The next time you do some deep-sea fishing, just drop 'em overboard.
Hey, it works for Dexter!
It should keep your super-secret h@x0r stuff safe from prying eyes for a few million years... and then our descendants can find it as a fossil and marvel at your pr0n collection.
Who dials telephones anymore? And who does so often enough to (A) worry about micro-optimizing this part of their life, and (B) actually prefer the telephone pattern to a ten-key calculator or keyboard?
You could run Mono on a *new* iPod Touch for the same price as just the combination of the whimpy CPU and display modules. And if you do, you'll get wifi, accelerometer, bluetooth, camera, video, Flash, battery, audio i/o, and a few switches thrown in for free. I don't understand the target market here, unless it's people who want to feel like they are low-level breadboarding gods because they plugged a ribbon cable into something and compiled some C# on it.
Your use cases for expected user-generated content include "user entry, correcting, searching, commentary, tagging, redistribution and so on, of such material."
Scanning of PD works, OCR, and making corrections to that data is just data, and you can't copyright facts or short phrases, titles, etc.
"Commentary" can enjoy copyright protection, so the CC licenses can be applied and each user would retain copyright of his commentary either under his real name or pen name.
But if the commentary is *editable* by other users, like Wikipedia, then the best course of action would probably be to treat the commentary as a "collective work." Collective works can still be licensed under CC without naming all of the individuals, but you'd have to assign an author of some sort--maybe the original author, regardless how much is edited later.
While individual tags are just facts, the entire *database* of tags may meet the "originality" test for copyright protection. But in the case of a database, there must be a single copyright holder (like with the collective work), and you can only file for 3 months of database changes at a time.
While it's not precisely the same thing, DISH Network's Sling Adapter allows users to watch anything recorded on the DVR, or to tune the DVR and watch live TV, on their PC (including OS X), iPad, or iPhone, regardless of their location (provided there's adequate bandwidth). It's $100 and has no service fee.
Using it within my house is great, I can carry my iPad around the house or the yard while watching TV. So far, attempts to use hotel wifi when I'm away have been a bust, the connections I've gotten just aren't fast enough, but more stable connections work just fine.
I know TW's product is a little different, but frankly, I like DISH's approach better. I rarely watch anything live, so having full access to my DVR's contents adds a lot of value.
I don't trust any form of unlimited power: government, corporations, churches, unions, mobs, free markets, or individuals.I don't think any of them should be in charge of the Internet, or society at large. But I do believe in pitting them against one another where needed, to balance each other's ability to control my life.
I give telcos the exclusive right to run wires through my back yard and shoot electrons through the air on limited frequencies. In return, I reasonably demand that if I'm paying for their services, I can connect who whoever they hell I want to without them degrading the connection because they want to sell me a competing service.
I don't let the water company charge me one rate for water to fill my pool, and another to brew my beer. I pay for water to be delivered, and it's none of their damned business who I use it. Same for electricity. Telcos can charge me for usage, but should not be able to use their quasi-government role as a monopoly utility service to turn the Internet back into Cable TV.
When the choice is between living without Internet access, or choosing a watered-down version, there really isn't an economically viable choice for most people, any more than most people could reasonably choose to live without water, electricity, or roads. You can survive, but you can't compete. So we can't unplug, nor can we vote with our wallets.. A natural monopoly requires a balancing force, because there is no free market. The government is the way that democratic societies choose to impose the will of the people when the market cannot.
- Google Search Appliance can handle the multimedia and other file indexing. - For desktops, unless you NEED laptops, the Mac Mini + a keyboard, mouse, and non-Apple monitor is a great choice. Runs OS X, Linux, or Windows. - GMail for corporate email. - For file, web, and database servers, Linux. - Colocate your servers elsewhere and use VPN. No need to worry about scaling, fire suppression, security, etc. - Possibly a local cache server, since you're doing multimedia. - Buy servers, don't piece them together yourself. Get on-site support. Otherwise that's you. - Tape backup sucks. Backup over the Internet to a backup server in a colo center somewhere else.
I use Zenio on my iPhone, iPad, and Mac for several magazine subscriptions. Works great, and I read my magazines more consistently than before, because the iPad is much more likely to be within reach when I have a few minutes to fill.
Short term: have the city attorney read the franchise agreement, hopefully they'll find good evidence that Comcast's ability to perform on its end is not the city's problem. Tell Comcast to take their $96 bill, shove it up their antenna, and send you the boxes.
Better: turn off the cable and give first responders a good ATSC antenna, a Wii, and a Netflix subscription. Ok, that's probably more expensive even if Netflix gives you a sweet deal, and there's the bandwidth, but it's the principle dammit!
Long term: 1982? Seriously? Time to re-negotiate the CATV contract. Require them to provide all non-premium digital TV over clear QAM so normal digital-ready HDTVs can pick it up, both for your sake, and for the citizens.
The nice thing about USB drives is that they *can* be reused (like you're doing now).
So, do your Christmas thing, but included with each card, send a list of the charities above who could also use the cards, and instructions on how to format and send the drives.
After all, Christmas is all above giving, and if they want to re-read your card, they can just copy the drive to their computer.
That way, you still get to send a spiffy card, and the blind kids in Australia still get to listen to a book (though, realistically, postage would be more expensive than sending a donation to buy a new drive in some cases).
To the charities above: try contacting companies who make trash-n-trinkets for conventions, etc. They probably have gobs of extras that can't be resold because of being already customized, or having outdated sizes (32MB is still plenty for a kid to write a few school papers on).
Using my MBP for retouching (it's even the old matte style) would be almost as silly as using my iPhone display.
Laptops are small, have inconsistent brightness, inconsistent ambient lighting, poor angle, and (commonly) 6-bit displays.
The matte and glossy both are fine for basic editing and everything else I do on a laptop. Retouching only happens in my studio, where I have full control over ambient light color and intensity, and a hardware-calibrated, 8-bit, 24" display running at 1920x1200 (and on my Mac Pro, not my MBP laptop--MBP has great speed for a laptop, but it doesn't touch the desktop when it comes to 200-MB Photoshop files).
Rather than fudging the numbers, we should be figuring out how to teach the children better.
Better solutions: - Raise the bar on minimum standards for teachers, and pay competitively - Make computer literacy the fourth "R". At a minimum, students should be fluent in spreadsheet formulas and have experience with at least two procedural languages. - Make science the fifth "R" (and I don't mean "(R)eligious views of science") - Combat home life issues that make learning difficult (noise, poverty, despair, lack of healthcare, idiot parents) - Replace the broken and expensive textbook system with open-sourced, peer-reviewed, live texts and tests. - Emphasize problem-solving and writing skills over test-taking and rote memorization. - Challenge the students, and move the stragglers to another class. - Divorce public education from the influence of intermural athletics. Sports should be relegated to city leagues and taken OFF school campuses. If you want school pride, have it in your school's rankings in intellectual pursuits, not how fast some idiot can run without dropping a ball. - Year-round school with three one-month breaks, so families can take vacations, but children don't lose pace like they do over summer break. This also gives children who fall behind three "catch-up" opportunities. - Add two years of vocational training to high school. Leave college for those who actually need a degree rather than a place where everyone goes to learn what they *should* have learned earlier. - More language skills. At a minimum, conversational knowledge of ASL, one non-English spoken languages.
*ALL* of our bills are paid by direct withdrawal from our primary checking account, including our credit cards.
We receive bills in the mail, which we review them for accuracy so we can stop the train if there's a problem.
We've been doing this about 7 years, with ZERO problems.
My paycheck is also deposited electronically, and has been for about 11 years between two employers. Again, ZERO problems except one company that screwed up their EFT payroll account transfer once, which took a few days to sort out.
Contrast with the people I know who use "online payment" from their banks-- they pay fees for the service, have problems when electronic checks don't go out on time, forget to pay (just like when they used paper checks), etc.
Glad this entire thread seems to realize the delicious irony here.
Oh, and since you're reading this thread, you've been added to the TSA's "random political dissident checklist." Have a nice day.
"Let us be thankful we have an occupation to fill. Work hard, increase production, prevent accidents and be happy. Let us be thankful we have commerce. Buy more. Buy more now. Buy. And be happy."
I'm with you... I'm a CS major, not a physics geek, so I'm still in awe that scientists can not only emit and detect individual photos, but do so reliably in several quantum states.
I thought our use of light and particle streams was still in the "drink from a firehose of similar particles" stage.
In larger companies, you can play a role of working as a liaison among the business users, IT folks, and development teams.
This requires solid communication skills and an understanding of the business needs you are modeling, but also the technical understanding to ensure that the resulting IT solutions are solid and elegant.
Project management is also an option--software projects need people who understand that building software is not like building a bridge.
But no would-be competitor has the time, money, or access rights to lay new fiber.
And unless that whole IP-over-power or IP-over-sewer-lines becomes a reality, that's what it would take.
I think the local government should own and maintain the lines, and competing services (phone, IP, cable, etc.) should pay for whatever they use. Government has incentive to upgrade the lines because they can sell more bandwidth, and services have incentive to keep costs not far above their wholesale costs.
Slashdot Mirror
The next time you do some deep-sea fishing, just drop 'em overboard.
Hey, it works for Dexter!
It should keep your super-secret h@x0r stuff safe from prying eyes for a few million years... and then our descendants can find it as a fossil and marvel at your pr0n collection.
Who dials telephones anymore? And who does so often enough to (A) worry about micro-optimizing this part of their life, and (B) actually prefer the telephone pattern to a ten-key calculator or keyboard?
You could run Mono on a *new* iPod Touch for the same price as just the combination of the whimpy CPU and display modules. And if you do, you'll get wifi, accelerometer, bluetooth, camera, video, Flash, battery, audio i/o, and a few switches thrown in for free. I don't understand the target market here, unless it's people who want to feel like they are low-level breadboarding gods because they plugged a ribbon cable into something and compiled some C# on it.
Your use cases for expected user-generated content include "user entry, correcting, searching, commentary, tagging, redistribution and so on, of such material."
Scanning of PD works, OCR, and making corrections to that data is just data, and you can't copyright facts or short phrases, titles, etc.
"Commentary" can enjoy copyright protection, so the CC licenses can be applied and each user would retain copyright of his commentary either under his real name or pen name.
But if the commentary is *editable* by other users, like Wikipedia, then the best course of action would probably be to treat the commentary as a "collective work." Collective works can still be licensed under CC without naming all of the individuals, but you'd have to assign an author of some sort--maybe the original author, regardless how much is edited later.
While individual tags are just facts, the entire *database* of tags may meet the "originality" test for copyright protection. But in the case of a database, there must be a single copyright holder (like with the collective work), and you can only file for 3 months of database changes at a time.
IANAL/TINLA
Yes, in a heartbeat. Especially when what replaces the ads is actually entertaining.
I've been to the movie theater in question. It was well worth the money, a great movie experience.
While it's not precisely the same thing, DISH Network's Sling Adapter allows users to watch anything recorded on the DVR, or to tune the DVR and watch live TV, on their PC (including OS X), iPad, or iPhone, regardless of their location (provided there's adequate bandwidth). It's $100 and has no service fee.
Using it within my house is great, I can carry my iPad around the house or the yard while watching TV. So far, attempts to use hotel wifi when I'm away have been a bust, the connections I've gotten just aren't fast enough, but more stable connections work just fine.
I know TW's product is a little different, but frankly, I like DISH's approach better. I rarely watch anything live, so having full access to my DVR's contents adds a lot of value.
I don't trust any form of unlimited power: government, corporations, churches, unions, mobs, free markets, or individuals.I don't think any of them should be in charge of the Internet, or society at large. But I do believe in pitting them against one another where needed, to balance each other's ability to control my life.
I give telcos the exclusive right to run wires through my back yard and shoot electrons through the air on limited frequencies. In return, I reasonably demand that if I'm paying for their services, I can connect who whoever they hell I want to without them degrading the connection because they want to sell me a competing service.
I don't let the water company charge me one rate for water to fill my pool, and another to brew my beer. I pay for water to be delivered, and it's none of their damned business who I use it. Same for electricity. Telcos can charge me for usage, but should not be able to use their quasi-government role as a monopoly utility service to turn the Internet back into Cable TV.
When the choice is between living without Internet access, or choosing a watered-down version, there really isn't an economically viable choice for most people, any more than most people could reasonably choose to live without water, electricity, or roads. You can survive, but you can't compete. So we can't unplug, nor can we vote with our wallets.. A natural monopoly requires a balancing force, because there is no free market. The government is the way that democratic societies choose to impose the will of the people when the market cannot.
Some elements I think might be worth looking at:
- Google Search Appliance can handle the multimedia and other file indexing.
- For desktops, unless you NEED laptops, the Mac Mini + a keyboard, mouse, and non-Apple monitor is a great choice. Runs OS X, Linux, or Windows.
- GMail for corporate email.
- For file, web, and database servers, Linux.
- Colocate your servers elsewhere and use VPN. No need to worry about scaling, fire suppression, security, etc.
- Possibly a local cache server, since you're doing multimedia.
- Buy servers, don't piece them together yourself. Get on-site support. Otherwise that's you.
- Tape backup sucks. Backup over the Internet to a backup server in a colo center somewhere else.
I use Zenio on my iPhone, iPad, and Mac for several magazine subscriptions. Works great, and I read my magazines more consistently than before, because the iPad is much more likely to be within reach when I have a few minutes to fill.
Short term: have the city attorney read the franchise agreement, hopefully they'll find good evidence that Comcast's ability to perform on its end is not the city's problem. Tell Comcast to take their $96 bill, shove it up their antenna, and send you the boxes.
Better: turn off the cable and give first responders a good ATSC antenna, a Wii, and a Netflix subscription. Ok, that's probably more expensive even if Netflix gives you a sweet deal, and there's the bandwidth, but it's the principle dammit!
Long term: 1982? Seriously? Time to re-negotiate the CATV contract. Require them to provide all non-premium digital TV over clear QAM so normal digital-ready HDTVs can pick it up, both for your sake, and for the citizens.
The nice thing about USB drives is that they *can* be reused (like you're doing now).
So, do your Christmas thing, but included with each card, send a list of the charities above who could also use the cards, and instructions on how to format and send the drives.
After all, Christmas is all above giving, and if they want to re-read your card, they can just copy the drive to their computer.
That way, you still get to send a spiffy card, and the blind kids in Australia still get to listen to a book (though, realistically, postage would be more expensive than sending a donation to buy a new drive in some cases).
To the charities above: try contacting companies who make trash-n-trinkets for conventions, etc. They probably have gobs of extras that can't be resold because of being already customized, or having outdated sizes (32MB is still plenty for a kid to write a few school papers on).
Automobile touch-up paint. $5, paint it right over the lens.
You can probably even find a match for most common laptops if you look hard enough.
The entire argument in the OP is silly.
Using my MBP for retouching (it's even the old matte style) would be almost as silly as using my iPhone display.
Laptops are small, have inconsistent brightness, inconsistent ambient lighting, poor angle, and (commonly) 6-bit displays.
The matte and glossy both are fine for basic editing and everything else I do on a laptop. Retouching only happens in my studio, where I have full control over ambient light color and intensity, and a hardware-calibrated, 8-bit, 24" display running at 1920x1200 (and on my Mac Pro, not my MBP laptop--MBP has great speed for a laptop, but it doesn't touch the desktop when it comes to 200-MB Photoshop files).
Use tools the way they were intended to be used.
Same thing in the non-code world... a list of conditions which should all be evaluated before a procedure is finished.
Ok, flame-proof suit going on...
Linux might offer some improvement, but OpenOffice is dog-slow compared to Office 2000/2002.
So if word processing and spreadsheet use is more than minimal, I'd suggest sticking with XP, unless, perhaps, you can get Office to run under WINE.
Just replace IE6/7 with Firefox or Chrome for web browsing, and consider Thunderbird for email.
Rather than fudging the numbers, we should be figuring out how to teach the children better.
Better solutions:
- Raise the bar on minimum standards for teachers, and pay competitively
- Make computer literacy the fourth "R". At a minimum, students should be fluent in spreadsheet formulas and have experience with at least two procedural languages.
- Make science the fifth "R" (and I don't mean "(R)eligious views of science")
- Combat home life issues that make learning difficult (noise, poverty, despair, lack of healthcare, idiot parents)
- Replace the broken and expensive textbook system with open-sourced, peer-reviewed, live texts and tests.
- Emphasize problem-solving and writing skills over test-taking and rote memorization.
- Challenge the students, and move the stragglers to another class.
- Divorce public education from the influence of intermural athletics. Sports should be relegated to city leagues and taken OFF school campuses. If you want school pride, have it in your school's rankings in intellectual pursuits, not how fast some idiot can run without dropping a ball.
- Year-round school with three one-month breaks, so families can take vacations, but children don't lose pace like they do over summer break. This also gives children who fall behind three "catch-up" opportunities.
- Add two years of vocational training to high school. Leave college for those who actually need a degree rather than a place where everyone goes to learn what they *should* have learned earlier.
- More language skills. At a minimum, conversational knowledge of ASL, one non-English spoken languages.
*ALL* of our bills are paid by direct withdrawal from our primary checking account, including our credit cards.
We receive bills in the mail, which we review them for accuracy so we can stop the train if there's a problem.
We've been doing this about 7 years, with ZERO problems.
My paycheck is also deposited electronically, and has been for about 11 years between two employers. Again, ZERO problems except one company that screwed up their EFT payroll account transfer once, which took a few days to sort out.
Contrast with the people I know who use "online payment" from their banks-- they pay fees for the service, have problems when electronic checks don't go out on time, forget to pay (just like when they used paper checks), etc.
Glad this entire thread seems to realize the delicious irony here.
Oh, and since you're reading this thread, you've been added to the TSA's "random political dissident checklist." Have a nice day.
"Let us be thankful we have an occupation to fill. Work hard, increase production, prevent accidents and be happy. Let us be thankful we have commerce. Buy more. Buy more now. Buy. And be happy."
So what happens when said outages or disasters take out ORNL's Internet access or Google's servers?
Corporate-enabled mash-ups are *SO* 2007. Time to focus on open clouds of massively-distributed computing resources and cached storage. /soapbox
I'm with you... I'm a CS major, not a physics geek, so I'm still in awe that scientists can not only emit and detect individual photos, but do so reliably in several quantum states.
I thought our use of light and particle streams was still in the "drink from a firehose of similar particles" stage.
In larger companies, you can play a role of working as a liaison among the business users, IT folks, and development teams.
This requires solid communication skills and an understanding of the business needs you are modeling, but also the technical understanding to ensure that the resulting IT solutions are solid and elegant.
Project management is also an option--software projects need people who understand that building software is not like building a bridge.
IIRC, the iPod Touch doesn't have a microphone, but I wonder whether (a) headset mics are still accessible, and (b) if iCall will support them?
Agreed.
But no would-be competitor has the time, money, or access rights to lay new fiber.
And unless that whole IP-over-power or IP-over-sewer-lines becomes a reality, that's what it would take.
I think the local government should own and maintain the lines, and competing services (phone, IP, cable, etc.) should pay for whatever they use. Government has incentive to upgrade the lines because they can sell more bandwidth, and services have incentive to keep costs not far above their wholesale costs.
Ugh. Glad I signed up years ago.
I use them for Internet only. Dish eats their lunch on television quality (including the local channels), and when I had VoIP, I used Packet8.
I'm *NOT* defending TWC here (see my comment below), but that's not a fair comparison.
It's a lot cheaper to deliver a GB delivered on Amazon's CDN than it is to send it down that last few miles of copper over a CATV system.