A 2-page article is hardly going to make you a know-it-all on this man. It's a good overview, but please don't go away from it thinking you're an expert on his life. (That's just a pet peeve of mine, like people who saw a Ken Burns series and now think they're Civil War experts).
What the article barely touches on, for example, is that (like Russell) he turned from science and philosophy to political activism later in life, complete with a heaping FBI file. Read his own words if you want to. There's also an interesting story about Einstein'sbrain!
But let's get to the heart of the matter. As much as you can hate this guy for what he's doing, the reason he's making money (and the same reason telemarketers stay in buisness) is because they're are idiots out there responding to spam with their wallets. If everyone would adhere to the minimum essential committment to never buy anything as a result of unsolicited commercial advertisements, commercial spam would not exist.
Because without passive-aggressive complaining about Microsoft we'd have nothing to talk about. The whole approach that Slashdot takes on Microsoft with is not helping the common cause.
Like the story about X-Box mods being banned. Blizzard does the same thing with Diablo and Warcraft hackers as it is a very good idea, so no need to heap on the accusatory tone.
This reminds me of two things: the criticism of Dilbert that it makes workers more content to whine than change the system, and the lament by CmdrTaco about childish anti-Microsoft tactics, framed nicely against the Slashdot topic icon for Microsoft.
With DVDs first came out, the general consumer opinion was "great - now I'll have the same flexibility with viewing that CDs offered over cassette tapes." Well guess again, buster. With most DVDs you're now forced to watch 2+ minutes of INTERPOL and FBI warnings before getting to a chapter index on a standard player (some of it is usability flashy annoyances, but you can't skip any of it).
These 2+ minute warnings do nothing to prevent piracy and only serve to annoy people - they're rather like the recently-dumped "are you carrying any bombs" questions at airport check-ins. Technological advances and misguided DRM measures just don't mix. It doesn't help that the entertainment industry is just paranoid of any new technology:
"I say to you that the VCR is to the American film producer and the American public as the Boston strangler is to the woman home alone." - Jack Valenti in 1982, trying to get congress to outlaw the VHR.
And I shall call it... the wheel!
on
Just One Page a Day
·
· Score: 3, Funny
You mean a more communal approach than an oligarchy of "editros" that can't spot day-old duplicates? Greatidea!
Mintzer, F. C., Boyle, L. E., Cazes, A. N., Christian, B. S., Cox, S. C., Giordano, F. P., Gladney, H. M., Lee J. C., Kelmanson, M. L., Lirani, A. C., Magerlein, K. A., Pavani, A. M. B., & Schiattarella, F. (1996). Toward online, worldwide access to Vatican library materials. IBM Journal of Research and Development, 40(2), 139-162.
But this project was to allow access to specified scholars. It's nice to see expanded access.
This happened when the Dead Sea Scrolls were fist reseased to a set of specific people. A data set was made available to the general public of word occurrences and relationships. A group of people used this data to compile the original texts, and released them to everyone. It pissed a lot of ivory tower types off, IIRC.
Tablet PCs are touch screens with handwriting recognition that run software just like a desktop personal computer. Early designs have been released and the first generation of models are expected to hit the market in late 2002. read and learn more.
the freedom to take a digital copy of the book, leaving the original on the shelf for someone who is not able to use a digital copy.
The biggest impediment to the type of access you describe nowadays isn't the technology, it's capitalism and all its derivatives, such as copyright.
Case in point: A few years ago, the ebook vendor netLibrary offered an offline reader. This product was removed due to publisher paranoia. Currently you can only view netLibrary titles one page at a time while connected to the Internet. Furthermore, despite the medium, only one patron per purchasing library can check out a book at any given time. But never fear, now they're offering - for an extra fee - the ability to use a (somewhat) DRM crippled offline reader.
Publishers are about as up to date with technology and new pricing models as the RIAA. Copyrights disputes have been cited as the reason several publishers have pulled their titles from full-text databases. So instead of moving towards the single search box method for library resources, we now have hundreds of competing library database vendors, each with different coverage and search interfaces. It is the most difficulty time in history to do library research (and the slack that Google is picking up is a detriment to research skills) not just because of varying library materials formats, but because of copyright.
I found the attitude in this story very odd, considering online map library exhibits have been around many years. What's next, people start discovering LOC's *free* pre-Google answers service?
Get a grip, nerds, librarians are Not What You Think. (draft of a page I made a few months ago especially directed at the slashdot crowd, url published here for the first time ever!). See also a category I build at the ODP, Librarians in Society.
Based on the most conservative estimates for variables in the Drake Equation, odds are we're not alone.
That's no proof, but it's not like astronomers are asking people to believe there's an invisible pink unicorn listening to their prayers. It's the best estimate we have. Without an ftl jet or a working dimensional transfuctioner or whatever the gyroscope thing was in Conact, in this case absence of evidence is not strong evidence of absence.
To have "jumped the shark" pretty much means to have "gone to hell" - based on a Happy Days show where Fonzie waterski-jumped a shark. The show was pretty much game over from then on. More definition and I'll also bet the above poster reads Boondocks.
"Don't talk to the press without permission" or "divert all media inquiries to the communications office" are boilerplate phrases from most every employee manual.
It's a control issue, for fear that every statement released will appear to be official company policy (cf. those "my opinions alone" email sigs, or/. headlines "Microsoft says..." that should be "A single Microsoft peon says...", or the recent Saudi pentagon leak, etc. etc.).
If you think this level of control isn't necessary for communications reps to do their job, why don't you give everyone root access and see what happens.:)
I've had a unlinked page on my Wizardry site for awhile now. If you read around in it you'll get instructions for the URL. Of the few thousand hits it gets a week, about a dozen people stumble on the secret page.
Acting against a blue screen has got to be worse than dealing with another actor.
Some quotes: Terence Stamp (Valorum): "When I arrived on set for Episode 1, George Lucas said, 'I've given Natalie the day off.' So, he pointed to a piece of paper on a post and said, 'Pretend that's her.' They couldn't afford me again."
Thus proving this prediction...
Mark Hamill: "I have a sneaking suspicion that if there were a way to make movies without actors, George would do it." Early 1980s
... but an accurate description of the current status of Diablo II online. The supposedly secure realms have been hacked to pieces. Many people charge items to help other players, sell items on ebay, and focus on the repetitive play that the game rewards.
One of the latest hacks, for example, which I find particularly funny, can program mouse and keyboard actions so that you keep creating games and killing the same monster over and over again soley for the purpose of getting the items the monster drops. This bot works - the prices within the trading economy have already gone down about one half because of the flood of all the items from players running it.
A good online game should not be based on rewarding this kind of repetitive behavior that a bot can perform (quote stolen from LB talking about Tabula Rasa.
Slashdot Mirror
A 2-page article is hardly going to make you a know-it-all on this man. It's a good overview, but please don't go away from it thinking you're an expert on his life. (That's just a pet peeve of mine, like people who saw a Ken Burns series and now think they're Civil War experts).
What the article barely touches on, for example, is that (like Russell) he turned from science and philosophy to political activism later in life, complete with a heaping FBI file. Read his own words if you want to. There's also an interesting story about Einstein's brain!
>Is this really possible? If so how?
Why, Windows Messaging, of course.
But let's get to the heart of the matter. As much as you can hate this guy for what he's doing, the reason he's making money (and the same reason telemarketers stay in buisness) is because they're are idiots out there responding to spam with their wallets. If everyone would adhere to the minimum essential committment to never buy anything as a result of unsolicited commercial advertisements, commercial spam would not exist.
Because without passive-aggressive complaining about Microsoft we'd have nothing to talk about. The whole approach that Slashdot takes on Microsoft with is not helping the common cause.
Like the story about X-Box mods being banned. Blizzard does the same thing with Diablo and Warcraft hackers as it is a very good idea, so no need to heap on the accusatory tone.
This reminds me of two things: the criticism of Dilbert that it makes workers more content to whine than change the system, and the lament by CmdrTaco about childish anti-Microsoft tactics, framed nicely against the Slashdot topic icon for Microsoft.
From March 13, 2002. Has some (currently) not /.ed pics too.
You mean this episode. But here's a real-life example.
Lost in Translation
With DVDs first came out, the general consumer opinion was "great - now I'll have the same flexibility with viewing that CDs offered over cassette tapes." Well guess again, buster. With most DVDs you're now forced to watch 2+ minutes of INTERPOL and FBI warnings before getting to a chapter index on a standard player (some of it is usability flashy annoyances, but you can't skip any of it).
These 2+ minute warnings do nothing to prevent piracy and only serve to annoy people - they're rather like the recently-dumped "are you carrying any bombs" questions at airport check-ins. Technological advances and misguided DRM measures just don't mix. It doesn't help that the entertainment industry is just paranoid of any new technology:
"I say to you that the VCR is to the American film producer and the American public as the Boston strangler is to the woman home alone."
- Jack Valenti in 1982, trying to get congress to outlaw the VHR.
You mean a more communal approach than an oligarchy of "editros" that can't spot day-old duplicates? Great idea!
>I think IBM Global Services was doing some work in this area.
Yup (note the date: "Received January 31, 1995").
But this project was to allow access to specified scholars. It's nice to see expanded access.
This happened when the Dead Sea Scrolls were fist reseased to a set of specific people. A data set was made available to the general public of word occurrences and relationships. A group of people used this data to compile the original texts, and released them to everyone. It pissed a lot of ivory tower types off, IIRC.
I wonder if it includes the Vatican's extra specail collections.
Why oh why did you link to the New York one? Don't you know there are more?
There's also an effort to make a national one.
And don't forget the DMA lists.
Tablet PCs are touch screens with handwriting recognition that run software just like a desktop personal computer. Early designs have been released and the first generation of models are expected to hit the market in late 2002. read and learn more.
The biggest impediment to the type of access you describe nowadays isn't the technology, it's capitalism and all its derivatives, such as copyright.
Case in point: A few years ago, the ebook vendor netLibrary offered an offline reader. This product was removed due to publisher paranoia. Currently you can only view netLibrary titles one page at a time while connected to the Internet. Furthermore, despite the medium, only one patron per purchasing library can check out a book at any given time. But never fear, now they're offering - for an extra fee - the ability to use a (somewhat) DRM crippled offline reader.
Publishers are about as up to date with technology and new pricing models as the RIAA. Copyrights disputes have been cited as the reason several publishers have pulled their titles from full-text databases. So instead of moving towards the single search box method for library resources, we now have hundreds of competing library database vendors, each with different coverage and search interfaces. It is the most difficulty time in history to do library research (and the slack that Google is picking up is a detriment to research skills) not just because of varying library materials formats, but because of copyright.
Libraries Are 31337
I found the attitude in this story very odd, considering online map library exhibits have been around many years. What's next, people start discovering LOC's *free* pre-Google answers service?
Get a grip, nerds, librarians are Not What You Think. (draft of a page I made a few months ago especially directed at the slashdot crowd, url published here for the first time ever!). See also a category I build at the ODP, Librarians in Society.
Based on the most conservative estimates for variables in the Drake Equation, odds are we're not alone.
That's no proof, but it's not like astronomers are asking people to believe there's an invisible pink unicorn listening to their prayers. It's the best estimate we have. Without an ftl jet or a working dimensional transfuctioner or whatever the gyroscope thing was in Conact, in this case absence of evidence is not strong evidence of absence.
Remember the Denver airport opening delays because of the baggage system bugs?
here.
To have "jumped the shark" pretty much means to have "gone to hell" - based on a Happy Days show where Fonzie waterski-jumped a shark. The show was pretty much game over from then on. More definition and I'll also bet the above poster reads Boondocks.
"Don't talk to the press without permission" or "divert all media inquiries to the communications office" are boilerplate phrases from most every employee manual.
/. headlines "Microsoft says..." that should be "A single Microsoft peon says...", or the recent Saudi pentagon leak, etc. etc.).
:)
It's a control issue, for fear that every statement released will appear to be official company policy (cf. those "my opinions alone" email sigs, or
If you think this level of control isn't necessary for communications reps to do their job, why don't you give everyone root access and see what happens.
I've had a unlinked page on my Wizardry site for awhile now. If you read around in it you'll get instructions for the URL. Of the few thousand hits it gets a week, about a dozen people stumble on the secret page.
Been mention here before, but here's a lengthy read - part of a larger site from someone who has a great deal of time on his hands.
Acting against a blue screen has got to be worse than dealing with another actor.
Some quotes:
Terence Stamp (Valorum): "When I arrived on set for Episode 1, George Lucas said, 'I've given Natalie the day off.' So, he pointed to a piece of paper on a post and said, 'Pretend that's her.' They couldn't afford me again."
Thus proving this prediction...
Mark Hamill: "I have a sneaking suspicion that if there were a way to make movies without actors, George would do it." Early 1980s
I wonder how many other readers know that reference. (/*points to id)
Help a commercial consorware company do business? I think not.
... but an accurate description of the current status of Diablo II online. The supposedly secure realms have been hacked to pieces. Many people charge items to help other players, sell items on ebay, and focus on the repetitive play that the game rewards.
One of the latest hacks, for example, which I find particularly funny, can program mouse and keyboard actions so that you keep creating games and killing the same monster over and over again soley for the purpose of getting the items the monster drops. This bot works - the prices within the trading economy have already gone down about one half because of the flood of all the items from players running it.
A good online game should not be based on rewarding this kind of repetitive behavior that a bot can perform (quote stolen from LB talking about Tabula Rasa.