I sort-of get why the rest of these were covered on Slashdot. Not this one though.
Someone sues for info about an NSA operation. How is this news? Anyone can file suit for anything at any time.
How is this news for nerds? The NSA isn't spying on nerds, it's spying on terrorists and the people they contact.
How is this "Your Rights Online"? Is there a new right to be free from surveillance in wartime when you associate with the enemy? there never was before.
graduate engineering programs... are utterly dominated by foreign students
I think this is because of immigration, visa, and residency rules. The foreign folks have to stay in school or leave the US. It would be harder to job-hunt from overseas, so they really need to get a good job before they can even think about leaving school. US citizens don't share this incentive.
They're getting more done. They're getting more work assigned to them.
If I get twice as much done and 3 times as much assigned to me, I'm going to feel like I'm getting a smaller percentage of my work done, even though my productivity has doubled.
Oh no, a problem! We're the press. We don't know anything about anything. How can this problem possibly be fixed! What's to be done!? Are we all doomed?
People who solve problems instead of hyping them understand that if there's a shortage of something (bandwidth, or QoS in this case), you go get more of it. And the problem is solved.
You didn't seriously go there did you??? Taking a rotten tomato throwing it at a wall and calling it a media player would have been better than real media player. The world yelled out in praise when media player came out compared to real and quicktime players that were out.
The OP brought up media player, not me.
Microsoft fixed it so they controlled the media player market, regardless of the technical merits of media player. Note how it hasn't improved in years and years.
Blu-ray??? How are they holding back that technology.
They're supporting a technically-inferior transitional technology for "free" in Windows Vista. They're offering their customers like HP cash incentives to support HD-DVD. They're doing it as a competitive move.
HD-DVD will offer smaller, slower discs than Blu-Ray. It has no technical advantages. (It may or may not have a small, temporary cost-per-disc advantage for movies. But Microsoft doesn't sell movies.)
I dont know - the USA is not exactly a paragon of libery and prosperity for all, and may not be the best model, which you are obviously suggesting here.
There's not fantastic prosperity for all, but there a modest level of prosperity for people who work and are even the slightest bit responsible. Avoiding poverty is as simple as graduating from high school, staying married, staying sober, and not having children until you're in your 20s. Check out the poverty rates for that group of people in the US -- they're infantesimal.
The worst case of a democratic government is about as good as the average case of all other forms of government.
That you visit some truly poor and struggling families.
Poor is relative. And struggling is the normal human condtion.
Can anyone on Slashdot say that they knew anyone in the US who starved to death? Have you ever heard anyone say they knew someone who starved to death in the USA? Have you ever seen it in the news? I haven't.
Correct me if I am wrong, but the only "illegal" activities that have even come close to sticking to microsoft are their actions in relation to IE and windows media player.. both of which are free, and compete against free alternatives.
You're wrong, so I'm correcting you.
Netscape was a commercial product before IE was bundled with Windows. Once Microsoft put Netscape out of business, it became free.
Media player competed against Real player. Real was charging for certain versions of their player (and their server) until Microsoft started bundling Media Player.
Microsoft has held back numerous technological improvements over the years. That's why I don't like them They're still doing it -- look at Blu-Ray.
What about the privacy of the people who submitted their email addresses?
This is just typical of Slashdot. If Sony wanted the list for the same reason, then the privacy of the email recipients would matter. Since there's a teenager involved, it's OK for him to violate their privacy all he wants.
It just proves that Slashdoters don't really care about privacy at all. It's just a tool to advance other agendas or bash your enemies.
Nice ranting, but I still don't get the point. Can you summarize it in one sentence? Maybe you're just trying to say you're unhappy? If so, that could be done more clearly with the word: I'm unhappy.
What we can do is make an attempt to stand up for what we claim our values are.
What values do you mean? And what would standing up for them be like? What actual actions would someone take to do this?
Is it something besides ranting on a message board?
We did not aid them in rebuilding their country. Once they accomplished our common aim (displacing the soviets), we left them to their own poorly-funded devices.
This sounds like excuse-making. If only the US had written a bunch of big checks, everything would have turned out perfect. I don't think so.
We helped defeat the communists in Nicaragua. We're not writing an unlimited number of checks to them. When can we expect the Nicaraguan terrorist attacks to start?
What the US needs is to act with caution and responsability and be a good world citizen.
The US government is responsible to US citizens, not to the world. "A good world citizen" is just a way of saying that the US should ignore our own interests.
Stop using torture
The US doesn't use torture as a matter of policy. Maybe you don't believe that, but what more can you ask for? A super-duper-policy against torture? Maybe a handshake? A promise?
Maybe some sort of verification where every US citizen is watched 24-hours a day to make sure no one is tortured.
and avoid collateral damage in foreign countries.
Already done. At least as much as possible while maintaining our other responsibilities.
Demand the same things from both friends and foes
This is just stupid. I want my friends to be well armed and my enemies to be poorly armed. That's because I'm not an idiot.
(like, why let Israel have illegal nuclear weapons but bash Iran wich has none nor the ability to develop them).
Because Israel isn't threatening to wipe out people? I think the USA would be happier if Israel didn't have nuclear weapons, but there's not much to be done about it. The US has no interest in invading Israel to take their nukes away. Those nukes aren't a danger to the US at this time.
Slashdot Mirror
I sort-of get why the rest of these were covered on Slashdot. Not this one though.
Someone sues for info about an NSA operation. How is this news? Anyone can file suit for anything at any time.
How is this news for nerds? The NSA isn't spying on nerds, it's spying on terrorists and the people they contact.
How is this "Your Rights Online"? Is there a new right to be free from surveillance in wartime when you associate with the enemy? there never was before.
Our company bought Linux machines from Dell 4 years ago with RH 7.1 on them.
graduate engineering programs ... are utterly dominated by foreign students
I think this is because of immigration, visa, and residency rules. The foreign folks have to stay in school or leave the US. It would be harder to job-hunt from overseas, so they really need to get a good job before they can even think about leaving school. US citizens don't share this incentive.
If they can come up with a disk that self-destructs when it leaves your house
Using magic?
If the disk isn't writable, and if the disk doesn't require some kind of external activation, then this is impossible.
They're getting more done. They're getting more work assigned to them.
If I get twice as much done and 3 times as much assigned to me, I'm going to feel like I'm getting a smaller percentage of my work done, even though my productivity has doubled.
My feelings are largely under my control. So I'd rather accomplish more and feel OK about it.
Actually, I'd rather get paid a lot regardless of my accomplishments and feel rich.
The study surveys people. The people feel like they get a smaller percentage of their work done.
This is just the press being stupid again.
So throttle the bandwidth then. Problem solved.
My point about the press stands.
Oh no, a problem! We're the press. We don't know anything about anything. How can this problem possibly be fixed! What's to be done!? Are we all doomed?
People who solve problems instead of hyping them understand that if there's a shortage of something (bandwidth, or QoS in this case), you go get more of it. And the problem is solved.
They could. It would cost $40000 because you could only put one on a wafer.
the only the Blu-Ray has going for it being able to support more space on it
Much more space. It's also much faster, because the bit density is higher.
I also find it hilarious that you are using Sony as an argument about holding back technology
No one mentioned Sony except for you. Blu-ray isn't Sony. Sony owns some of the technology and is leading the push, but Blu-ray has broad support.
You didn't seriously go there did you??? Taking a rotten tomato throwing it at a wall and calling it a media player would have been better than real media player. The world yelled out in praise when media player came out compared to real and quicktime players that were out.
The OP brought up media player, not me.
Microsoft fixed it so they controlled the media player market, regardless of the technical merits of media player. Note how it hasn't improved in years and years.
Blu-ray??? How are they holding back that technology.
They're supporting a technically-inferior transitional technology for "free" in Windows Vista. They're offering their customers like HP cash incentives to support HD-DVD. They're doing it as a competitive move.
HD-DVD will offer smaller, slower discs than Blu-Ray. It has no technical advantages. (It may or may not have a small, temporary cost-per-disc advantage for movies. But Microsoft doesn't sell movies.)
Yes, Microsoft drove them out of business. But that doesn't mean it was done out of spite.
It was done illegally.
I dont know - the USA is not exactly a paragon of libery and prosperity for all, and may not be the best model, which you are obviously suggesting here.
There's not fantastic prosperity for all, but there a modest level of prosperity for people who work and are even the slightest bit responsible. Avoiding poverty is as simple as graduating from high school, staying married, staying sober, and not having children until you're in your 20s. Check out the poverty rates for that group of people in the US -- they're infantesimal.
There's no draft
The worst case of a democratic government is about as good as the average case of all other forms of government.
That you visit some truly poor and struggling families.
Poor is relative. And struggling is the normal human condtion.
Can anyone on Slashdot say that they knew anyone in the US who starved to death? Have you ever heard anyone say they knew someone who starved to death in the USA? Have you ever seen it in the news? I haven't.
Correct me if I am wrong, but the only "illegal" activities that have even come close to sticking to microsoft are their actions in relation to IE and windows media player.. both of which are free, and compete against free alternatives.
You're wrong, so I'm correcting you.
Netscape was a commercial product before IE was bundled with Windows. Once Microsoft put Netscape out of business, it became free.
Media player competed against Real player. Real was charging for certain versions of their player (and their server) until Microsoft started bundling Media Player.
Microsoft has held back numerous technological improvements over the years. That's why I don't like them They're still doing it -- look at Blu-Ray.
Would you like the government to be able to maintain secret lists of people they plan to exterminate?
This is just stupid. Would anyone like anyone to maintain any lists of people they want to exterminate, secret or open?
What about the privacy of the people who submitted their email addresses?
This is just typical of Slashdot. If Sony wanted the list for the same reason, then the privacy of the email recipients would matter. Since there's a teenager involved, it's OK for him to violate their privacy all he wants.
It just proves that Slashdoters don't really care about privacy at all. It's just a tool to advance other agendas or bash your enemies.
MS Windows users have had this for 5 years. Congrats to Apple for finally catching up to us.
Nice ranting, but I still don't get the point. Can you summarize it in one sentence? Maybe you're just trying to say you're unhappy? If so, that could be done more clearly with the word: I'm unhappy.
What we can do is make an attempt to stand up for what we claim our values are.
What values do you mean? And what would standing up for them be like? What actual actions would someone take to do this?
Is it something besides ranting on a message board?
We did not aid them in rebuilding their country. Once they accomplished our common aim (displacing the soviets), we left them to their own poorly-funded devices.
This sounds like excuse-making. If only the US had written a bunch of big checks, everything would have turned out perfect. I don't think so.
We helped defeat the communists in Nicaragua. We're not writing an unlimited number of checks to them. When can we expect the Nicaraguan terrorist attacks to start?
There is nothing that really beats that, when it comes to convincing people.
Telling people what they want to hear is always more convincing than the truth.
What the US needs is to act with caution and responsability and be a good world citizen.
The US government is responsible to US citizens, not to the world. "A good world citizen" is just a way of saying that the US should ignore our own interests.
Stop using torture
The US doesn't use torture as a matter of policy. Maybe you don't believe that, but what more can you ask for? A super-duper-policy against torture? Maybe a handshake? A promise?
Maybe some sort of verification where every US citizen is watched 24-hours a day to make sure no one is tortured.
and avoid collateral damage in foreign countries.
Already done. At least as much as possible while maintaining our other responsibilities.
Demand the same things from both friends and foes
This is just stupid. I want my friends to be well armed and my enemies to be poorly armed. That's because I'm not an idiot.
(like, why let Israel have illegal nuclear weapons but bash Iran wich has none nor the ability to develop them).
Because Israel isn't threatening to wipe out people? I think the USA would be happier if Israel didn't have nuclear weapons, but there's not much to be done about it. The US has no interest in invading Israel to take their nukes away. Those nukes aren't a danger to the US at this time.
That's one reason I don't watch PBS.
Also they don't have porn.