>> We communicate with our ATMs over a dedicated line. > Not phone lines?
this I'm not so sure about... I beleive the bank machines that are run by the big banks are handled this way (though I don't know for absolute certainty), HOWEVER around here we have a lot of "white label" machines that are privatly owned and operated (usually the ones seen in gas stations and other "low traffic" areas), these machines ARE connected via POTS (Plain Old Telelphone System) lines, I know, I work for the phone company and have been out to repair lines for a few of them now. I have no idea what protocols they use, but I do know that when the phone rings they answer... (and no, I haven't hooked a modem up and tried to talk to them, I like being employed and out of jail thanks)
problem is the law only covers making a first generation copy for personal use, as was pointed out earlier here are 2 cases, the first is legal, the second is not even though both have the same net result.
1) I lend my cd to you, you make a copy and return my cd. then I lend my cd to a second person who copies it and gives it back. net result: I have the orriginal and 2 other people have copies, all perfectly legal.
2) I lend my cd to you, you make a copy and return my cd. then you lend your cd to a second person who copies it and gives it back. net result: I have the orriginal and 2 other people have copies, but this time the law was broken.
so for what you suggest to be legal the file that you orriginally move to person B's computer has to be the "orriginal" file that you got from the record industry, and not already be a copy. and considering the willingness that the industry has shown to distribute music electronically, this isn't verry likely.
as such your suggestion breaks the law as soon as you send that file to person B because it wasn't the orriginal you gave away, it was already a copy.
"Not everyone lives in an area where all the roads are paved."
my response to that is "so?" I drive a 4 door sedan, I take it on gravel and dirt roads all the time, and occasionally through grass fields, along cut-lines and such, it's more comfortable than an SUV and I get in the range of 30mpg on my diesel engine. the idea that you "NEED" and SUV to leave asphalt is ridiculous. In the worst snow storms and such I see more SUVs stuck than sedans and most of them insist that they have the SUV because of the winter snow.
I have seen almost no applications where a normal SUV is your best choice, what most people use an SUV for should usually be done by mini-van or station wagon, if you do SERIOUS off-roading (the kind where you are likely to need to use the winch to get yourself out) then your average SUV wouldn't be of any use anyway, and most things less can be done in many other vehicles as long as you know how to drive them.
this is the same reason that CDs cost more than cassettes did and cassettes cost more than records did, not because they are more expensive to produce, but because the industry thinks that new=better=more expensive, well that and the fact that as long as they pretend to deliver music online in some format they can always show how the internet just "isn't ready" for legitimate music distribution and strengthen their ridiculous court cases.
> a 52 inch screen isn't a silver screen and 5.1 isn't THX
no, but a 52" screen 8 feet away from you often is better than the "real thing" when you're near the back of the theatre, and 5.1 when you're sitting in the centre of the room is offten better than THX sitting in the back corner + people talking + coughing + eating popcorn
not to mention that a proper projector for a "real" home theatre can be had around here for as little as $2000...
at this point the ONLY reason I go to the theatre to watch a movie is because I'm impatient and don't want to wait for the DVD, and with prices here ($13.50cdn for a seat in a crowded, loud theatre) I cringe each time I consider going to the theatre, I have frequently sat in a theatre and realized that it would look and sound better at home, and be cheaper at that ($27 for 2 people at the theatre, or $25 for as many as you want to invite in to your living room for the DVD) it also REALLY annoys me that I have to sit through 20+ minutes of ads before the movie after paying that much!
I truly beleive that the ONLY advantage theatres have now (or at least will soon when more people have better home theatres) is the fact that they have the movie 6 months to a year before the DVD comes out... and that is an "artificial advantage" that I don't know if they'll be able to hold on to, (more and more DVDs leak out early, and if people are given the option to watch an illegal copy now for free, or pay $25+ and wait a year to do it right... it's hard for the "industry" to compete on those terms...)
maybe we won't see "all the jobs" replaced with computers/robots however I do think that at some point in the future (I won't even hazard a guess as to when) we will have a huge majority of the jobs "computerized" this actually shouldn't be a bad thing because it would mean that people wouldn't have to "work" to live because the computers/robots would be able to do it instead. (you'd end up with a future where everyone is free to pursue other interests, explore, learn, play, whatever.)
The problem isn't with the eventual takeover of work by machines, the problem is in the transition, right now when a machine replaces a few hundred jobs it usually creates 1 or 2 to maintain it, but it leaves those remaining hundreds unemployed, and needing a new job, they don't get the benefit of that job being computerized, only the top portion of society profits from computerization at the moment. so how do you get from that situation, to that where everyone benefits?
unfortuantly although I see a bright future once it all gets sorted out, I also forsee a verry dark time inbetween as the unemployment rate goes through the roof, and the poor get poorer while the rich get richer... untill, at some point, (and who knows what that will be) the monetary side basically vanishes and everyone can benefit from society's success...
>In a lot of countries they reverse the roles of the comma and the period in numbers. Confused the hell out of me when I first saw it, but it's true. $350,000.00 is written $350.000,00 for instance. Disturbing, isn't it?
from my experience that's not quite true... usually they use the , as the seperator between dollars and cents however they usually do not use the period elsewhere in the number, they will either write it straight out $350000,00 or use a space $350 000,00
I've been on the other end of it, dumpster full of old computer equipment (well the office they were behind was getting rid of them, they weren't "old" per-se, definitely worth salvaging)(we're talking the REALLY big dumpsters and just choc full of computers/monitors/printers tossed in, (plus a small amount of "trash" but not much))
the place that threw them out probably had no problem with it, but the neighbours saw us loading up a station-wagon and called the police, who made us put it all back in the dumpster so that it could go clog up the local landfill like good garbage does... *rolls eyes*
I work for a relatively large telco, and the reasons these things happen can be a bit odd... in our case when a re-seller asks for service (I used to work for the re-seller...) the telco does some tests on the line and tells the re-seller that it is either over or under an imaginary 1100 ohm loop limit (the re-seller I used to work for would actually not provide service beyond 1000 ohms due to increased support hassles) and I beleive they leave the actual decision to the re-seller, (sorta, the re-seller has to aruge pretty hard to get the telco to try it past that limit)
Now comes the way it works for a customer of the telco requesting DSL (and here come the problems...) SOMETIMES the line gets tested and treated the same way as the re-sellers, however often the line doesn't get tested at all and they just send out a kit to install it, or a tech... in these cases the tech (that would be me...) gets out there and either it works fine, or we spend an hour or more cursing the idiot in sales who didn't test the line... now this gives us more customers, (and our sales people are on commision, so guess why they do it...) but it also creates a lot of frustrated customers/techs... (I've had 3 in the past couple weeks alone where I was sent out to "troubleshoot" connections that never should have been given service to start with... sometimes we can work our magic and get something... (clean up inside wiring, remove bridge-taps, install POTS splitters instead of microfilters, etc) other times not...
actually upon inspection of the unit we found out that the magnatron had shut down at the end of the cooking time, it was just that the fan kept going and the light stayed on and the door locked, leaving the appearance of it still cooking, (and an inability to get at the food) looking at the simple ways the interlocks were built though I'm confident that they would have stopped the magnatron had the door been opened, the machine did however prevent us from testing that.
but yes, it did instill more confidence than the new microwaves.
our old microwave went one step better, not only did it have multiple interlocks (I can't remember how many... but there were a few in there when I disected it after it died) but it also had a lock on the door making it impossible to open the door while the microwave was in operation, somehow I always trusted that a whole lot more than the solution of the microwave turning off when you open the door...
of course that was, in the end, one of the downfalls of that particular unit as it started to die, some bug in the system developed such that every so often it wouldn't stop cooking at the end of the cooking time, and pressing stop wouldn't stop it either, and as it had locked the door for safety, you couldn't open the door to turn it off either, only way to stop it when that happened was to either run down to the basement and hit the circuit-breaker, or heave the monster off the shelf (with the food still inside, usually something like soup if you had to do this) and unplug it.
Speaking as a Canadian, the whole gun thing kinda bugs me, while I generally lean more towards the anti-gun side than the pro-gun side I still have no illusions that there aren't guns up here, nor do I beleive that guns don't have legitimate purposes.
You can still have guns in Canada, the main difference is that it isn't a constitutionally protected "right" which I think is a good thing, almost anyone can still get one, they just have to make some minor amount of effort to show that they aren't planning a shooting rampage first. the person who has a gun because it is their right truly frightens me, the person who has a gun because he/she enjoys hunting, or visits the shooting range on occasion doesn't worry me nearly so much.
personally, I don't like guns, I don't want one, and I see absolutely NO situation where I could ever be better off having one at home, whereas I can see MANY sittuations where it is a really bad idea. (having one around greatly increases your chances of accidentally killing someone you mistake for someone else. also if your gun is stored safely, than there is no way you could have it in your hand ready to use quickly enough to stop an armed invader, and if it is NOT stored properly than there is a good chance of an unarmed invader becomming armed by your own gun, or of a loved one using it accidentally.)
I have a few thoughts on that one, the first being that if the US forces had found any within a week of invading Iraq I would have KNOWN they were lying, while I don't nesecarilly beleive that Blix et al were 100% effective, I also don't beleive they were that incompetant as to miss anything major that is obvious enough to be found that quickly by the americans.
the second thought is that I, unfortunatly, have no doubt in my mind that the americans will find WMD in Iraq, now before you assume that this means I think the US was "right" hear me out, this is a huge publicity thing, the US looks REALLY bad if nothing is found, so I'm sure they will find something, the real question is, was what they find there BEFORE the US got there? now I know that will put me in a few people's bad books, but should we really trust a country that brought obviously falsified evidence to the UN to justify the invasion (the CIA is "investigating" how that falsified information got to Powell to present it...) and even more obvious is when the US tells the UN that they do not want any UN inspectors to verify any finds... now why wouldn't you want the international community to verify your find (when you know that a lot of countries are sceptical) unless you aren't sure that they will agree the find is legitimate... I should also say (before I get completely flamed to death) that I think Iraq could easilly have WMD, I also think they could NOT have them just as easilly (and not because Saddam didn't WANT them, but because there was a LOT of preasure on him from the rest of the world, and just because he was a "Bad Man" (tm) does not mean he's stupid (in fact most evidence is to the contrary))
anyway, just this Canuk's 0.02$ (that's somewhere less than 0.014$ US...)
>>In Canada you can get 9Mbps DSL connections already.
I'm REALLY curious, where in Canada are you talking?
I'm in the west and the highest speed DSL you can get here is 4Mbps, the equipment is capable of more, but the telco doesn't offer plans any higher, and they say it's a CRTC regulation...
I used to work for a local ISP with our own DSL network operating on leased dry copper loops, we provided up to 7Mbps, (the equipment we had didn't go any higher) but that ISP was bought out by the local telco and that equipment has all been dismantled, so the highest you can get here is 4Mbps again...
Disclaimer: I work for the local telco Now that said, I'm not in marketing, I'm a field tech, and I get this question a lot, I have a fair amount of experience with both systems, (my parents are on cable (no dsl in their area yet) and I have a few good friends working for the local cable company) so I'll try to be relatively unbiased here.
I'm often asked "how does DSL compare to cable" the real answer is it doesn't, the two are different technologies. and can't be dirrectly compared to come up with an answer of "X is faster than Y", here are a few points to consider...
The theoretical end of things: -the local cable company uses cable modems with a maximum possible speed of 10Mb/s downstream (I can't remember the upstream) -the local telco uses equipment (DSLAMs and DSL modems) with a maximum possible speed of 8Mb/s downstream and 1MB/s upstream
The administrative side of things: -the local cable company throttles this to 1.5Mb/s downstream (I can't remember what they set the upstream to) -the local telco throttles this to 1.5Mb/s downstream and 640kb/s upstream
The practical downside of things: -Cable is usage dependant, the cable system is based on one line running in to the neighborhood and splitting to all the houses, so the more people online at a time the slower the connection. -DSL is distance dependant, you've got just over 3km of cable before you can't get DSL, and if you're over 2-2.5km you won't be getting full speeds, so just because you have a phoneline doesn't mean you can get DSL.
The practical upside of things: -Cable being shielded can run for amazing lengths with verry little loss allowing extended distances, if you have cable tv around here you can probably get cable internet -DSL runs on the phoneline, and you have your own line from your house to the phone exchange, so you don't share bandwidth with anyone untill you get back to the phone exchange, (you do from there on out just like you would with any ISP but there's lots to go around (at least around here there is))
The practical summary: -if you live a long way from a phone exchange in a community full of people who use the computer only for their email once a day. Cable is going to be faster. -if you live really close to the phone exchange in a community full of slashdotters. DSL is going to be faster.
Now most of us don't live in either one of those sittuations, so around here at least, the two compare verry closely on the home packages. the main difference is stability (the kind affecting speed, the kind affecting uptime isn't discussed here), on DSL you get what you get, if you got speeds of 1Mb/s when they hooked you up, you'll probably continue to get that speed, whereas on cable you may get 1.5Mb/s at slack times and 500-600kb/s at busy times, it all depends on what type of usage you have and at what times you make use of it.
Final Disclaimer: I only compared the "home" packages here, and only on the point of speed, there are many other factors to consider when getting a connection, both companies offer many packages catering to different needs at different costs, do your research before going with either, just keep the stuff mentioned here in mind because the marketting departments of neither company will ever mention the downsides to their own system....
>> All of you are assuming that no one rams into the manhole cover with a car/truck/SUV, denting and distorting the shape enough to go through the hole
not likely a problem, I have never seen a bent manhole cover, (and you probably haven't either) they are VERRY strong/heavy things, I also think they would break before bending, but even that would take a LOT of effort, the car/truck/SUV on the other hand would be quite "bent" if it managed to "ram" a manhole cover.
"if US troops suddenly opened fire on a large group of civilians you can bet EVERY US news outlet would be running coverage non-stop"
so I would assume that "every US news outlet" is currently "running coverage non-stop" of the devastation to a residential neighborhood caused by cruise missles from the american millitary? (even the american millitary admitted to this one)
the truth is that none of these news agencies are "objective" Al Jazeera may lean towards their government, US based media outlets lean towards their government. The only way to get "objective" viewpoints is to find information from BOTH sides and make up your own mind... (and yes, it requires thinking, you can't just turn on the tube and absorb as so many people want to do) the only problem now is that it is getting to be quite difficult to find information comming out of the "other" side.
so it would not be terrorism if the whitehouse was bombed by a foreign group?
you say this isn't terrorism, however installations such as the presidential pallaces (their equivlant of the whitehouse, only more of 'em) were bombed, but when anyone talks about attacks on the US, such as those on the pentagon, or attmpts on the whitehouse, those are terrorism? how does that work?
great words of wisdom from my father "most of the time, if you're just willing to look under the hood, you can fix whatever is wrong" basically if you're willing to try you've already won half the battle, and it has served me well, I often fix things others can't just because they weren't willing to look to see that it wasn't plugged in or whatnot...
that being said... I wish my dear old dad who had given me this advice wouldn't follow it himself! it causes far too many tech support issues as he never knows what he did to try to "fix" something that wasn't broken untill he started "fixing" it!
this is how it should be, HOWEVER, it doesn't quite work that way in computers... I have no problem fixing my in-laws computer when I'm sitting in front of it, but I just can't fix the strange things they manage to screw up over the phone, it's just not possible, but they expect it done, and done NOW. (and this when the most detailed description of the problem I can get is "the thing...it's not able to do that thing that it used to... it must be a virus! can you tell me how to fix it?") it would be like me calling a plumber and asking them to (over the phone) tell me how to fix the piping in my house after I take a hacksaw to 3/4 of the pipes, and then describing the problem as "when I turn on the thing, it doesn't do what it used to".
I will still help them fix things they screw up, no matter how badly, BUT I will not drop everything I'm doing and try to solve it over the phone when they can't even tell me what's wrong. and I certainly won't jump in my car and drive to their house in another city every 2 days when they call, there ARE limits.
now when they call I just hope my SO picks up before I do, then SHE can handle the tech support, and as for doing tech support for her... well when I met her she had never used a computer that had windows on it, all of the ones she had ever used were linux, so that says something about her technical ability right there... makes things go much smoother:)
I think that many urban legends, wether based in fact or fiction do give people ideas, and all too often those ideas become reality.
I work for a telco (please don't shoot me!) and I know a few years ago an urban legend circulated about people disposing of infected needles in payphone coin-return slots, at the time the company (and they also checked with other major telcos) was unable to find any evidence of it ever having happened and looking it up on a few hoax sites showed it as such. however, a year or so later corporate security and health and safety sent out urgent bulletins about this practice, as a bunch of the guys dismissed it as the old urban legend we found out that in fact someone had started doing this and it was becomming a problem for some of our inner city coin techs. (a few were injured, nobody tested possitive for any strange diseases though)
this is just one example... but I'm sure many other urban legends that may not have been based in fact have "caused" what they talk about.
on the other hand I worked tech support for an ISP for a while (a looooooooooong... PAINFULL 8 months...) and it was amazing how many clients ASSUMED that we had some form of a magical way to access and take control of their system for this reason, you'd be talking to someone on the phone who can't connect and you ask them to describe what they see on the screen and they respond "can't you see it???" (and remember, this person is calling in because they couldn't get connected... so even if we DID have some magical backdoor we could use that we had managed to convince microsoft AND apple to BOTH implement in their OS just for us, (a small independant ISP) we STILL wouldn't have been able to use it because the person isn't able to connect!!!)
boy am I glad I managed to get out of that department...
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>> We communicate with our ATMs over a dedicated line.
> Not phone lines?
this I'm not so sure about... I beleive the bank machines that are run by the big banks are handled this way (though I don't know for absolute certainty), HOWEVER around here we have a lot of "white label" machines that are privatly owned and operated (usually the ones seen in gas stations and other "low traffic" areas), these machines ARE connected via POTS (Plain Old Telelphone System) lines, I know, I work for the phone company and have been out to repair lines for a few of them now. I have no idea what protocols they use, but I do know that when the phone rings they answer... (and no, I haven't hooked a modem up and tried to talk to them, I like being employed and out of jail thanks)
problem is the law only covers making a first generation copy for personal use, as was pointed out earlier here are 2 cases, the first is legal, the second is not even though both have the same net result.
1) I lend my cd to you, you make a copy and return my cd. then I lend my cd to a second person who copies it and gives it back. net result: I have the orriginal and 2 other people have copies, all perfectly legal.
2) I lend my cd to you, you make a copy and return my cd. then you lend your cd to a second person who copies it and gives it back. net result: I have the orriginal and 2 other people have copies, but this time the law was broken.
so for what you suggest to be legal the file that you orriginally move to person B's computer has to be the "orriginal" file that you got from the record industry, and not already be a copy. and considering the willingness that the industry has shown to distribute music electronically, this isn't verry likely.
as such your suggestion breaks the law as soon as you send that file to person B because it wasn't the orriginal you gave away, it was already a copy.
"Not everyone lives in an area where all the roads are paved."
my response to that is "so?" I drive a 4 door sedan, I take it on gravel and dirt roads all the time, and occasionally through grass fields, along cut-lines and such, it's more comfortable than an SUV and I get in the range of 30mpg on my diesel engine. the idea that you "NEED" and SUV to leave asphalt is ridiculous. In the worst snow storms and such I see more SUVs stuck than sedans and most of them insist that they have the SUV because of the winter snow.
I have seen almost no applications where a normal SUV is your best choice, what most people use an SUV for should usually be done by mini-van or station wagon, if you do SERIOUS off-roading (the kind where you are likely to need to use the winch to get yourself out) then your average SUV wouldn't be of any use anyway, and most things less can be done in many other vehicles as long as you know how to drive them.
this is the same reason that CDs cost more than cassettes did and cassettes cost more than records did, not because they are more expensive to produce, but because the industry thinks that new=better=more expensive, well that and the fact that as long as they pretend to deliver music online in some format they can always show how the internet just "isn't ready" for legitimate music distribution and strengthen their ridiculous court cases.
> a 52 inch screen isn't a silver screen and 5.1 isn't THX
no, but a 52" screen 8 feet away from you often is better than the "real thing" when you're near the back of the theatre, and 5.1 when you're sitting in the centre of the room is offten better than THX sitting in the back corner + people talking + coughing + eating popcorn
not to mention that a proper projector for a "real" home theatre can be had around here for as little as $2000...
at this point the ONLY reason I go to the theatre to watch a movie is because I'm impatient and don't want to wait for the DVD, and with prices here ($13.50cdn for a seat in a crowded, loud theatre) I cringe each time I consider going to the theatre, I have frequently sat in a theatre and realized that it would look and sound better at home, and be cheaper at that ($27 for 2 people at the theatre, or $25 for as many as you want to invite in to your living room for the DVD) it also REALLY annoys me that I have to sit through 20+ minutes of ads before the movie after paying that much!
I truly beleive that the ONLY advantage theatres have now (or at least will soon when more people have better home theatres) is the fact that they have the movie 6 months to a year before the DVD comes out... and that is an "artificial advantage" that I don't know if they'll be able to hold on to, (more and more DVDs leak out early, and if people are given the option to watch an illegal copy now for free, or pay $25+ and wait a year to do it right... it's hard for the "industry" to compete on those terms...)
maybe we won't see "all the jobs" replaced with computers/robots however I do think that at some point in the future (I won't even hazard a guess as to when) we will have a huge majority of the jobs "computerized" this actually shouldn't be a bad thing because it would mean that people wouldn't have to "work" to live because the computers/robots would be able to do it instead. (you'd end up with a future where everyone is free to pursue other interests, explore, learn, play, whatever.)
The problem isn't with the eventual takeover of work by machines, the problem is in the transition, right now when a machine replaces a few hundred jobs it usually creates 1 or 2 to maintain it, but it leaves those remaining hundreds unemployed, and needing a new job, they don't get the benefit of that job being computerized, only the top portion of society profits from computerization at the moment. so how do you get from that situation, to that where everyone benefits?
unfortuantly although I see a bright future once it all gets sorted out, I also forsee a verry dark time inbetween as the unemployment rate goes through the roof, and the poor get poorer while the rich get richer... untill, at some point, (and who knows what that will be) the monetary side basically vanishes and everyone can benefit from society's success...
>In a lot of countries they reverse the roles of the comma and the period in numbers. Confused the hell out of me when I first saw it, but it's true. $350,000.00 is written $350.000,00 for instance. Disturbing, isn't it?
from my experience that's not quite true... usually they use the , as the seperator between dollars and cents however they usually do not use the period elsewhere in the number, they will either write it straight out $350000,00 or use a space $350 000,00
I've been on the other end of it, dumpster full of old computer equipment (well the office they were behind was getting rid of them, they weren't "old" per-se, definitely worth salvaging)(we're talking the REALLY big dumpsters and just choc full of computers/monitors/printers tossed in, (plus a small amount of "trash" but not much))
the place that threw them out probably had no problem with it, but the neighbours saw us loading up a station-wagon and called the police, who made us put it all back in the dumpster so that it could go clog up the local landfill like good garbage does... *rolls eyes*
I work for a relatively large telco, and the reasons these things happen can be a bit odd... in our case when a re-seller asks for service (I used to work for the re-seller...) the telco does some tests on the line and tells the re-seller that it is either over or under an imaginary 1100 ohm loop limit (the re-seller I used to work for would actually not provide service beyond 1000 ohms due to increased support hassles) and I beleive they leave the actual decision to the re-seller, (sorta, the re-seller has to aruge pretty hard to get the telco to try it past that limit)
Now comes the way it works for a customer of the telco requesting DSL (and here come the problems...) SOMETIMES the line gets tested and treated the same way as the re-sellers, however often the line doesn't get tested at all and they just send out a kit to install it, or a tech... in these cases the tech (that would be me...) gets out there and either it works fine, or we spend an hour or more cursing the idiot in sales who didn't test the line... now this gives us more customers, (and our sales people are on commision, so guess why they do it...) but it also creates a lot of frustrated customers/techs... (I've had 3 in the past couple weeks alone where I was sent out to "troubleshoot" connections that never should have been given service to start with... sometimes we can work our magic and get something... (clean up inside wiring, remove bridge-taps, install POTS splitters instead of microfilters, etc) other times not...
actually upon inspection of the unit we found out that the magnatron had shut down at the end of the cooking time, it was just that the fan kept going and the light stayed on and the door locked, leaving the appearance of it still cooking, (and an inability to get at the food)
looking at the simple ways the interlocks were built though I'm confident that they would have stopped the magnatron had the door been opened, the machine did however prevent us from testing that.
but yes, it did instill more confidence than the new microwaves.
our old microwave went one step better, not only did it have multiple interlocks (I can't remember how many... but there were a few in there when I disected it after it died) but it also had a lock on the door making it impossible to open the door while the microwave was in operation, somehow I always trusted that a whole lot more than the solution of the microwave turning off when you open the door...
of course that was, in the end, one of the downfalls of that particular unit as it started to die, some bug in the system developed such that every so often it wouldn't stop cooking at the end of the cooking time, and pressing stop wouldn't stop it either, and as it had locked the door for safety, you couldn't open the door to turn it off either, only way to stop it when that happened was to either run down to the basement and hit the circuit-breaker, or heave the monster off the shelf (with the food still inside, usually something like soup if you had to do this) and unplug it.
> 3) We like guns. You guys used to.
Speaking as a Canadian, the whole gun thing kinda bugs me, while I generally lean more towards the anti-gun side than the pro-gun side I still have no illusions that there aren't guns up here, nor do I beleive that guns don't have legitimate purposes.
You can still have guns in Canada, the main difference is that it isn't a constitutionally protected "right" which I think is a good thing, almost anyone can still get one, they just have to make some minor amount of effort to show that they aren't planning a shooting rampage first. the person who has a gun because it is their right truly frightens me, the person who has a gun because he/she enjoys hunting, or visits the shooting range on occasion doesn't worry me nearly so much.
personally, I don't like guns, I don't want one, and I see absolutely NO situation where I could ever be better off having one at home, whereas I can see MANY sittuations where it is a really bad idea. (having one around greatly increases your chances of accidentally killing someone you mistake for someone else. also if your gun is stored safely, than there is no way you could have it in your hand ready to use quickly enough to stop an armed invader, and if it is NOT stored properly than there is a good chance of an unarmed invader becomming armed by your own gun, or of a loved one using it accidentally.)
> where are the WMDs again?
I have a few thoughts on that one, the first being that if the US forces had found any within a week of invading Iraq I would have KNOWN they were lying, while I don't nesecarilly beleive that Blix et al were 100% effective, I also don't beleive they were that incompetant as to miss anything major that is obvious enough to be found that quickly by the americans.
the second thought is that I, unfortunatly, have no doubt in my mind that the americans will find WMD in Iraq, now before you assume that this means I think the US was "right" hear me out, this is a huge publicity thing, the US looks REALLY bad if nothing is found, so I'm sure they will find something, the real question is, was what they find there BEFORE the US got there? now I know that will put me in a few people's bad books, but should we really trust a country that brought obviously falsified evidence to the UN to justify the invasion (the CIA is "investigating" how that falsified information got to Powell to present it...) and even more obvious is when the US tells the UN that they do not want any UN inspectors to verify any finds... now why wouldn't you want the international community to verify your find (when you know that a lot of countries are sceptical) unless you aren't sure that they will agree the find is legitimate... I should also say (before I get completely flamed to death) that I think Iraq could easilly have WMD, I also think they could NOT have them just as easilly (and not because Saddam didn't WANT them, but because there was a LOT of preasure on him from the rest of the world, and just because he was a "Bad Man" (tm) does not mean he's stupid (in fact most evidence is to the contrary))
anyway, just this Canuk's 0.02$ (that's somewhere less than 0.014$ US...)
>>In Canada you can get 9Mbps DSL connections already.
I'm REALLY curious, where in Canada are you talking?
I'm in the west and the highest speed DSL you can get here is 4Mbps, the equipment is capable of more, but the telco doesn't offer plans any higher, and they say it's a CRTC regulation...
I used to work for a local ISP with our own DSL network operating on leased dry copper loops, we provided up to 7Mbps, (the equipment we had didn't go any higher) but that ISP was bought out by the local telco and that equipment has all been dismantled, so the highest you can get here is 4Mbps again...
Disclaimer: I work for the local telco
Now that said, I'm not in marketing, I'm a field tech, and I get this question a lot, I have a fair amount of experience with both systems, (my parents are on cable (no dsl in their area yet) and I have a few good friends working for the local cable company) so I'll try to be relatively unbiased here.
I'm often asked "how does DSL compare to cable" the real answer is it doesn't, the two are different technologies. and can't be dirrectly compared to come up with an answer of "X is faster than Y", here are a few points to consider...
The theoretical end of things:
-the local cable company uses cable modems with a maximum possible speed of 10Mb/s downstream (I can't remember the upstream)
-the local telco uses equipment (DSLAMs and DSL modems) with a maximum possible speed of 8Mb/s downstream and 1MB/s upstream
The administrative side of things:
-the local cable company throttles this to 1.5Mb/s downstream (I can't remember what they set the upstream to)
-the local telco throttles this to 1.5Mb/s downstream and 640kb/s upstream
The practical downside of things:
-Cable is usage dependant, the cable system is based on one line running in to the neighborhood and splitting to all the houses, so the more people online at a time the slower the connection.
-DSL is distance dependant, you've got just over 3km of cable before you can't get DSL, and if you're over 2-2.5km you won't be getting full speeds, so just because you have a phoneline doesn't mean you can get DSL.
The practical upside of things:
-Cable being shielded can run for amazing lengths with verry little loss allowing extended distances, if you have cable tv around here you can probably get cable internet
-DSL runs on the phoneline, and you have your own line from your house to the phone exchange, so you don't share bandwidth with anyone untill you get back to the phone exchange, (you do from there on out just like you would with any ISP but there's lots to go around (at least around here there is))
The practical summary:
-if you live a long way from a phone exchange in a community full of people who use the computer only for their email once a day. Cable is going to be faster.
-if you live really close to the phone exchange in a community full of slashdotters. DSL is going to be faster.
Now most of us don't live in either one of those sittuations, so around here at least, the two compare verry closely on the home packages. the main difference is stability (the kind affecting speed, the kind affecting uptime isn't discussed here), on DSL you get what you get, if you got speeds of 1Mb/s when they hooked you up, you'll probably continue to get that speed, whereas on cable you may get 1.5Mb/s at slack times and 500-600kb/s at busy times, it all depends on what type of usage you have and at what times you make use of it.
Final Disclaimer: I only compared the "home" packages here, and only on the point of speed, there are many other factors to consider when getting a connection, both companies offer many packages catering to different needs at different costs, do your research before going with either, just keep the stuff mentioned here in mind because the marketting departments of neither company will ever mention the downsides to their own system....
>> All of you are assuming that no one rams into the manhole cover with a car/truck/SUV, denting and distorting the shape enough to go through the hole
not likely a problem, I have never seen a bent manhole cover, (and you probably haven't either) they are VERRY strong/heavy things, I also think they would break before bending, but even that would take a LOT of effort, the car/truck/SUV on the other hand would be quite "bent" if it managed to "ram" a manhole cover.
"if US troops suddenly opened fire on a large group of civilians you can bet EVERY US news outlet would be running coverage non-stop"
so I would assume that "every US news outlet" is currently "running coverage non-stop" of the devastation to a residential neighborhood caused by cruise missles from the american millitary? (even the american millitary admitted to this one)
the truth is that none of these news agencies are "objective" Al Jazeera may lean towards their government, US based media outlets lean towards their government. The only way to get "objective" viewpoints is to find information from BOTH sides and make up your own mind... (and yes, it requires thinking, you can't just turn on the tube and absorb as so many people want to do) the only problem now is that it is getting to be quite difficult to find information comming out of the "other" side.
The Canadian comedy group "Three Dead Trolls In A Baggie" has a verry appropriate song about this... called "Every OS Sucks"... available here
I do know my history... but agreeing to something when you have a gun to your head hardly means you like it.
mind you... wouldn't the americans shoot at planes flying to patrol a "no-fly" zone covering a large portion of the states?
keep in mind that the no-fly zone wasn't approved by the UN either...
so it would not be terrorism if the whitehouse was bombed by a foreign group?
you say this isn't terrorism, however installations such as the presidential pallaces (their equivlant of the whitehouse, only more of 'em) were bombed, but when anyone talks about attacks on the US, such as those on the pentagon, or attmpts on the whitehouse, those are terrorism? how does that work?
great words of wisdom from my father "most of the time, if you're just willing to look under the hood, you can fix whatever is wrong"
basically if you're willing to try you've already won half the battle, and it has served me well, I often fix things others can't just because they weren't willing to look to see that it wasn't plugged in or whatnot...
that being said... I wish my dear old dad who had given me this advice wouldn't follow it himself! it causes far too many tech support issues as he never knows what he did to try to "fix" something that wasn't broken untill he started "fixing" it!
this is how it should be, HOWEVER, it doesn't quite work that way in computers... I have no problem fixing my in-laws computer when I'm sitting in front of it, but I just can't fix the strange things they manage to screw up over the phone, it's just not possible, but they expect it done, and done NOW. (and this when the most detailed description of the problem I can get is "the thing...it's not able to do that thing that it used to... it must be a virus! can you tell me how to fix it?")
:)
it would be like me calling a plumber and asking them to (over the phone) tell me how to fix the piping in my house after I take a hacksaw to 3/4 of the pipes, and then describing the problem as "when I turn on the thing, it doesn't do what it used to".
I will still help them fix things they screw up, no matter how badly, BUT I will not drop everything I'm doing and try to solve it over the phone when they can't even tell me what's wrong. and I certainly won't jump in my car and drive to their house in another city every 2 days when they call, there ARE limits.
now when they call I just hope my SO picks up before I do, then SHE can handle the tech support, and as for doing tech support for her... well when I met her she had never used a computer that had windows on it, all of the ones she had ever used were linux, so that says something about her technical ability right there... makes things go much smoother
I think that many urban legends, wether based in fact or fiction do give people ideas, and all too often those ideas become reality.
I work for a telco (please don't shoot me!) and I know a few years ago an urban legend circulated about people disposing of infected needles in payphone coin-return slots, at the time the company (and they also checked with other major telcos) was unable to find any evidence of it ever having happened and looking it up on a few hoax sites showed it as such. however, a year or so later corporate security and health and safety sent out urgent bulletins about this practice, as a bunch of the guys dismissed it as the old urban legend we found out that in fact someone had started doing this and it was becomming a problem for some of our inner city coin techs. (a few were injured, nobody tested possitive for any strange diseases though)
this is just one example... but I'm sure many other urban legends that may not have been based in fact have "caused" what they talk about.
on the other hand I worked tech support for an ISP for a while (a looooooooooong... PAINFULL 8 months...) and it was amazing how many clients ASSUMED that we had some form of a magical way to access and take control of their system for this reason, you'd be talking to someone on the phone who can't connect and you ask them to describe what they see on the screen and they respond "can't you see it???" (and remember, this person is calling in because they couldn't get connected... so even if we DID have some magical backdoor we could use that we had managed to convince microsoft AND apple to BOTH implement in their OS just for us, (a small independant ISP) we STILL wouldn't have been able to use it because the person isn't able to connect!!!)
boy am I glad I managed to get out of that department...