I don't think the pure, unadulterated paranoia is justified. Ultimately "trusted computing" will probably catch on for mainstream 'computers' running Tivo-like devices and refrigerators and home networking appliances, but I doubt the core computer can ever go away now. That would be like trying to take the rifle away from the frontiersman in early America, or the printing press away from the one man shop in colonial times. It just won't happen because computing has already spread like wildfire and is fueling serious economic growth around the world.
Any lawyer with 1/10th a brain doesn't represent themselves in any kind of law related matter. They hire another lawyer to represent them. Therefore you should be upset with the jerks and dillweeds bringing the frivolous lawsuits, not all the lawyers.
Are you mad at the cops for all the murders that happen because they're not doing enough to stop it? I doubt it. You're mad at the murderers - the cops are just trying to do their job. There are bad cops encouraging and engaging in dispecable or even illegal behavior, sure, but just like lawyers the "bad ones" are the vast minority of all of those people in their profession.
I was, and am, pissed off at you because of your overly broad stereotyping of lawyers, a group of professional people who do in fact have a rather high bar of standards that they keep for themselves. That's immature, unprofessional, and generally just stupid.
You are widely mistaken if you think ambulance chasers and those attorney's who advertise their services on TV represent the majority of lawyers. Did you know that the VAST majority of lawyers look down on any lawyer who advertises their services in ANY format - TV, radio, or the newspaper?
And it's unfortunate that your first impression with a lawyer was apparently with a bad one. Unfortunately, you have taken that one singular lawyer impression and broadly painted every lawyer in the US as the exact same type of person. We don't even need to go into all the details about how lawyers that work for the EFF, ACLU, etc. are proactively trying to stem the tide of frivolous abuses by our own government on private citizens since you have apparently already made up your mind about all lawyers.
Fuck you. I know several lawyers now, and I can assure you they are most certainly not "bloodsuckers" and get no joy in watching a husband and wife tear each others marriage and lives and the lives of their children apart. But when someone needs represented, the lawyer needs to make it worth their while to do all the work required to represent them in court. They're not doing it for fucking free you asshole.
And when it comes to companies, no, they most certainly DO NOT get 90% of the court settlement. In fact, when a company goes belly-up, the lawyer is typically the last one on the list to get any money. (I believe they make a minimum of $1000 per bankruptcy case, but for the amount of filings and work involved in representing a bankruptcy client, $1000 is not even close to fairly compensating the lawyer for the work they put into the case)
And yes, the lawyer is a "professional" because they get paid for their services; services for which they been trained through a minimum of 7 years of schooling (4yrs undergrad + 3yrs law school typically) and professional certification. (the Bar exam - yes, I know it's a seriously flawed system in some respects, but it does work in other ways)
And if you don't want to go through arbitration, DON'T!!! Hire a lawyer and haul the offending party through the legal process in the courts. Besides, it is usually the judges that fuck things up, not YOUR lawyer who is getting paid to represent YOU as best as he/she can. How the fuck would you get any business if all you did was lose every single case you took? I certainly wouldn't be using such a lawyer, would you?
And while amenities may have decreased on today's airlines, so have the prices. Tickets to Florida are about the same price today as they were 8 years ago when I went to college there, and flew home to Ohio over the breaks. I'll take cheaper prices and better competition over satisfying customer wants over the governmental buearacracy any day. Good point.
Also, think how much more attractive it is to non-communications businesses to relocate or build new offices in communities with cheap fiber connections everywhere in the city...
Finally, to put it all together, I find my job fun when I'm learning something new. Jobs aren't always like that.
Me too. And in my job, I do that on nearly every project I work on: find out something new. So what is this totally rockin' awesome IT job that I have? It's not IT, but close. I'm a Business Analyst. And not the banking industry's version of "Business Analyst" which really equates to Software Quality Testing Monkey. Nope. I work with statistics, get to do a little process re-engineering from time to time, and generally do a lot of 4-10 pages in length report writing with nifty charts and supporting technical data. So it's like that Technical Report Writing 125 class you hated in college. Yep, that's what I do that I enjoy. (Well it's enjoyable enough anyways because I'm usually learning something new)
And from the age of 12-23 I thought computer programming was what I really wanted to do. So writing is important. Grammar is important. And all those basic skills you learn how to learn in college are worth it.
So what got me into this position? I hated the attitudes, personalities, and general lack of drive that the majority of programmers I was around as a Software Tester in my company, and hated it for 2 long years.
My advice to the college kids: Finish college, get a job, find out if you like it, if you do: stick to it. If you don't, find a new one. Do NOT be afraid to expirement with your career. For me I think that comes pretty easily and I actually really enjoy changes as major as a new job. For others I realize that can be a scary proposition; but I'm telling you it may just keep you from getting stuck in that Fight Club mentality and you'll actually enjoy your life.
Sure it's hard to make because living things usually need to be connected within themselves by nerves, tissue, vessels etc
-emphasis mine-
This makes me think of an interesting sidenote: Nature doesn't "make" itself. It may evolve - that question is up for interpretation as I'm sure I'll start a flamewar here - but it doesn't creatively take disparate systems, combine them, and come up with something better than before. Natural evolution of a species (or an ecosystem, or a star, or a galaxy) may improve upon an existing design, that I can agree with, or even adapt an existing system to cope with changes to the environment. But I'm not sure I've ever seen, heard, or read about a natural system 'creating' something completely new that actively seeks to fundamentally change the existing system. That's something I think only us humans and God have the capability of doing. Notice I'm not arguing for/against Creationism here. I'm merely pointing out the realization that us humans (and God) have a fundamentally different capability than the rest of "nature": creativity and the ability to combine complete seperate 'stuff' to form some new 'stuff.'
I would love to hear any rebuttals to my ideas though. I know this is way-offtopic, but it's in this thread that my mind suddenly started thinkining all this crap.
Ah, but you're viewing the "what constitutes software development project failures" through a developer's looking glass. The goal in analysis is to be objective in determining what the true "drivers" are behind the data. In this instance, I don't think the report is wrong. True, user requirements (and understanding them properly) may be your biggest headache, but overall I find it is the methodology driving failed software projects at the company I work at currently. Usually the projects are never complete failures, but sometimes they are very behind schedule, don't work the way the end users thought it would, and generally are not really what the user wanted in the first place.
And I think the reasons for these psuedo-failures is directly due to methodology. Developers think users will just "do it the right way", when software testers and business people are telling them that they won't. But the developers, those all-knowing gods and godesses of everything technical, come up with 5 major reasons why "well it would take a LOT longer to code that! I guess we can't deliver the product to you then..." This twists the arm of the business who NEEDS that software app to be delivered on time.
If the methodology of software programming were different, and developers actually talked to "users," and worked with (instead of against) software testing groups, business analysis groups, and senior management the failures would happen with much less frequency.
You mentioned that large downloads can cause the VoIP to be less than stellar. What about the other way around? I have DSL for one reason only. Loweset latency that I can afford. Does the VoIP kill your latency? For me, anything that makes me have greater than (say 70ms) to my favorite Q3 servers is a no go. That's why I kill peer to peer (& anything else that's going on) on my home network while I'm gaming.
I haven't noticed that it does. I regularly get under 70ms pings to CounterStrike:Source servers in the midwest. (I live in Columbus, OH) Of course, I use a router which provides connections to the VoIP box and other computers in the house, so without a router in front of the VoIP box it might. I could probably get even fancier if my router was a linux box with QoS packet scheduling enabled, but I'm not all that into administering a fancy-schmancy network in my home. (This is on a 3Mbit down/356?Mbit up cable modem through Insight RoadRunner) I can consistently max out a really large download from high bandwidth servers at 300kB/s, so YMMV on DSL or a slower cable connection.
The VoIP box pings the central server A LOT, but it hasn't impacted my online gaming as far as I can tell.
Vonage's current units work by having a unique identifier that they send back to Vonage to identify which "number" the call is coming from or going to. In other words, if I take my Vonage unit with me on the road and have a hotel with broadband available in the room, all I have to do is plug the unit in and I could make calls from it back to my area code as a "local" call. I could also receive calls in my hotel room from people trying to reach me at my "home" phone number. I assume their WiFi phone would work the exact same way.
I know some/.'ers may poo-poo this idea, but I think it's got some real sticking power. The whole "college kids making free calls" thing mentioned in the article is just one use of many. In the approx. 1yr that we've had Vonage at my home, neither my wife or I have been displeased with the service. Yes, my wife gets displeased when I'm trying to d/l all three Mandrake 10.1 ISO's and she's trying to talk to her mother because I'm swamping the cable connection with my d/l's, but I simply delay the downloads... no big deal.
I'd also like to mention the sheer joy you will receive when telling your local and long distance telemark-a-droids that there is no way they can beat the price you're currently getting for phone service. When you tell them: "I'm getting every single service you offer PLUS long distance PLUS Canada calls PLUS $0.05-$0.15/min. for International calls for $29.99", you can hear their jaw hit the desk as they say: "Oh. Have a nice day." True, we're not factoring in the price of broadband to that dollar amount, but hell, I'd have broadband whether or not I needed phone service anyways so that doesn't matter.
Look, I understand your argument, but until you have any "actual" numbers on number of 'pirated' copies in the wild, why don't you stick to grandiose theories and postulating instead of claiming that we're all "looking at the numbers." You're just making yourself look stupid.
It's kinda like breakin' the speed limit while DUI. There's too many people doing it on an ongoing basis to adequately enforce it 100% of the time, so the cops just try to catch the worst offenders and get them off the streets before they do any real physical harm to others.
Same goes for spammers and crackers and script kiddies.
This is why the Internet seems like more and more of the "wild, wild west" to me lately. Vigilante justice (people scamming the scammers and spamming the spammers with actual trash and junk mail dropped on their actual lawns) is oftentimes far more effective in the cyberspace realm than real, actual "protectors of the law" can be. For now. The Internet will get mundane and not quite as exciting as it used to be "back in the days" as soon as real law and order come to it in full force. So I guess what I'm saying is this: Enjoy the crapflood of spam while you can, because it also means you have immensely more freedom to do whatever the hell you want to do in cyberspace right now. Sure, spam is a royal pain in the ass, but there's so many freedoms to enjoy in the meantime!
No, it's designed to defeat bayesian filters. If you're sending out millions of emails, and making a tidy profit, you don't want to lose that profit. So every once in a while you send out a million emails that are worthless crap, blank, not really selling somethings, etc. to confuse the filters. Then you send out the next wave of spam, wash, rinse, repeat.
I echo your endorsement of Brian Green's "Elegant Universe." I took me several years of periodic interest in physics to make it all the way through the book (which I recently finished about 8 months ago), but by the end I was thoroughly engrossed in the work he and his colleagues have done in the realm of theoretical physics, as well as the potential theoretical physics still has to reveal more amazing stuff to humanity. Even if you have only a passing hobbyist interest in physics and the universe, I think you'll really eat this book up. It has been by far one of the easiest to read yet full of knowledge science related book that I've ever read. The writing style is quite similar to The Economist article linked from above.
As a side note, I was once reading that book in an airport a couple years ago while waiting for my flight to take me home from a business trip. Some guy stopped and asked me what I thought of the book. At that time I wasn't halfway through but whole-heartedly recommended it to him. Kind of an odd encounter with a fellow businessman (at least he looked like a businessman type) who was also interested in physics. Go figure.
Nuclear fusion happens everyday: it's called, THE SUN! and it's the sole reason this planet is warm enough for us to all live on it. Nuclear fusion needs to be explained by using Einsteinian mathematics and physics. Let me guess, you're a philosophy major?
Well, you're crossing genre's of "crimes" there, but I think you're on the right track. Who the FBI, CIA, NSA, DoD, and the Pentagon ought to be going after is China, Korea, Thailand, and all the other Southeast Asian countries that are costing American companies millions, if not billions, in 'lost revenues' on computer software sales. Sadly, that would require an act of war, and since our government leaders know that this is not a viable solution for saving a select few American companies millions of dollars every year, they stand by and let the piss-ant agents go after all of the American citizens who aren't really making any money off of these thefts of computer programs to give the rest of the country's bumbling idiots a sense that all is well in our great nation.
It's pathetic, and sad, but such are the times we live in. If this were medieval times we'd probably just go try to kick some Southeast Asia ass, but then we'd also only live to be about 40 and could get burned at the stake for not kissing the royal scepter and worshipping the Pope.
...They're basing this "Hobbit" on a single small human skull they found in Indonesia? Sorry, but that's not all that convincing to me that the entire body of the thing was ADULT, and also small. Just a bunch more psuedo-science BS.
LOL! I was thinking the exact same thing, and I'm a Christian! But I wholeheartedly laughed when reading through their best/worst lists. It's like they picked all the most mundane, non-entertaining shows to put on their "best" list, and all the funny, "on the edge", ENTERTAINING shows on their "worst" list.
I may not appreciate all of the content on TV these days, but c'mon, "The Honeymooners" was just as bad if not a whole lot worse than anything on TV these days. I'm with the/. majority on this one and say that this group has got to go!
In that case, I would consider them unfit to perform the duties they're getting paid for because I agree that not laying out the money for the right tools is stupid when the job being done is being done for profit.
By the way, I am not a wedding photographer as some other responders in this thread might have thought. And I also meant that most all of my pictures turn out like crap. Then again, because photography is merely a minor hobby of mine at this point and will probably never be professional, I know that my photos turn out like crap in part because I lack the right equipment: external flash equipment, different wider angle lenses, etc.
Sadly, you're mistaken about what it means to be a "professional." You are correct in thinking that a "professional" gets paid for their services. You are incorrect in thinking that all professionals are knowledgeable and know what they're doing in return for the pay they are receiving. I have seen wedding photographers who actually arranged and took worse pictures than even I would take - and I would hardly even consider myself an amateur at this point because not all of my pictures turn out well.
The person that wrote this "Ask Slashdot" may just be in the camp of those who get paid for services they're not qualified to perform. Or they may just be getting started. In any case, they did preface the question by mentioning that they were not willing to pay for the high quality stuff that many professional photographers use, so I don't see why you're so up in arms with their lack of desire to use "real" equipment. Just answer the damn question!
Well I don't actually "remember" it 'cause I wasn't born then (not even close to then), but perhaps we need a new euphamism for the free-speech haters:
I was going to moderate you 'flamebait' or 'troll,' but I just had to post a reply instead:
First, try learning how to spell correctly in your posts. I also suggest not putting your thoughts down in one sentence paragraphs. Doing so makes you appear to have an intelligence that is "below average."
Second, it appears that the parent poster really hit a nerve of yours in poking fun at those people who would rather spend an additional $1,000 - $1,500 on a brand new computer rather than just having someone come over and clean out the spyware for $50. Sounds to me like someone is feeling a bit sheepish over a rather costly error in logical thinking as of late.
Lastly, why is it that American "homies" can't even come up with a decently spelled version of the word "shit" when trying to represent the phonetic "homie" version of the word: 'shee-it.' (or 'shee-ite,' or 'shee-it' if you prefer) The stupidity in writing 'shite' all the time in CounterStrike chat or on websites such as Slashdot drives me crazy!
People who have a computer-related degree from DeVry will say "nope" because they have a bottom-rung tech job.
I couldn't resist responding to this one. I am a business analyst NOW (have been for 2yrs now) and I am also attending DeVry to get that BS in Comp. Eng. Yes I realize DeVry is no MIT, but my life choices were not always geared towards JUST being a computer scientist or such. Nor did I expect that I'd be slogging out a degree at someplace like DeVry. Life just sorta gets in the way sometimes. So I took a job at a company I thought had their shit together back in the late 90's, and guess what? They did!
But if I had finished my degree at the very large state school I was at, or if I had stuck it out at the prestigious private college I went to straight out of high school I would be in a VERY different place than I am today. (I'd probably be working on my master's, PhD, or JD degrees - or finished with one - by now)
Oh, BTW, why is it that everyone thinks DeVry is for total idiots that can't get more than a low-paying job? In my 3yrs there going part-time at nights, I've met some very clueless idiots, it's true, but I've also met people juggling a spouse, kids, a middle to upper-class income job, AND a part-time college degree course all at the same time. I wouldn't call those sorts 'idiots' or 'slackers' if they can handle all of those responsibilities at once.
Slashdot Mirror
I don't think the pure, unadulterated paranoia is justified. Ultimately "trusted computing" will probably catch on for mainstream 'computers' running Tivo-like devices and refrigerators and home networking appliances, but I doubt the core computer can ever go away now. That would be like trying to take the rifle away from the frontiersman in early America, or the printing press away from the one man shop in colonial times. It just won't happen because computing has already spread like wildfire and is fueling serious economic growth around the world.
Any lawyer with 1/10th a brain doesn't represent themselves in any kind of law related matter. They hire another lawyer to represent them. Therefore you should be upset with the jerks and dillweeds bringing the frivolous lawsuits, not all the lawyers.
Are you mad at the cops for all the murders that happen because they're not doing enough to stop it? I doubt it. You're mad at the murderers - the cops are just trying to do their job. There are bad cops encouraging and engaging in dispecable or even illegal behavior, sure, but just like lawyers the "bad ones" are the vast minority of all of those people in their profession.
I was, and am, pissed off at you because of your overly broad stereotyping of lawyers, a group of professional people who do in fact have a rather high bar of standards that they keep for themselves. That's immature, unprofessional, and generally just stupid.
You are widely mistaken if you think ambulance chasers and those attorney's who advertise their services on TV represent the majority of lawyers. Did you know that the VAST majority of lawyers look down on any lawyer who advertises their services in ANY format - TV, radio, or the newspaper?
And it's unfortunate that your first impression with a lawyer was apparently with a bad one. Unfortunately, you have taken that one singular lawyer impression and broadly painted every lawyer in the US as the exact same type of person. We don't even need to go into all the details about how lawyers that work for the EFF, ACLU, etc. are proactively trying to stem the tide of frivolous abuses by our own government on private citizens since you have apparently already made up your mind about all lawyers.
Fuck you. I know several lawyers now, and I can assure you they are most certainly not "bloodsuckers" and get no joy in watching a husband and wife tear each others marriage and lives and the lives of their children apart. But when someone needs represented, the lawyer needs to make it worth their while to do all the work required to represent them in court. They're not doing it for fucking free you asshole.
And when it comes to companies, no, they most certainly DO NOT get 90% of the court settlement. In fact, when a company goes belly-up, the lawyer is typically the last one on the list to get any money. (I believe they make a minimum of $1000 per bankruptcy case, but for the amount of filings and work involved in representing a bankruptcy client, $1000 is not even close to fairly compensating the lawyer for the work they put into the case)
And yes, the lawyer is a "professional" because they get paid for their services; services for which they been trained through a minimum of 7 years of schooling (4yrs undergrad + 3yrs law school typically) and professional certification. (the Bar exam - yes, I know it's a seriously flawed system in some respects, but it does work in other ways)
And if you don't want to go through arbitration, DON'T!!! Hire a lawyer and haul the offending party through the legal process in the courts. Besides, it is usually the judges that fuck things up, not YOUR lawyer who is getting paid to represent YOU as best as he/she can. How the fuck would you get any business if all you did was lose every single case you took? I certainly wouldn't be using such a lawyer, would you?
And no, I'm not a lawyer.
And while amenities may have decreased on today's airlines, so have the prices. Tickets to Florida are about the same price today as they were 8 years ago when I went to college there, and flew home to Ohio over the breaks. I'll take cheaper prices and better competition over satisfying customer wants over the governmental buearacracy any day. Good point.
Also, think how much more attractive it is to non-communications businesses to relocate or build new offices in communities with cheap fiber connections everywhere in the city...
Finally, to put it all together, I find my job fun when I'm learning something new. Jobs aren't always like that.
Me too. And in my job, I do that on nearly every project I work on: find out something new. So what is this totally rockin' awesome IT job that I have? It's not IT, but close. I'm a Business Analyst. And not the banking industry's version of "Business Analyst" which really equates to Software Quality Testing Monkey. Nope. I work with statistics, get to do a little process re-engineering from time to time, and generally do a lot of 4-10 pages in length report writing with nifty charts and supporting technical data. So it's like that Technical Report Writing 125 class you hated in college. Yep, that's what I do that I enjoy. (Well it's enjoyable enough anyways because I'm usually learning something new)
And from the age of 12-23 I thought computer programming was what I really wanted to do. So writing is important. Grammar is important. And all those basic skills you learn how to learn in college are worth it.
So what got me into this position? I hated the attitudes, personalities, and general lack of drive that the majority of programmers I was around as a Software Tester in my company, and hated it for 2 long years.
My advice to the college kids: Finish college, get a job, find out if you like it, if you do: stick to it. If you don't, find a new one. Do NOT be afraid to expirement with your career. For me I think that comes pretty easily and I actually really enjoy changes as major as a new job. For others I realize that can be a scary proposition; but I'm telling you it may just keep you from getting stuck in that Fight Club mentality and you'll actually enjoy your life.
Slashdot is now reporting on rumors about blogs.
They might as well change the tag line to: "News for supermarket checkout lines, shit that we can neither confirm nor deny."
Sure it's hard to make because living things usually need to be connected within themselves by nerves, tissue, vessels etc
-emphasis mine-
This makes me think of an interesting sidenote: Nature doesn't "make" itself. It may evolve - that question is up for interpretation as I'm sure I'll start a flamewar here - but it doesn't creatively take disparate systems, combine them, and come up with something better than before. Natural evolution of a species (or an ecosystem, or a star, or a galaxy) may improve upon an existing design, that I can agree with, or even adapt an existing system to cope with changes to the environment. But I'm not sure I've ever seen, heard, or read about a natural system 'creating' something completely new that actively seeks to fundamentally change the existing system. That's something I think only us humans and God have the capability of doing. Notice I'm not arguing for/against Creationism here. I'm merely pointing out the realization that us humans (and God) have a fundamentally different capability than the rest of "nature": creativity and the ability to combine complete seperate 'stuff' to form some new 'stuff.'
I would love to hear any rebuttals to my ideas though. I know this is way-offtopic, but it's in this thread that my mind suddenly started thinkining all this crap.
Ah, but you're viewing the "what constitutes software development project failures" through a developer's looking glass. The goal in analysis is to be objective in determining what the true "drivers" are behind the data. In this instance, I don't think the report is wrong. True, user requirements (and understanding them properly) may be your biggest headache, but overall I find it is the methodology driving failed software projects at the company I work at currently. Usually the projects are never complete failures, but sometimes they are very behind schedule, don't work the way the end users thought it would, and generally are not really what the user wanted in the first place.
And I think the reasons for these psuedo-failures is directly due to methodology. Developers think users will just "do it the right way", when software testers and business people are telling them that they won't. But the developers, those all-knowing gods and godesses of everything technical, come up with 5 major reasons why "well it would take a LOT longer to code that! I guess we can't deliver the product to you then..." This twists the arm of the business who NEEDS that software app to be delivered on time.
If the methodology of software programming were different, and developers actually talked to "users," and worked with (instead of against) software testing groups, business analysis groups, and senior management the failures would happen with much less frequency.
You mentioned that large downloads can cause the VoIP to be less than stellar. What about the other way around? I have DSL for one reason only. Loweset latency that I can afford. Does the VoIP kill your latency? For me, anything that makes me have greater than (say 70ms) to my favorite Q3 servers is a no go. That's why I kill peer to peer (& anything else that's going on) on my home network while I'm gaming.
I haven't noticed that it does. I regularly get under 70ms pings to CounterStrike:Source servers in the midwest. (I live in Columbus, OH) Of course, I use a router which provides connections to the VoIP box and other computers in the house, so without a router in front of the VoIP box it might. I could probably get even fancier if my router was a linux box with QoS packet scheduling enabled, but I'm not all that into administering a fancy-schmancy network in my home. (This is on a 3Mbit down/356?Mbit up cable modem through Insight RoadRunner) I can consistently max out a really large download from high bandwidth servers at 300kB/s, so YMMV on DSL or a slower cable connection.
The VoIP box pings the central server A LOT, but it hasn't impacted my online gaming as far as I can tell.
Vonage's current units work by having a unique identifier that they send back to Vonage to identify which "number" the call is coming from or going to. In other words, if I take my Vonage unit with me on the road and have a hotel with broadband available in the room, all I have to do is plug the unit in and I could make calls from it back to my area code as a "local" call. I could also receive calls in my hotel room from people trying to reach me at my "home" phone number. I assume their WiFi phone would work the exact same way.
/.'ers may poo-poo this idea, but I think it's got some real sticking power. The whole "college kids making free calls" thing mentioned in the article is just one use of many. In the approx. 1yr that we've had Vonage at my home, neither my wife or I have been displeased with the service. Yes, my wife gets displeased when I'm trying to d/l all three Mandrake 10.1 ISO's and she's trying to talk to her mother because I'm swamping the cable connection with my d/l's, but I simply delay the downloads... no big deal.
I know some
I'd also like to mention the sheer joy you will receive when telling your local and long distance telemark-a-droids that there is no way they can beat the price you're currently getting for phone service. When you tell them: "I'm getting every single service you offer PLUS long distance PLUS Canada calls PLUS $0.05-$0.15/min. for International calls for $29.99", you can hear their jaw hit the desk as they say: "Oh. Have a nice day." True, we're not factoring in the price of broadband to that dollar amount, but hell, I'd have broadband whether or not I needed phone service anyways so that doesn't matter.
Look, I understand your argument, but until you have any "actual" numbers on number of 'pirated' copies in the wild, why don't you stick to grandiose theories and postulating instead of claiming that we're all "looking at the numbers." You're just making yourself look stupid.
It's kinda like breakin' the speed limit while DUI. There's too many people doing it on an ongoing basis to adequately enforce it 100% of the time, so the cops just try to catch the worst offenders and get them off the streets before they do any real physical harm to others.
Same goes for spammers and crackers and script kiddies.
This is why the Internet seems like more and more of the "wild, wild west" to me lately. Vigilante justice (people scamming the scammers and spamming the spammers with actual trash and junk mail dropped on their actual lawns) is oftentimes far more effective in the cyberspace realm than real, actual "protectors of the law" can be. For now. The Internet will get mundane and not quite as exciting as it used to be "back in the days" as soon as real law and order come to it in full force. So I guess what I'm saying is this: Enjoy the crapflood of spam while you can, because it also means you have immensely more freedom to do whatever the hell you want to do in cyberspace right now. Sure, spam is a royal pain in the ass, but there's so many freedoms to enjoy in the meantime!
No, it's designed to defeat bayesian filters. If you're sending out millions of emails, and making a tidy profit, you don't want to lose that profit. So every once in a while you send out a million emails that are worthless crap, blank, not really selling somethings, etc. to confuse the filters. Then you send out the next wave of spam, wash, rinse, repeat.
I echo your endorsement of Brian Green's "Elegant Universe." I took me several years of periodic interest in physics to make it all the way through the book (which I recently finished about 8 months ago), but by the end I was thoroughly engrossed in the work he and his colleagues have done in the realm of theoretical physics, as well as the potential theoretical physics still has to reveal more amazing stuff to humanity. Even if you have only a passing hobbyist interest in physics and the universe, I think you'll really eat this book up. It has been by far one of the easiest to read yet full of knowledge science related book that I've ever read. The writing style is quite similar to The Economist article linked from above.
As a side note, I was once reading that book in an airport a couple years ago while waiting for my flight to take me home from a business trip. Some guy stopped and asked me what I thought of the book. At that time I wasn't halfway through but whole-heartedly recommended it to him. Kind of an odd encounter with a fellow businessman (at least he looked like a businessman type) who was also interested in physics. Go figure.
Nuclear fusion happens everyday: it's called, THE SUN! and it's the sole reason this planet is warm enough for us to all live on it. Nuclear fusion needs to be explained by using Einsteinian mathematics and physics. Let me guess, you're a philosophy major?
Well, you're crossing genre's of "crimes" there, but I think you're on the right track. Who the FBI, CIA, NSA, DoD, and the Pentagon ought to be going after is China, Korea, Thailand, and all the other Southeast Asian countries that are costing American companies millions, if not billions, in 'lost revenues' on computer software sales. Sadly, that would require an act of war, and since our government leaders know that this is not a viable solution for saving a select few American companies millions of dollars every year, they stand by and let the piss-ant agents go after all of the American citizens who aren't really making any money off of these thefts of computer programs to give the rest of the country's bumbling idiots a sense that all is well in our great nation.
It's pathetic, and sad, but such are the times we live in. If this were medieval times we'd probably just go try to kick some Southeast Asia ass, but then we'd also only live to be about 40 and could get burned at the stake for not kissing the royal scepter and worshipping the Pope.
...They're basing this "Hobbit" on a single small human skull they found in Indonesia? Sorry, but that's not all that convincing to me that the entire body of the thing was ADULT, and also small. Just a bunch more psuedo-science BS.
And how, pray tell, could anyone possible conclude such a "fact" when NO known existence of life outside of our piddly little Earth has been found?
I moderate this article F.U.D.!!!
LOL! I was thinking the exact same thing, and I'm a Christian! But I wholeheartedly laughed when reading through their best/worst lists. It's like they picked all the most mundane, non-entertaining shows to put on their "best" list, and all the funny, "on the edge", ENTERTAINING shows on their "worst" list.
/. majority on this one and say that this group has got to go!
I may not appreciate all of the content on TV these days, but c'mon, "The Honeymooners" was just as bad if not a whole lot worse than anything on TV these days. I'm with the
In that case, I would consider them unfit to perform the duties they're getting paid for because I agree that not laying out the money for the right tools is stupid when the job being done is being done for profit.
By the way, I am not a wedding photographer as some other responders in this thread might have thought. And I also meant that most all of my pictures turn out like crap. Then again, because photography is merely a minor hobby of mine at this point and will probably never be professional, I know that my photos turn out like crap in part because I lack the right equipment: external flash equipment, different wider angle lenses, etc.
Sadly, you're mistaken about what it means to be a "professional." You are correct in thinking that a "professional" gets paid for their services. You are incorrect in thinking that all professionals are knowledgeable and know what they're doing in return for the pay they are receiving. I have seen wedding photographers who actually arranged and took worse pictures than even I would take - and I would hardly even consider myself an amateur at this point because not all of my pictures turn out well.
The person that wrote this "Ask Slashdot" may just be in the camp of those who get paid for services they're not qualified to perform. Or they may just be getting started. In any case, they did preface the question by mentioning that they were not willing to pay for the high quality stuff that many professional photographers use, so I don't see why you're so up in arms with their lack of desire to use "real" equipment. Just answer the damn question!
Well I don't actually "remember" it 'cause I wasn't born then (not even close to then), but perhaps we need a new euphamism for the free-speech haters:
"Fundies", as in Fundamentalism.
I was going to moderate you 'flamebait' or 'troll,' but I just had to post a reply instead:
First, try learning how to spell correctly in your posts. I also suggest not putting your thoughts down in one sentence paragraphs. Doing so makes you appear to have an intelligence that is "below average."
Second, it appears that the parent poster really hit a nerve of yours in poking fun at those people who would rather spend an additional $1,000 - $1,500 on a brand new computer rather than just having someone come over and clean out the spyware for $50. Sounds to me like someone is feeling a bit sheepish over a rather costly error in logical thinking as of late.
Lastly, why is it that American "homies" can't even come up with a decently spelled version of the word "shit" when trying to represent the phonetic "homie" version of the word: 'shee-it.' (or 'shee-ite,' or 'shee-it' if you prefer) The stupidity in writing 'shite' all the time in CounterStrike chat or on websites such as Slashdot drives me crazy!
I couldn't resist responding to this one. I am a business analyst NOW (have been for 2yrs now) and I am also attending DeVry to get that BS in Comp. Eng. Yes I realize DeVry is no MIT, but my life choices were not always geared towards JUST being a computer scientist or such. Nor did I expect that I'd be slogging out a degree at someplace like DeVry. Life just sorta gets in the way sometimes. So I took a job at a company I thought had their shit together back in the late 90's, and guess what? They did!
But if I had finished my degree at the very large state school I was at, or if I had stuck it out at the prestigious private college I went to straight out of high school I would be in a VERY different place than I am today. (I'd probably be working on my master's, PhD, or JD degrees - or finished with one - by now)
Oh, BTW, why is it that everyone thinks DeVry is for total idiots that can't get more than a low-paying job? In my 3yrs there going part-time at nights, I've met some very clueless idiots, it's true, but I've also met people juggling a spouse, kids, a middle to upper-class income job, AND a part-time college degree course all at the same time. I wouldn't call those sorts 'idiots' or 'slackers' if they can handle all of those responsibilities at once.