Meanwhile, robots don't have these disadvantages, and are becoming increasingly capable of doing anything we might want to do up in space.
Except for anything outside of their programming or equipment capabilities. If androids are developed, that's a different story. Until then, the robotic exploration is great and useful, but there are many things we won't be able to find out until actual ugly-bags-of-mostly-water learn how to get around, survive under harsh conditions that would normally kill them, and operate in new places.
But the USA persuaded all these countries to put their chips in with the US effort and build an international space station.
And that was a mistake--monoculture, single points of failure, eggs in one basket and all.
If the USA cancels the shuttle (which is the only possible vehicle with which to finish the space station), the rest of the world will have spent two decades and billions of rubles/yen/euros in vain.
I have the sick feeling that will happen anyway, continued shuttle missions or not. The more I learn about the development of space programs in the past couple of decades (your post included), the more I come to think that a lot of resources have been spent on complicated, bold promises with no flexibility or alternative plans, a recipe for disaster.
When you make a promise, stick with it.
Or admit you can't come through and take responsibility for the consequences. I hate saying it, but this might be exactly what needs to happen for space travel to move beyond Big Prestige Projects that have turned into money pits. Actually, I wouldn't mind seeing China, Europe, and Japan collaborating without the US or Russia for a while--let space travel diversify while the old-timers retool, rebuild, or get out and leave it to new generations and teams.
So one disaster should cause a national halt on space travel indefinitely?
This is two disasters now, in a horribly expensive program (far, far more expensive than originally planned) that now goes nowhere other than a space station of currently dubious utility. The space shuttle was supposed to be relatively cheap, reliable, versatile, and used far more frequently than it is now. The shuttle program is showing its age. Note that I didn't call for a halt to all space travel, only that the time be taken to put an old workhorse to rest, and to develop a new system without some of the political crap that burdened the predecessor. I want to be excited about people going into space again (ISS residents aside). The numerous robotic Mars missions currenlty in progress are exciting. Cassini is exciting. The New Horizons mission is exciting. SMART-1 is exciting. These programs are discovering new things, built on ever-newer technologies and techniques. Why can't NASA put that much energy into developing new human space travel systems? (Another semi-rhetorical question; I understand budgetary problems, but that's a whole other kettle of fish you don't want me to delve into. Trust me.)
I think 2 years is a good time to rest, reflect on what happened and try again and show the world we can get back up on our feet and try again. We all get knocked down, but the important thing is that we get back up and try again.
Piffle. Dreams are great. Dreams built on obsolete frameworks need to be moved to new, better frameworks, or they will go no farther. The shuttle has had its run. Why is there a reluctance to do something new? This, incidentally, is precisely the mindset I was complaining about in my post; the bizarre sense that if NASA stops spaceflight to develop something new, it will never happen again OH MY GOD WE HAVE TO DO THIS NO MATTER WHAT!!!
Come on. Human space travel won't be perfectly safe; I know this. That doesn't mean bulling through on an old transport that has seen better days and is now limited to, effectively, one destination, until it's finally put to rest anyway. Mothball the shuttle program, take that money, brainpower, and time, and put it toward something new and revolutionary.
Why is NASA even bothering with shuttle launches at this point? Shouldn't the Columbia disaster have been taken as a sign that the spaceflight program needed a complete overhaul?
Sometimes, I wonder if NASA support for other human spaceflight and heavy-lift systems stagnated due to some bizarre political desire to fling the Shuttle into orbit, regardless of the cost. I almost get the sense that bureaucrats are afraid 99% of humanity would forget about outer space, never mind human exploration, if NASA stopped for a few years to put some time and resources into developing something better?
That's why you don't rely on a single power source. AFAIK, we don't do that now in the US or Canada. I can't speak for other parts of the world.
There are a lot of rooftops that can be used for panel installations--and if that solar paint pans out, sweet.
Wind generators are quiet, look kinda neat, and can be set up to scare off birds with scarecrows. Again, you can't rely on it everywhere--but that goes for everything, least of all sources that require mining for fuel and either particulate/gaseous exhaust, or waste products that shouldn't go near biological habitats for, oh, a few thousand years. That includes the reactors that will ultimately have to be decommissioned and replaced.
Then there's the biggie--drastically reducing individual consumption and increasing the efficiency of what energy usage remains. What a concept. Unfortunately, I don't see this last one taking off short of a catastrophe (or a simple reduction in remaining supply) that would make fossil fuel sources unavailable and nuclear or renewable systems unusuable or too minimal to make available in short order.
Hey, no one said this shit would be easy, but I think such changes will be necessary to ensure the viability of widespread human, and even animal and plant habitation on the surface and in the seas of this rock.
People opposed to the Bush victory in 2000 claim that ChoicePoint may have aided in voter disenfranchisement.
*This is not an endorsement of the linked site or the opinions expressed there. I just recall these claims from a Slashdot submission I made a couple years ago related to this.
And they can do this because they have a monopoly on force, granted by tradition, inertia, and acquiescence. People who refuse to pay taxes can be coerced to by individuals in power through leverage of that force--hence, the term "extortion". If they didn't have that monopoly on force, government would have to be funded voluntarily, right?
I think you'd be amazed what people will voluntarily fund, given the chance and a lack of pressing needs.
Don't misunderstand me--I recognize the necessity of services that everyone covers a part of. I live in Canada, for cryin' out loud; my taxes cover the health care system that I've had to use from time to time, and that's one thing I will gladly fund, even knowing that I may never make use of it again. Someone else might desperately need it and not have the funds. I just try to be realistic about what takes place in a society, since I think doing that might lead me to develop better ways of existence. Those same tax dollars that fund useful services, and could go to fund even more services, are just as likely to end up socializing some private entity's costs or funding someone's military misadventure. The government running the country I live in, for example, blew hundreds of millions on busted submarines that are still out of service. Great use of tax dollars, geniuses.
We really do need to develop stronger communities, which I think can only be truly done by trashing the power hierarchies built through Machiavellian activities and accepted by quiet submission. Then, I think we will start to see wonderful things happen. Shiny things are not necessarily the pinnacle of existence.
I believe that any company that is too ignorant to install protections on their systems, or too stupid to find someone to do it for them, deserves to lose their money.
Hardware, maintenance, and setup costs money, which was probably figured into this amount (having not RTFA, natch). Last I heard, unless you find a volunteer and some discarded/donated hardware, those things aren't free.
A town in essence is a group of people who have gotten together because it's in their best interests to consolidate their efforts to make the best use of resources (ie roads, schools). If this group of people begins to see the benefits of locally-provided high speed access (albeit wireless) and votes on it, why shouldn't they be free to exercise their will and implement such a plan
If your hypothetical town were organized along decentralized, anarchist lines, as your description seems to imply, you would be absolutely correct. Hell, I would love to see this happen. I think the residents of that town/city would develop a stronger sense of involvement and connection to the place they live and they people they live with, even stronger than the proverbial small rural town.
However, in this case you're dealing with a community run by a few individuals with authority to extort funding from the population in the form of taxes*. Elected or not, the town as a whole isn't making these decisions. The centralized power structure is making them. Under the prevailing attitude toward politics and economics that exists in the US, these centralized authorities are considered to be inefficient allocators of resources, entities that should be limited to providing physical security and defence of control over property. To counteract this attitude, which is somewhat based on false assumptions and selective reality, you would have to successfully argue that the town government can provide the service better than a private entity without making use of its power to extort funding from individuals who do not wish to make use of the system, while playing within its own rules, with no bias in regulation or enforcement of laws. Even then, there are people--some of them influential--who oppose any activity by a government that might present an opportunity for private profit.
* Of course, recall that the colonists back in the late 1700s weren't entirely opposed to taxes, only being taxed without complementary agency. Extreme capitalists and tax protesters may want to remember this; if you don't think you're being represented properly, there are avenues of redress in the system you claim to uphold.
I'm sure thinking "VIIV" == "64" is neat and all, but isn't sixty-four LXIV?
I know, I know--doesn't look as symmetrical or "cool". Doesn't Intel look dumb enough these days without putting together nonsensical combinations of letters for marketing purposes and trying to pass it off as intellectually hip or something?
Because the snarky comment at the end was a blatant piece of flamebait which cheapened the act that is the supposed subject of the posting. It was completely unnecessary, meant to provoke the kind of negative reaction that some posters have unfortunately expressed, playing a pointless game of scoreboard or "but he's richer!" and getting caught up in someone else's little game of worthiness.
I'm sure you wouldn't have cared if it were a Linux story bashing MS - there's been tons of those on the/. frontpage, yet I haven't seen you decry any of them the same way you did this story.
That's because I'm not in front of the computer 24/7, ready to comment on Slashdot's increasingly poor postings on a regular basis. Holy crap, I have a life away from the computer--shock and surprise. Less of that computer time has been spent at Slashdot due to the increasingly poor quality of articles being posted, many of which seem little better than press releases for various products or blatant attempts to stoke controversy for no necessary reason, perhaps to increase ad hits. The blatant Linux advocacy and knee-jerk bashing of anything else has gotten on my nerves--and I'm a FOSS-using anarchist freak! I just can't stand having a viewpoint metaphorically bashed over my head over and over. I blocked michael's postings for this reason, set another site as my homepage, and visit/. less often than I used to.
Normally, a trollicious comment like yours wouldn't even merit comment, but in this particular case, I can't allow your accusations to stand unchallenged.
It is probably the wording of the story that will cause this.
If I had mod points, I'd mod you up.
If we could moderate stories, I would have voted this one down. The act itself is worthy of praise, especially contrasted with Gates' business tactics. The submitter had no reason to insert those last two statements except to provoke negative comments. The "Linux Community" will have a helluva time being able to donate $750 million to people who desperately need some form of necessity, because many (most? almost all?) members of that community don't have anything close to the available cash or equivalents that Gates has at his fingertips.
"Do the ends justify the means?" Fuck no, and shame on the submitter for even turning this into a dicksize contest and inserting controversy where none should be needed. Gates' generosity does not justify his company's monopolistic tactics aimed at wiping out healthy competition (as a believer in the free market might say). I can donate $25 towards the purchase of necessary vaccines, and that in itself is a good act. Does the amount of money involved make the means any more or less justifiable? What is the metric for justifying the means?
Turn off the machine, put on some shoes and clean clothes, and go outside for a while. Get away from the wiz-bang graphics and fantastic worlds and 3D high-intensity white-knuckle action, find a nice park bench or bookstore, and relax. Look around. Get in touch with reality, instead of projecting the fantasies you've immersed yourself in on reality.
Based on Taco's post up there, I think he has reason to be concerned. Lay off the stimulants. Get away from Slashdot and ad revenues and shit for a while. Beg Kathleen to take him away from all the digital shit for a few days. Hell, maybe stick the game consoles in a closet for a month or two, delete the games from the hard drive(s), and only deal with the computer for the necessary work. I think he'll come back a healthier person. Hell, it would be good for any Slashdotter to find a greenspace or quiet spot, away from the flashing lights and flickering screens, to reconnect with the outside world and get away from the immersive fantasy.
After each take, the tape would have to be rewound, either to the top of the track or to the punch point. It was an enforced pause, a chance to let your ears cool off for a few seconds or a minute, maybe take a sip of coffee or beer. I'm not the only engineer who missed this.
From what little I've gathered in my extremely limited experience, this is something of a personality thing these days. If the engineer and talent are in a relaxed mood, those breaks will happen anyway, even if a long-distance phone patch is racking up charges. I don't know how common that is outside music studios and some commercial, voiceover-oriented operations, but I know this still exists, thankfully.
Of course, nowadays we have hard drives and we all know that they never ever fail.
Funny, but this business about the slow disappearance of sources for raw analog stock makes me think of the internship I just finished at a rather large player in film post services, where the people who worry about these things are wondering where they'll be able to find 9 and 18GB removable hard drives soon, since these things do eventually fail.
Part of me wonders whether our rate of technological development is increasing so fast that there's barely enough time to make use of a recently established technology before it becomes obsolete and hard to find spare parts for.
Splicing: okay, I'll readily admit that in the early '90s Digidesign Sound Designer made me hang up my razor blade and splicing block forever, but it was a hell of a useful skill at the time.
Indeed, up until 2000, the very first thing taught in the university course I took was how to splice analog tape. The first couple of projects completely relied upon analog tape; you didn't even get to touch the (crappy) multitrack software until second semester of the first year. I'm almost positive this has been excised now in favour of getting the first-years into the digital realm as quickly as possible, but give me a grease pencil, a razor blade, and a block, and I could probably knock enough rust off those skills to chop together a passable 30-second spot.
Without a standard multi-track digital audio format that works across platforms and software packages, one that can be perpetuated for decades, musicians, producers, and record labels will find themselves in the same conundrum. Remember that a tape recorded on an Ampex deck will (theoretically) work on a Studer, an MCI, a Tascam, or an Otari.
Indeed, isn't this the same argument presented for open protocols and data formats whenever someone posts an Ask Slashdot about converting one closed, proprietary data format to another? Even the de facto software's session files change format, and that business with the hard disk recorders a couple sections back rears its ugly head here as well, where it will only properly read sessions created by an older version of the software.
This is one of those things all the software manufacturers and audio gurus may want to start hammering out a spec for, now. Hell, don't even limit this to multitrack audio; just figure out a standard for the next-generation audio encoding and transport--whether or not it just builds on existing stuff--and give everyone enough lead time to ensure compatibility or upgradability. The children of PCM won't last forever, and from what I understand, doing something in Direct Stream Digital requires a completely new, Sony-proprietary digital infrastructure, from the console to the recorder. If DSD somehow spreads to a non-SACD advanced format that hits big, or something else that needs all new equipment comes along, there will be chaos, because we all know how every company uses one standard connection type, data encoding, and software format... *sigh*
On a completely OT, selfish note, if you know anyone in the Toronto area willing to take on a coffee boy who wants to get some hands-on experience in any kind of sound production work, I'll work for cold water and a bag of peanuts.
1950 DA previously had the highest calculated chance of impact--about a 1 in 300 chance in 2880. It had the previous highest rating on the Palermo Scale, 0.17. Although it's a larger rock, its chances of smacking into our homeworld are still lower than 2004 MN4, which ranks about 1.03 on the scale. To get some idea of what these numbers mean, here's a quickie overview from the fine eggheads at JPL. Short version if I understand it correctly: it measures the odds of impact compared to the background level odds of a random hit from an undetected object of similar characteristics.
Yep, the news media should have gobs of fun with this on Monday.
Over lunch one day, he told me that there are at least five "global Internets" that he knows of.. and how the govt gave the worst one to the public to play with.
Off the top of my head, would SIPRNET be one of the global networks he was referring to?
I can't think of any other networks that might qualify as a global network worth noting these days. Internet2 seems to be mostly an experimental system at this point, and I have no clue what happened to the Mbone or 6bone. I wonder what the other networks are, and who controls them...
Interesting security measure, using actual knowledge of the credit history rather than just a personal question, something that can be guessed or even researched.
What happens if one of the security questions is based on erroneous information?
He says if consumers wanted more features, they'd tell Microsoft, using the example of tabbed browsing.
Really? I didn't know Microsoft had an open bug database where users can submit Requests for Enhancements, or that users could get in touch with an active user community with access to the source code!
Hey, now that the (s)election is over, the counting continues, and the FSCKING CAMPAIGN ADS are gone for another couple of years, can the editors expand the focus of the Politics section to events around the rest of the world? Barring that, can it be shelved? There's a whole world of political shenanigans outside the US, but I don't want to see/. become just another politics site with some geeky entertainment/tech stuff thrown in.
For that matter, can the editors come to some kind of consensus regarding when and if the Your Rights Online section is appropriate for a particular article? Some of the stuff that appeared in YRO over the past few months would fit better in Politics, while some items had no place in any section aside from the general mish-mash.
I know, I know--"you can hide a category if you don't like it". My problem is not that I'm completely fed up with the articles in a category, like some are with the SCO stuff, but that I think certain categories can be made better through some judicious, minor effort on the part of Taco and crew. Expand or dump Politics, tighten up the definition of YRO.
I'd also say "dump a certain editor whose name starts with an 'm' since he's one unrequested front-page comment away from making me hide all of his posts", but that's probably asking too much:-). However, That Editor Who Shall Remain Unnamed does manage to grate on me, even when I might possibly agree with his POV.
I think I just convinced myself to go through with The Banishing.
(this will get modded down as offtopic, but I have karma to spare, so nyahhhh!:P )
In the event of a decisive, relatively clean Kerry win, will there be discussion of "Kerry Republicans"? I'm aware of one who went home specifically to vote against Bush, despite normally leaning Republican, and from what I gather, the same goes for many small-c conservatives who generally vote Republican.
What other memes/phrases/future forbidden terms will come out of tomorrow's fiasco?
Despite the inherent liberal bias of the "New York Times", the "Times" correctly asserts that all voting machines should leave a paper trail.
Could you take a moment to explain how the Times' "inherent liberal bias" affects in any way the legitimacy of its assertion that all voting machines should have some kind of physical verification system? What does liberal, conservative, communist, anarchist, or capitalist bias have to do with the legitimacy of voting methods (my own views on mass electoral systems aside)?
Slashdot Mirror
Meanwhile, robots don't have these disadvantages, and are becoming increasingly capable of doing anything we might want to do up in space.
Except for anything outside of their programming or equipment capabilities. If androids are developed, that's a different story. Until then, the robotic exploration is great and useful, but there are many things we won't be able to find out until actual ugly-bags-of-mostly-water learn how to get around, survive under harsh conditions that would normally kill them, and operate in new places.
But the USA persuaded all these countries to put their chips in with the US effort and build an international space station.
And that was a mistake--monoculture, single points of failure, eggs in one basket and all.
If the USA cancels the shuttle (which is the only possible vehicle with which to finish the space station), the rest of the world will have spent two decades and billions of rubles/yen/euros in vain.
I have the sick feeling that will happen anyway, continued shuttle missions or not. The more I learn about the development of space programs in the past couple of decades (your post included), the more I come to think that a lot of resources have been spent on complicated, bold promises with no flexibility or alternative plans, a recipe for disaster.
When you make a promise, stick with it.
Or admit you can't come through and take responsibility for the consequences. I hate saying it, but this might be exactly what needs to happen for space travel to move beyond Big Prestige Projects that have turned into money pits. Actually, I wouldn't mind seeing China, Europe, and Japan collaborating without the US or Russia for a while--let space travel diversify while the old-timers retool, rebuild, or get out and leave it to new generations and teams.
So one disaster should cause a national halt on space travel indefinitely?
This is two disasters now, in a horribly expensive program (far, far more expensive than originally planned) that now goes nowhere other than a space station of currently dubious utility. The space shuttle was supposed to be relatively cheap, reliable, versatile, and used far more frequently than it is now. The shuttle program is showing its age. Note that I didn't call for a halt to all space travel, only that the time be taken to put an old workhorse to rest, and to develop a new system without some of the political crap that burdened the predecessor. I want to be excited about people going into space again (ISS residents aside). The numerous robotic Mars missions currenlty in progress are exciting. Cassini is exciting. The New Horizons mission is exciting. SMART-1 is exciting. These programs are discovering new things, built on ever-newer technologies and techniques. Why can't NASA put that much energy into developing new human space travel systems? (Another semi-rhetorical question; I understand budgetary problems, but that's a whole other kettle of fish you don't want me to delve into. Trust me.)
I think 2 years is a good time to rest, reflect on what happened and try again and show the world we can get back up on our feet and try again. We all get knocked down, but the important thing is that we get back up and try again.
Piffle. Dreams are great. Dreams built on obsolete frameworks need to be moved to new, better frameworks, or they will go no farther. The shuttle has had its run. Why is there a reluctance to do something new? This, incidentally, is precisely the mindset I was complaining about in my post; the bizarre sense that if NASA stops spaceflight to develop something new, it will never happen again OH MY GOD WE HAVE TO DO THIS NO MATTER WHAT!!!
Come on. Human space travel won't be perfectly safe; I know this. That doesn't mean bulling through on an old transport that has seen better days and is now limited to, effectively, one destination, until it's finally put to rest anyway. Mothball the shuttle program, take that money, brainpower, and time, and put it toward something new and revolutionary.
Semi-rhetorical question:
Why is NASA even bothering with shuttle launches at this point? Shouldn't the Columbia disaster have been taken as a sign that the spaceflight program needed a complete overhaul?
Sometimes, I wonder if NASA support for other human spaceflight and heavy-lift systems stagnated due to some bizarre political desire to fling the Shuttle into orbit, regardless of the cost. I almost get the sense that bureaucrats are afraid 99% of humanity would forget about outer space, never mind human exploration, if NASA stopped for a few years to put some time and resources into developing something better?
Some guy I heard about on the internets.
That's why you don't rely on a single power source. AFAIK, we don't do that now in the US or Canada. I can't speak for other parts of the world.
There are a lot of rooftops that can be used for panel installations--and if that solar paint pans out, sweet.
Wind generators are quiet, look kinda neat, and can be set up to scare off birds with scarecrows. Again, you can't rely on it everywhere--but that goes for everything, least of all sources that require mining for fuel and either particulate/gaseous exhaust, or waste products that shouldn't go near biological habitats for, oh, a few thousand years. That includes the reactors that will ultimately have to be decommissioned and replaced.
Then there's the biggie--drastically reducing individual consumption and increasing the efficiency of what energy usage remains. What a concept. Unfortunately, I don't see this last one taking off short of a catastrophe (or a simple reduction in remaining supply) that would make fossil fuel sources unavailable and nuclear or renewable systems unusuable or too minimal to make available in short order.
Hey, no one said this shit would be easy, but I think such changes will be necessary to ensure the viability of widespread human, and even animal and plant habitation on the surface and in the seas of this rock.
People opposed to the Bush victory in 2000 claim that ChoicePoint may have aided in voter disenfranchisement.
*This is not an endorsement of the linked site or the opinions expressed there. I just recall these claims from a Slashdot submission I made a couple years ago related to this.
...require extraordinary evidence.
I'm keeping my mind open (hey, it's a big universe out there), held together by a healthy dose of skepticism and intellectual honesty.
My first thought, upon reading the RedNova article, was to wonder what the article didn't say. Am I the only one who found it rather credulous?
Maybe this is legit, but I won't be rushing out to buy a random number generator to go along with my astrology charts and I Ching anytime soon.;)
One word:
Fallback.
governments can levy "taxes".
And they can do this because they have a monopoly on force, granted by tradition, inertia, and acquiescence. People who refuse to pay taxes can be coerced to by individuals in power through leverage of that force--hence, the term "extortion". If they didn't have that monopoly on force, government would have to be funded voluntarily, right?
I think you'd be amazed what people will voluntarily fund, given the chance and a lack of pressing needs.
Don't misunderstand me--I recognize the necessity of services that everyone covers a part of. I live in Canada, for cryin' out loud; my taxes cover the health care system that I've had to use from time to time, and that's one thing I will gladly fund, even knowing that I may never make use of it again. Someone else might desperately need it and not have the funds. I just try to be realistic about what takes place in a society, since I think doing that might lead me to develop better ways of existence. Those same tax dollars that fund useful services, and could go to fund even more services, are just as likely to end up socializing some private entity's costs or funding someone's military misadventure. The government running the country I live in, for example, blew hundreds of millions on busted submarines that are still out of service. Great use of tax dollars, geniuses.
We really do need to develop stronger communities, which I think can only be truly done by trashing the power hierarchies built through Machiavellian activities and accepted by quiet submission. Then, I think we will start to see wonderful things happen. Shiny things are not necessarily the pinnacle of existence.
I believe that any company that is too ignorant to install protections on their systems, or too stupid to find someone to do it for them, deserves to lose their money.
Hardware, maintenance, and setup costs money, which was probably figured into this amount (having not RTFA, natch). Last I heard, unless you find a volunteer and some discarded/donated hardware, those things aren't free.
A town in essence is a group of people who have gotten together because it's in their best interests to consolidate their efforts to make the best use of resources (ie roads, schools). If this group of people begins to see the benefits of locally-provided high speed access (albeit wireless) and votes on it, why shouldn't they be free to exercise their will and implement such a plan
If your hypothetical town were organized along decentralized, anarchist lines, as your description seems to imply, you would be absolutely correct. Hell, I would love to see this happen. I think the residents of that town/city would develop a stronger sense of involvement and connection to the place they live and they people they live with, even stronger than the proverbial small rural town.
However, in this case you're dealing with a community run by a few individuals with authority to extort funding from the population in the form of taxes*. Elected or not, the town as a whole isn't making these decisions. The centralized power structure is making them. Under the prevailing attitude toward politics and economics that exists in the US, these centralized authorities are considered to be inefficient allocators of resources, entities that should be limited to providing physical security and defence of control over property. To counteract this attitude, which is somewhat based on false assumptions and selective reality, you would have to successfully argue that the town government can provide the service better than a private entity without making use of its power to extort funding from individuals who do not wish to make use of the system, while playing within its own rules, with no bias in regulation or enforcement of laws. Even then, there are people--some of them influential--who oppose any activity by a government that might present an opportunity for private profit.
* Of course, recall that the colonists back in the late 1700s weren't entirely opposed to taxes, only being taxed without complementary agency. Extreme capitalists and tax protesters may want to remember this; if you don't think you're being represented properly, there are avenues of redress in the system you claim to uphold.
I'm sure thinking "VIIV" == "64" is neat and all, but isn't sixty-four LXIV?
I know, I know--doesn't look as symmetrical or "cool". Doesn't Intel look dumb enough these days without putting together nonsensical combinations of letters for marketing purposes and trying to pass it off as intellectually hip or something?
But why would you have modded it down?
/. frontpage, yet I haven't seen you decry any of them the same way you did this story.
/. less often than I used to.
Because the snarky comment at the end was a blatant piece of flamebait which cheapened the act that is the supposed subject of the posting. It was completely unnecessary, meant to provoke the kind of negative reaction that some posters have unfortunately expressed, playing a pointless game of scoreboard or "but he's richer!" and getting caught up in someone else's little game of worthiness.
I'm sure you wouldn't have cared if it were a Linux story bashing MS - there's been tons of those on the
That's because I'm not in front of the computer 24/7, ready to comment on Slashdot's increasingly poor postings on a regular basis. Holy crap, I have a life away from the computer--shock and surprise. Less of that computer time has been spent at Slashdot due to the increasingly poor quality of articles being posted, many of which seem little better than press releases for various products or blatant attempts to stoke controversy for no necessary reason, perhaps to increase ad hits. The blatant Linux advocacy and knee-jerk bashing of anything else has gotten on my nerves--and I'm a FOSS-using anarchist freak! I just can't stand having a viewpoint metaphorically bashed over my head over and over. I blocked michael's postings for this reason, set another site as my homepage, and visit
Normally, a trollicious comment like yours wouldn't even merit comment, but in this particular case, I can't allow your accusations to stand unchallenged.
It is probably the wording of the story that will cause this.
If I had mod points, I'd mod you up.
If we could moderate stories, I would have voted this one down. The act itself is worthy of praise, especially contrasted with Gates' business tactics. The submitter had no reason to insert those last two statements except to provoke negative comments. The "Linux Community" will have a helluva time being able to donate $750 million to people who desperately need some form of necessity, because many (most? almost all?) members of that community don't have anything close to the available cash or equivalents that Gates has at his fingertips.
"Do the ends justify the means?" Fuck no, and shame on the submitter for even turning this into a dicksize contest and inserting controversy where none should be needed. Gates' generosity does not justify his company's monopolistic tactics aimed at wiping out healthy competition (as a believer in the free market might say). I can donate $25 towards the purchase of necessary vaccines, and that in itself is a good act. Does the amount of money involved make the means any more or less justifiable? What is the metric for justifying the means?
Or the home of one Charles Foster Kane.
Turn off the machine, put on some shoes and clean clothes, and go outside for a while. Get away from the wiz-bang graphics and fantastic worlds and 3D high-intensity white-knuckle action, find a nice park bench or bookstore, and relax. Look around. Get in touch with reality, instead of projecting the fantasies you've immersed yourself in on reality.
Based on Taco's post up there, I think he has reason to be concerned. Lay off the stimulants. Get away from Slashdot and ad revenues and shit for a while. Beg Kathleen to take him away from all the digital shit for a few days. Hell, maybe stick the game consoles in a closet for a month or two, delete the games from the hard drive(s), and only deal with the computer for the necessary work. I think he'll come back a healthier person. Hell, it would be good for any Slashdotter to find a greenspace or quiet spot, away from the flashing lights and flickering screens, to reconnect with the outside world and get away from the immersive fantasy.
After each take, the tape would have to be rewound, either to the top of the track or to the punch point. It was an enforced pause, a chance to let your ears cool off for a few seconds or a minute, maybe take a sip of coffee or beer. I'm not the only engineer who missed this.
From what little I've gathered in my extremely limited experience, this is something of a personality thing these days. If the engineer and talent are in a relaxed mood, those breaks will happen anyway, even if a long-distance phone patch is racking up charges. I don't know how common that is outside music studios and some commercial, voiceover-oriented operations, but I know this still exists, thankfully.
Of course, nowadays we have hard drives and we all know that they never ever fail.
Funny, but this business about the slow disappearance of sources for raw analog stock makes me think of the internship I just finished at a rather large player in film post services, where the people who worry about these things are wondering where they'll be able to find 9 and 18GB removable hard drives soon, since these things do eventually fail.
Part of me wonders whether our rate of technological development is increasing so fast that there's barely enough time to make use of a recently established technology before it becomes obsolete and hard to find spare parts for.
Splicing: okay, I'll readily admit that in the early '90s Digidesign Sound Designer made me hang up my razor blade and splicing block forever, but it was a hell of a useful skill at the time.
Indeed, up until 2000, the very first thing taught in the university course I took was how to splice analog tape. The first couple of projects completely relied upon analog tape; you didn't even get to touch the (crappy) multitrack software until second semester of the first year. I'm almost positive this has been excised now in favour of getting the first-years into the digital realm as quickly as possible, but give me a grease pencil, a razor blade, and a block, and I could probably knock enough rust off those skills to chop together a passable 30-second spot.
Without a standard multi-track digital audio format that works across platforms and software packages, one that can be perpetuated for decades, musicians, producers, and record labels will find themselves in the same conundrum. Remember that a tape recorded on an Ampex deck will (theoretically) work on a Studer, an MCI, a Tascam, or an Otari.
Indeed, isn't this the same argument presented for open protocols and data formats whenever someone posts an Ask Slashdot about converting one closed, proprietary data format to another? Even the de facto software's session files change format, and that business with the hard disk recorders a couple sections back rears its ugly head here as well, where it will only properly read sessions created by an older version of the software.
This is one of those things all the software manufacturers and audio gurus may want to start hammering out a spec for, now. Hell, don't even limit this to multitrack audio; just figure out a standard for the next-generation audio encoding and transport--whether or not it just builds on existing stuff--and give everyone enough lead time to ensure compatibility or upgradability. The children of PCM won't last forever, and from what I understand, doing something in Direct Stream Digital requires a completely new, Sony-proprietary digital infrastructure, from the console to the recorder. If DSD somehow spreads to a non-SACD advanced format that hits big, or something else that needs all new equipment comes along, there will be chaos, because we all know how every company uses one standard connection type, data encoding, and software format... *sigh*
On a completely OT, selfish note, if you know anyone in the Toronto area willing to take on a coffee boy who wants to get some hands-on experience in any kind of sound production work, I'll work for cold water and a bag of peanuts.
1950 DA previously had the highest calculated chance of impact--about a 1 in 300 chance in 2880. It had the previous highest rating on the Palermo Scale, 0.17. Although it's a larger rock, its chances of smacking into our homeworld are still lower than 2004 MN4, which ranks about 1.03 on the scale. To get some idea of what these numbers mean, here's a quickie overview from the fine eggheads at JPL. Short version if I understand it correctly: it measures the odds of impact compared to the background level odds of a random hit from an undetected object of similar characteristics.
Yep, the news media should have gobs of fun with this on Monday.
Over lunch one day, he told me that there are at least five "global Internets" that he knows of.. and how the govt gave the worst one to the public to play with.
Off the top of my head, would SIPRNET be one of the global networks he was referring to?
I can't think of any other networks that might qualify as a global network worth noting these days. Internet2 seems to be mostly an experimental system at this point, and I have no clue what happened to the Mbone or 6bone. I wonder what the other networks are, and who controls them...
Interesting security measure, using actual knowledge of the credit history rather than just a personal question, something that can be guessed or even researched.
What happens if one of the security questions is based on erroneous information?
He says if consumers wanted more features, they'd tell Microsoft, using the example of tabbed browsing.
:)
Really? I didn't know Microsoft had an open bug database where users can submit Requests for Enhancements, or that users could get in touch with an active user community with access to the source code!
'zat shrill enough for ya?
Hey, now that the (s)election is over, the counting continues, and the FSCKING CAMPAIGN ADS are gone for another couple of years, can the editors expand the focus of the Politics section to events around the rest of the world? Barring that, can it be shelved? There's a whole world of political shenanigans outside the US, but I don't want to see /. become just another politics site with some geeky entertainment/tech stuff thrown in.
:-). However, That Editor Who Shall Remain Unnamed does manage to grate on me, even when I might possibly agree with his POV.
:P )
For that matter, can the editors come to some kind of consensus regarding when and if the Your Rights Online section is appropriate for a particular article? Some of the stuff that appeared in YRO over the past few months would fit better in Politics, while some items had no place in any section aside from the general mish-mash.
I know, I know--"you can hide a category if you don't like it". My problem is not that I'm completely fed up with the articles in a category, like some are with the SCO stuff, but that I think certain categories can be made better through some judicious, minor effort on the part of Taco and crew. Expand or dump Politics, tighten up the definition of YRO.
I'd also say "dump a certain editor whose name starts with an 'm' since he's one unrequested front-page comment away from making me hide all of his posts", but that's probably asking too much
I think I just convinced myself to go through with The Banishing.
(this will get modded down as offtopic, but I have karma to spare, so nyahhhh!
In the event of a decisive, relatively clean Kerry win, will there be discussion of "Kerry Republicans"? I'm aware of one who went home specifically to vote against Bush, despite normally leaning Republican, and from what I gather, the same goes for many small-c conservatives who generally vote Republican.
What other memes/phrases/future forbidden terms will come out of tomorrow's fiasco?
Despite the inherent liberal bias of the "New York Times", the "Times" correctly asserts that all voting machines should leave a paper trail.
Could you take a moment to explain how the Times' "inherent liberal bias" affects in any way the legitimacy of its assertion that all voting machines should have some kind of physical verification system? What does liberal, conservative, communist, anarchist, or capitalist bias have to do with the legitimacy of voting methods (my own views on mass electoral systems aside)?