I'm using gAIM and mIRC, should I use the IRC feature of gAIM, rather than running two applications? The only thing that's keeping me from leaving mIRC is the fact that mIRC is so expandable with scripts and everything. Does IRC on gAIM support scripts and addons? Or should I stick with mIRC?
How about a third option? (This is a shameless plug, I've contributed code to the project I'm about to recommend.)
Try X-Chat for all your multi-platform IRC needs. It is highly expandable with plugins and scripts that can be written in python or perl.
The official Windows build is shareware (a decision I disagree with, but it's not my project), however, the source is GPLed and there are third-party Windows builds that are free.
The advantages of X-Chat?
* Open Source
* Not subject to mIRC vulnerabilities
* Not subject to mIRC script viruses
* Plugin interface
* Perl and Python scripting.
* No built-in trout-slap popup.
Is there a point to free Trillian anymore? I'm not knocking it (much..), I did use it once upon a time and tbh it was very good, nice eye candy too, but since finding GAIM I haven't looked back.
Well, I only use Windows on one machine, and I have Trillian installed. Why don't I use GAIM? Well, once upon a time, when I bought this laptop, I was looking for an IM client that supported the ICQ protocol (I use licq on my Linux boxen). I installed GAIM first, always going for the open source solution. It didn't work. Crashed. Nothing I could think of would make it load correctly.
Now, before you go saying PEBKAC, I'm well experienced in these matters and believe me, while there may have been an issue with the configuration of *my* particular system, it's just a bit odd that 99% of all other software I've tried works just fine, but GAIM is in the 1% that did not.
I installed Trillian after some hunting, and it worked great.
This ends up being the #1 reason I make all my software choices and stick by them (until something changes that really annoys me)... It's the reason I chose KDE over GNOME (GNOME crashed the first time I tried it back in... 1997 or 1998. Installed KDE and it worked right the first time.)
Until something happens with Trillian that makes me want to switch, or until GAIM has something that is so cool I can't stand to be without it, I'll stick with what's been working right. (And, while open source is plus, it is neither necessary nor sufficient for me to choose one product over another.)
Note, you don't have to "Join" the military to work for the military. I have a DoD civilian job. As a rule of thumb, it takes at least 3 months to get a clearance so you probably won't be able to obtain one unless you work at that facility for a while. Also, I've never seen temporaries (read interns) get a clearance.
Which is why it helps to already have one. (By having joined the military before going to college... all the GI Bill money and a clearance, too!) Of course, I waited so long to start school after I got discharged that my clearance will be expired by the time I'm ready to re-enter the workforce.
That's because you can't be take photos of imaginary girlfriends.
s/ be//; Damn! My written English sucks sometimes.
As another poster pointed out, I suppose you can *have* pictures of imaginary girlfriends(LINK IS NOT WORK SAFE), but *taking* them is an entirely different story...
Ahh, to be a photographer in the lesbian pr0n industry...
I just wished the iPod could replace my tape recorder in class when I want to tape the lecture.
My 128 MB flash MP3 player does this, however.
Re:I hope you're trying to be funny
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As a liberal arts graduate with a math degree, I can proudly say that I do both, generally in your preferred order unless I can incorporate the thinking into the doing without ditching too much efficiency.
It's nice to be in a field where the thinking results either in publications (if it is deep), some C/java code (if it is thorough) or a perl script to replace some future "doing" (if it's neither).
That's true, and I am also in a liberal arts school seeking a CIS degree (with minors in Math and Geology), but the needs and workings of the world economy don't support the idea that everyone should receive a liberal arts degree.
The chief problem I see with the liberal arts curriculum is that, for instance, my school doesn't touch anything with the word "engineering" in it. Thinking is one thing, being able to apply thought in a practical manner is another. I've also had to waste a lot of effort in art classes that I will never make use of. Good GPA boosters, however.
Personally, I know people come out of liberal arts schools with the ability to both do and think, but I see a lot of my fellow students learning how to think (or what to think, depending on degree) but not learning how to do anything practical with that knowledge. I avoided a lot of this by spending my lower-division time in another school that emphasized skills as well.
This is all reminding me one of my computer science teachers who knew theory to an amazing depth, yet needed help from a student when enabling video mirroring in MacOS X every few days in class. She taught MIPS assembler, too, but couldn't write a working program to save her life. Still, she was damn smart when it came to theory.
Re:How's this for a better idea
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Linux is fractured between two dominant desktop enviorments; which is hindering it's market penetration.
No, the fact that one company already held 90% of the market share when Linux became viable as a desktop OS is hindering its market share. If your average Linux distro was 100% compatible with MS-Windows XP, Microsoft would disappear.
So, therefore, why don't we merge gnome into kde so that we have one major desktop enviroment with two 'sub-desktops' (the original kde and gnome) that users can choose between?
There already is a common denominator, and that is pure X11 programs. Besides, I don't like one of those two desktop environments, and I'd rather use nothing than a combined monstrosity of a desktop. If I wanted that, I'd use Windows.
Don't be so quick to scoff, after emacs absorbed vi its' user base increased, and I think that with a little thought and planning the same could happen for linux, too.
Since when did emacs absorb the vi userbase? I use vi every day, and haven't used emacs for... 8 years maybe. Is this some sort of joke? Emacs is a bloated overbuilt editor that takes too damn long to start up. (If it takes longer than about a second, it's too long.)
My guess is that you are trying to reignite a KDE-vs-GNOME or VI-vs-EMACS flame war.
Re:Here's the idea of the year (NYT: hint hint nud
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FACT: websites with free content that force readers to surrender their details end up collecting garbage information, and also annoy said readers who end up reading some other website with similar content.
IDEA: uuh, like, stop the registration thing perhaps?
You seem to think that the content is free. You are mistaken.
Just because the currency isn't green or made of metal doesn't mean it isn't a payment. The NYT wants a payment for viewing their content. That payment is your personal information.
Re:I hope you're trying to be funny
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Letting techno-geeks rule the country is BAD. (Unfortunately, I include lawyers among that group; and they're the ones running things right now.) You want your country populated by people capable of seeing the big picture not just their little part of it. We need fewer people with employable skills and more people capable of actually thinking. It's a matter of training vs. education. I vote for more education and less trainable skills.
The problem is, you then have people that do too much thinking, and not enough 'doing.'
You've probably never been in charge of someone, given them a task to do, come back when it was supposed to be done and instead of seeing the result you get something that starts with this: "So I've been thinking about this..."
To which I reply with a simple "Do first, think later"... unless it is the third or so time, in which case I reply with "You're fired."
An utter crock. Do the math. Assume a mere 150 miles of track and only 10,000 passengers a day. One hundred fifty million to build and 200 thousand to operate daily, but the passenger only pays less than twenty thou total? Give a link or back down
Okay, actually I was being rather conservative... this document says the latest segment will only cost a mere $64 million dollars per mile: "... at $64 million per mile, the North Portland MAX will be very expensive to construct." Thankfully, the cost of operation per rider on that segment will only be $10 each, of which the rider will pay maybe 20-30%.
This article says that the MAX system in Portland costs ten times as much per rider than the bus. That means that on the more flexible bus system a $1 fare pays for the cost of the rider, assuming the $10 figure above is correct.
This article says: "Airport MAX This was a $125 million, 5.5-mile extension developed through an innovative public/private venture involving the Port of Portland, Tri-Met, the City of Portland, Portland Development Commission and Bechtel Enterprises. Bechtel contributed $28.2 million towards the $125 million project. It links Portland International Airport to the existing regional light rail system. The system was completed in late 2001." Note that this says $125 million for 5.5 miles. That would be around $20 million dollars per mile. The article also mentions several other projects with as high or higher cost per mile.
This document has more numbers to crunch. In 2005 it will cost $7.2 million to operate this 5-mile segment each year. They give a ridership forecast for 2020 (which may or may not be bullshit depending on the motives of the person making the forecast), and assuming the fare is $2.00 per boarding, it will bring in from fares $9,412,000. However, inflation and the trend of increasing costs to maintain government programs will have no doubt raised the operating cost of the segment to well beyond that by the time 2020 hits.
75 in a 55 might be completely acceptable if traffic is flowing at that speed and conditions are dry with good visibility. My parents taught me to drive with the flow of traffic on the highway whenever possible and safe - being the slowest one on the highway opens you up to more risks, like the risk of being rear-ended.
True, in fact in basic-rule states like mine if there is no posted speed 55 is the prima facie maximum speed, but if you aren't doing 75 with the traffic, you might be not be being "safe and prudent."
I was going to use this defense in court a couple years ago, but the cop never showed up, so I got an instant acquital.
Oh, and on a side note... I'd never ever subscribe to a service that reports my child's speed on the road to me. If I can get it, so can the government, the insurance company (like they don't penalize young drivers or the parents of young drivers already!) and anyone else with a mind to gain access.
A requirement to pass those skills on an annual basis (license renewal time?) would be HIGHLY beneficial, make our roads safer, and increase much needed revenue to the public transportation system.
1. Every five years makes a lot more sense. Under your plan, just imagine the future lines for license renewals.
2. I completely disagree with *any* part of vehicle licensing fees going to public transit. If they made riders of public transit pay for the exact cost of their trip, maybe cheaper and more effective public transit would be constructed.
Here, the light rail system in our major metropolitan area costs $1,000,000 US per mile to construct, and costs an average of $20 per rider to operate on a daily basis. Of that the riders pay less than 10 percent.
A more extensive bus system costs less to construct, less to operate, takes you closer to your destination in most cases, and can be adjusted in real-time for changing or special circumstances (try rerouting a train around a car accident on a crossing).
Besides, most of the cost of public transit in my city (a bus-only) is paid for by the riders and a modest tax on businesses (with justification that it will bring more business from people who can get there, but that's bullshit, especially if you don't have a storefront and also the fact that the vast majority of people who take the bus can't even afford a car, let alone spend more money shopping) and self-employed persons.
This is stupid. Here's why: What will the average parent do when they get an alert by phone that their child is 20mph over the speed limit?
They'll phone them.
No. If it is *my* child... depending on the speed my first phone call just might be the Department of Motor Vehicles, who are obligated to suspend a child's license at the request of their parents or legal guardians.
For 75 in a 55, I'd probably just ground them for a week.
The point that I am disputing is that it is the geographic distribution of population that answers for the difference between the US and Japan/Korea/Belgium. It must be something else as well.
I agree that there is something else or several somethings else. I think a lot of it is culture and there is also an amount of baby boomers (a large population group itself) and older people who do not have any use for the internet and broadband.
Case in point would be my father: He's never surfed the web or even sent an e-mail. Doesn't own a computer, either. My mom does all that. He does, however, have a 4dtv system, which makes cable and digital mini-dishes look like garbage, but that's his shining example of technology adoption. He prefers classic cars over computers any day.
I imagine that farmers out in the midwest probably have adopted digital satellite, but largely haven't made use of the internet or two-way broadband. I've never asked, but I should, next time I'm in the middle of nowhere.
Canada has a population even sparser and further spreadout yet it ranks above the USA and Japan in broadband adoption.
Yeah, but Canada also has 90% of its population amassed within 100 miles of its border with the United States. Aside from being a chief military concern of U.S. citizens like myself (kidding!), it means that most of Canada's population is in a band 100 miles wide and a few thousand miles long. In the United States there are a couple such bands along each coast, and the rest of the population is concentrated around pockets here and there. Much harder to plan infrastucture for.
Besides, some of us don't see much of a need for broadband. I'm don't have cable TV (jeeze people, get out of the house and darken up!), and still have 56K dial-up (which conveniently makes the internet more like a book and less like TV).
If I really need high-speed access, I walk down the street and get on one of the public access WiFi hotspots that are around here. This is usually only necessary when a new version of one of my favorite Linux distributions is released and I need the ISOs.
Maybe I'm off on this, but perhaps the vast majority of Americans have no use for things like portable PlayStations and other such toys.
The article also mentions investment in technological infrastructure and heavy subsidies to the tech industry. I won't get into subsidies here, but I can certainly get into infrastructure.
Infrastructure is easy to build in countries with high population density. The cost of the infrastructure per person served is low. This is why many European countries have wonderful rail systems and why countries like Japan have high-speed cell networks and high broadband penetration. The population density is higher, and the distance between major metropolitan areas is shorter.
Compare that to the United States. Here we have vast spaces of sparsely populated land. It is not very costworthy to put in cell towers in the middle of South Dakota, for instance, or deliver broadband to ranchers in the Salmon River valley in Idaho. Even if 100% of the people in the area served bought the service, it would be either too expensive for the customers or be a money-losing venture.
So, in the end, what we have are pockets of populations (urban and suburban areas) that actually do have access to all of the infrastructure needed by 'cool' gadgets. You then run into a cultural difference.
Personally, I don't have much of a need to carry video games with me wherever I go. I carry a Palm Zire 31, and I use it to keep my address book and calendar This is the only gadget I carry. I don't own a cell phone, and will avoid having one for as long as possible. I used to have a cell phone, but I quickly got rid of it once my contract expired.
I, for one, do not like being able to be contacted 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. "Just turn it off, you say?" Well, my option is better, and here is why: If you don't own a cell phone, everyone understands that and they don't actually get to pick up the phone and dial. They are never bothered by you not being at your home number. If you have a cell phone, on the other hand, and they dial you and get your voice mail, they are pissed off because they couldn't reach you. You have a cell phone, after all!
Then there is the matter of people just annoying the crap out of me with their cell phones. I am a slightly older (late 20s) college student. All these ill-mannered children (the freshman/sophomores) I have to go to school with leave their phones on in class, and some actually answer them in class. Furthermore, if their phone rings during an exam, I just want to strangle them. Oh, and there's nothing like trying to go to a nice restaurant with my wife, and having some moron on their cell phone in the next booth talking so loud that most of the other people in the restaurant understand what the conversation is about.
Oh, and there was the guy who took like 500 flash photos with his digital camera in a restaurant, from a table away with the flash aimed right in my direction. I almost went to jail that night...
All this has really made me relatively anti-gadget. Especially anti-phone gadget. Not that I don't own cool stuff. I have a digital camera, and a laptop computer, etc. I just don't need them on me all of the time.
Sorry if this sounds like a rant. Well, I guess it is, but I'm just trying to make the point that Japan is Japan, and here in America (and all you people who think that the United States and it's citizens who have been calling themselves 'America' and 'Americans' for hundreds of years should change because you can't make a contextual distinction can shove it...) we don't all necessarily want the gadgets, nor is it cost effective to provide for all of the United States to have the infrustructure for all of the fancy internet-enabled ultra-high resolution spy-camera radio communicator walkie-talkie GPS PDA cell phones.
Schwartz: Competing against a social movement we helped to found
Parent: Someone care to enlighten me (or Jon) how Sun helped to "found" the FSF ?
This is just a nitpick, but the FSF is a nonprofit corporation, not a social movement. Furthermore, the FSF isn't even entirely representative of everyone participating in said social movement. Not everyone who believes in free (as in speech) software likes Stallman or even necessarily the GPL.
Now, as far as the extent of Sun's contribution to said movement is concerned, you have a point.
1. Of, relating to, or resembling a digit, especially a finger.
2. Operated or done with the fingers: a digital switch.
3. Having digits.
4. Expressed in numerical form, especially for use by a computer.
5. Computer Science. Of or relating to a device that can read, write, or store information that is represented in numerical form. See Usage Note at virtual.
6. Using or giving a reading in digits: a digital clock.
Please see #6, and then go think about why you don't know the definitions of common words. It also seems that you can't be bothered to look them up.
Are you sure you are 'intelligent' by any sense of that word?
When you transfer to the new school, it should send a memo to your old school (since your new school will need to know where you've been in the past) a memo saying "J. Doe SSN 123-45-6789 has just enrolled at Alfa Better University. Please remove him from your dropout records and place into your transfer records. Thanks."
After a few years, it will all average out, and numbers will be much more accurate. No new people get your information, and schools will have better numbers to report to the feds.
On a side note, if you fill out a FAFSA the department of education has all the information they want to include in this database already.
(P.S.: Not all Republicans like this kind of shit, and those of us who don't are trying to convert the rest.)
And I find it hard to believe that someone making $18k is living in a $200k home...I think they'd end up with a lower taxable income from the mortage interest deduction, too.
Thanks to clever (asinine) land use planning, the price of housing is skyrocketing in Oregon.
You can buy a 3-bedroom double-wide trailer for about $120,000 not too far from my . The main reason I picked the $199,000 home is because it was easy to find the tax records for, though:). We do have fairly high property taxes here, though, even with constitutional limitations enacted by referendum a decade ago.
(If the income is that low compared to the assessment on the house, there might be homestead tax credits available.)
No such thing here.
You are right, my figure for the listed taxes may be a bit high, but there are dozens of other taxes and fees that are applied every day that I didn't account for.
but the allegations that typical middle-income taxpayers are paying 40-50% of their income in taxes are simply not true.
I imagine that depends on how you define 'typical'.
Slashdot Mirror
I'm using gAIM and mIRC, should I use the IRC feature of gAIM, rather than running two applications? The only thing that's keeping me from leaving mIRC is the fact that mIRC is so expandable with scripts and everything. Does IRC on gAIM support scripts and addons? Or should I stick with mIRC?
How about a third option? (This is a shameless plug, I've contributed code to the project I'm about to recommend.)
Try X-Chat for all your multi-platform IRC needs. It is highly expandable with plugins and scripts that can be written in python or perl.
The official Windows build is shareware (a decision I disagree with, but it's not my project), however, the source is GPLed and there are third-party Windows builds that are free.
The advantages of X-Chat?
* Open Source
* Not subject to mIRC vulnerabilities
* Not subject to mIRC script viruses
* Plugin interface
* Perl and Python scripting.
* No built-in trout-slap popup.
Is there a point to free Trillian anymore? I'm not knocking it (much..), I did use it once upon a time and tbh it was very good, nice eye candy too, but since finding GAIM I haven't looked back.
Well, I only use Windows on one machine, and I have Trillian installed. Why don't I use GAIM? Well, once upon a time, when I bought this laptop, I was looking for an IM client that supported the ICQ protocol (I use licq on my Linux boxen). I installed GAIM first, always going for the open source solution. It didn't work. Crashed. Nothing I could think of would make it load correctly.
Now, before you go saying PEBKAC, I'm well experienced in these matters and believe me, while there may have been an issue with the configuration of *my* particular system, it's just a bit odd that 99% of all other software I've tried works just fine, but GAIM is in the 1% that did not.
I installed Trillian after some hunting, and it worked great.
This ends up being the #1 reason I make all my software choices and stick by them (until something changes that really annoys me)... It's the reason I chose KDE over GNOME (GNOME crashed the first time I tried it back in... 1997 or 1998. Installed KDE and it worked right the first time.)
Until something happens with Trillian that makes me want to switch, or until GAIM has something that is so cool I can't stand to be without it, I'll stick with what's been working right. (And, while open source is plus, it is neither necessary nor sufficient for me to choose one product over another.)
Note, you don't have to "Join" the military to work for the military. I have a DoD civilian job. As a rule of thumb, it takes at least 3 months to get a clearance so you probably won't be able to obtain one unless you work at that facility for a while. Also, I've never seen temporaries (read interns) get a clearance.
Which is why it helps to already have one. (By having joined the military before going to college... all the GI Bill money and a clearance, too!) Of course, I waited so long to start school after I got discharged that my clearance will be expired by the time I'm ready to re-enter the workforce.
That's because you can't be take photos of imaginary girlfriends.
s/ be//; Damn! My written English sucks sometimes.
As another poster pointed out, I suppose you can *have* pictures of imaginary girlfriends (LINK IS NOT WORK SAFE), but *taking* them is an entirely different story...
Ahh, to be a photographer in the lesbian pr0n industry...
A privacy issue my g/f will care about. She hates having her photo taken!
That's because you can't be take photos of imaginary girlfriends...
You need to get one of these [Belkin Voice Recorder for iPod].
Okay, that's a pretty sweet attachment.
Now I just need the money for them both!
I just wished the iPod could replace my tape recorder in class when I want to tape the lecture.
My 128 MB flash MP3 player does this, however.
As a liberal arts graduate with a math degree, I can proudly say that I do both, generally in your preferred order unless I can incorporate the thinking into the doing without ditching too much efficiency.
It's nice to be in a field where the thinking results either in publications (if it is deep), some C/java code (if it is thorough) or a perl script to replace some future "doing" (if it's neither).
That's true, and I am also in a liberal arts school seeking a CIS degree (with minors in Math and Geology), but the needs and workings of the world economy don't support the idea that everyone should receive a liberal arts degree.
The chief problem I see with the liberal arts curriculum is that, for instance, my school doesn't touch anything with the word "engineering" in it. Thinking is one thing, being able to apply thought in a practical manner is another. I've also had to waste a lot of effort in art classes that I will never make use of. Good GPA boosters, however.
Personally, I know people come out of liberal arts schools with the ability to both do and think, but I see a lot of my fellow students learning how to think (or what to think, depending on degree) but not learning how to do anything practical with that knowledge. I avoided a lot of this by spending my lower-division time in another school that emphasized skills as well.
This is all reminding me one of my computer science teachers who knew theory to an amazing depth, yet needed help from a student when enabling video mirroring in MacOS X every few days in class. She taught MIPS assembler, too, but couldn't write a working program to save her life. Still, she was damn smart when it came to theory.
Linux is fractured between two dominant desktop enviorments; which is hindering it's market penetration.
No, the fact that one company already held 90% of the market share when Linux became viable as a desktop OS is hindering its market share. If your average Linux distro was 100% compatible with MS-Windows XP, Microsoft would disappear.
So, therefore, why don't we merge gnome into kde so that we have one major desktop enviroment with two 'sub-desktops' (the original kde and gnome) that users can choose between?
There already is a common denominator, and that is pure X11 programs. Besides, I don't like one of those two desktop environments, and I'd rather use nothing than a combined monstrosity of a desktop. If I wanted that, I'd use Windows.
Don't be so quick to scoff, after emacs absorbed vi its' user base increased, and I think that with a little thought and planning the same could happen for linux, too.
Since when did emacs absorb the vi userbase? I use vi every day, and haven't used emacs for... 8 years maybe. Is this some sort of joke? Emacs is a bloated overbuilt editor that takes too damn long to start up. (If it takes longer than about a second, it's too long.)
My guess is that you are trying to reignite a KDE-vs-GNOME or VI-vs-EMACS flame war.
FACT: websites with free content that force readers to surrender their details end up collecting garbage information, and also annoy said readers who end up reading some other website with similar content.
IDEA: uuh, like, stop the registration thing perhaps?
You seem to think that the content is free. You are mistaken.
Just because the currency isn't green or made of metal doesn't mean it isn't a payment. The NYT wants a payment for viewing their content. That payment is your personal information.
Letting techno-geeks rule the country is BAD. (Unfortunately, I include lawyers among that group; and they're the ones running things right now.) You want your country populated by people capable of seeing the big picture not just their little part of it. We need fewer people with employable skills and more people capable of actually thinking. It's a matter of training vs. education. I vote for more education and less trainable skills.
..."
... unless it is the third or so time, in which case I reply with "You're fired."
The problem is, you then have people that do too much thinking, and not enough 'doing.'
You've probably never been in charge of someone, given them a task to do, come back when it was supposed to be done and instead of seeing the result you get something that starts with this: "So I've been thinking about this
To which I reply with a simple "Do first, think later"
An utter crock. Do the math. Assume a mere 150 miles of track and only 10,000 passengers a day. One hundred fifty million to build and 200 thousand to operate daily, but the passenger only pays less than twenty thou total? Give a link or back down
Okay, actually I was being rather conservative... this document says the latest segment will only cost a mere $64 million dollars per mile: "... at $64 million per mile, the North Portland MAX will be very expensive to construct." Thankfully, the cost of operation per rider on that segment will only be $10 each, of which the rider will pay maybe 20-30%.
This article says that the MAX system in Portland costs ten times as much per rider than the bus. That means that on the more flexible bus system a $1 fare pays for the cost of the rider, assuming the $10 figure above is correct.
This article says: "Airport MAX This was a $125 million, 5.5-mile extension developed through an innovative public/private venture involving the Port of Portland, Tri-Met, the City of Portland, Portland Development Commission and Bechtel Enterprises. Bechtel contributed $28.2 million towards the $125 million project. It links Portland International Airport to the existing regional light rail system. The system was completed in late 2001." Note that this says $125 million for 5.5 miles. That would be around $20 million dollars per mile. The article also mentions several other projects with as high or higher cost per mile.
This document has more numbers to crunch. In 2005 it will cost $7.2 million to operate this 5-mile segment each year. They give a ridership forecast for 2020 (which may or may not be bullshit depending on the motives of the person making the forecast), and assuming the fare is $2.00 per boarding, it will bring in from fares $9,412,000. However, inflation and the trend of increasing costs to maintain government programs will have no doubt raised the operating cost of the segment to well beyond that by the time 2020 hits.
75 in a 55 might be completely acceptable if traffic is flowing at that speed and conditions are dry with good visibility. My parents taught me to drive with the flow of traffic on the highway whenever possible and safe - being the slowest one on the highway opens you up to more risks, like the risk of being rear-ended.
True, in fact in basic-rule states like mine if there is no posted speed 55 is the prima facie maximum speed, but if you aren't doing 75 with the traffic, you might be not be being "safe and prudent."
I was going to use this defense in court a couple years ago, but the cop never showed up, so I got an instant acquital.
Oh, and on a side note... I'd never ever subscribe to a service that reports my child's speed on the road to me. If I can get it, so can the government, the insurance company (like they don't penalize young drivers or the parents of young drivers already!) and anyone else with a mind to gain access.
Arnie in Cali already wants to use some GPS tech to track how far people drive and tax them accordingly (why isn't a gas tax better??).
You think they are going to get rid of the gas tax because they implement this per-mile tax?
Please come back to reality. You have way too much faith in government as it is.
A requirement to pass those skills on an annual basis (license renewal time?) would be HIGHLY beneficial, make our roads safer, and increase much needed revenue to the public transportation system.
1. Every five years makes a lot more sense. Under your plan, just imagine the future lines for license renewals.
2. I completely disagree with *any* part of vehicle licensing fees going to public transit. If they made riders of public transit pay for the exact cost of their trip, maybe cheaper and more effective public transit would be constructed.
Here, the light rail system in our major metropolitan area costs $1,000,000 US per mile to construct, and costs an average of $20 per rider to operate on a daily basis. Of that the riders pay less than 10 percent.
A more extensive bus system costs less to construct, less to operate, takes you closer to your destination in most cases, and can be adjusted in real-time for changing or special circumstances (try rerouting a train around a car accident on a crossing).
Besides, most of the cost of public transit in my city (a bus-only) is paid for by the riders and a modest tax on businesses (with justification that it will bring more business from people who can get there, but that's bullshit, especially if you don't have a storefront and also the fact that the vast majority of people who take the bus can't even afford a car, let alone spend more money shopping) and self-employed persons.
This is stupid. Here's why: What will the average parent do when they get an alert by phone that their child is 20mph over the speed limit?
They'll phone them.
No. If it is *my* child... depending on the speed my first phone call just might be the Department of Motor Vehicles, who are obligated to suspend a child's license at the request of their parents or legal guardians.
For 75 in a 55, I'd probably just ground them for a week.
I don't know what's more embarrassing. To be caught going 100mph on the hightway or 0mph in the backseat in some empty supermarket parking lot.
You read Slashdot. You wouldn't know!
The point that I am disputing is that it is the geographic distribution of population that answers for the difference between the US and Japan/Korea/Belgium. It must be something else as well.
I agree that there is something else or several somethings else. I think a lot of it is culture and there is also an amount of baby boomers (a large population group itself) and older people who do not have any use for the internet and broadband.
Case in point would be my father: He's never surfed the web or even sent an e-mail. Doesn't own a computer, either. My mom does all that. He does, however, have a 4dtv system, which makes cable and digital mini-dishes look like garbage, but that's his shining example of technology adoption. He prefers classic cars over computers any day.
I imagine that farmers out in the midwest probably have adopted digital satellite, but largely haven't made use of the internet or two-way broadband. I've never asked, but I should, next time I'm in the middle of nowhere.
Canada has a population even sparser and further spreadout yet it ranks above the USA and Japan in broadband adoption.
Yeah, but Canada also has 90% of its population amassed within 100 miles of its border with the United States. Aside from being a chief military concern of U.S. citizens like myself (kidding!), it means that most of Canada's population is in a band 100 miles wide and a few thousand miles long. In the United States there are a couple such bands along each coast, and the rest of the population is concentrated around pockets here and there. Much harder to plan infrastucture for.
Besides, some of us don't see much of a need for broadband. I'm don't have cable TV (jeeze people, get out of the house and darken up!), and still have 56K dial-up (which conveniently makes the internet more like a book and less like TV).
If I really need high-speed access, I walk down the street and get on one of the public access WiFi hotspots that are around here. This is usually only necessary when a new version of one of my favorite Linux distributions is released and I need the ISOs.
Maybe I'm off on this, but perhaps the vast majority of Americans have no use for things like portable PlayStations and other such toys.
The article also mentions investment in technological infrastructure and heavy subsidies to the tech industry. I won't get into subsidies here, but I can certainly get into infrastructure.
Infrastructure is easy to build in countries with high population density. The cost of the infrastructure per person served is low. This is why many European countries have wonderful rail systems and why countries like Japan have high-speed cell networks and high broadband penetration. The population density is higher, and the distance between major metropolitan areas is shorter.
Compare that to the United States. Here we have vast spaces of sparsely populated land. It is not very costworthy to put in cell towers in the middle of South Dakota, for instance, or deliver broadband to ranchers in the Salmon River valley in Idaho. Even if 100% of the people in the area served bought the service, it would be either too expensive for the customers or be a money-losing venture.
So, in the end, what we have are pockets of populations (urban and suburban areas) that actually do have access to all of the infrastructure needed by 'cool' gadgets. You then run into a cultural difference.
Personally, I don't have much of a need to carry video games with me wherever I go. I carry a Palm Zire 31, and I use it to keep my address book and calendar This is the only gadget I carry. I don't own a cell phone, and will avoid having one for as long as possible. I used to have a cell phone, but I quickly got rid of it once my contract expired.
I, for one, do not like being able to be contacted 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. "Just turn it off, you say?" Well, my option is better, and here is why: If you don't own a cell phone, everyone understands that and they don't actually get to pick up the phone and dial. They are never bothered by you not being at your home number. If you have a cell phone, on the other hand, and they dial you and get your voice mail, they are pissed off because they couldn't reach you. You have a cell phone, after all!
Then there is the matter of people just annoying the crap out of me with their cell phones. I am a slightly older (late 20s) college student. All these ill-mannered children (the freshman/sophomores) I have to go to school with leave their phones on in class, and some actually answer them in class. Furthermore, if their phone rings during an exam, I just want to strangle them. Oh, and there's nothing like trying to go to a nice restaurant with my wife, and having some moron on their cell phone in the next booth talking so loud that most of the other people in the restaurant understand what the conversation is about.
Oh, and there was the guy who took like 500 flash photos with his digital camera in a restaurant, from a table away with the flash aimed right in my direction. I almost went to jail that night...
All this has really made me relatively anti-gadget. Especially anti-phone gadget. Not that I don't own cool stuff. I have a digital camera, and a laptop computer, etc. I just don't need them on me all of the time.
Sorry if this sounds like a rant. Well, I guess it is, but I'm just trying to make the point that Japan is Japan, and here in America (and all you people who think that the United States and it's citizens who have been calling themselves 'America' and 'Americans' for hundreds of years should change because you can't make a contextual distinction can shove it...) we don't all necessarily want the gadgets, nor is it cost effective to provide for all of the United States to have the infrustructure for all of the fancy internet-enabled ultra-high resolution spy-camera radio communicator walkie-talkie GPS PDA cell phones.
Schwartz: Competing against a social movement we helped to found
Parent: Someone care to enlighten me (or Jon) how Sun helped to "found" the FSF ?
This is just a nitpick, but the FSF is a nonprofit corporation, not a social movement. Furthermore, the FSF isn't even entirely representative of everyone participating in said social movement. Not everyone who believes in free (as in speech) software likes Stallman or even necessarily the GPL.
Now, as far as the extent of Sun's contribution to said movement is concerned, you have a point.
That's not a digital clock in any sense of the word.
What high school did you graduate from? Obviously they weren't doing their job.
From dictionary.reference.com:
digital
1. Of, relating to, or resembling a digit, especially a finger.
2. Operated or done with the fingers: a digital switch.
3. Having digits.
4. Expressed in numerical form, especially for use by a computer.
5. Computer Science. Of or relating to a device that can read, write, or store information that is represented in numerical form. See Usage Note at virtual.
6. Using or giving a reading in digits: a digital clock.
Please see #6, and then go think about why you don't know the definitions of common words. It also seems that you can't be bothered to look them up.
Are you sure you are 'intelligent' by any sense of that word?
(Sorry, I couldn't resist...)
When you transfer to the new school, it should send a memo to your old school (since your new school will need to know where you've been in the past) a memo saying "J. Doe SSN 123-45-6789 has just enrolled at Alfa Better University. Please remove him from your dropout records and place into your transfer records. Thanks."
After a few years, it will all average out, and numbers will be much more accurate. No new people get your information, and schools will have better numbers to report to the feds.
On a side note, if you fill out a FAFSA the department of education has all the information they want to include in this database already.
(P.S.: Not all Republicans like this kind of shit, and those of us who don't are trying to convert the rest.)
And I find it hard to believe that someone making $18k is living in a $200k home...I think they'd end up with a lower taxable income from the mortage interest deduction, too.
:). We do have fairly high property taxes here, though, even with constitutional limitations enacted by referendum a decade ago.
Thanks to clever (asinine) land use planning, the price of housing is skyrocketing in Oregon.
You can buy a 3-bedroom double-wide trailer for about $120,000 not too far from my . The main reason I picked the $199,000 home is because it was easy to find the tax records for, though
(If the income is that low compared to the assessment on the house, there might be homestead tax credits available.)
No such thing here.
You are right, my figure for the listed taxes may be a bit high, but there are dozens of other taxes and fees that are applied every day that I didn't account for.
but the allegations that typical middle-income taxpayers are paying 40-50% of their income in taxes are simply not true.
I imagine that depends on how you define 'typical'.
Oregon doesn't have an income tax (most places in Oregon don't, anyway.)
Damnit, I meant sales tax. Bah.