He didn't say he was sorry for lying about being Satoshi. He said he's sorry that everybody is being a bunch of dicks to him, by asking him to provide ordinary proof for his extraordinary claim.
Why do you need to fly drones at school? Why does anyone need to be flying a drone at school?
You don't. Unless you do.
See, the thing is, not everybody agrees on what school is for, just like not everybody agrees what prison is for, just like not everyone agrees what welfare or the army or the library is for. Everybody's got their own agenda. All of these institutions serve or hinder these agendas in various ways. Two people who support a given institution may support it for different reasons. For example, some people support building prisons to rehabilitate felons, while some support building prisons because they want to punish those same felons. Some support building prisons because they just want the streets to be safer and quieter for a little while. Some people build prisons for a living. And so on.
School is much the same way. Some people want kids to learn a trade, so they can not be unemployed and so we can compete with China. Some believe universal schooling contributes to an increase in society's level of technological advancement. Some people want our youth to learn critical thinking skills, so that they won't be tricked by politicians and other scoundrels. Some people just want their kids to have similar experiences to their own, so that they can have something to talk about at dinner. Again, some people just want the streets to be quieter during the day.
You obviously don't think that piloting a drone is what school is for. Well, you're not exactly wrong. But some people disagree. And they're not exactly wrong either.
PC: "Hi, Windows here, I'm so glad you decided to shut down your laptop, because now I can install those updates that I downloaded and didn't feel were worth the trouble of asking you about earlier! It'll only take about 15-20 minutes!"
My friend: "But I want to put my laptop away so I can leave now?"
Windows: Just for that, it's going to take an additional ten minutes. Don't bother me while I'm juggling these knives, or I'll kill myself and scrawl a note blaming you for it in my own blood. Even if your professional reputation survives that, I'm guessing it won't survive losing whatever you've been working on on this laptop all week. Now shut up and go look morosely out the window at the ever-worsening traffic.
"Hello, user. Windows here. Listen, I really need to shut down to update myself. Would you like me to do that immediately? Or would you like to be reminded again in four hours?"
"Remind me again in four hours."
"Gotcha, see you in four hours."
[Ten minutes later.]
"Hello, user. Windows here. Listen, I really need to shut down to update myself. Would you like me to do that immediately? Or would you like to be reminded again in four hours?"
"This bid tells us that some bidders are willing to risk a lot for the prestige of being the cheapest solar developer," said Jenny Chase, head of solar analysis at BNEF. "Nobody knows how it's meant to work."
Well, I'm neither an economist nor an... electrician? But I have bought a lot of printers that I palmed off on the thrift store people after the original ink cartridge ran out, because it was cheaper to just buy a new one. So I'll take a shot.
The low bidders are selling their electricity for less than it costs to produce because, at some point in the future, they hope to charge a higher price for it, after all of their competitors have had to exit the industry, and, due to inertial effects, would find it difficult to re-enter.
No other industry does this, of course. Oh, wait, almost every other industry does this now.
Five qubits? According to understanding of quantum computing, which I got by reading two seconds of various Wired articles before the paywall kicked in, that means that this amazing machine is capable of storing every value between 0 and 31 simultaneously!
Taking a "year off" may be great if you are part of the British monarchy, but it is not something that normal people can afford.
This. It doesn't matter if an Upper-Class Twit of the Year takes a gap year, because nothing they do really matters anyway. They're pretty much already committed to a gap lifetime.
How about this: "Encryption is a vitally important tool. But the topic is far more complicated than can be addressed in a short interview, which makes discussing the reality of its wide-spread use by well organized criminals and terrorists impossible in this setting."
So, basically: "My opponent makes some good points. Some really good points, actually. And my own points, which seem kind of dumb by comparison, would take too long to explain. I don't know why I even agreed to show up. I just like to hear myself talk. But not anymore. Whatever, I'm going home."
Wow, after the high-school debate team I didn't think things could get any more lame and depressing.
In other words, making proclamations about it in the way Snowden did serves no educational purpose, but does keep his own name in the news, which is the only reason he did it.
It serves a small educational purpose. Perhaps someone's aunt will now ask their nephew about these issues the next time he shows up to fix their computer. It's not much, but it's something.
And perhaps what he wants to keep going is the dialogue we're now having about these ideas? Aren't you and I doing the same thing right now? Nobody's going to base their Master's dissertation on a three-sentence Slashdot post, but that doesn't mean that post isn't saying anything at all. Just because people like to post our opinions on the internet doesn't mean they don't sincerely hold those opinions, or want to convince others of their validity.
As soon as you're done thrashing that straw man, how about addressing how completely lacking was this publicity post from Snowden in any sort of contextual nuance.
Contextual nuance? In a few minutes of airtime on CNN?
You're absolutely right. Nothing/nobody should be listened to unless it/they completely addresses every facet of the subject at hand. No abbreviations, no summaries, no abstractions can be permitted. No one in the audience can be expected to have anything else going on in their lives. Nothing but perpetual laserlike monomaniacal focus is acceptable. No one in the audience can be expected to have done any research on this matter beforehand, nor can they be expected to do any afterward.
Now, then, let's do this right. In the beginning, the primal monobloc exploded into space and time... but perhaps we should back up a bit...
Cue the 40 jillion posts positing that Snowden's opinion on secret government surveillance and controls on anti-surveillance technology is not even remotely relevant to anyone ever, while simultaneously holding that his efforts to oppose secret government surveillance made him the single greatest threat to America's national security in the last two centuries.
Yeah, I guess that's one. Although that's really more a matter of Oracle chopping off the rest of the trunk just above the branch. It seems that's just standard operating procedure down at Oracle Orchards.
So fork it. Problem "solved". People like to complain about stuff.
Well said.
Still, forking never actually seems to work. After the initial uproar that led to the fork dies down, people pretty much abandon the fork and go back to the trunk project, and continue to grumble about the same issues. Can anyone name a forked-and-renamed project that actually became the most prominent branch? There's bound to have been some, but I can't for the life of me think of one.
Devuan? Nope. Soylent News? Nope. Wikipedia 2? Probably not.
Outside of that, trends in offshoring, outsourcing, robotics, and automation are set to destroy over 50% of jobs in under 20 years.
This. And the remaining 50% shortly thereafter.
Free market capitalism, in practice if not in theory, was the least repressive economic system for hundreds of years. But once that first real android rolls off the line, it's over. In my rather pessimistic opinion, we probably won't survive the subsequent onslaught of von Neumann Terminators, but if we do, we're going to have to figure some other way to spend 40+ hours a week.
Everybody grab a souvenir tool on the way out. Me, I'm going to see if I can get my hands on an adz.
They want more people in the industry so they can flood the market with labor and lower the pay of their tech employees.
Close. They want to create the perception that more people are desperately needed in the industry so that they can have political cover to import more foreign workers on H1B visas, so they can flood the market with foreign labor and lower the pay of their tech employees.
Townfolk: You can see it flying from here! And burning! He's going to destroy everything!
Dragon Patrol: I know it seems that way on the face of it, but as yet we have no hard evidence that that's the case.
Townsfolk: Please do something, it's your job!
Dragon Patrol: Very well, we'll schedule an investigation for next week.
Townsfolk: AAAAAGH!! OH GOD WE'RE BURNING AAAAGH!
[Six months later...]
City Watch: After a thorough investigation, we have concluded that this dragon attack is really an actionable issue. Everything and everyone that could be burned already has been. And it's a good thing, in a lot of ways. For example, the dragon has given us, the Dragon Patrol, a portion of the proceeds from burning down the city down and looting its riches. We consider this case closed.
Well, I tried to read it, since I'm a huge fan of Python. But one of the paragraphs was indented in a slightly different way than all the others, so I couldn't.
Problem is when someone is under multiple oaths, then which one takes priority? Most here would say congress trumps all others, but they would be wrong. There is a well defined legal framework for clandestine operations - there are no quotable examples because there are no public examples.
So true. As always, my ultimate allegiance is to my crossed index and middle fingers, concealed behind my back.
Slashdot Mirror
He didn't say he was sorry for lying about being Satoshi. He said he's sorry that everybody is being a bunch of dicks to him, by asking him to provide ordinary proof for his extraordinary claim.
Is just 25 hours really a world record? It sounds like the kind of thing a South Korean might do by accident.
Why do you need to fly drones at school? Why does anyone need to be flying a drone at school?
You don't. Unless you do.
See, the thing is, not everybody agrees on what school is for, just like not everybody agrees what prison is for, just like not everyone agrees what welfare or the army or the library is for. Everybody's got their own agenda. All of these institutions serve or hinder these agendas in various ways. Two people who support a given institution may support it for different reasons. For example, some people support building prisons to rehabilitate felons, while some support building prisons because they want to punish those same felons. Some support building prisons because they just want the streets to be safer and quieter for a little while. Some people build prisons for a living. And so on.
School is much the same way. Some people want kids to learn a trade, so they can not be unemployed and so we can compete with China. Some believe universal schooling contributes to an increase in society's level of technological advancement. Some people want our youth to learn critical thinking skills, so that they won't be tricked by politicians and other scoundrels. Some people just want their kids to have similar experiences to their own, so that they can have something to talk about at dinner. Again, some people just want the streets to be quieter during the day.
You obviously don't think that piloting a drone is what school is for. Well, you're not exactly wrong. But some people disagree. And they're not exactly wrong either.
PC: "Hi, Windows here, I'm so glad you decided to shut down your laptop, because now I can install those updates that I downloaded and didn't feel were worth the trouble of asking you about earlier! It'll only take about 15-20 minutes!"
My friend: "But I want to put my laptop away so I can leave now?"
Windows: Just for that, it's going to take an additional ten minutes. Don't bother me while I'm juggling these knives, or I'll kill myself and scrawl a note blaming you for it in my own blood. Even if your professional reputation survives that, I'm guessing it won't survive losing whatever you've been working on on this laptop all week. Now shut up and go look morosely out the window at the ever-worsening traffic.
No One Should Have To Use Proprietary Software To Communicate With Their Government
You mean TurboTax?
Aging and Bloated OpenSSL Is Purged of 2 High-Severity Bugs
The way that headline is phrased makes me want to call the Elder Abuse Hotline.
"Hello, user. Windows here. Listen, I really need to shut down to update myself. Would you like me to do that immediately? Or would you like to be reminded again in four hours?"
"Remind me again in four hours."
"Gotcha, see you in four hours."
[Ten minutes later.]
"Hello, user. Windows here. Listen, I really need to shut down to update myself. Would you like me to do that immediately? Or would you like to be reminded again in four hours?"
"This bid tells us that some bidders are willing to risk a lot for the prestige of being the cheapest solar developer," said Jenny Chase, head of solar analysis at BNEF. "Nobody knows how it's meant to work."
Well, I'm neither an economist nor an... electrician? But I have bought a lot of printers that I palmed off on the thrift store people after the original ink cartridge ran out, because it was cheaper to just buy a new one. So I'll take a shot.
The low bidders are selling their electricity for less than it costs to produce because, at some point in the future, they hope to charge a higher price for it, after all of their competitors have had to exit the industry, and, due to inertial effects, would find it difficult to re-enter.
No other industry does this, of course. Oh, wait, almost every other industry does this now.
Five qubits? According to understanding of quantum computing, which I got by reading two seconds of various Wired articles before the paywall kicked in, that means that this amazing machine is capable of storing every value between 0 and 31 simultaneously!
Taking a "year off" may be great if you are part of the British monarchy, but it is not something that normal people can afford.
This. It doesn't matter if an Upper-Class Twit of the Year takes a gap year, because nothing they do really matters anyway. They're pretty much already committed to a gap lifetime.
How about this: "Encryption is a vitally important tool. But the topic is far more complicated than can be addressed in a short interview, which makes discussing the reality of its wide-spread use by well organized criminals and terrorists impossible in this setting."
So, basically: "My opponent makes some good points. Some really good points, actually. And my own points, which seem kind of dumb by comparison, would take too long to explain. I don't know why I even agreed to show up. I just like to hear myself talk. But not anymore. Whatever, I'm going home."
Wow, after the high-school debate team I didn't think things could get any more lame and depressing.
In other words, making proclamations about it in the way Snowden did serves no educational purpose, but does keep his own name in the news, which is the only reason he did it.
It serves a small educational purpose. Perhaps someone's aunt will now ask their nephew about these issues the next time he shows up to fix their computer. It's not much, but it's something.
And perhaps what he wants to keep going is the dialogue we're now having about these ideas? Aren't you and I doing the same thing right now? Nobody's going to base their Master's dissertation on a three-sentence Slashdot post, but that doesn't mean that post isn't saying anything at all. Just because people like to post our opinions on the internet doesn't mean they don't sincerely hold those opinions, or want to convince others of their validity.
As soon as you're done thrashing that straw man, how about addressing how completely lacking was this publicity post from Snowden in any sort of contextual nuance.
Contextual nuance? In a few minutes of airtime on CNN?
You're absolutely right. Nothing/nobody should be listened to unless it/they completely addresses every facet of the subject at hand. No abbreviations, no summaries, no abstractions can be permitted. No one in the audience can be expected to have anything else going on in their lives. Nothing but perpetual laserlike monomaniacal focus is acceptable. No one in the audience can be expected to have done any research on this matter beforehand, nor can they be expected to do any afterward.
Now, then, let's do this right. In the beginning, the primal monobloc exploded into space and time... but perhaps we should back up a bit...
Cue the 40 jillion posts positing that Snowden's opinion on secret government surveillance and controls on anti-surveillance technology is not even remotely relevant to anyone ever, while simultaneously holding that his efforts to oppose secret government surveillance made him the single greatest threat to America's national security in the last two centuries.
Libre Office?
Yeah, I guess that's one. Although that's really more a matter of Oracle chopping off the rest of the trunk just above the branch. It seems that's just standard operating procedure down at Oracle Orchards.
So fork it. Problem "solved". People like to complain about stuff.
Well said.
Still, forking never actually seems to work. After the initial uproar that led to the fork dies down, people pretty much abandon the fork and go back to the trunk project, and continue to grumble about the same issues. Can anyone name a forked-and-renamed project that actually became the most prominent branch? There's bound to have been some, but I can't for the life of me think of one.
Devuan? Nope. Soylent News? Nope. Wikipedia 2? Probably not.
Outside of that, trends in offshoring, outsourcing, robotics, and automation are set to destroy over 50% of jobs in under 20 years.
This. And the remaining 50% shortly thereafter.
Free market capitalism, in practice if not in theory, was the least repressive economic system for hundreds of years. But once that first real android rolls off the line, it's over. In my rather pessimistic opinion, we probably won't survive the subsequent onslaught of von Neumann Terminators, but if we do, we're going to have to figure some other way to spend 40+ hours a week.
Everybody grab a souvenir tool on the way out. Me, I'm going to see if I can get my hands on an adz.
They want more people in the industry so they can flood the market with labor and lower the pay of their tech employees.
Close. They want to create the perception that more people are desperately needed in the industry so that they can have political cover to import more foreign workers on H1B visas, so they can flood the market with foreign labor and lower the pay of their tech employees.
Dang it, I meant to say "this dragon attack is NOT really an actionable issue".
Townsfolk: There's a dragon attacking the city!
Dragon Patrol: That is troubling, if true.
Townfolk: You can see it flying from here! And burning! He's going to destroy everything!
Dragon Patrol: I know it seems that way on the face of it, but as yet we have no hard evidence that that's the case.
Townsfolk: Please do something, it's your job!
Dragon Patrol: Very well, we'll schedule an investigation for next week.
Townsfolk: AAAAAGH!! OH GOD WE'RE BURNING AAAAGH!
[Six months later...]
City Watch: After a thorough investigation, we have concluded that this dragon attack is really an actionable issue. Everything and everyone that could be burned already has been. And it's a good thing, in a lot of ways. For example, the dragon has given us, the Dragon Patrol, a portion of the proceeds from burning down the city down and looting its riches. We consider this case closed.
Interview With Python Creator Guido Van Rossum
Well, I tried to read it, since I'm a huge fan of Python. But one of the paragraphs was indented in a slightly different way than all the others, so I couldn't.
Problem is when someone is under multiple oaths, then which one takes priority? Most here would say congress trumps all others, but they would be wrong. There is a well defined legal framework for clandestine operations - there are no quotable examples because there are no public examples.
So true. As always, my ultimate allegiance is to my crossed index and middle fingers, concealed behind my back.
And thus does democracy flourish.
San Francisco Adopts Law Requiring Solar Panels On All New Buildings
What about heat pollution? What if you wanted to build a nice roof garden instead?
Why does absolutely everyone have to do exactly the same thing all the time?
Basically, they just arbitrarily decided what to call Chernobyl radiation. They have no clue.
"Pssht. Science. Science is, just, like, a bunch of numbers. They can mean anything you want. This is art, man."
"Cartel"? Is that the word for it?
Ah, solidarity, the last virtue of the gangster.
What does an opposite sex clone version of myself counts as?
Depends. Are either of you even slightly attracted to the other?