On the topposting, I've kind of suspected that this is a battle between journalistic writing and chronological writing. Most geeks tend to favor the chronological approach.
However, for many people, they want the most important information first (meaning the most recent) and the rest in order of decreasing importance. This mirrors how newspaper articles are written, such that the article can be trimmed after any given paragraph and still be intelligible.
Because I almost always know the context of a given message, it's actually more irritating to me to have to scroll to the bottom, past lots of information I already know to get to the important bit. (yes, I've read ALL of the articles pounding the idea that top posting is bad and I don't care) I prefer to read the important bit first, then look deeper if I need more context.
I average 1200 spam messages per day, though it's an aggregate spam trap for several accounts. PopFile does an admirable job routing them out of my inbox though.
They build for Minnesota and Wisconsin building code right now, which is actually pretty stringent given the swings from hard winter (-30F) to pretty hot and humid summers (95F at 90% humidity) with some pretty violent thunderstorms, blizzards, etc.
I'm not sure exactly what's required to move from that to hurricane standards.
I agree with the "beach house" thing, which kind of fits my office/guest house setup as well. The smallest one is kind of intriguing to me as a sort of loft/studio type of setup.
I wouldn't want to try to live in it full-time with my wife and 2 dogs or anything, but as a space to work in, I think it's a pretty cool idea.
There's a local company (to me anyway) that's also doing some interesting things with modular home units. One of their most interesting approaches is that the base prices (listed in the brochure below) include complete custom designing. I'm contemplating one of the small units as an office/guest house.
FYI, generalizing about Americans like that is just as stupid as other generalizations. I know a LOT of people with whom I interact daily who spent today with both sides of their family in the same day. In many of those cases, every single member of the extended family attended.
Keep in mind that there are 300 million people in the US and we have some of the widest ranges of diversity of anywhere on earth. In many communities, Americans do exactly what your European examples do: live in the same city for their entire lives. Oftentimes, these roots go back several generations. Except for my little pocket of family and a few here and there, my extended family (my grandparents, mother's 5 brothers, father's 3 brothers and their entire families (including children and, now grandchildren) totaling well over 100 people all still live in the same county that my great-grandparents immigrated to 100 years ago. Their children attend the same schools that they did, work the same farms they did and share in regular meals and gatherings together.
The vast majority of Americans are NOT obsessed with fear, money and power. They just want to live their lives (pretty much like people the whole world over).
Also, to equate George Bush's policies with the desires of the American people (given that only 1/3 of the population even voted and only 51% of those voted for Bush, and a significant percentage of those didn't do so enthusiastically, putting the real "mandate" at closer to 18%) is ignorant.
How about this? I won't make gross assumptions about Europeans based only on the news I read and the things I see on TV and the Europeans who come here and you stop believing that Thanksgiving is the first time this year that all 300 million of us suddenly realized we have a family and frantically ran all over the country to find them. Please don't be simple.
"and strangely always seemed to find themselves next to each other at dinner"
Are you kidding? If I knew that exchanges like that were likely, I'd not only regularly invite both to gatherings but INSIST that they sit near each other.
I live within the city limits of the state capitol in the middle of a metro area with over 2 million people and I can't get DSL. Fortunately, I can get cable, but no DSL for me as I'm too far from the CO.
Correct. I use GPRS on my Palm for email text messaging, checking the news, etc. and the 28.8 equiv that I usually get is just fine. As long as most of your use is textual, you don't have much need for high speed.
I also feel the same way about gifts that come with ongoing costs. To me, giving someone a cellphone with $40/month in subscription fees (particularly if the phone was highly subsidized) is a terrible gift, yet people keep doing it. Same thing with satellite dishes, etc.
I use a combination of the Mixonic; custom CD-R printing and Jewelboxing; cases to make up bundles for my web clients. I deliver all of the project deliverables (code, images, initial database loads, etc.) as well as video tutorials on using the content management system, photo galleries and other tools installed on the site (using Wink) . The packaging uses one of my templates, but both the template for the CD and the packaging has slots for their logo and company information, so each bundle is completely customized to their company.
The packaging really cements the client's confidence in the work done and it really ends up as an inconsequential cost with much higher benefits. It costs a little more than having 100 CD-R's printed all the same (5x more), but $5 is still dirt cheap for a serious web project. When I started doing this, it actually cut down dramatically on complaints about the bill size. They had something in hand to match up to the invoice.
I'm amazed at the number of software companies, web design companies and others that just don't take the time to put a bit of polish into their presentation. I've paid $150 for software that came on a store-bought CD-R with Sharpie marker as the "label" and others with a cheap paper label sloppily slapped on the disc.
Are you aware that Nader's "party" isn't the same as last time? When you run under different parties in sequential elections, you aren't very tightly affiliated with the party.
While I had a sleeve for mine and didn't have to wait, my ballot didn't have a blank side here in MN. Rather, the reverse side had 27 judge elections on it, most of whom were running unopposed.
Stock up on a few cases of <a href="http://www.warmhandsnow.com/store/warmers.s<nobr>h<wbr></wbr></nobr> tml">these</a>. They'll keep people warm however they most need and throw a few wherever you need easy heat.
The T-shirt is there for the same reason that most adult men wear underwear under their pants and socks "under" their shoes. It's there as a cheaper buffer between the dirt your body produces and your more expensive clothes.
In addition, many quality dress shirts are made assuming you *are* wearing an undershirt and are really too see-through to be worn without the undershirt.
It also tends to cut down on excess friction between your torso and the dress shirt.
My degree is in English with an emphasis in creative writing. The class that really got me excited about writing was a class that had what I first thought were immense daily required word counts. The class required 500 words a day to be turned in. Everyone kind of eyed that number skeptically, but soon found themselves easily averaging over 2500 a day and some days coming closer to 5000.
The rules were that it didn't have to even be coherent. The words just needed to be on the page. If you needed to write "what the hell shall I write about", it counted. The point, like with most productivity issues was to just sit down and actually do it.
Those 9 weeks contain many of my fondest memories as a writer.
Mostly because pricing isn't a function of costs, but of demand. Frequently demand is manipulated to bring them into sync, but not always.
For instance, high profit items (like super sizing it) are advertised and pushed, but this particular high cost sandwich isn't pushed at all (except during Lent).
In this case, if the pricing were a straight function of cost (where the fish sandwich was 2 times the cost of the Big Mac), that value meal would now fall outside of their ~$5 lunch setup they have now. So, they deal with a lower margin on that sandwich and make up for it by pushing more super sizing.
"Personally, I can’t believe that 1 out of 5 CDs are sold in Walmarts."
The thing is, nearly 1 out of 5 *anythings* are sold by Walmart. They are big on a scale most people can't imagine.
We view "entertainment" industries as big, but really, companies like Walmart dwarf them. They just aren't in the news every day like the movie and record industry. They chug along making billions of dollars without drawing attention to themselves.
Wal-Mart has 3500+ domestic stores, and nearly 1500 international units. They pull in over $60 BILLION dollars per quarter and $2 billion of that is PROFIT.
Walmart has so much purchasing power with wholesalers that this current story is just everyday business. However, this time they happened to target a branch of the media, who tend to yell and scream louder than most industries when *anything* happens to them.
If it really bugs you that bad, just get a disposable email address ask the damn question and delete the address.
People demand answers and, when they aren't packaged the way they want, claim the answer hasn't been delivered.
You asked about his taxes, were given a perfectly reasonable way to obtain the forms and yet are still upset. That's like saying "I'm thirsty", getting a bottle of water and being upset because you have a thing about drinking straight from the bottle and would prefer a straw.
Yes. I'm still trying to figure out why this is news. I mean Gateway, yes Gateway, is selling one of these and there's a whole category in Amazon full of standalone DVD recorders. I mean, the next thing they'll tell me is that you can get a TV that's only a few inches thick.
Exactly. Someone tried to steal $12,000 from MY credit cards and bank accounts through my Paypal account and it took me 2 years to get it back. After that, they sent me a letter accusing *me* of fraud.
Exactly. I run www.mncriminals.com, which publishes the MN criminal conviction data. We get the data directly from the state. We frequently get letters from people demanding that we "expunge" their record because "the state cleared their name". We pretty much just ask that they fax a copy of the state's paperwork removing the conviction from their record.
We've only ever heard further from one person. Even then, she hadn't really had it expunged. Rather, she'd had the remainder of her sentence, including parole, etc. commuted. A lot of people make demands and I'm perfectly willing to follow through, but you're going to at least provide a piece of paper proving it needs to happen.
The BSA can come into my offices only if there's a warrant in their hand, etc.
Yes, I do still drive after taking the bus for a couple of months. Why? Because the bus ride takes 50 minutes to cover what takes me 17 minutes by car. Add to that the fact that I have to walk 3/4 mile to get to the bus stop (I live within the city limits of the state capital) and the snow will soon fly and the bus no longer looks like much of an improvement in the situtation. I get to stay warm for my entire trip, get over an hour a day back (so I can actually cook healthy meals instead of eating quick junk), don't have to listen to crazy people barking in my left ear, etc.
Umm. Some of us live where -15C pretty much describes most of December, January and February and large portions of November and March are under 0C as well. We get around just fine in cars, many of us ride bikes through that entire time and we even venture outside on a regular basis. Heck, spend any time here at the end of February and anything above 0C is cause for going with short sleeves and no jacket.
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On the topposting, I've kind of suspected that this is a battle between journalistic writing and chronological writing. Most geeks tend to favor the chronological approach.
However, for many people, they want the most important information first (meaning the most recent) and the rest in order of decreasing importance. This mirrors how newspaper articles are written, such that the article can be trimmed after any given paragraph and still be intelligible.
Because I almost always know the context of a given message, it's actually more irritating to me to have to scroll to the bottom, past lots of information I already know to get to the important bit. (yes, I've read ALL of the articles pounding the idea that top posting is bad and I don't care) I prefer to read the important bit first, then look deeper if I need more context.
I average 1200 spam messages per day, though it's an aggregate spam trap for several accounts. PopFile does an admirable job routing them out of my inbox though.
They build for Minnesota and Wisconsin building code right now, which is actually pretty stringent given the swings from hard winter (-30F) to pretty hot and humid summers (95F at 90% humidity) with some pretty violent thunderstorms, blizzards, etc.
I'm not sure exactly what's required to move from that to hurricane standards.
I agree with the "beach house" thing, which kind of fits my office/guest house setup as well. The smallest one is kind of intriguing to me as a sort of loft/studio type of setup.
I wouldn't want to try to live in it full-time with my wife and 2 dogs or anything, but as a space to work in, I think it's a pretty cool idea.
There's a local company (to me anyway) that's also doing some interesting things with modular home units. One of their most interesting approaches is that the base prices (listed in the brochure below) include complete custom designing. I'm contemplating one of the small units as an office/guest house.
http://www.weehouses.com/
http://www.weehouses.com/weehouse_brochure.pdf
Right, because that payment to the United Nations was right on time.
FYI, generalizing about Americans like that is just as stupid as other generalizations. I know a LOT of people with whom I interact daily who spent today with both sides of their family in the same day. In many of those cases, every single member of the extended family attended.
Keep in mind that there are 300 million people in the US and we have some of the widest ranges of diversity of anywhere on earth. In many communities, Americans do exactly what your European examples do: live in the same city for their entire lives. Oftentimes, these roots go back several generations. Except for my little pocket of family and a few here and there, my extended family (my grandparents, mother's 5 brothers, father's 3 brothers and their entire families (including children and, now grandchildren) totaling well over 100 people all still live in the same county that my great-grandparents immigrated to 100 years ago. Their children attend the same schools that they did, work the same farms they did and share in regular meals and gatherings together.
The vast majority of Americans are NOT obsessed with fear, money and power. They just want to live their lives (pretty much like people the whole world over).
Also, to equate George Bush's policies with the desires of the American people (given that only 1/3 of the population even voted and only 51% of those voted for Bush, and a significant percentage of those didn't do so enthusiastically, putting the real "mandate" at closer to 18%) is ignorant.
How about this? I won't make gross assumptions about Europeans based only on the news I read and the things I see on TV and the Europeans who come here and you stop believing that Thanksgiving is the first time this year that all 300 million of us suddenly realized we have a family and frantically ran all over the country to find them. Please don't be simple.
"and strangely always seemed to find themselves next to each other at dinner"
Are you kidding? If I knew that exchanges like that were likely, I'd not only regularly invite both to gatherings but INSIST that they sit near each other.
I live within the city limits of the state capitol in the middle of a metro area with over 2 million people and I can't get DSL. Fortunately, I can get cable, but no DSL for me as I'm too far from the CO.
Correct. I use GPRS on my Palm for email text messaging, checking the news, etc. and the 28.8 equiv that I usually get is just fine. As long as most of your use is textual, you don't have much need for high speed.
I also feel the same way about gifts that come with ongoing costs. To me, giving someone a cellphone with $40/month in subscription fees (particularly if the phone was highly subsidized) is a terrible gift, yet people keep doing it. Same thing with satellite dishes, etc.
I use a combination of the Mixonic; custom CD-R printing and Jewelboxing; cases to make up bundles for my web clients. I deliver all of the project deliverables (code, images, initial database loads, etc.) as well as video tutorials on using the content management system, photo galleries and other tools installed on the site (using Wink) . The packaging uses one of my templates, but both the template for the CD and the packaging has slots for their logo and company information, so each bundle is completely customized to their company. The packaging really cements the client's confidence in the work done and it really ends up as an inconsequential cost with much higher benefits. It costs a little more than having 100 CD-R's printed all the same (5x more), but $5 is still dirt cheap for a serious web project. When I started doing this, it actually cut down dramatically on complaints about the bill size. They had something in hand to match up to the invoice. I'm amazed at the number of software companies, web design companies and others that just don't take the time to put a bit of polish into their presentation. I've paid $150 for software that came on a store-bought CD-R with Sharpie marker as the "label" and others with a cheap paper label sloppily slapped on the disc.
I use a combination of the Mixonic custom CD-R printing and Jewelboxing> cases to make up bundles for my web clients. I deliver all of the project deliverables (code, images, initial database loads, etc.) as well as video tutorials on using the content management system, photo galleries and other tools installed on the site (using <a href="http://www.debugmode.com/wink/">Wink</a>) . The packaging uses one of my templates, but both the template for the CD and the packaging has slots for their logo and company information, so each bundle is completely customized to their company.
The packaging really cements the client's confidence in the work done and it really ends up as an inconsequential cost with much higher benefits. It costs a little more than having 100 CD-R's printed all the same (5x more), but $5 is still dirt cheap for a serious web project. When I started doing this, it actually cut down dramatically on complaints about the bill size. They had something in hand to match up to the invoice.
I'm amazed at the number of software companies, web design companies and others that just don't take the time to put a bit of polish into their presentation. I've paid $150 for software that came on a store-bought CD-R with Sharpie marker as the "label" and others with a cheap paper label sloppily slapped on the disc.
Are you aware that Nader's "party" isn't the same as last time? When you run under different parties in sequential elections, you aren't very tightly affiliated with the party.
While I had a sleeve for mine and didn't have to wait, my ballot didn't have a blank side here in MN. Rather, the reverse side had 27 judge elections on it, most of whom were running unopposed.
Stock up on a few cases of <a href="http://www.warmhandsnow.com/store/warmers.s<nobr>h<wbr></wbr></nobr> tml">these</a>. They'll keep people warm however they most need and throw a few wherever you need easy heat.
The T-shirt is there for the same reason that most adult men wear underwear under their pants and socks "under" their shoes. It's there as a cheaper buffer between the dirt your body produces and your more expensive clothes.
In addition, many quality dress shirts are made assuming you *are* wearing an undershirt and are really too see-through to be worn without the undershirt.
It also tends to cut down on excess friction between your torso and the dress shirt.
My degree is in English with an emphasis in creative writing. The class that really got me excited about writing was a class that had what I first thought were immense daily required word counts. The class required 500 words a day to be turned in. Everyone kind of eyed that number skeptically, but soon found themselves easily averaging over 2500 a day and some days coming closer to 5000.
The rules were that it didn't have to even be coherent. The words just needed to be on the page. If you needed to write "what the hell shall I write about", it counted. The point, like with most productivity issues was to just sit down and actually do it.
Those 9 weeks contain many of my fondest memories as a writer.
Mostly because pricing isn't a function of costs, but of demand. Frequently demand is manipulated to bring them into sync, but not always.
For instance, high profit items (like super sizing it) are advertised and pushed, but this particular high cost sandwich isn't pushed at all (except during Lent).
In this case, if the pricing were a straight function of cost (where the fish sandwich was 2 times the cost of the Big Mac), that value meal would now fall outside of their ~$5 lunch setup they have now. So, they deal with a lower margin on that sandwich and make up for it by pushing more super sizing.
"Personally, I can’t believe that 1 out of 5 CDs are sold in Walmarts."
The thing is, nearly 1 out of 5 *anythings* are sold by Walmart. They are big on a scale most people can't imagine.
We view "entertainment" industries as big, but really, companies like Walmart dwarf them. They just aren't in the news every day like the movie and record industry. They chug along making billions of dollars without drawing attention to themselves.
Wal-Mart has 3500+ domestic stores, and nearly 1500 international units. They pull in over $60 BILLION dollars per quarter and $2 billion of that is PROFIT.
Walmart has so much purchasing power with wholesalers that this current story is just everyday business. However, this time they happened to target a branch of the media, who tend to yell and scream louder than most industries when *anything* happens to them.
If it really bugs you that bad, just get a disposable email address ask the damn question and delete the address.
People demand answers and, when they aren't packaged the way they want, claim the answer hasn't been delivered.
You asked about his taxes, were given a perfectly reasonable way to obtain the forms and yet are still upset. That's like saying "I'm thirsty", getting a bottle of water and being upset because you have a thing about drinking straight from the bottle and would prefer a straw.
Yes. I'm still trying to figure out why this is news. I mean Gateway, yes Gateway, is selling one of these and there's a whole category in Amazon full of standalone DVD recorders. I mean, the next thing they'll tell me is that you can get a TV that's only a few inches thick.
Exactly. Someone tried to steal $12,000 from MY credit cards and bank accounts through my Paypal account and it took me 2 years to get it back. After that, they sent me a letter accusing *me* of fraud.
Exactly. I run www.mncriminals.com, which publishes the MN criminal conviction data. We get the data directly from the state. We frequently get letters from people demanding that we "expunge" their record because "the state cleared their name". We pretty much just ask that they fax a copy of the state's paperwork removing the conviction from their record. We've only ever heard further from one person. Even then, she hadn't really had it expunged. Rather, she'd had the remainder of her sentence, including parole, etc. commuted. A lot of people make demands and I'm perfectly willing to follow through, but you're going to at least provide a piece of paper proving it needs to happen. The BSA can come into my offices only if there's a warrant in their hand, etc.
Yes, I do still drive after taking the bus for a couple of months. Why? Because the bus ride takes 50 minutes to cover what takes me 17 minutes by car. Add to that the fact that I have to walk 3/4 mile to get to the bus stop (I live within the city limits of the state capital) and the snow will soon fly and the bus no longer looks like much of an improvement in the situtation. I get to stay warm for my entire trip, get over an hour a day back (so I can actually cook healthy meals instead of eating quick junk), don't have to listen to crazy people barking in my left ear, etc.
Mass transit doesn't work everywhere.
Umm. Some of us live where -15C pretty much describes most of December, January and February and large portions of November and March are under 0C as well. We get around just fine in cars, many of us ride bikes through that entire time and we even venture outside on a regular basis. Heck, spend any time here at the end of February and anything above 0C is cause for going with short sleeves and no jacket.