Doh! You're right, the voltage figures are a lot higher (up to 400 kV) than the current values (up to 4,000 A) but I'm fairly certain that you want a high current for the reasons that I previously stated.
If the current is too low then you're not transmitting as much energy (power) as you'd like, and a far higher proportion of it is lost between the transmission and reception points.
(Of course, I learnt this stuff two decades ago, so it's entirely possible that I've got it wrong because my brain's turned to mush in the meantime. I'm pretty certain I'm right, but I'm willing to admit that I wouldn't stake my life on it.)
Even the article that you link to, which was written in October of last year, puts the number of gun-related crimes (which, as I previously explained, is a loosely defined term in the UK) for 2002 at around 10,000 incidents.
But, overall, the article that you refer to is both out of date and misleading. Read these two articles for a more up-to-date and accurate pitcure:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/3419401.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/3419941.stm
Note, before you want to use it as an argument about how bad the situation is in Britain, that "violent crime" is defined as including anti-social behaviour in general, so it includes offences that would be classed as misdemeanours rather than felonies in the US.
Anyhow, the most recent statistics show a year on year increase in gun crime of 2 percent, which totalled 10,248 offences, or 0.41% of all crime committed. Within that 10,248 offences, there were 1,815 crimes that were known to have involved imitation firearms only, so the actual number of crimes that involved anything that could fire any kind of ammunition (including air rifles and guns) was 8,433. Furthermore, only 9 percent of the 10,248 offences resulted in any injury - so that's less than a thousand in total.
Only 81 murders involved guns compared, down from 97 the year before.
The number of robberies involving guns was down by 13 percent.
The number of handguns used to commit a crime was down by 6 percent.
Tell me again about how gun crime is "rampant" in the UK?
Of course gun crime is politically sensitive but that's because the idea of guns in general are so abhorrent to British society that they have shock value, just like Janet Jackson's right nipple does in the US. However, the idea that it's "top of the political agenda" is laughable: there are other more pressing issues such as terrorism, the war in Iraq, the EU constitution and enlargement, health, education, etc that are of far greater concern to MPs and the average man on the street.
Uh, the number of people killed in the UK by guns last year was a little over 100. That's for a country with a population of about 60 million. Now compare that to the US, with a population of about 5 times that. How many Americans were shot and killed last year? 10,000? 15,000? More? It sure the hell wasn't 500 or so, was it?
The idea that gun-related crime is "going thru the roof" in the UK is a fallacy. For one thing, the very definition of a gun-related crime in the UK is much looser than it is in the US. In the UK, any crime where a gun is believed to have been used is classified as gun-related, which means if you were to hold up a bank with an imitation firearm, a banana or even two fingers in your pocket it would go down on the books as a gun-related crime.
So, comparing US and UK gun crime figures isn't as straightforward as you would like to think. Even if you did assume you were comparing apples and apples, rather than apples and oranges, you'd still find that gun crime in the UK is virtually unheard of compared to the US.
Bottom line is this: you are far more likely to be the victim of a gun crime in the US than in the UK or almost any other society in the Western world.
Places where corruption reigns supreme? What, like the US, where Bush, Cheney, Rice, etc all have strong oil connections and conveniently hand out contracts to their buddies without putting them out to tender?
Don't assume that every developing world nation is run by corrupt dictators. And don't assume that every developed nation is free from corruption and other ills at the highest levels.
Pop quiz hotshot: you're the honest, democratically-elected leader of one of the poorest nations on the planet. Do you want to spend some of your scarce resources on software licences or do you want to ensure that as little money as possible is spent in that area so that your meagre budget can be as effective as possible in the everyday struggle to feed, clothe, protect and educate your people?
Open source software isn't only for developed nations. On the contrary, it can be more effective in developing nations precisely because they have much greater priorities than software licences to worry about, far more problems to worry about, yet far fewer means of raising the funds to cure all the ills of their societies.
If you want to run a radio station here, you must play a certain percentage of Canadian artists so that US artists do not swamp out our industryt altogether.
Hey, if the rest of us are going to have Celine Dion thrust down our throats then it's only fair that you do too!
Perhaps you haven't heard but...
on
ICANN Meets Annan
·
· Score: 4, Insightful
...the full name of the country is the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, or the UK for short.
If I have to explain why the UK has the legitimate claim on the.uk TLD then you've got bigger problems than TLD country codes.
Yes, people (including politicians and the media) treat the terms "The United Kingdom" and "Great Britain" as though they are interchangeable, but I think you'll find they do the same thing with "The United States [of America]" and "America" too.
But if you're reasoning held true then the TLD country code for the US should be.am or some such.
Bottom line: the UK's use of the.uk TLD is entirely appropriate. As is the US's use of the.us TLD.
Oh, and by the way, diplomacy is rarely about reaching a concensus; it's about reaching a compromise: it's just a pity that some governments have conveniently chosen to forget that.
Have you thought of how the security guys at Immigration and Naturalization (or whatever it's called nowadays) at JFK would react to a passenger scheduled to be in New York for only four days who is carrying around a dead notebook?
Can you imagine what kind of security flags carrying a non-functional piece of electronic equipment of laptop size would raise? Especially if you're travelling alone, have tanned skin, or both?
Seriously, it's the kind of manouvre that could end up with a long stay in a customs holding cell followed by a quick enforced return flight back to the UK and a blacklisting to boot.
Forget the dummy/dead notebook idea. In this day and age you'd have to be nuts to do it.
A spammer pushes their wares onto you, which is clearly a bad thing, but it's not like anybody forced the people who downloaded the files that contained this trojan to do so. It's not like person A in your example is shoving files down person B's throat, is it?
Are people here (not you specifically, Walkiry) really suggesting that downloaders aren't responsible for the consequences of their own actions? Generally speaking, are they really "victims" of anything but their own greed?
And aren't "it's their own damn fault" and "they should have had a decent firewall running", etc, the standard lines that most Slashdotters arrogantly reach for when it's non-technical users (AOLers, "Windows lusers", or whatever derogratory label we're using today) being hit by trojans, etc?
Caveat emptor is great advice, especially so when you're buying blind and what you're buying is being freely given.
So this whole story and related discussions leave us with yet more examples of Slashcrowd hypocrisy. I swear that the Slashdot motto should be changed to "Hypocrisy for Nerds. Double Standards that matter."
That's what they (the "victims") are essentially spreading. There's asses should land in jail as soon as possible.
Sorry, that's not my personal view (I don't believe in locking people up for small-scale copyright infringment) but it is the view of some, such as the content creators whose property is being infringed on.
I just find it ironic that just changing the subject line of your message from "Trojans" to "Illegally distributed software" gives us a whole new look at this issue: after all, most of the people engaging in P2P distribution of copyrighted material live in countries where it's illegal and probably punishable by a jail sentence.
The majority of people here seem to be engaging in double think: messaging people who engage in P2P copyright infringement that what they're doing is wrong and publishing their IP addresses is a Bad Thing, yet tracking down the online behaviour of spammers and then publishing their real world addresses (without any consideration for what might happen as a consequence) is a Good Thing.
Can someone please explain to me how one is so wrong yet the other is so right? (Preferably without resorting to the kind of language that you wouldn't use in front of your mother?)
Oh, please. Most games companies would quite happily sell their proverbial grandmother's kideneys or daughters into slavery rather than do the right thing. Blizzard, however, is an exception.
Time after time, Blizzard has chosen to let a product launch date slide rather than release an incomplete or buggy game. And time after time, when those products have finally been finished they've turned out to be masterpieces.
Can you name one bad game that Blizzard has made? Can you name another developer that has released three games that have free online multiplayer play that are as popular as Warcraft III, Diablo II and Starcraft? Heck, Starcraft is almost six years old now and Blizzard still supports it! There are even people playing the first Diablo online at Battle.net and how old is that game now?
Blizzard objected to bnetd because it allowed people to play online without CD key verification (ie, without needing to buy a copy of the games concerned). When you consider that the initial purchase of those games (and the almost unnoticeable banner ads on Battle.net whilst you chat) are the only source of income that Blizzard has, it's hardly surprising that they weren't too keen on an online service that directly threatened their existance.
If Blizzard has big $ signs permanently on its collective mind as you suggest then perhaps you can explain why it lets people play its games online for free rather than charging a single penny for the privelege?
Why people always complain about new designs when they haven't even used this design?? I mean, If it was for people like these, then we'd all still use the old "wheel" system of ancient analogue phones... I guess somebody also asked the same question "Jesus, you imagine pressing the right button in the dark, when I can count the holes on the wheel and be sure is the right number??"....
1. Have you looked at the pictures of this model?
2. Do you have any design or usability experience at all?
This isn't a revolutionary or evolutionary change that Nokia has made, it's a cosmetic change. This new keypad design does nothing except make the phone look more pretty (and even that's a matter of taste); it's not as if this new keypad layout works any differently to the keypad layout on my four year-old Nokia 3210.
In terms of usability, for the reasons I gave in my original post, this layout is a big step backwards because it subtracts one of the major benefits of a traditional four by three layout (ie, easy "blind" dialling) and adds nothing in exchange.
If you can show just one benefit of this new layout apart from "Ooh, it looks nicer" then I'll shut up and concede that you have a point. But, until you can think of one, be prepared to be ridiculed for suggesting that any deviation from what's come before is automatically progress.
I've personally owned four handsets in my time, and through work I've had the experience to use dozens of others, and when asked by others which manufacturer to go for when buying a phone I don't hesitate to say Nokia. But, having seen some of its recent designs, including this one, I can't help but think that the people in Nokia's design teams are losing it.
Just look at the numeric keypad portion of this new handset. Then look at the numeric keypad of any handset you have to hand. Unless you own a quirky model, the odds are that your current numeric keypad is little different to that on a wired phone: four rows of three (1-2-3, 4-5-6, 7-8-9, *-0-#) arranged in a grid-like fashion with similar-shaped and -sized buttons.
This traditional configuration is great, because it allows you to dial numbers easily by touch alone, even in very poor lighting or total darkness. Now tell me how you're meant to do that on this new handset? 3, 6, 9 and # are pretty well vertically aligned but 1, 4, 7 and * are pratically sloped at 45 degrees.
Now I don't know about you, but if I was dialling without looking (something that's child's play on most phones) I'd expect the 7 to be two buttons directly below the 1, but on this handset, if you drop two buttons vertically down from 1 then you're hitting 8. Which means that to dial a number on this handset you're pretty much forced to look at the keypad as you dial. That's poor design.
Sure, sure, it looks pretty enough. But if how a handset looks even comes in your top three criteria when buying a new phone (above, say, features/functions, battery life and size/weight) then you're a fool.
The unwritten first rule of useability and ergonomics is "if it ain't broke, don't fix it". The traditional keypad layout works, and it works damn well: it looks like someone needs to remind Nokia of that.
Anyone stupid enough to come to work and put on a used jock strap isn't "lowly", they are "retarded".
"Disney won't allow them to organize"... again, they are retarded. The only thing that stops them from organizing is themselves.
These are small issues of local importance. Stupid people who won't take their fates into their own hands. Copyright extension, otoh, is a global issue with ramifications that will touch your children's children. I pity them, I pity you, and I pity a world that cares more for their breads and circuses than they do for what is right.
Oh, I see, so in your eyes, anyone who takes a lowly job to feed their family is "retarded"? Nice worldview you've got their, bub. You talk about copyright extensions in terms of "what is right" but why don't you tell me what's right about a society where a multi-billion dollar behemoth like Disney can treat workers so shabbily on a daily basis and get away with it? Does it make you proud that you live in a society where employee protection is so weak that employers can pull stunts like this?
I find it sad that we're having a discussion where people value copyright more than they value more fundamental human rights. It says everything about your attitude that you resort to labelling hard working ordinary people as "retarded": clearly, you'd rather insult and ridicule them than live in a society where they (and everyone else) was afforded fair protection from exploitative employers.
What's even sadder is that you drag out the "children's children" line: sorry, but I think that you're living in a dream if you think that copyright will be their main concern. We're living in an age where environmental breakdown is visible, where social programmes (health, education, pensions) are critically close to collapse, and where nations talk to other nations using direct force rather than diplomacy and you think that our children's children are going to turn to us and bitch at us about copyright? I'm sorry, but I think that they're going to inherit a mountain-worth of crap from us and you're bitching about a mole-hill.
Now , Mr Anonymous Coward, unless you want to show a modicum of manners by logging in and showing me just who I'm talking to, this discussion is over.
You sir, are a perfect example of the people who don't deserve freedom, and yet have good men and women die everyday to preserve your right to be a greedy, selfish pig.
Thank God there are still some people who put the good of society before their own selfish interests, but you are not one of them. More pity for you.
Thanks for taking the time to check the "Post Anonymously" box, whoever you are. Funny how you infer that I'm a coward but how it's you rather than me who doesn't have the courage of his convictions enough to stand up and be counted for your personal beliefs.
I don't work for Disney. I'm fortunate enough to be able to choose who I work for, and to work in an industry where I'm not exploited on a daily basis. But I'm not so naive that I don't realise that there are others less fortunate than me that don't have the same opportunities and rights, even in the most advanced of nations.
I believe that even the lowliest worker should be respected and treated with dignity, especially by their employers. Working in a hot stuffy Mickey Mouse suit might not be mentally taxing but I bet it's hard work, and it sure as hell is an important job as far as the public's perception of Disney goes: get it right and you've made some kid's dream come true, get it wrong and you've ruined the holiday of a lifetime.
Irrespective of how I feel about copyright extensions (as I pointed out previously in this thread, I don't like them) it says something about our society that looking out for the interests of those less fortunate than ourselves is labelled "greedy" and "selfish".
How exactly, pray tell, am I not putting "the good of society before [my own] selfish interests" when I point out that a global corporation that practically has a licence to print money (and, indeed, does) fails to provide even basic protection for its workers?
The least you can say about people who regard copyright extensions as being more contentious an issue than the blatant exploitation of their peers is that they have their priorities wrong. But when those same people start clothing their argument in terms of freedom, well, then you know that they're missing the whole point: failing to respect the people who work so hard to make you such a handsome profit and treating them in an undignified and demeanful manner is behaviour that's more synonymous to slavery than anything else.
Please, spare me your pity. If you can't see that ideology is less important than reality then you're delusional and it's you that needs pitying.
Sorry, but I missed the bit where the workers getting screwed were more concerned with some copyright law than they were with their own health.
If I remember correctly, Disney doesn't allow its workers to join unions, and we aren't exactly talking about the best paid jobs in the world, so your legal restitution route is all but useless most of the time. To people concerned with putting food on their kids' plates, keeping a steady job and not getting fired for being a troublemaker are more important issues than whether or not copyright lasts for death plus 70 years, 90 years or even a million years.
People in the real world have real world problems. The rights and wrongs of copyright laws aren't often among them.
I think a company's first reponsibilities are to its workers and shareholders. Everyone else comes second.
I'd be pissed if my employer was more worried about making billions more from copyright extensions, widgets or whatever than providing me with a safe working environment. Wouldn't you?
Slashdot Mirror
Well, isn't it?
The US is the oldest government in the world...
It's a good thing that you're posting as an AC otherwise you'd really look like an idiot for starting a post that way.
There are older governmental systems than the US one still in existance. For example, the UK Parliament, to name but one, dates back beyond 1700.
Doh! You're right, the voltage figures are a lot higher (up to 400 kV) than the current values (up to 4,000 A) but I'm fairly certain that you want a high current for the reasons that I previously stated.
If the current is too low then you're not transmitting as much energy (power) as you'd like, and a far higher proportion of it is lost between the transmission and reception points.
(Of course, I learnt this stuff two decades ago, so it's entirely possible that I've got it wrong because my brain's turned to mush in the meantime. I'm pretty certain I'm right, but I'm willing to admit that I wouldn't stake my life on it.)
No, electricity cables operate at very high currents. Here's why:
P = IV
and
V = IR
so,
P = I(IR) = I^2R
Therefore, by transmitting at a high current you lessen the amount of power that you lose to resistance. So simple I learnt it in school.
Even the article that you link to, which was written in October of last year, puts the number of gun-related crimes (which, as I previously explained, is a loosely defined term in the UK) for 2002 at around 10,000 incidents.
But, overall, the article that you refer to is both out of date and misleading. Read these two articles for a more up-to-date and accurate pitcure:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/3419401.stm
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/3419941.stm
Note, before you want to use it as an argument about how bad the situation is in Britain, that "violent crime" is defined as including anti-social behaviour in general, so it includes offences that would be classed as misdemeanours rather than felonies in the US.
Anyhow, the most recent statistics show a year on year increase in gun crime of 2 percent, which totalled 10,248 offences, or 0.41% of all crime committed. Within that 10,248 offences, there were 1,815 crimes that were known to have involved imitation firearms only, so the actual number of crimes that involved anything that could fire any kind of ammunition (including air rifles and guns) was 8,433. Furthermore, only 9 percent of the 10,248 offences resulted in any injury - so that's less than a thousand in total.
Only 81 murders involved guns compared, down from 97 the year before.
The number of robberies involving guns was down by 13 percent.
The number of handguns used to commit a crime was down by 6 percent.
Tell me again about how gun crime is "rampant" in the UK?
Of course gun crime is politically sensitive but that's because the idea of guns in general are so abhorrent to British society that they have shock value, just like Janet Jackson's right nipple does in the US. However, the idea that it's "top of the political agenda" is laughable: there are other more pressing issues such as terrorism, the war in Iraq, the EU constitution and enlargement, health, education, etc that are of far greater concern to MPs and the average man on the street.
Uh, the number of people killed in the UK by guns last year was a little over 100. That's for a country with a population of about 60 million. Now compare that to the US, with a population of about 5 times that. How many Americans were shot and killed last year? 10,000? 15,000? More? It sure the hell wasn't 500 or so, was it?
The idea that gun-related crime is "going thru the roof" in the UK is a fallacy. For one thing, the very definition of a gun-related crime in the UK is much looser than it is in the US. In the UK, any crime where a gun is believed to have been used is classified as gun-related, which means if you were to hold up a bank with an imitation firearm, a banana or even two fingers in your pocket it would go down on the books as a gun-related crime.
So, comparing US and UK gun crime figures isn't as straightforward as you would like to think. Even if you did assume you were comparing apples and apples, rather than apples and oranges, you'd still find that gun crime in the UK is virtually unheard of compared to the US.
Bottom line is this: you are far more likely to be the victim of a gun crime in the US than in the UK or almost any other society in the Western world.
Capitalism at it's best.
Places where corruption reigns supreme? What, like the US, where Bush, Cheney, Rice, etc all have strong oil connections and conveniently hand out contracts to their buddies without putting them out to tender?
Don't assume that every developing world nation is run by corrupt dictators. And don't assume that every developed nation is free from corruption and other ills at the highest levels.
Pop quiz hotshot: you're the honest, democratically-elected leader of one of the poorest nations on the planet. Do you want to spend some of your scarce resources on software licences or do you want to ensure that as little money as possible is spent in that area so that your meagre budget can be as effective as possible in the everyday struggle to feed, clothe, protect and educate your people?
Open source software isn't only for developed nations. On the contrary, it can be more effective in developing nations precisely because they have much greater priorities than software licences to worry about, far more problems to worry about, yet far fewer means of raising the funds to cure all the ills of their societies.
If you want to run a radio station here, you must play a certain percentage of Canadian artists so that US artists do not swamp out our industryt altogether.
Hey, if the rest of us are going to have Celine Dion thrust down our throats then it's only fair that you do too!
...the full name of the country is the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, or the UK for short.
.uk TLD then you've got bigger problems than TLD country codes.
.am or some such.
.uk TLD is entirely appropriate. As is the US's use of the .us TLD.
If I have to explain why the UK has the legitimate claim on the
Yes, people (including politicians and the media) treat the terms "The United Kingdom" and "Great Britain" as though they are interchangeable, but I think you'll find they do the same thing with "The United States [of America]" and "America" too.
But if you're reasoning held true then the TLD country code for the US should be
Bottom line: the UK's use of the
Oh, and by the way, diplomacy is rarely about reaching a concensus; it's about reaching a compromise: it's just a pity that some governments have conveniently chosen to forget that.
See? Straight from the source: men want it now, women will wait for it.
And, no matter what they say, size does matter.
1. Telecommute - don't leave the house, but still get paid.
2. Move - be closer to work or be somewhere where there's less commuter traffic hindering your journey.
3. Change jobs - ie, commute somewhere else instead.
4. Use public transport - use your travelling time productively, reading a book or something.
Have you thought of how the security guys at Immigration and Naturalization (or whatever it's called nowadays) at JFK would react to a passenger scheduled to be in New York for only four days who is carrying around a dead notebook?
Can you imagine what kind of security flags carrying a non-functional piece of electronic equipment of laptop size would raise? Especially if you're travelling alone, have tanned skin, or both?
Seriously, it's the kind of manouvre that could end up with a long stay in a customs holding cell followed by a quick enforced return flight back to the UK and a blacklisting to boot.
Forget the dummy/dead notebook idea. In this day and age you'd have to be nuts to do it.
A spammer pushes their wares onto you, which is clearly a bad thing, but it's not like anybody forced the people who downloaded the files that contained this trojan to do so. It's not like person A in your example is shoving files down person B's throat, is it?
Are people here (not you specifically, Walkiry) really suggesting that downloaders aren't responsible for the consequences of their own actions? Generally speaking, are they really "victims" of anything but their own greed?
And aren't "it's their own damn fault" and "they should have had a decent firewall running", etc, the standard lines that most Slashdotters arrogantly reach for when it's non-technical users (AOLers, "Windows lusers", or whatever derogratory label we're using today) being hit by trojans, etc?
Caveat emptor is great advice, especially so when you're buying blind and what you're buying is being freely given.
So this whole story and related discussions leave us with yet more examples of Slashcrowd hypocrisy. I swear that the Slashdot motto should be changed to "Hypocrisy for Nerds. Double Standards that matter."
That's what they (the "victims") are essentially spreading. There's asses should land in jail as soon as possible.
Sorry, that's not my personal view (I don't believe in locking people up for small-scale copyright infringment) but it is the view of some, such as the content creators whose property is being infringed on.
I just find it ironic that just changing the subject line of your message from "Trojans" to "Illegally distributed software" gives us a whole new look at this issue: after all, most of the people engaging in P2P distribution of copyrighted material live in countries where it's illegal and probably punishable by a jail sentence.
The majority of people here seem to be engaging in double think: messaging people who engage in P2P copyright infringement that what they're doing is wrong and publishing their IP addresses is a Bad Thing, yet tracking down the online behaviour of spammers and then publishing their real world addresses (without any consideration for what might happen as a consequence) is a Good Thing.
Can someone please explain to me how one is so wrong yet the other is so right? (Preferably without resorting to the kind of language that you wouldn't use in front of your mother?)
Oh, please. Most games companies would quite happily sell their proverbial grandmother's kideneys or daughters into slavery rather than do the right thing. Blizzard, however, is an exception.
Time after time, Blizzard has chosen to let a product launch date slide rather than release an incomplete or buggy game. And time after time, when those products have finally been finished they've turned out to be masterpieces.
Can you name one bad game that Blizzard has made? Can you name another developer that has released three games that have free online multiplayer play that are as popular as Warcraft III, Diablo II and Starcraft? Heck, Starcraft is almost six years old now and Blizzard still supports it! There are even people playing the first Diablo online at Battle.net and how old is that game now?
Blizzard objected to bnetd because it allowed people to play online without CD key verification (ie, without needing to buy a copy of the games concerned). When you consider that the initial purchase of those games (and the almost unnoticeable banner ads on Battle.net whilst you chat) are the only source of income that Blizzard has, it's hardly surprising that they weren't too keen on an online service that directly threatened their existance.
If Blizzard has big $ signs permanently on its collective mind as you suggest then perhaps you can explain why it lets people play its games online for free rather than charging a single penny for the privelege?
Why people always complain about new designs when they haven't even used this design?? I mean, If it was for people like these, then we'd all still use the old "wheel" system of ancient analogue phones... I guess somebody also asked the same question "Jesus, you imagine pressing the right button in the dark, when I can count the holes on the wheel and be sure is the right number??"....
1. Have you looked at the pictures of this model?
2. Do you have any design or usability experience at all?
This isn't a revolutionary or evolutionary change that Nokia has made, it's a cosmetic change. This new keypad design does nothing except make the phone look more pretty (and even that's a matter of taste); it's not as if this new keypad layout works any differently to the keypad layout on my four year-old Nokia 3210.
In terms of usability, for the reasons I gave in my original post, this layout is a big step backwards because it subtracts one of the major benefits of a traditional four by three layout (ie, easy "blind" dialling) and adds nothing in exchange.
If you can show just one benefit of this new layout apart from "Ooh, it looks nicer" then I'll shut up and concede that you have a point. But, until you can think of one, be prepared to be ridiculed for suggesting that any deviation from what's come before is automatically progress.
I've personally owned four handsets in my time, and through work I've had the experience to use dozens of others, and when asked by others which manufacturer to go for when buying a phone I don't hesitate to say Nokia. But, having seen some of its recent designs, including this one, I can't help but think that the people in Nokia's design teams are losing it.
Just look at the numeric keypad portion of this new handset. Then look at the numeric keypad of any handset you have to hand. Unless you own a quirky model, the odds are that your current numeric keypad is little different to that on a wired phone: four rows of three (1-2-3, 4-5-6, 7-8-9, *-0-#) arranged in a grid-like fashion with similar-shaped and -sized buttons.
This traditional configuration is great, because it allows you to dial numbers easily by touch alone, even in very poor lighting or total darkness. Now tell me how you're meant to do that on this new handset? 3, 6, 9 and # are pretty well vertically aligned but 1, 4, 7 and * are pratically sloped at 45 degrees.
Now I don't know about you, but if I was dialling without looking (something that's child's play on most phones) I'd expect the 7 to be two buttons directly below the 1, but on this handset, if you drop two buttons vertically down from 1 then you're hitting 8. Which means that to dial a number on this handset you're pretty much forced to look at the keypad as you dial. That's poor design.
Sure, sure, it looks pretty enough. But if how a handset looks even comes in your top three criteria when buying a new phone (above, say, features/functions, battery life and size/weight) then you're a fool.
The unwritten first rule of useability and ergonomics is "if it ain't broke, don't fix it". The traditional keypad layout works, and it works damn well: it looks like someone needs to remind Nokia of that.
Ah, properly vetted articles. The holy grail of Slashdot readers.
This story isn't about watching movies on laptops, it's about watching them on PDAs.
Anyone stupid enough to come to work and put on a used jock strap isn't "lowly", they are "retarded".
"Disney won't allow them to organize"... again, they are retarded. The only thing that stops them from organizing is themselves.
These are small issues of local importance. Stupid people who won't take their fates into their own hands. Copyright extension, otoh, is a global issue with ramifications that will touch your children's children. I pity them, I pity you, and I pity a world that cares more for their breads and circuses than they do for what is right.
Oh, I see, so in your eyes, anyone who takes a lowly job to feed their family is "retarded"? Nice worldview you've got their, bub. You talk about copyright extensions in terms of "what is right" but why don't you tell me what's right about a society where a multi-billion dollar behemoth like Disney can treat workers so shabbily on a daily basis and get away with it? Does it make you proud that you live in a society where employee protection is so weak that employers can pull stunts like this?
I find it sad that we're having a discussion where people value copyright more than they value more fundamental human rights. It says everything about your attitude that you resort to labelling hard working ordinary people as "retarded": clearly, you'd rather insult and ridicule them than live in a society where they (and everyone else) was afforded fair protection from exploitative employers.
What's even sadder is that you drag out the "children's children" line: sorry, but I think that you're living in a dream if you think that copyright will be their main concern. We're living in an age where environmental breakdown is visible, where social programmes (health, education, pensions) are critically close to collapse, and where nations talk to other nations using direct force rather than diplomacy and you think that our children's children are going to turn to us and bitch at us about copyright? I'm sorry, but I think that they're going to inherit a mountain-worth of crap from us and you're bitching about a mole-hill.
Now , Mr Anonymous Coward, unless you want to show a modicum of manners by logging in and showing me just who I'm talking to, this discussion is over.
You sir, are a perfect example of the people who don't deserve freedom, and yet have good men and women die everyday to preserve your right to be a greedy, selfish pig.
Thank God there are still some people who put the good of society before their own selfish interests, but you are not one of them. More pity for you.
Thanks for taking the time to check the "Post Anonymously" box, whoever you are. Funny how you infer that I'm a coward but how it's you rather than me who doesn't have the courage of his convictions enough to stand up and be counted for your personal beliefs.
I don't work for Disney. I'm fortunate enough to be able to choose who I work for, and to work in an industry where I'm not exploited on a daily basis. But I'm not so naive that I don't realise that there are others less fortunate than me that don't have the same opportunities and rights, even in the most advanced of nations.
I believe that even the lowliest worker should be respected and treated with dignity, especially by their employers. Working in a hot stuffy Mickey Mouse suit might not be mentally taxing but I bet it's hard work, and it sure as hell is an important job as far as the public's perception of Disney goes: get it right and you've made some kid's dream come true, get it wrong and you've ruined the holiday of a lifetime.
Irrespective of how I feel about copyright extensions (as I pointed out previously in this thread, I don't like them) it says something about our society that looking out for the interests of those less fortunate than ourselves is labelled "greedy" and "selfish".
How exactly, pray tell, am I not putting "the good of society before [my own] selfish interests" when I point out that a global corporation that practically has a licence to print money (and, indeed, does) fails to provide even basic protection for its workers?
The least you can say about people who regard copyright extensions as being more contentious an issue than the blatant exploitation of their peers is that they have their priorities wrong. But when those same people start clothing their argument in terms of freedom, well, then you know that they're missing the whole point: failing to respect the people who work so hard to make you such a handsome profit and treating them in an undignified and demeanful manner is behaviour that's more synonymous to slavery than anything else.
Please, spare me your pity. If you can't see that ideology is less important than reality then you're delusional and it's you that needs pitying.
Sorry, but I missed the bit where the workers getting screwed were more concerned with some copyright law than they were with their own health.
If I remember correctly, Disney doesn't allow its workers to join unions, and we aren't exactly talking about the best paid jobs in the world, so your legal restitution route is all but useless most of the time. To people concerned with putting food on their kids' plates, keeping a steady job and not getting fired for being a troublemaker are more important issues than whether or not copyright lasts for death plus 70 years, 90 years or even a million years.
People in the real world have real world problems. The rights and wrongs of copyright laws aren't often among them.
I think a company's first reponsibilities are to its workers and shareholders. Everyone else comes second.
I'd be pissed if my employer was more worried about making billions more from copyright extensions, widgets or whatever than providing me with a safe working environment. Wouldn't you?