I get pissed off when I call and get an IVR system. Do you think I'm even going to give you the time of day if you replace a sales person with this? I can't think of a better way to chase away your customers than to show that you are genuinely not interested in talking to them.
And you'll only have to charge the thing for 16 hours between 200 mile drives. Fine for day to day, but forget about the road trip. IMO, the Chevy Volt solves this problem in a much better fashion. Hell, even Top Gear was smart enough to put an electric generator in their electric car to solve this problem. As for their business model, it was destined to fail. The companies that make super cars that also make road cars for the rest of us all sell their super cars at a loss. The Ford GT, the Bugatti Vayron (VW), the Lexus LFA, etc. are all sold at a loss. These cars are built for prestige and R&D, not for profit. Companies like Aston Martin and Ferrari sell their cars for profit, but there isn't that huge of a profit margin. They're not exactly known as fortune 500 companies. Aston Martin has started offering a compact, but only because of a change in EU regulations regarding fleet-wide fuel economy.
IMO, Tesla would have been far better off taking the Ferrari model and focusing on building electric HYBRID super cars. By doing this, they could have greatly reduced the battery weight and had an even faster car.
Speaking of character issues: So you're capturing the other team's babe. What do you do with her once you have successfully captured her? You've already slapped her silly. It seems to insinuate a forced sexual act of some sort. Or does she become submissive and just go down on you?
Right, that way they can add an additional delay. The goal is to string along the salaries of the 800 people who lose their jobs as soon as the shuttle hits orbit as long as possible. And as somebody who works near Cape Canaveral, I fully support not having 800 more unemployed people here.
As a white hat developer, I've found tools such as nmap, wireshark and tcpdump useful in my daily life. While I can see that this tool can be used by security researchers, I cannot imagine a scenario where I would use a tool such as this one. Forget about the security objections of Fedora. On its own, this tool is a highly specialized utility. It is not something the everyday user or developer really needs.
I wrote the underpinnings of an SVG Javascript game years ago at while at a previous job. The frame rate was horrible but the project proved it could be done even then.
Meanwhile SpaceX didn't have to build or maintain a launch facility, probably has zero budget for the safety department and will react with an "Oh, whoops!" when the first one blows up.
Add on the fact that it uses Kerosene for its launches rather than hydrogen which pollutes the upper atmosphere (you know, such as the ozone layer). Kerosene has for years been known to be a cheaper fuel than liquid hydrogen, but NASA won't use it because of the ecological impacts.
"They don't force you to use their anti-spam identification system — it's totally opt-in."
Back when they started they did. Spamhaus started out extorting ISPs and forcing them to use their services. If you didn't you would stay blocked until you did. I was working at an ISP in the 90's that was forced into using Spamhaus.
The reality is, like it or not US law doesn't allow us to be vigilantes and go out and make up laws. For now we live in an opt-out world and interfering with lawful commerce is illegal even if you don't like the commercial activity. Anti-abortion protesters must stay back from clinics. Environmental protesters must not destroy oil rigs. Etc., etc., etc.
Actually, there's a lot of perspective being missed here. The technology in question has been available for several years and the inventor of the technology has approached every saw manufacturer out there to include it, only to be told 'no'. The manufacturers have shied away from this device because if they offer one saw with the technology, they must do it will all saws. So from the perspective of the plaintiff, the saw manufacturers had an opportunity to make their products safer, and they declined to do so. Its like knowing that your product causes cancer and knowing how to make it not cause cancer but failing to do so.
What you want to do is actually very simple and you will not have to enter into the individual health care market. You likely have these options:
1) No matter what, when you leave you'll be given the option to sign up for COBRA. COBRA lets you keep the health insurance you have now and it is mandated by federal law. So long as you pay the premiums, they have to keep you on at the exact coverage you have today. After 2 or 3 years, the insurance company will take you off of COBRA but will be required to offer you a guaranteed issue policy. This option can be pricey.
2) Most states offer some form of socialized medicine. For example, Maine has a state program that anyone can qualify for provided their employer doesn't provide insurance. Massachusetts requires insurance companies offer you a policy (and requires that everyone carry it). If your wife doesn't work or doesn't make a lot, until you can cover your new company's expenses and pay yourself you are low income and will therefore qualify for many of the programs out there.
3) Some states such as Florida require that health insurance companies offer guaranteed issue policies to companies under a certain size (50 employees in the case of Florida). Since your company has only 1 employee, you qualify. Insurance salesmen don't often like to take these policies because the commissions are intentionally set low to encourage the salesmen to put you in an individual policy instead.
While working at a major online brokerage, I was tasked with comparing a basic "hello world" program written in 3 methods: Perl in CGI, Perl in a core-dumped executable (this was the 90s) and C++. C++ of course won, but when you took the compile time away from Perl, the factor decreased from 8:1 to around 1.5:1. I'm guessing you'd find that PHP behaves in much the same way.
The fact is most users really don't care about ads on websites and don't have such a vindictive spirit as to want to put companies out of business. Truth be told, only a very small subset of users care enough to run ad blocking software because the minor annoyance just isn't worth the trouble.
Well the thing is the article itself is a bit misleading. It didn't take a study to find that you can predict the first 5 digits with 44% accuracy -- it was already a known factor. In fact, the less populous a state, the more likely they are to get it right. In smaller states (population-wise) such as the Dakotas, there may only be one prefix assigned to the state and with the second set of numbers being sequential, that 44% accuracy goes up very close to 100%. This is why the government has always told the private sector it was a bad idea.
It comes down to relationships -- how do you relate to your co-workers?
I'll give you a few examples:
* A friend of mine is helpful in such a role, but he comes at it with a "Holier than thou" attitude. As a result, while people accept his help, they don't respect him.
* I used to be arrogant and expecting something in return for my help. People didn't respect me and would generally turn to other sources. While this might sound good, it always left me wondering why people didn't befriend me.
* I switched to being kind, genuine, respectful and dignified. If I had a problem with what somebody did, I told them in a clear but positive way. One example is the 'ditcher' -- the person who leaves once you start working on their computer. I used to get angry about people doing this, but instead I find the person and explain that "I can't resolve your problem unless I have you around to help guide me with what you're doing." This is generally followed by an apology and a "Oh, I didn't know." I've found that by going with this approach, people respond in kind.
Ultimately it comes down to how you see relationships. You say that you "try to be friendly, helpful, and responsive." In the great words of Yoda, "There is no try. Only do or do not." Instead of trying to be friendly, be friendly. Instead of trying to be helpful, be helpful, etc. Explain your situation. "Unfortunately I'm in the middle of XYZ, but as soon as I'm done with that I can help you out." Frequently this is difficult for IT people because they see relationships as dominant/submissive. Building relationships on mutual respect will produce much better results -- and it might even get you laid.
ADHD isn't a function of teachers, its a function of parenting. There is an old psychology theory that found that ADHD was caused by lacking the concept of a situation -- something your parents would teach you. Having been diagnosed as ADHD I've found the following:
1) The theory is correct. When I gained a concept of a situation and began using it a few years ago, I started finding myself focusing MUCH better. I found myself better able to organize my thoughts and I communicate much more clearly. I have a 'filter' to determine relevence and appropriate behavior. Prior to understanding this concept, I lacked these abilities. 2) Having been put through ampetamines while growing up and for a while in adulthood, they help, sort of but they simply are not the same. Additionally, the have bad side effects and can cause you to become reclusive and paranoid.
With their permission, I've helped a few friends who are ADHD or ADD diagnosed to learn the concept. One of the more telling ones was a girl I dated who said "Oh my god! You changed something in my brain! I can focus!"
So the reality is we need to help kids with ADD/ADHD to understand the concept of a situation, and further we need to help their parents so they lay information out to their children in the context of a situation.
God, I agree with this 100%. If you want your kids to succeed in school, talk with their teachers an reward your kids based on their efforts. Communication shouldn't just happen at parent teacher conferences. It should be happening constantly so you know what is going on. Don't be a helecopter though -- don't try to influence the teacher. Just use that communication to provide the appropriate rewards and punishments to your child.
I hesitated before not posting this anonymously, but here it goes...
I used to work in the email industry for a large organization known as Naviant, and though I don't email anymore I still have many contacts within the industry. Here are some of my experiences:
On opt-outs: 1) Many firms (Naviant was one of them) want to send advertisements legitamatly and as such DO honor opt outs. Naviant was one such organization. 2) Many other firms (true spammers) took their harvested lists and once CANSPAM came about, started calling their lists 'optin', though they never were. 3) In the modern market, many emailers interpret CANSPAM to say that the opt-out belongs to the advertiser and the campaign, and that they are an ASP (not an agency or an advertiser) and therefore exempt beyond the current campaign. Note that that based on this interpretation that does mean that if you get something from Dish Network and you opt out, you should in theory not receive another email for a Dish campaign if Dish and its advertising agency are following the rules.
Several years ago (before point #3 was discovered in the industry), I actually decided to opt out of every email coming into my yahoo account, provided there was an opt-out link. I actually saw a dramatic drop in the amount of advertising email I received. I went from > 100 to about 5-10, and the ones I received were from spammers with no opt-outs. Gradutally as lists were sold (this was pre-CANSPAM), my inbox was flooded again, but I did have about 2 months of minimal advertising.
On Opt-ins: Quite often, people can opt in from places that they may not realize they're opting in from. At Naviant, we held several contests where by you agreed to receive email in exchange for an entry into our contests. Upon entry into our system, you were sent an email indicating your subscription request. If you wanted an entry without receiving email, you could opt out immediately from this email. I wrote these systems and as such I can confirm that this worked. For one such contest -- winningkey.com (now owned by somebody else), we gave away a Porsche Boxter every year with your subscription status being irrelevant (I wrote the script to pick winners as well). Our website fully disclosed in the privacy policy that we were going to email you, and in fact we earned the 'TrustE' logo because of it.
In today's industry, many such contests still exist. There are a lot of freebees offered in exchange for your email address, because to a list broker an email address is worth quite a bit, so if one contributes $5 to your new iPod or gives you a mop, he'll more than get his money back. He'll even give you a confirmation email which you must click on to sign up for email while receiving that contribution. It all comes down to you can't get something for nothing, and many of these incentives have been done by marketers for years prior to the invention of email. One example is Pubisher's Clearing House. PCH doesn't make most of its money selling magazine subscriptions. It makes its money selling your information from your contest entry, and then gives away an insignificant portion as a $10 million prize.
So the problem comes along because people are too quick to call something 'Spam' if they didn't want that particular piece of advertisement, then throw up their arms when they say "Oh, I didn't sign up for that" even after being presented with their name, address, phone number, email, the IP associated with their computer at both the time of opt-in and confirmation. But the fact is that iPod and that swiffer were free as in beer, but they weren't truly free.
There is also a problem on the side of the industry. There is a lack of trust of the industry, and some of it is rightly placed. If you define Spam by the definition provided by SpamHaus, both Spammers and legitimate emailers exist. The problem is there isn't an easy way for a user to differentiate between the two. Because all emailers (Spammers and legit) must target the inbox,
Know what you're getting into. Your concerns seem to be oriented around the code, and the reality is that consumers generally don't care how the code is structured so long as it works. So if you do go down this path, make certain that you're actually going to give the consumer something better and more compelling to work with.
I got an offer on a domain purchase much like this years ago (terabytesoftware.com). Like this situation they owned one with an almost identical name (terabyte-software.com). A few things were funny about it. First, nothing was on their site. The other funny thing was when we agreed on terms, they couldn't seem to come up with a way to transfer the funds that didn't involve me providing my checking account number and routing number. I'm not saying thats the case here, but it sound really familiar.
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I get pissed off when I call and get an IVR system. Do you think I'm even going to give you the time of day if you replace a sales person with this? I can't think of a better way to chase away your customers than to show that you are genuinely not interested in talking to them.
And you'll only have to charge the thing for 16 hours between 200 mile drives. Fine for day to day, but forget about the road trip. IMO, the Chevy Volt solves this problem in a much better fashion. Hell, even Top Gear was smart enough to put an electric generator in their electric car to solve this problem.
As for their business model, it was destined to fail. The companies that make super cars that also make road cars for the rest of us all sell their super cars at a loss. The Ford GT, the Bugatti Vayron (VW), the Lexus LFA, etc. are all sold at a loss. These cars are built for prestige and R&D, not for profit. Companies like Aston Martin and Ferrari sell their cars for profit, but there isn't that huge of a profit margin. They're not exactly known as fortune 500 companies. Aston Martin has started offering a compact, but only because of a change in EU regulations regarding fleet-wide fuel economy.
IMO, Tesla would have been far better off taking the Ferrari model and focusing on building electric HYBRID super cars. By doing this, they could have greatly reduced the battery weight and had an even faster car.
Which makes your hands base 11, not base 10.
Speaking of character issues: So you're capturing the other team's babe. What do you do with her once you have successfully captured her? You've already slapped her silly. It seems to insinuate a forced sexual act of some sort. Or does she become submissive and just go down on you?
Right, that way they can add an additional delay. The goal is to string along the salaries of the 800 people who lose their jobs as soon as the shuttle hits orbit as long as possible. And as somebody who works near Cape Canaveral, I fully support not having 800 more unemployed people here.
As a white hat developer, I've found tools such as nmap, wireshark and tcpdump useful in my daily life. While I can see that this tool can be used by security researchers, I cannot imagine a scenario where I would use a tool such as this one. Forget about the security objections of Fedora. On its own, this tool is a highly specialized utility. It is not something the everyday user or developer really needs.
Depends where you live. I think Taiwan is far enough south that winter isn't really a concern. Trees still drop leaves, but very slowly over years.
I wrote the underpinnings of an SVG Javascript game years ago at while at a previous job. The frame rate was horrible but the project proved it could be done even then.
Meanwhile SpaceX didn't have to build or maintain a launch facility, probably has zero budget for the safety department and will react with an "Oh, whoops!" when the first one blows up.
Add on the fact that it uses Kerosene for its launches rather than hydrogen which pollutes the upper atmosphere (you know, such as the ozone layer). Kerosene has for years been known to be a cheaper fuel than liquid hydrogen, but NASA won't use it because of the ecological impacts.
And with your help we'll get it up to 50%.
"They don't force you to use their anti-spam identification system — it's totally opt-in."
Back when they started they did. Spamhaus started out extorting ISPs and forcing them to use their services. If you didn't you would stay blocked until you did. I was working at an ISP in the 90's that was forced into using Spamhaus.
The reality is, like it or not US law doesn't allow us to be vigilantes and go out and make up laws. For now we live in an opt-out world and interfering with lawful commerce is illegal even if you don't like the commercial activity. Anti-abortion protesters must stay back from clinics. Environmental protesters must not destroy oil rigs. Etc., etc., etc.
Actually, there's a lot of perspective being missed here. The technology in question has been available for several years and the inventor of the technology has approached every saw manufacturer out there to include it, only to be told 'no'. The manufacturers have shied away from this device because if they offer one saw with the technology, they must do it will all saws. So from the perspective of the plaintiff, the saw manufacturers had an opportunity to make their products safer, and they declined to do so. Its like knowing that your product causes cancer and knowing how to make it not cause cancer but failing to do so.
What you want to do is actually very simple and you will not have to enter into the individual health care market. You likely have these options:
1) No matter what, when you leave you'll be given the option to sign up for COBRA. COBRA lets you keep the health insurance you have now and it is mandated by federal law. So long as you pay the premiums, they have to keep you on at the exact coverage you have today. After 2 or 3 years, the insurance company will take you off of COBRA but will be required to offer you a guaranteed issue policy. This option can be pricey.
2) Most states offer some form of socialized medicine. For example, Maine has a state program that anyone can qualify for provided their employer doesn't provide insurance. Massachusetts requires insurance companies offer you a policy (and requires that everyone carry it). If your wife doesn't work or doesn't make a lot, until you can cover your new company's expenses and pay yourself you are low income and will therefore qualify for many of the programs out there.
3) Some states such as Florida require that health insurance companies offer guaranteed issue policies to companies under a certain size (50 employees in the case of Florida). Since your company has only 1 employee, you qualify. Insurance salesmen don't often like to take these policies because the commissions are intentionally set low to encourage the salesmen to put you in an individual policy instead.
Somebody likes their Anime a bit too much.
While working at a major online brokerage, I was tasked with comparing a basic "hello world" program written in 3 methods: Perl in CGI, Perl in a core-dumped executable (this was the 90s) and C++. C++ of course won, but when you took the compile time away from Perl, the factor decreased from 8:1 to around 1.5:1. I'm guessing you'd find that PHP behaves in much the same way.
I don't see what the big deal is with leaving a comment about "Cat Aids." It's not that big a deal. School officials should be ashamed of themselves.
QT is a good platform but don't turn past Mono/.Net either. .Net isn't OSS but Mono most certainly is.
The fact is most users really don't care about ads on websites and don't have such a vindictive spirit as to want to put companies out of business. Truth be told, only a very small subset of users care enough to run ad blocking software because the minor annoyance just isn't worth the trouble.
Well the thing is the article itself is a bit misleading. It didn't take a study to find that you can predict the first 5 digits with 44% accuracy -- it was already a known factor. In fact, the less populous a state, the more likely they are to get it right. In smaller states (population-wise) such as the Dakotas, there may only be one prefix assigned to the state and with the second set of numbers being sequential, that 44% accuracy goes up very close to 100%. This is why the government has always told the private sector it was a bad idea.
It comes down to relationships -- how do you relate to your co-workers?
I'll give you a few examples:
* A friend of mine is helpful in such a role, but he comes at it with a "Holier than thou" attitude. As a result, while people accept his help, they don't respect him.
* I used to be arrogant and expecting something in return for my help. People didn't respect me and would generally turn to other sources. While this might sound good, it always left me wondering why people didn't befriend me.
* I switched to being kind, genuine, respectful and dignified. If I had a problem with what somebody did, I told them in a clear but positive way. One example is the 'ditcher' -- the person who leaves once you start working on their computer. I used to get angry about people doing this, but instead I find the person and explain that "I can't resolve your problem unless I have you around to help guide me with what you're doing." This is generally followed by an apology and a "Oh, I didn't know." I've found that by going with this approach, people respond in kind.
Ultimately it comes down to how you see relationships. You say that you "try to be friendly, helpful, and responsive." In the great words of Yoda, "There is no try. Only do or do not." Instead of trying to be friendly, be friendly. Instead of trying to be helpful, be helpful, etc. Explain your situation. "Unfortunately I'm in the middle of XYZ, but as soon as I'm done with that I can help you out." Frequently this is difficult for IT people because they see relationships as dominant/submissive. Building relationships on mutual respect will produce much better results -- and it might even get you laid.
ADHD isn't a function of teachers, its a function of parenting. There is an old psychology theory that found that ADHD was caused by lacking the concept of a situation -- something your parents would teach you. Having been diagnosed as ADHD I've found the following:
1) The theory is correct. When I gained a concept of a situation and began using it a few years ago, I started finding myself focusing MUCH better. I found myself better able to organize my thoughts and I communicate much more clearly. I have a 'filter' to determine relevence and appropriate behavior. Prior to understanding this concept, I lacked these abilities.
2) Having been put through ampetamines while growing up and for a while in adulthood, they help, sort of but they simply are not the same. Additionally, the have bad side effects and can cause you to become reclusive and paranoid.
With their permission, I've helped a few friends who are ADHD or ADD diagnosed to learn the concept. One of the more telling ones was a girl I dated who said "Oh my god! You changed something in my brain! I can focus!"
So the reality is we need to help kids with ADD/ADHD to understand the concept of a situation, and further we need to help their parents so they lay information out to their children in the context of a situation.
God, I agree with this 100%. If you want your kids to succeed in school, talk with their teachers an reward your kids based on their efforts. Communication shouldn't just happen at parent teacher conferences. It should be happening constantly so you know what is going on. Don't be a helecopter though -- don't try to influence the teacher. Just use that communication to provide the appropriate rewards and punishments to your child.
I hesitated before not posting this anonymously, but here it goes...
I used to work in the email industry for a large organization known as Naviant, and though I don't email anymore I still have many contacts within the industry. Here are some of my experiences:
On opt-outs:
1) Many firms (Naviant was one of them) want to send advertisements legitamatly and as such DO honor opt outs. Naviant was one such organization.
2) Many other firms (true spammers) took their harvested lists and once CANSPAM came about, started calling their lists 'optin', though they never were.
3) In the modern market, many emailers interpret CANSPAM to say that the opt-out belongs to the advertiser and the campaign, and that they are an ASP (not an agency or an advertiser) and therefore exempt beyond the current campaign. Note that that based on this interpretation that does mean that if you get something from Dish Network and you opt out, you should in theory not receive another email for a Dish campaign if Dish and its advertising agency are following the rules.
Several years ago (before point #3 was discovered in the industry), I actually decided to opt out of every email coming into my yahoo account, provided there was an opt-out link. I actually saw a dramatic drop in the amount of advertising email I received. I went from > 100 to about 5-10, and the ones I received were from spammers with no opt-outs. Gradutally as lists were sold (this was pre-CANSPAM), my inbox was flooded again, but I did have about 2 months of minimal advertising.
On Opt-ins:
Quite often, people can opt in from places that they may not realize they're opting in from. At Naviant, we held several contests where by you agreed to receive email in exchange for an entry into our contests. Upon entry into our system, you were sent an email indicating your subscription request. If you wanted an entry without receiving email, you could opt out immediately from this email. I wrote these systems and as such I can confirm that this worked. For one such contest -- winningkey.com (now owned by somebody else), we gave away a Porsche Boxter every year with your subscription status being irrelevant (I wrote the script to pick winners as well). Our website fully disclosed in the privacy policy that we were going to email you, and in fact we earned the 'TrustE' logo because of it.
In today's industry, many such contests still exist. There are a lot of freebees offered in exchange for your email address, because to a list broker an email address is worth quite a bit, so if one contributes $5 to your new iPod or gives you a mop, he'll more than get his money back. He'll even give you a confirmation email which you must click on to sign up for email while receiving that contribution. It all comes down to you can't get something for nothing, and many of these incentives have been done by marketers for years prior to the invention of email. One example is Pubisher's Clearing House. PCH doesn't make most of its money selling magazine subscriptions. It makes its money selling your information from your contest entry, and then gives away an insignificant portion as a $10 million prize.
So the problem comes along because people are too quick to call something 'Spam' if they didn't want that particular piece of advertisement, then throw up their arms when they say "Oh, I didn't sign up for that" even after being presented with their name, address, phone number, email, the IP associated with their computer at both the time of opt-in and confirmation. But the fact is that iPod and that swiffer were free as in beer, but they weren't truly free.
There is also a problem on the side of the industry. There is a lack of trust of the industry, and some of it is rightly placed. If you define Spam by the definition provided by SpamHaus, both Spammers and legitimate emailers exist. The problem is there isn't an easy way for a user to differentiate between the two. Because all emailers (Spammers and legit) must target the inbox,
Know what you're getting into. Your concerns seem to be oriented around the code, and the reality is that consumers generally don't care how the code is structured so long as it works. So if you do go down this path, make certain that you're actually going to give the consumer something better and more compelling to work with.
I got an offer on a domain purchase much like this years ago (terabytesoftware.com). Like this situation they owned one with an almost identical name (terabyte-software.com). A few things were funny about it. First, nothing was on their site. The other funny thing was when we agreed on terms, they couldn't seem to come up with a way to transfer the funds that didn't involve me providing my checking account number and routing number. I'm not saying thats the case here, but it sound really familiar.