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User: atr0x

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  1. religion is NOT the basis for morality on Larry Wall On Perl, Religion, and... · · Score: 1

    I disagree with Larry on the point of religion and morality. Religion may be valuable to some, not so to others, whatever, but it is NOT the basis for morality as Larry states, it IS in third grade, not after that.

    "Because if it turns out to be a 0, then we really are the slaves of our selfish genes, and there's no basis for morality other than various forms of tribalism. "

    According to Kohlbergs theories on moral development and my own thoughts on the matter (regardless of others theories) high levels of moral development are related to conscience and an understanding of the world around you and consequnces to other beings.

    Morals are NOT based on the bad boy punishment hype of most modern religions. I am an atheist (not agnostic, the first bit is zero, so the rest of the Larry explanation is out the window, sorry) and I have a high level of morals. I participate in my community, I am law abiding, I help others in need, I have compassion for others, I can decide what is right and wronq quite well, without religion. Tribalism is NOT the only alternative. There is REALITY to turn to. Nature is beautiful and magical and special and worth preserving, caring for and maintaining, just because of what it is, without some other extra psuedo up in the clouds watching over giving it meaning crap. Life has meaning without god, MORE meaning.

    I would normally leave religion well enough alone, but in this case, as in most cases where it comes up, it is the religious who brought up the discussion and hence warrant a response. Religion is fear based. Religion was created by man because we are smart enough to understand that we are mortal and that is a mindblower for most. We will all die, and we will be dead. There is no afterlife, there is no reason to "be good" here to get some silly reward for eternity later.

    When more people start to live in reality the world will be a better place.

  2. Re:Recognizing IE's Strengths on A First Look at Netscape 7 · · Score: 1

    thank you, well said, i dont know what the hell this clown means by smoother either. both moz and opera operate FASTER, with more useful user controllable functions, better access to controlling and customizing features and better security than IE.

    and as for "pages were designed for IE", dont get me started, there is a little thing called the HTML standard which is carefully considered, published and revised by a governing body made up of many many contributors from insitutions and industries, its called the W3C. web pages that are compliant work GREAT in moz and opera. web pages full of proprietary crap dont, aww what a shame, do we blame the browsers that actually MEET the standards? microsoft is doing a lot of preaching lately about standards but they did not even give a crap until others came along and introduced them to it.

    IE is better my ass.

  3. Can I take a piss or what? on Turner CEO: "PVR Users Are Thieves" · · Score: 1

    So if skipping the ads with a PVR violates the contract, according to the CEO, can I go take a piss or what? What about getting popcorn, what if the doorbell rings? What if the house is on fire? All "violations" if I dont watch the commercials?

  4. Flash is proprietary and NOT a good idea for web on Flash and Open Source · · Score: 1

    The reason there are not many Flash tools in the open source world is simple. Flash is proprietary Macromedia stuff, not a standard nor open. Open source is not about coming up with tools to code in proprietary formats (not in general anyway.)

    That beind said there are a few tools for Flash, but Flash should NEVER be used on a public website. Consider the decision to use Flash at all, not what tools are required.

    Flash is proprietary, requires a plugin (ie requires special client side configuration), Flash is also blocked by many firewalls and proxy servers (several offices I have worked in, more in Europe than US, but in both) block Flash, for bandwidth and security concerns, and rightfully so.)

    Flash is pretty and fancy, but unless you can GUARANTEE the client side implementation you should not use it, PERIOD. You cant guarantee the client on a public network, ie the Internet.

    Thats not a slam against Flash itself, but rather a precaution that should be taken when using anything that depends on client side implementation or processing. Javascript, Applets, Flash, etc. All should NEVER be used as a sole means to view or perform functionality on a site.

    These are all great if you DETECT that the client can handle it, and provide an alternative if the client cannot. Sites that rely on any of these technologies lose many many visitors because they either dont allow those technologies (ie have them blocked or disabled) or dont have the capability to use them (dont have the plugin, misconfigured, etc.)

    Flash is chief among these technologies and again, should NOT EVER be used on a public website (without detection and alternative.)

  5. Re:It's this on GPS Wristwatch for Kids · · Score: 1

    This one was firsthand knowledge, I wish it was a myth. And, I have firsthand friends whom work at Disney World (fla) and they confirm that in fact it is a huge issue at Disney. They do have contigencies for it, and it has happened. It does happen. Again, unfortunately.

    Also, I dont know if another incident was true or not, but recently on the news in Atlanta Georgia a similar thing occured at a Sams Club (wholesale buying club.) Again, kids hair cut, etc. In that incident the parents apparently were yelling throughout the store, the kid had only been missing for minutes and was found in the bathroom. Abductor not found. This was on the major news networks (not that that makes it true.)

  6. Re:Almost there... on Weirdest Case Mod You've Ever Seen · · Score: 1

    HAHAHAHA, yep, I noticed that too. All that effort for LAN parties and its running win2K? It better be water and flame proof, because its going to piss everyone else on the network off with its incessent broadcasts for NetBIOS services!

  7. Re:It's this on GPS Wristwatch for Kids · · Score: 1

    "on /. there are some fairly common beliefs . . . "

    speak for yourself.

    there is nothing wrong with this. the helicopters are not coming over the hill, the government is not trying to implicate you (or your 4 year old child) in some espionage ring, lets come back to reality.

    this is an example of parents using technology to their advantage, not of parents being swept away by the media with their eyes glazed over into believing this will do parenting for them. this is an example of parents who give a crap being concerned about their childrens safety.

    that is not wrong at all. if only we could get more parents today to participate and care about their kids.

    specifically the location of the child can be known to the PARENT immediately if required. this is a SAFETY device, not a tracking device for parents whom cant keep track of their kids anyway (if the child is unwilling to wear it, or subverts it, etc, then obviously that wont work, that is not the point of this device, this is a device for parents and children whom trust each other and want an added security measure.)

    and using it with a child of any age is not and "abuse" of anything. of course with older children there is an issue of trust and respect that should be maintained. forcing a child to wear one of these if they object based on their own personal privacy beliefs would be wrong. however, if you are brining up your children and teaching them your sky is falling conspiracy outlook then you may have larger problems than this device.

    the 15 year olds are not the focus of the device, the device is obviously intended to prevent abductions of small children (which DO happen, contrary to posts on this thread, especially in large public settings such as Disney.)

    (Disney Sidebar:
    There is a special security contigency and policy at Disney for just such an event AND i know of a person who had a child ABDUCTED at Disney. happily they were able to locate the child, return the child, and arrest the perpetrator very quickly, BECAUSE OF TECHNOLOGY. they tracked down the child with the extensive surveillance that Disney has, the childs hair had been cut and clothes had been completely changed except for the shoes, all within minutes, its disapointing that this happens in the world, but it DOES happen.)

    most of the posts on this thread are obviously from people who DONT have children. this isnt about the conspiracy and privacy crap, this is about safety.

  8. Re:What's that? on Mandrake Asks for Support · · Score: 1

    Well said, totally agreed. Wanna support somebody, go see the FSF.

    Because after all this FOR PROFIT Mandrake outift is really just a slick bundled up collection of open source software most of which comes from the FSF. Mandrake ought to be paying them anyway!

  9. Re:Reduplication of efforts on ClosedBSD 1.0b Released · · Score: 1

    FOR FUCKS SAKE "Is reliablity something that nobody cares about?" is exactly WHY you would want only a floppy!

    The FACT (not "tired argument") that you only use the floppy at bootup is a totally viable point. You DO only use it at boot, so what exactly is your point about reliability?

    "Fact is thing could fail . . . " blah blah blah. What does that mean? What could fail, the floppy? Yeah, OK. The machine could fail, sure, but it has a far smaller chance of failure with fewer parts (and if you set it up correctly there is monitoring going on.)

    Less moving parts, its that simple. The firewall doesnt need to do any fancy crap, it needs to filter packets, masquerade packets and thats it.

    Software DOES get updated with floppy based systems, you stick in a new floppy and reboot.

    Log files is the only valid point you even come close to making. Yes you want to log. You CAN do that with a floppy based system by storing the logs on a device that is loaded in ram. Of course the logs are lost if reboot, but firewalls dont reboot by accident. Uptime on mine is over 120 days. A cron job tars and compresses the logs and ftps them to "server" that can store the information.

    Overall floppy based "distros" are great for firewall-VPN-gateway-router type applications. In fact what do you think a checkpoint firewall or a cisco router is? These are appliances that boot from a very small device (ROM, etc), have no moving parts and perform routing and firewall functions. Checkpoint is BSD kernel, JUST LIKE this closedBSD project!

  10. NEVER USE SPEEDPASS - DANGER on The Timex Speedpass Watch · · Score: 2, Informative

    Speedpass is a good idea, but all the consumer protections associated with a normal credit card DO NOT APPLY.

    According to consumer advocates (one among them being Clark Howard in Atlanta GA) SpeedPass is bad news. If your speedpass device is lost or stolen or in any way abused you are LIABLE for ALL charges. Not so with a real credit card. According to Clark on his syndicated radio show part of the SpeedPass agreement states this (I have not seen it.) A consumer called into Clarks show and relayed that they had to pay over $4000 in bogus charges for a fleet vehicle because one of his employees had lost the SpeedPass. Clark explained to him that there was nothing he could do to help, SpeedPass is built that way. It was clearly fraud but SpeedPass, again, does not offer the protections a credit card does. BE ADVISED, NOT A GOOD IDEA.

    Until these clowns step up to the plate and make SpeedPass work identically to a credit card, then forget it.

  11. Jabber and EveryBuddy, options abound on AOL IM Rival Pulls The Plug · · Score: 1
    Jabber and EveryBuddy are both open source IMs that work great.

    Jabber is an excellent open source product and in fact far exceeds the "functionality" of AOL IM.

    Jabber can communicate with its own network, AIM, ICQ, MSN, Yahoo and even get RSS news feeds!

    Jabber rocks, and for those who want something really cool, checkout mozdev.org and get jabberZilla, great plug in for Mozilla that puts jabber in the browser.

  12. Re:jabber vs AOL. on AOL IM Rival Pulls The Plug · · Score: 1

    uh, yeah, whatever ever heard of apache, php, mysql, postgres, sendmail, bind, and on and on and on you probably are using 5 open source products or more to surf to this site and or send email and this site runs all open source stuff you are pretty damn ignorant, maybe that is what you are trying to say about "most people"?