When I first got into Lego, their primary focus was Legoland and Lego Technic. I remember staring in awe at a friend's Legoland set up in his parent's garage, the entire floor of which was covered in baseplates with every kind of building, and even the Legoland train running around it.
In addition to that, another friend had the Technic lego car, with big wheels, cylinders, rack & pinion steering, suspension, etc. It ruled!
Where are those kits now? Relegated in favour of crappy Bionicles and Harry Potter themed kits. What can a child build with them? Bugger all, that's what!
Perhaps if they want their fortunes to improve, Lego should bring back the originals.
I own various region 2 DVDs I purchased when living in the UK.
I can't play them in the ~$100 player I purchased from Best Buy.
The original reply said I could get a multi region pal capable player in the US at low cost. Since when is $300 (sorry, $299!) low cost, especially when a regular player retails in BestBuy / Circuit City for between $50-$100?
My post said that I resented spending an extra $200 to $250 over the cost of a regular player.
Does that make sense to you? (seriously, not being sarcastic)
I get by ok for now by running a 25' A/V cable from the PC in the other room into the home theatre. I was just irked that to avoid having to go through the ritual every time I have to fork out $300 instead of somewhere between $50 and $100.
Calm down:) You really should read what I said again before having a go, and just so you know, I had seen that player, and a few others besides.
I wrote (point in bold)... "jo42 (227475) wrote... "You need to invest in a region-free DVD player... There are many low-cost ones out there."
I haven't seen a player available in the US that can play any region and cope with the PAL > NTSC issue for under $300 (not including shipping), and rather resent paying $200-$250 more than I would for regular region 1 players from BestBuy, Circuit City , etc."
You replied... " Okay, I went to google, typed in "Region Free DVD Player", and got www.codefreedvd.com. They sell the D8500, which for $299 US is code free, dolby, CD-R compatible, does Karaoke, and not only does PAL/NTSC full conversion, BUT ALSO is multi-voltage, 100-230V."
Thrifty person that you are, you've just pointed out that I'll save a whole buck. I'd better think how I'll spend my new found wealth, perhaps on a cup of coffee?
Seriously though, the only low cost player that I've seen in retail stores the US that would do regions other than 1 and deal with PAL to NTSC conversion was the Apex AD-600A at around $100 or so, which is no longer easily available.
jo42 (227475) wrote... "You need to invest in a region-free DVD player... There are many low-cost ones out there."
I haven't seen a player available in the US that can play any region and cope with the PAL > NTSC issue for under $300 (not including shipping), and rather resent paying $200-$250 more than I would for regular region 1 players from BestBuy, Circuit City , etc.
I'd be very interested in any players (& retailers selling them) you can suggest:) Until then, I'll soldier on with the 25' A/V cable to the PC.
Deja vu! I have a number of region 2 DVDs I bought perfectly legitimately before moving from the UK to the US that now gather dust unless I watch them from the PC. This is a shame given the home theatre set up in the living room!
The majority are UK specific comedy so there is no region 1 version, with the remainder being US films I spent more on than if I had bought the region 1 version here.
ps. I'd be interested in comparing notes with you as judging by your journal/comments you're in the same boat as myself on various "expat in US" type things. E-mail/IM? My addy's on my site (if it's visible in my/. info)
He's also wrong in claiming they were the first 32 bit systems available. I hate articles like this because nobody ever mentions any computers from outside of the United States.
The Amiga 1200 was launched in December 1992 but before that a British company called Acorn Computers released the Archimedes range of computers, the next generation after their 8 bit systems (Atom, BBC A/B/B+, Master, Master Compact). Starting with the A305, A310, A410 & A440 in mid 1989 these machines had 32bit ARM2 processors (from which the Intel XScale/StrongARM chips out now originated), the Arthur (later RISCOS (Screenshot) operating system in ROM (instant bootup!), wonderful GUI, built in BBC Basic and easy ARM assembler access, 8 channel stereo sound, etc.
My first computer was a BBC B in 1982 (which should have been mentioned for it's incredible robustness and shedload of I/O ports.. you could link it to anything, oh and for being the machine the original version of Elite was written for) to an Acorn A3000 in 1990, before going PC 94'ish. Shortly after Linux appeared so all was ok again;)
In your rage you're missing the point made. It's all about the jurisdiction of law.
American engineers and companies can and do screw things up too, and can where law permits be held accountable.
The workers and companies of other countries may not be subject to the same laws and standards, and therefore are not accountable and as is the case here, can hold information to ransom, etc if they can get away with it under the laws of their own country.
If data pertaining to residents of any specific country is that sensitive, then the third parties it is outsourced to, if at all, should at least be within the reach of the laws of that country.
By writing online, authors are providing content, therefore surely would be more aptly defined as content providers, if indeed author isn't enough of a title for them. If someone writes something that goes into a newspaper or magazine, they're contributing to the content. Why reclassify them because their content lives on a server?
A book author isn't the same as a book publisher, though the author could be considered both if he or she were to go to the lengths of printing and distributing the book.
I certainly wouldn't call an author or content provider an Internet Service provider. Content and the medium or process by which it is delivered are two separate things.
" I hate to tell you this but it's not illegal to call someone a "nigger" or anything else. It's called speech, as in free, not as in beer. If it were illegal to call someone a "nigger" 99.9% of all blacks would be in prison, seems that's their favorite thing to call EACH OTHER.."
The BBC recently published an article all about the N word which makes the distinction between it's use as a racial slur and term of endearment when ending in er and a. It also mentions who uses it, who doesn't, and has includes various opinions on it too.
This has to be like the dumbest "mod" I have ever seen. If the regular GBA isn't big enough or have a full featured gamepad, get a gameboy player, see you can get a screen for the gamecube and a battery pack. That would cost about the same and not void any warranties. This mod is moot.
Consider this. Why do people modify old cars when they can just go out and buy a nice new one? It's the 'I can' factor. It may not make much economic, or functional sense, but is for the enthusiast that did it, it's a personal achievement.
Perhaps you were in the panhandle. Take a trip along I-44 sometime. Tulsa, in northeast Oklahoma is in an area known as green country. Sure there's plenty of red clay soil, but there are also trees from Tulsa to OKC as far as the eye can see, also the other way up and out to Missourri.
If you want barren, go down to southern Texas. If you want flat and desolate go around Kansas, which is officially flatter than a pancake.
As an outsider who has lived in Oklahoma for ~3 years I agree the state is backward in many ways, but disagree on the claim of a lack of technology. The cheap shots about "They have phones in OK?" indicate the poster(s) themselves share some of the traditional ignorant attitutes stereotyped to people here.
The lack of decent net connectivity affect rural Oklahoma as much as anywhere else in the US, though in Tulsa, OKC, etc you'll have no problem getting a decent (in my case 3mbps/256kbps) net connection for cheap. On a business level, both WorldCom (yeah yeah) and Williams being in Tulsa meant plenty of carrier infrastructure is in place for fatter net connections.
Cellphone coverage and facilities could do with improvement but they work. Having come from the UK I'm not impressed with the US cellphone setup anyway, but that's another flamewar.
Analogue and digital cable TV are readily available though it's quite sad how even with the hundreds of channels offered by the latter, there's still nothing decent on half the time.
Perhaps the CEOs are getting richer because nowadays they're paying offshore outsourcing companies such as Tata peanuts to do the work their fellow countrymen (and women) did only a year or two back? I'm sure it's not the sole reason but likely is a significant one.
So the comparing software to the funcional structure of ones wanker is worth a +5 insightful?
Knowing the meaning of the word wanker might be though. Your usage of the word suggests a wanker is a penis. It isn't, at least not in British slang, which is where the word originated.
wank wank - to masturbate e.g. He was wanking, or He had a wank wanker - person who masturbates. More commonly used to insult, e.g. You fucking wanker!. Associated hand gestures often used. wankered - drunk. e.g. He was totally wankered.
Other infinitely useful gems of the British lexicon include...
bollocks
name for testicles. e.g. she kicked him in the bollocks. bollocksed - drunk, e.g. I'm totally bollocksed, bollocked - in trouble. e.g. Jimmy got bollocked by the teacher for punching Tom. bollocking - see bollocked e.g. Jimmy got a good bollocking for punching Tom. bollocks - crap / not very good e.g. MS Windows is a load of bollocks or Fred talked such utter bollocks at the meeting bollock - Single testicle, or insult e.g. You stupid bollock
knackers knackers - testicles only. not used as insult. e.g. she cut off his knackers knackered - exhausted e.g. I'm completely knackered. Also means in trouble. e.g. Jimmy got knackered for skipping class. knackering - tiring - see knackered
I can't comment on comedy from mainland European countries, but what made you decide to rip Brits just because O.B.L supposedly likes Benny Hill? The original poster was AC, could have been anyone.
Given the population of the US vs the UK you'd expect there to be a few more funny people in the US, though if you sift out the amusing shows from the endless slew of crap Fox, NBC, etc churn out you end up with Seinfeld, Friends, The Simpsons, King of the Hill and Frasier.
The rest is dire. Big Fat Greek Life *argh* Wanda at large *diabolical* Good Morning Miami *ick* That 70s show.. canned laughter'r'us, and no everybody doesn't love Raymond. I'm surprised they didn't cut Ray Romano's salary when he bitched about it... how hard it must be for an unfunny man to get by on a paltry $200k per show.
Going back to the era of Benny Hill, you can use the current "I love the 70s" run on VH1 as a good indicator of what was available in the US at the time, and it's hardly very good either.
I don't suppose you watch any of the current UK comedy that gets airtime in the US? Ever watched Ali G? (on HBO), Trigger Happy TV (Comedy Central), The Office, 3 Non Blondes, Blackadder (BBC America), etc? Quality stuff. There is a little more to UK comedy than Keeping up appearances and Monty Python, oh and Benny Hill.
"I can certainly guarantee that here in the US that text messaging is not as prevelant is the cell phone companies would like"
I'd say you hit the nail on the head with your assessment of SMS (text messaging) in the US vs the rest of the world. 99% of the time you can only SMS people on your network (AT&TAT&T, CingularCingular, etc), and that talk is cheap (3000 minutes, unlimited night & weekend, long distance, etc). Compare that with the UK, where if I wanted to sms from Orange to Voda, or BT Cellnet or whoever I'd have no problem.
"So while mass communication is FASTER these days (24/7 Internet connections, AIM, etc), I doubt that it has any bearing on the movie industry. Would it account for GOOD MOVIES doing better as well? "HEY THIS movE ROX"
Why would the MPAA care if someone text's that the movie is great? If it's good the viewers are going to tell their friends when they get out of the theatre anyway and so others won't run away. Once they've shelled out their cash and sat through a bad movie it's too late! The cash is in the register by then.
The museum does not seem to cover much history outside of the USA. Although understandable as it is a US site, it would have been nice to see some of the excellent machines produced by Acorn Computers (UK) from 1979 to ~1997 featured.
"This is exactly backwards, in fact. Rich people send their kids to private schools, but they still pay more property tax which goes to education."
Rich people are rich because they devote their lives to their careers. This is often, though not always, at the expense of being real parents to their children. This 'you deal with them, we pay you' mentality has turned most private schools into babysitters for the hours before and after normal public school hours while the parents are 'out being rich career people'. The sad thing is that the teachers, the very people who fill young minds with knowledge, a sense of right and wrong, ideas and interests are among the worst paid professional people in the USA.
"Rich people pay for their own health care, instead of relying on medicare or medicaid."
Everyone gets sick. Medicare/Medicade is no alternative to having health insurance, and hence insurance premiums go up to subsidise the people that can't pay. That's ok, you shouldn't have to die because you can't afford medical attention, indeed in the UK the NHS, for all it's faults, doesn't do that bad a job of providing healthcare for everyone. Back to the point, out of those that do pay for health insurance, the average joe with no/partial health insurance through his job is still going to feel the pinch of skyrocketing healthcare a lot more than the rich guy, so it's hardly a great sacrifice for the latter party.
"Rich people buy less fuel-efficient vehicles, so they buy more fuel (and pay more tax on them) even though they only go the same distances and have to abide by the same speed limits as poor people driving Civics."
And what's wrong with a nice new 2003 Civic? Perhaps you meant the pimp'ass rusty Buicks? I digress. To try and justify the needless waste, ecological damage, and drain on the world's fuel supply by saying the rich use more fuel and pay more tax is a most astonishingly poor, and selfish argument. FUEL IN THE UNITED STATES IS RIDICULOUSLY CHEAP compared with the rest of the world. Tell me if the taxes on $1.40 a gallon of fuel, in dollars, are anything significant in comparison with Europe, where for example in the UK you will pay about 78p per litre. There are 3.78 liters in a gallon, so that's about 2.94 a gallon. Convert that from pounds into US dollars and you have $4.72 a gallon. That's $3.32 more. Now, fill up your 30 gallon SUV tank and you're spending $42 vs the UK's $99.60. The UK's fuel prices are mostly in tax, in an effort to limit consumption and thus emissions and pollution. The bottom line is that lower US fuel taxation is hardly an excuse to pollute the environment as much as is happening. Oh of course, that's right, the kids the rich dump in private school will have to deal with it when they grow up. Good job they're going to private school; that top quality education will be needed to figure out how to clean up their parents/grandparents mess. Of course, now Hummers are being marketed to the well off soccer moms too; and it's all for the greater good.. they pay extra tax you know!;)
"Does a rich guy fly an airplane as a hobby? Typically, less than a quarter of the taxes charged on FBO use and aviation fuel goes back to airport services; otherwise these flyboys are paying for your municipal parks!"
See my above response on needless waste of fuel? How many gallons do you think it takes to fill the average private jet? Good job those responsible rich people are paying a bit for city beautification; we need something to soak up the extra emissions, and of course there's always the remote possibility the rich may grace us with their presence at the parks too from time to time, while they jog along with their bodyguards.
"Police, fire, public services? Rich people have their own alarm systems monitored by private companies, yet they still pay for YOUR public services."
Private firms? What would ADT, etc be then? ADT and other such companies are hardly above the average middle-class home owner, and guess what, they do when there's a break in? They relay the information to the police and fire departments. That's ok, as the rich people, *just like everyone else* are paying for said services.
I'll start out by saying I have not studied the Linux kernel source very much, so could be wrong in my following assumption.
As every system I own has only one processor, I haven't bothered to compile SMP support into the kernel. Therefore I'm not using any SCO code AFAIAA. If this is the case for me, it is also the case for thousands of other companies using single processor systems, vastly reducing the number of potential targets for SCO to extort from.
What I'm interested in now is seeing how they react to the report that a Caldera employee actually added SCO's IP to the kernel and that IBM merely improved that code.
We switched to Mozilla when the company moved to Linux. While the browser is up to the job, Mozilla mail, at least in the corporate environment, is missing key things such as a decent integrated calendar/schedule/task/appointment type system.
The one in Ximian Evolution is very good, and the Mozilla dev team would score big points if they could get this functionality added.
ps. minor whinge while I'm at it - fixing the mail notification sound bug in the Linux version of Mozilla Mail would also be nice, saving me from the complaints staff have about the loud beep of the internal speaker upon mail collection. I know the replies on Bugzilla mention it's down to the variance of sound systems on Linux, but even a box to issue a full command line so I could run mpg123 or play or something would do.
Slashdot Mirror
You may jest! Wait for the follow up article where Monti raises his pinky finger to his face and demands one hundred billion dollars! ;)
Anyone used to the current obfuscation techniques spammers use to get their spam past the filters will be able to read that manual easily! ;)
Margaret Thatcher naked on a cold day!
Margaret Thatcher naked on a cold day!
(Austin Powers reference)
When I first got into Lego, their primary focus was Legoland and Lego Technic. I remember staring in awe at a friend's Legoland set up in his parent's garage, the entire floor of which was covered in baseplates with every kind of building, and even the Legoland train running around it.
In addition to that, another friend had the Technic lego car, with big wheels, cylinders, rack & pinion steering, suspension, etc. It ruled!
Where are those kits now? Relegated in favour of crappy Bionicles and Harry Potter themed kits. What can a child build with them? Bugger all, that's what!
Perhaps if they want their fortunes to improve, Lego should bring back the originals.
That wasn't what I said. To recap...
Does that make sense to you? (seriously, not being sarcastic)
I get by ok for now by running a 25' A/V cable from the PC in the other room into the home theatre. I was just irked that to avoid having to go through the ritual every time I have to fork out $300 instead of somewhere between $50 and $100.
Thank you ever so much! :) I'll check into that. By the way, where did you hear it could do it?
Cheers!
Calm down :) You really should read what I said again before having a go, and just so you know, I had seen that player, and a few others besides.
I wrote (point in bold)...
"jo42 (227475) wrote...
"You need to invest in a region-free DVD player... There are many low-cost ones out there."
I haven't seen a player available in the US that can play any region and cope with the PAL > NTSC issue for under $300 (not including shipping), and rather resent paying $200-$250 more than I would for regular region 1 players from BestBuy, Circuit City , etc."
You replied...
" Okay, I went to google, typed in "Region Free DVD Player", and got www.codefreedvd.com. They sell the D8500, which for $299 US is code free, dolby, CD-R compatible, does Karaoke, and not only does PAL/NTSC full conversion, BUT ALSO is multi-voltage, 100-230V."
Thrifty person that you are, you've just pointed out that I'll save a whole buck. I'd better think how I'll spend my new found wealth, perhaps on a cup of coffee?
Seriously though, the only low cost player that I've seen in retail stores the US that would do regions other than 1 and deal with PAL to NTSC conversion was the Apex AD-600A at around $100 or so, which is no longer easily available.
jo42 (227475) wrote...
:) Until then, I'll soldier on with the 25' A/V cable to the PC.
"You need to invest in a region-free DVD player... There are many low-cost ones out there."
I haven't seen a player available in the US that can play any region and cope with the PAL > NTSC issue for under $300 (not including shipping), and rather resent paying $200-$250 more than I would for regular region 1 players from BestBuy, Circuit City , etc.
I'd be very interested in any players (& retailers selling them) you can suggest
Deja vu! I have a number of region 2 DVDs I bought perfectly legitimately before moving from the UK to the US that now gather dust unless I watch them from the PC. This is a shame given the home theatre set up in the living room!
/. info)
The majority are UK specific comedy so there is no region 1 version, with the remainder being US films I spent more on than if I had bought the region 1 version here.
ps. I'd be interested in comparing notes with you as judging by your journal/comments you're in the same boat as myself on various "expat in US" type things. E-mail/IM? My addy's on my site (if it's visible in my
Wow! Minutes elapsed and no goatse link yet. People must be busy today
;)
We're talking about spamholes, not assholes but then again, they're evidently both willing to accept as much 'mail' as the spammers can supply
He's also wrong in claiming they were the first 32 bit systems available. I hate articles like this because nobody ever mentions any computers from outside of the United States.
;)
The Amiga 1200 was launched in December 1992 but before that a British company called Acorn Computers released the Archimedes range of computers, the next generation after their 8 bit systems (Atom, BBC A/B/B+, Master, Master Compact). Starting with the A305, A310, A410 & A440 in mid 1989 these machines had 32bit ARM2 processors (from which the Intel XScale/StrongARM chips out now originated), the Arthur (later RISCOS (Screenshot) operating system in ROM (instant bootup!), wonderful GUI, built in BBC Basic and easy ARM assembler access, 8 channel stereo sound, etc.
My first computer was a BBC B in 1982 (which should have been mentioned for it's incredible robustness and shedload of I/O ports.. you could link it to anything, oh and for being the machine the original version of Elite was written for) to an Acorn A3000 in 1990, before going PC 94'ish. Shortly after Linux appeared so all was ok again
In your rage you're missing the point made. It's all about the jurisdiction of law.
American engineers and companies can and do screw things up too, and can where law permits be held accountable.
The workers and companies of other countries may not be subject to the same laws and standards, and therefore are not accountable and as is the case here, can hold information to ransom, etc if they can get away with it under the laws of their own country.
If data pertaining to residents of any specific country is that sensitive, then the third parties it is outsourced to, if at all, should at least be within the reach of the laws of that country.
"Does writing online now qualify one as an ISP?"
By writing online, authors are providing content, therefore surely would be more aptly defined as content providers, if indeed author isn't enough of a title for them. If someone writes something that goes into a newspaper or magazine, they're contributing to the content. Why reclassify them because their content lives on a server?
A book author isn't the same as a book publisher, though the author could be considered both if he or she were to go to the lengths of printing and distributing the book.
I certainly wouldn't call an author or content provider an Internet Service provider. Content and the medium or process by which it is delivered are two separate things.
" I hate to tell you this but it's not illegal to call someone a "nigger" or anything else. It's called speech, as in free, not as in beer. If it were illegal to call someone a "nigger" 99.9% of all blacks would be in prison, seems that's their favorite thing to call EACH OTHER.."
The BBC recently published an article all about the N word which makes the distinction between it's use as a racial slur and term of endearment when ending in er and a. It also mentions who uses it, who doesn't, and has includes various opinions on it too.
This has to be like the dumbest "mod" I have ever seen. If the regular GBA isn't big enough or have a full featured gamepad, get a gameboy player, see you can get a screen for the gamecube and a battery pack. That would cost about the same and not void any warranties. This mod is moot.
Consider this. Why do people modify old cars when they can just go out and buy a nice new one? It's the 'I can' factor. It may not make much economic, or functional sense, but is for the enthusiast that did it, it's a personal achievement.
Perhaps you were in the panhandle. Take a trip along I-44 sometime. Tulsa, in northeast Oklahoma is in an area known as green country. Sure there's plenty of red clay soil, but there are also trees from Tulsa to OKC as far as the eye can see, also the other way up and out to Missourri.
If you want barren, go down to southern Texas. If you want flat and desolate go around Kansas, which is officially flatter than a pancake.
The lack of decent net connectivity affect rural Oklahoma as much as anywhere else in the US, though in Tulsa, OKC, etc you'll have no problem getting a decent (in my case 3mbps/256kbps) net connection for cheap. On a business level, both WorldCom (yeah yeah) and Williams being in Tulsa meant plenty of carrier infrastructure is in place for fatter net connections.
Cellphone coverage and facilities could do with improvement but they work. Having come from the UK I'm not impressed with the US cellphone setup anyway, but that's another flamewar.
Analogue and digital cable TV are readily available though it's quite sad how even with the hundreds of channels offered by the latter, there's still nothing decent on half the time.
Good things about Oklahoma
Reasons to go elsewhere
Perhaps the CEOs are getting richer because nowadays they're paying offshore outsourcing companies such as Tata peanuts to do the work their fellow countrymen (and women) did only a year or two back? I'm sure it's not the sole reason but likely is a significant one.
So the comparing software to the funcional structure of ones wanker is worth a +5 insightful?
Knowing the meaning of the word wanker might be though. Your usage of the word suggests a wanker is a penis. It isn't, at least not in British slang, which is where the word originated.
wank
wank - to masturbate e.g. He was wanking, or He had a wank
wanker - person who masturbates. More commonly used to insult, e.g. You fucking wanker!. Associated hand gestures often used.
wankered - drunk. e.g. He was totally wankered.
Other infinitely useful gems of the British lexicon include...
bollocks
name for testicles. e.g. she kicked him in the bollocks.
bollocksed - drunk, e.g. I'm totally bollocksed,
bollocked - in trouble. e.g. Jimmy got bollocked by the teacher for punching Tom.
bollocking - see bollocked e.g. Jimmy got a good bollocking for punching Tom.
bollocks - crap / not very good e.g. MS Windows is a load of bollocks or Fred talked such utter bollocks at the meeting
bollock - Single testicle, or insult e.g. You stupid bollock
knackers
knackers - testicles only. not used as insult. e.g. she cut off his knackers
knackered - exhausted e.g. I'm completely knackered. Also means in trouble. e.g. Jimmy got knackered for skipping class.
knackering - tiring - see knackered
I can't comment on comedy from mainland European countries, but what made you decide to rip Brits just because O.B.L supposedly likes Benny Hill? The original poster was AC, could have been anyone.
:(
Given the population of the US vs the UK you'd expect there to be a few more funny people in the US, though if you sift out the amusing shows from the endless slew of crap Fox, NBC, etc churn out you end up with Seinfeld, Friends, The Simpsons, King of the Hill and Frasier.
The rest is dire. Big Fat Greek Life *argh* Wanda at large *diabolical* Good Morning Miami *ick* That 70s show.. canned laughter'r'us, and no everybody doesn't love Raymond. I'm surprised they didn't cut Ray Romano's salary when he bitched about it... how hard it must be for an unfunny man to get by on a paltry $200k per show.
Going back to the era of Benny Hill, you can use the current "I love the 70s" run on VH1 as a good indicator of what was available in the US at the time, and it's hardly very good either.
I don't suppose you watch any of the current UK comedy that gets airtime in the US? Ever watched Ali G? (on HBO), Trigger Happy TV (Comedy Central), The Office, 3 Non Blondes, Blackadder (BBC America), etc? Quality stuff. There is a little more to UK comedy than Keeping up appearances and Monty Python, oh and Benny Hill.
Shame Peter Kay would never work in the US
"I can certainly guarantee that here in the US that text messaging is not as prevelant is the cell phone companies would like"
I'd say you hit the nail on the head with your assessment of SMS (text messaging) in the US vs the rest of the world. 99% of the time you can only SMS people on your network (AT&TAT&T, CingularCingular, etc), and that talk is cheap (3000 minutes, unlimited night & weekend, long distance, etc). Compare that with the UK, where if I wanted to sms from Orange to Voda, or BT Cellnet or whoever I'd have no problem.
"So while mass communication is FASTER these days (24/7 Internet connections, AIM, etc), I doubt that it has any bearing on the movie industry. Would it account for GOOD MOVIES doing better as well? "HEY THIS movE ROX"
Why would the MPAA care if someone text's that the movie is great? If it's good the viewers are going to tell their friends when they get out of the theatre anyway and so others won't run away. Once they've shelled out their cash and sat through a bad movie it's too late! The cash is in the register by then.
What am I talking about you might ask?
"This is exactly backwards, in fact. Rich people send their kids to private schools, but they still pay more property tax which goes to education."
;)
Rich people are rich because they devote their lives to their careers. This is often, though not always, at the expense of being real parents to their children. This 'you deal with them, we pay you' mentality has turned most private schools into babysitters for the hours before and after normal public school hours while the parents are 'out being rich career people'. The sad thing is that the teachers, the very people who fill young minds with knowledge, a sense of right and wrong, ideas and interests are among the worst paid professional people in the USA.
"Rich people pay for their own health care, instead of relying on medicare or medicaid."
Everyone gets sick. Medicare/Medicade is no alternative to having health insurance, and hence insurance premiums go up to subsidise the people that can't pay. That's ok, you shouldn't have to die because you can't afford medical attention, indeed in the UK the NHS, for all it's faults, doesn't do that bad a job of providing healthcare for everyone. Back to the point, out of those that do pay for health insurance, the average joe with no/partial health insurance through his job is still going to feel the pinch of skyrocketing healthcare a lot more than the rich guy, so it's hardly a great sacrifice for the latter party.
"Rich people buy less fuel-efficient vehicles, so they buy more fuel (and pay more tax on them) even though they only go the same distances and have to abide by the same speed limits as poor people driving Civics."
And what's wrong with a nice new 2003 Civic? Perhaps you meant the pimp'ass rusty Buicks? I digress. To try and justify the needless waste, ecological damage, and drain on the world's fuel supply by saying the rich use more fuel and pay more tax is a most astonishingly poor, and selfish argument. FUEL IN THE UNITED STATES IS RIDICULOUSLY CHEAP compared with the rest of the world. Tell me if the taxes on $1.40 a gallon of fuel, in dollars, are anything significant in comparison with Europe, where for example in the UK you will pay about 78p per litre. There are 3.78 liters in a gallon, so that's about 2.94 a gallon. Convert that from pounds into US dollars and you have $4.72 a gallon. That's $3.32 more. Now, fill up your 30 gallon SUV tank and you're spending $42 vs the UK's $99.60. The UK's fuel prices are mostly in tax, in an effort to limit consumption and thus emissions and pollution. The bottom line is that lower US fuel taxation is hardly an excuse to pollute the environment as much as is happening. Oh of course, that's right, the kids the rich dump in private school will have to deal with it when they grow up. Good job they're going to private school; that top quality education will be needed to figure out how to clean up their parents/grandparents mess. Of course, now Hummers are being marketed to the well off soccer moms too; and it's all for the greater good.. they pay extra tax you know!
"Does a rich guy fly an airplane as a hobby? Typically, less than a quarter of the taxes charged on FBO use and aviation fuel goes back to airport services; otherwise these flyboys are paying for your municipal parks!"
See my above response on needless waste of fuel? How many gallons do you think it takes to fill the average private jet? Good job those responsible rich people are paying a bit for city beautification; we need something to soak up the extra emissions, and of course there's always the remote possibility the rich may grace us with their presence at the parks too from time to time, while they jog along with their bodyguards.
"Police, fire, public services? Rich people have their own alarm systems monitored by private companies, yet they still pay for YOUR public services."
Private firms? What would ADT, etc be then? ADT and other such companies are hardly above the average middle-class home owner, and guess what, they do when there's a break in? They relay the information to the police and fire departments. That's ok, as the rich people, *just like everyone else* are paying for said services.
I'll start out by saying I have not studied the Linux kernel source very much, so could be wrong in my following assumption.
As every system I own has only one processor, I haven't bothered to compile SMP support into the kernel. Therefore I'm not using any SCO code AFAIAA. If this is the case for me, it is also the case for thousands of other companies using single processor systems, vastly reducing the number of potential targets for SCO to extort from.
What I'm interested in now is seeing how they react to the report that a Caldera employee actually added SCO's IP to the kernel and that IBM merely improved that code.
We switched to Mozilla when the company moved to Linux. While the browser is up to the job, Mozilla mail, at least in the corporate environment, is missing key things such as a decent integrated calendar/schedule/task/appointment type system.
The one in Ximian Evolution is very good, and the Mozilla dev team would score big points if they could get this functionality added.
ps. minor whinge while I'm at it - fixing the mail notification sound bug in the Linux version of Mozilla Mail would also be nice, saving me from the complaints staff have about the loud beep of the internal speaker upon mail collection. I know the replies on Bugzilla mention it's down to the variance of sound systems on Linux, but even a box to issue a full command line so I could run mpg123 or play or something would do.