worked!
I already get that after having viewed only four or five pages. Then again, I'm using a proxy, maybe my "net neighbors" are testing this, too.
Certain search subjects are banned in Germany.
No, certain sites are banned because they have proven to break German laws when it comes to hate speech etc. Banning an entire subject, e.g. based on words, would be another thing. I find the current situation stupid nonetheless, but that's another issue.
BTW, I don't think anyone in North Korea has access to the Internet, with the exception of a few higher-ups who can indeed read anything because they run the place.
Some other people have replied to the documentation issue. Irrlicht seems to be quite good in that department.
However, the question in the subject is a valid one.
What makes Irrlicht different or even better than other libraries? Anyone here with some practical experience who can shed some light on that?
But if North Korea really wanted to attack the US, why would they use a missile whose source can be detectable when they could just sneak a missile on one of the thousands of Chinese ships that come to the US each year that go virtually unsearched by customs?
That only works for a first strike, not so good for retaliation, a response every head of state (especially the crazy ones like Kim-il-Jong - or was that the father's name? - anyway...) likes to have.
It's a general problem for a president or any high-ranking executive official to get good advice. It's the same for science as for any other area. Sometimes they succeed, sometimes not. So the only sincere answer a politician can give is "I'll have to try, in each case". The president rarely does the selection of people who will give advice. His staff will have to make sure that people with a clear agenda stay out. Unless they want to push that agenda, but then they do not seek advice but simply want to emphasize that the direction they've taken is supported by renowned expert X.
Funny, yet sadly true.
However, both Bush and Kerry emphasize that they want to make it easier again to attract smart foreign students, at least according to this SPIEGEL article (in German). In the time since 9/11 it has become extremely hard to get into the country, and not only for students that match certain profiles. Even if you're a white female Christian from Northern Europe there were quite a few obstacles.