This is one of (many) places where conservative economic/free market politics just don't work.
While the right wing economists tout the free market as the solution to everything, arguing that an unregulated market is the only way to approach pretty much everything, there are cases where the market is dominated by 1/2/3 players that cannot be avoided. We, as consumers, are not able to vote with our dollars - we have no choice. We did have a choice - Bell was allowing ISPs to resell DSL and manage the data themselves, but when they realized that meant that people (who know/care about such things) were flocking to the unrestricted ISPs, they squashed that avenue to unrestricted net access.
The other competitor, Rogers, hasn't opened their network up to competition (that i know of), so they can do whatever they feel like.
That leaves us with the occasional small wireless isp with leases lines, satellite (slow), or of course, leasing our own line. Yes - we have options, but no, none of them are good for the consumer. Without government regulation, and with the small size of our market (ie: very little competition), the few major ISPs will control our destinies, and it's only a matter of time until they start with tiered data speed.
Web - sure, fast as you'd like, it's highly compressible, proxyable, no big deal. Email - sure, but you can only have small attachments, but we'd prefer you use our free webmail service. Music? Only if you buy from our store (or from stores that we have deals with), otherwise, we're going to filter you. Otherwise, we'll limit you. Video? Only if you buy from our store (or from stores we have deals with). Otherwise, no bandwidth for you. Overall data? Sure, your unlimited plan will apply, if you shop in our stores. Otherwise, here's a cap. enjoy!
I think the real problem is that Bell/Rogers/etc have been severely overselling their networks without paying the money to upgrade them. Our monthly fees have been slowly creeping up instead of dropping (you'd think I could get high speed internet for cheaper now than I did 10 years ago, but you'd be wrong, for the same level of service). Our connection quality has been dropping. The service level at the ISPs is consistently poor. However, Rogers and Bell are turning out huge profits every quarter. Why? Because they've managed to find a way to provide the minimum of service for the maximum of profit, and their shareholders love it. And ultimately, in todays world, the shareholder is the more important measure of a business than their customers. So long as the share prices stay up, the businesses will continue to do whatever they want. Once the prices start to slip, and they will, or once a better level of competition is introduced/forced, then we might see customer focus becoming a priority.
There are some that say any regulation in business is bad for the economy, that we should let businesses set their policies, and the customers will go where they feel is best. But when there are no reasonable choices, when there is no competition, then the customer loses and big business wins. The government must step in and regulate, until such time as market conditions exist to enable the free market to take a go at managing themselves again.
Positive reinforcement hasn't worked so far, it's time for negative reinforcement. Bad doggy, no treat for you.
Just remember that, even though you look down on these people, and think them lesser, they can still arrange for you to be stripped naked and jam things in uncomfortable places. You may not respect them, but you have to yield to their authority anyways.
Curling combines the skillful art of hitting things with other things, ice, and beer. What more could you desire out of a sport? Sure, theres a lack of bikinis, see ice for a reason.
With the cold war over, and the major super powers having no one to have air battles with, is it really necessary to spend huge amounts of money to fight an enemy that doesn't exist? I mean, back in the Cold War, it made sense-ish, but since the current battle is against "terror", and "terror" doesn't have an air force...
Granted - the technology is cool, and it's good to have somewhere to spend money to research tools like this, which I'm sure have other, less militaristic uses, but why should military spending dictate research?
Or is the world planning to gang up on China, and just not telling us?
For me, it's iTunes. I know that sounds crazy, but if you get beyond the bloat and horrible interface...
I don't have a lot of free time to go hopping from store to store looking for CDs, and I don't listen to regular radio (CBC or bust), so I don't get exposed to a lot of new music. But, when I do have some free time, I can fire up iTunes and checkout music at home, quickly. And, if I like it, in a matter of minutes I can have the music on my desktop and iPod, for less than I would pay in a music store. Sure, theres DRM, but I don't care, I'm playing the music on my iPod. And, if I don't want to play it there, I convert to mp3, or burn it directly from iTunes.
Yeah, it's not fantastic, but I want to support artists whose music I like. Since I'm much more likely to do that in iTunes than in a music store, and I'm not going to just download their music and not have them get paid for it (however little they make off an album, it's still money in their pocket they wouldn't get if I.torrent'd it), I stick with my iPod and their stupid bloaty software that frequently uses up more memory than even memory sucking firefox or WoW.
they had ATMs in 1986? In Tasmania? that connected back to banks here?
I can vaguely remember the first ATMs appearing here around that time. That they had them in Tasmania, that would talk back to FI's else where is remarkable.
Everyone knows that just because you're a good technical person, it doesn't mean you're a good manager. So don't turn in to that guy that everyone hates. Be honest with yourself... in a years time, look at how you manage things, look at the happiness of your employees, of yourself, look at the amount of work going on is right, and try and think of how happy you'd be if you were being managed by you. And, if the results of that aren't as positive as they should be, do the right thing and step aside. There is no lost face here - not everyone is made to be a manager, plain and simple. But by continuing when you're not suitable for the job, you're impacting other lives, potentially very negatively, as well as probably impacting your own life and happiness.
Thats my suggestion - just be honest with yourself about your performance, and, if things aren't good, find a way out.
Some people don't want to be experts - I have absolutely no desire to be an 'expert' at anything. I am a generalist and have found a few roles where that is a bonus. And where there isn't a "need" for a generalist, I can go in to a specific role and branch out, letting my general skills help out where they can.
"If you really are competent then the step up..." - I don't like the implication there. I am very competent, but I would find it exceedingly difficult for me to become "great" at any one part of my knowledge. I don't like to focus on one thing - I read multiple books at a time, I watch movies and read at the same time, I listen to music and surf and cook. I move from Windows to Linux to databases to development to application support to web to systems management many times a day, and I do them all well. Not everyone is made to become GREAT at things. I am a poster child for ADD and I think it's a great skill.
Not everyone wants to be an expert, and I don't think that should detract from their usefulness - like anything, you just need to find the right spot to apply your skills.
I was feeling bad that I was going to be a dissenting voice, but I am glad I found someone who agrees with me.
As much as I encourage kids to want to learn and try things, the fact of the matter is that there are rules, and if they break the rules, then there are consequences.
it seems like a lot of the consequences of things are being removed in order to make things easier and less mean for kids. This is bringing a whole herd of kids through schools who think that actions don't have consequences, then hit the real world and don't know what to do. Real life has consequences - if they were to, say, circumvent their offices security as they have their school security, the odds are they'd be fired.
I'm not that old, and still remember my devious days of getting in trouble for mucking around on the network in my highschool. thankfully the head of computers was a nice guy and understood why we geeks wanted to mess around, but I still got a good talking to, and was sent to the VP's office a couple times. Granted, I never breached security or tried to change grades or things of a serious nature, just messing around.
It's part of the whole growing up experience, rebelling against authority, thinking you're smarter than the adults, etc. I'm all for that, but there are limits that shouldn't be pushed, and kids (well, everyone) needs to know that. They also need to knwo that just because you CAN break in to something, doesn't mean you SHOULD. Just because I know I could go in to my bosses office because the door is unlocked, doesn't mean I SHOULD go in there and read all sorts of confidential stuff.
It's a hard lesson to learn, especially as a teenager. Hopefully those that get in trouble learn the lesson and learn it good. Learn now, while they're kids and can 'get away' with it (ie: aren't put in jail, fired, etc).
Was listening to the CBC on the way home from work yesterday, and they had the minister of education on.
She indicated that their plan for the cyber bullying is to gather students and ask them what THEY would consider to be cyber bullying. That will start the discussion about what constitutes cyber bullying.
Having read about some cyber bullying, I'm glad to see that this action is being taken. There are cases of people getting 100's of text messages abusing them, of myspace/facebook/etc pages being overrun with people harassing kids. Pictures/videos spreading, either real or modified, to harass kids.
How is this a bad thing? This should help tackle a problem that parents and teachers, who are mostly unaware of technology and how it's used. And, since it's actual kids who are helping guide the rules, it should actually mean something more than some government official.
Funny, reading her biography, I would have hoped for better from her:
"Ms. Jennings is the Liberal critic for Justice and a member of the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights"
"Ms. Jennings has been Vice-Chair of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Industry, Science and Technology,"
"She was a member of the Joint House of Commons-Senate Standing Committee on Scrutiny of Regulations, of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics"
She seems to have the makings of a good, upstanding netizen, who would be protecting our rights...
I have sent her a note, and am still reading the bill. I would encourage all Canadians to do the same:
Parliamentary Office: 416 West Block Ottawa ON K1A 0A6 (613) 995-2251 jennim@parl.gc.ca
Constituency Office: 6332 Sherbrooke St W Suite 204 Montreal QC H4B 1M7 (514) 489-8703
Time to exercise your democratic muscles and express displeasure at such things, no matte which party this comes from.
And, while I am no fan of conservative politics in Canada, or anywhere else, editorial comments such as the one on this article are unnecessary. Keep comments like that to your myspace page.
because there is already an ENORMOUS investment is gasoline powered vehicles. To go and say 'umm, sorry, you need to go buy a new car if you want to use a renewable fuel" would drive away most people.
Ethanol is attractive, in some ways, because it replaces some of the volume of gasoline used, which helps reduce the need for the refinery time, etc.
don't get me wrong here, I love biodiesel, I use it in my car (TDI Jetta) which I bought simply because I wanted a diesel for the fuel effiency and it's environmental benefits (and paid another $3000 for). But, we have to be realistic. There are very, very few consumer ready diesels out there (in North America - Europe is rife with them). VW has them, Smartcars do... ummm.. mercedes does I think. There are others, but they are in trucks/jeeps/suvs, and those don't really help solve the problem. Sure, my friends Diesel pickup is diesel, but it gets 8l/100km, which is higher than most gas powered cars.
Biodiesel is great, but until there is infrastructure in place for it, and a demand for it (ie: small cars that people will buy), and they over come some issues with it (ie: it's fine in higher ratios in warm climates, but in cold climates it gels too easily so has to be blended) it won't be ready as a gasoline replacement.
I am happy to say that with the high price of gas lately, there are many more TDIs on the road, and having talked to the dealership, they say they can't keep them in stock, so there is a movement afoot. A few gas stations near me have put in diesel pumps in the last little while as well. But there are only 2 places I know of in my city (Toronto) that sell Biodiesel, so there is a long way to go. Sadly, though, having just come back from a weeks vacation in floriduh, I can count on one hand the number of diesel cars I saw (yes, I look for these things, I'm a geek).
We've run into this situation with three of our vendors (HP, Novell and Redhat) where they released patches for DST a while ago (last fall and before), but didn't include the Canadian timezone fixes. Novell has finally released a patch that updates Canadian timezones, and we've got it going on a Redhat box as well, but I heard our HP-UX people are still waiting.
So, if you're Canadian, or have boxes in Canadia, make sure the patch you applied will handle the Canadian timezone rules.
"zdump -v Canada/Eastern | grep 2007" and "zic -l Canada/Eastern" is now forever stuck in my brain from all the testing.
Slashdot Mirror
All general statements are false.
If the terrorists get their hands on this, we're all doomed!
Quick, invade something, anything!
You, sir, are a complete fucking moron.
Funny, calling someone Sir, then calling them a "complete fucking moron". Why bother with the pretend respect?
If you're going to flame and/or abuse someone, do you feel better pretending you're doing it respectfully?
I'd argue that the number of occurrences of profanity says more about how you feel about the person than a pretend sir.
Also, I'd suggest that if you want to make a point, it's generally better than when not laced with insults.
Just sayin.
This is one of (many) places where conservative economic/free market politics just don't work.
While the right wing economists tout the free market as the solution to everything, arguing that an unregulated market is the only way to approach pretty much everything, there are cases where the market is dominated by 1/2/3 players that cannot be avoided. We, as consumers, are not able to vote with our dollars - we have no choice. We did have a choice - Bell was allowing ISPs to resell DSL and manage the data themselves, but when they realized that meant that people (who know/care about such things) were flocking to the unrestricted ISPs, they squashed that avenue to unrestricted net access.
The other competitor, Rogers, hasn't opened their network up to competition (that i know of), so they can do whatever they feel like.
That leaves us with the occasional small wireless isp with leases lines, satellite (slow), or of course, leasing our own line. Yes - we have options, but no, none of them are good for the consumer. Without government regulation, and with the small size of our market (ie: very little competition), the few major ISPs will control our destinies, and it's only a matter of time until they start with tiered data speed.
Web - sure, fast as you'd like, it's highly compressible, proxyable, no big deal.
Email - sure, but you can only have small attachments, but we'd prefer you use our free webmail service.
Music? Only if you buy from our store (or from stores that we have deals with), otherwise, we're going to filter you. Otherwise, we'll limit you.
Video? Only if you buy from our store (or from stores we have deals with). Otherwise, no bandwidth for you.
Overall data? Sure, your unlimited plan will apply, if you shop in our stores. Otherwise, here's a cap. enjoy!
I think the real problem is that Bell/Rogers/etc have been severely overselling their networks without paying the money to upgrade them. Our monthly fees have been slowly creeping up instead of dropping (you'd think I could get high speed internet for cheaper now than I did 10 years ago, but you'd be wrong, for the same level of service). Our connection quality has been dropping. The service level at the ISPs is consistently poor. However, Rogers and Bell are turning out huge profits every quarter. Why? Because they've managed to find a way to provide the minimum of service for the maximum of profit, and their shareholders love it. And ultimately, in todays world, the shareholder is the more important measure of a business than their customers. So long as the share prices stay up, the businesses will continue to do whatever they want. Once the prices start to slip, and they will, or once a better level of competition is introduced/forced, then we might see customer focus becoming a priority.
There are some that say any regulation in business is bad for the economy, that we should let businesses set their policies, and the customers will go where they feel is best. But when there are no reasonable choices, when there is no competition, then the customer loses and big business wins. The government must step in and regulate, until such time as market conditions exist to enable the free market to take a go at managing themselves again.
Positive reinforcement hasn't worked so far, it's time for negative reinforcement. Bad doggy, no treat for you.
$0.02 CDN.
Just remember that, even though you look down on these people, and think them lesser, they can still arrange for you to be stripped naked and jam things in uncomfortable places. You may not respect them, but you have to yield to their authority anyways.
Ain't that always the way?
Curling combines the skillful art of hitting things with other things, ice, and beer. What more could you desire out of a sport? Sure, theres a lack of bikinis, see ice for a reason.
In some cultures/subcultures, stating the obvious is humourous, as is creating obscenely long acronyms.
Now You Know (tm).
Since when do 'The Terrorists' have fighters?
...
With the cold war over, and the major super powers having no one to have air battles with, is it really necessary to spend huge amounts of money to fight an enemy that doesn't exist? I mean, back in the Cold War, it made sense-ish, but since the current battle is against "terror", and "terror" doesn't have an air force
Granted - the technology is cool, and it's good to have somewhere to spend money to research tools like this, which I'm sure have other, less militaristic uses, but why should military spending dictate research?
Or is the world planning to gang up on China, and just not telling us?
*folding arms across chest, frowning*
If China and India don't have to eat their vegetables, I'M NOT GOING TO EITHER!
*feet stomping, teeth gnashing, screaming*
God knows, the US would never show initiative and do anything pre-emptively, without the support of other nations, right?
Thank you! I see SO many people on forums, mailing lists, IRC saying "wallah" that I'm beginning to think it's a campaign against the French, again.
I don't think that it's functionally bloated - it's got great features and is easy to use.
I think it's MEMORY bloated - the thing easily eats 300meg of RAM/SWAP every time it loads
For me, it's iTunes. I know that sounds crazy, but if you get beyond the bloat and horrible interface ...
.torrent'd it), I stick with my iPod and their stupid bloaty software that frequently uses up more memory than even memory sucking firefox or WoW.
I don't have a lot of free time to go hopping from store to store looking for CDs, and I don't listen to regular radio (CBC or bust), so I don't get exposed to a lot of new music. But, when I do have some free time, I can fire up iTunes and checkout music at home, quickly. And, if I like it, in a matter of minutes I can have the music on my desktop and iPod, for less than I would pay in a music store. Sure, theres DRM, but I don't care, I'm playing the music on my iPod. And, if I don't want to play it there, I convert to mp3, or burn it directly from iTunes.
Yeah, it's not fantastic, but I want to support artists whose music I like. Since I'm much more likely to do that in iTunes than in a music store, and I'm not going to just download their music and not have them get paid for it (however little they make off an album, it's still money in their pocket they wouldn't get if I
Plus, theres the scrollwheel.
$0.02 CDN
oh dear god, I hadnt run across that before and totally looked it up.
please, pass me the acid.
they had ATMs in 1986? In Tasmania? that connected back to banks here?
I can vaguely remember the first ATMs appearing here around that time. That they had them in Tasmania, that would talk back to FI's else where is remarkable.
Everyone knows that just because you're a good technical person, it doesn't mean you're a good manager. So don't turn in to that guy that everyone hates. Be honest with yourself ... in a years time, look at how you manage things, look at the happiness of your employees, of yourself, look at the amount of work going on is right, and try and think of how happy you'd be if you were being managed by you. And, if the results of that aren't as positive as they should be, do the right thing and step aside. There is no lost face here - not everyone is made to be a manager, plain and simple. But by continuing when you're not suitable for the job, you're impacting other lives, potentially very negatively, as well as probably impacting your own life and happiness.
Thats my suggestion - just be honest with yourself about your performance, and, if things aren't good, find a way out.
Best of luck!
Some people don't want to be experts - I have absolutely no desire to be an 'expert' at anything. I am a generalist and have found a few roles where that is a bonus. And where there isn't a "need" for a generalist, I can go in to a specific role and branch out, letting my general skills help out where they can.
..." - I don't like the implication there. I am very competent, but I would find it exceedingly difficult for me to become "great" at any one part of my knowledge. I don't like to focus on one thing - I read multiple books at a time, I watch movies and read at the same time, I listen to music and surf and cook. I move from Windows to Linux to databases to development to application support to web to systems management many times a day, and I do them all well. Not everyone is made to become GREAT at things. I am a poster child for ADD and I think it's a great skill.
"If you really are competent then the step up
Not everyone wants to be an expert, and I don't think that should detract from their usefulness - like anything, you just need to find the right spot to apply your skills.
I was feeling bad that I was going to be a dissenting voice, but I am glad I found someone who agrees with me.
As much as I encourage kids to want to learn and try things, the fact of the matter is that there are rules, and if they break the rules, then there are consequences.
it seems like a lot of the consequences of things are being removed in order to make things easier and less mean for kids. This is bringing a whole herd of kids through schools who think that actions don't have consequences, then hit the real world and don't know what to do. Real life has consequences - if they were to, say, circumvent their offices security as they have their school security, the odds are they'd be fired.
I'm not that old, and still remember my devious days of getting in trouble for mucking around on the network in my highschool. thankfully the head of computers was a nice guy and understood why we geeks wanted to mess around, but I still got a good talking to, and was sent to the VP's office a couple times. Granted, I never breached security or tried to change grades or things of a serious nature, just messing around.
It's part of the whole growing up experience, rebelling against authority, thinking you're smarter than the adults, etc. I'm all for that, but there are limits that shouldn't be pushed, and kids (well, everyone) needs to know that. They also need to knwo that just because you CAN break in to something, doesn't mean you SHOULD. Just because I know I could go in to my bosses office because the door is unlocked, doesn't mean I SHOULD go in there and read all sorts of confidential stuff.
It's a hard lesson to learn, especially as a teenager. Hopefully those that get in trouble learn the lesson and learn it good. Learn now, while they're kids and can 'get away' with it (ie: aren't put in jail, fired, etc).
Was listening to the CBC on the way home from work yesterday, and they had the minister of education on.
She indicated that their plan for the cyber bullying is to gather students and ask them what THEY would consider to be cyber bullying. That will start the discussion about what constitutes cyber bullying.
Having read about some cyber bullying, I'm glad to see that this action is being taken. There are cases of people getting 100's of text messages abusing them, of myspace/facebook/etc pages being overrun with people harassing kids. Pictures/videos spreading, either real or modified, to harass kids.
How is this a bad thing? This should help tackle a problem that parents and teachers, who are mostly unaware of technology and how it's used. And, since it's actual kids who are helping guide the rules, it should actually mean something more than some government official.
Funny, reading her biography, I would have hoped for better from her:
...
"Ms. Jennings is the Liberal critic for Justice and a member of the Standing Committee on Justice and Human Rights"
"Ms. Jennings has been Vice-Chair of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Industry, Science and Technology,"
"She was a member of the Joint House of Commons-Senate Standing Committee on Scrutiny of Regulations, of the House of Commons Standing Committee on Access to Information, Privacy and Ethics"
She seems to have the makings of a good, upstanding netizen, who would be protecting our rights
I have sent her a note, and am still reading the bill. I would encourage all Canadians to do the same:
Parliamentary Office:
416 West Block
Ottawa ON K1A 0A6
(613) 995-2251
jennim@parl.gc.ca
Constituency Office:
6332 Sherbrooke St W
Suite 204
Montreal QC H4B 1M7
(514) 489-8703
Time to exercise your democratic muscles and express displeasure at such things, no matte which party this comes from.
And, while I am no fan of conservative politics in Canada, or anywhere else, editorial comments such as the one on this article are unnecessary. Keep comments like that to your myspace page.
because there is already an ENORMOUS investment is gasoline powered vehicles. To go and say 'umm, sorry, you need to go buy a new car if you want to use a renewable fuel" would drive away most people.
... ummm .. mercedes does I think. There are others, but they are in trucks/jeeps/suvs, and those don't really help solve the problem. Sure, my friends Diesel pickup is diesel, but it gets 8l/100km, which is higher than most gas powered cars.
Ethanol is attractive, in some ways, because it replaces some of the volume of gasoline used, which helps reduce the need for the refinery time, etc.
don't get me wrong here, I love biodiesel, I use it in my car (TDI Jetta) which I bought simply because I wanted a diesel for the fuel effiency and it's environmental benefits (and paid another $3000 for). But, we have to be realistic. There are very, very few consumer ready diesels out there (in North America - Europe is rife with them). VW has them, Smartcars do
Biodiesel is great, but until there is infrastructure in place for it, and a demand for it (ie: small cars that people will buy), and they over come some issues with it (ie: it's fine in higher ratios in warm climates, but in cold climates it gels too easily so has to be blended) it won't be ready as a gasoline replacement.
I am happy to say that with the high price of gas lately, there are many more TDIs on the road, and having talked to the dealership, they say they can't keep them in stock, so there is a movement afoot. A few gas stations near me have put in diesel pumps in the last little while as well. But there are only 2 places I know of in my city (Toronto) that sell Biodiesel, so there is a long way to go. Sadly, though, having just come back from a weeks vacation in floriduh, I can count on one hand the number of diesel cars I saw (yes, I look for these things, I'm a geek).
I second the motion.
"If we have craters on our planet & there are bones of things that shouldn't have died lying all around,"
What if the people paying the bills don't believe in the bones of things laying around?
We've run into this situation with three of our vendors (HP, Novell and Redhat) where they released patches for DST a while ago (last fall and before), but didn't include the Canadian timezone fixes. Novell has finally released a patch that updates Canadian timezones, and we've got it going on a Redhat box as well, but I heard our HP-UX people are still waiting.
So, if you're Canadian, or have boxes in Canadia, make sure the patch you applied will handle the Canadian timezone rules.
"zdump -v Canada/Eastern | grep 2007" and "zic -l Canada/Eastern" is now forever stuck in my brain from all the testing.
Todd.
I was in there tonight (the one in Markham) and found some.
only wee stacks, but they were there.
I didn't know there was even an IAAL acronym!
..
.. my head is spinning!
A real, "honest" to goodness Lawyer, here?
Next, you're going to tell me DNF is out
I have to sit down