"AFAIK it was assembled decades or centuries (parts earlier, parts later) after the date where Jesus lived according to the church/bible."
True, but the most of the books of the New Testament are still attributed to the disciples; they just wrote them decades after the fact. The only real dispute over who wrote what concerns Revelations. Purists say it was written by the disciple John, while some historians say that this is impossible, and that it was written by a a Greek (also named John) at a later date.
MS Word is pretty much backwards compatible through Word 97. Word's format WAS changed in the transistion from 95 to 97 (needing import filters when opening old documents), but since then, the output has been of the same type. I jump between Word XP, 2000, and 97 all the time with nary a problem. And some of these documents are pretty complex, as far as Word goes. Most of the differences in 2000 and XP are just feature creep, nothing more. That's why so many shops dragged thier feet on upgrading office suites. They really didn't need to, and they knew it.
" It's not about sexual repression. It's about maintaining a culture by force when it wants to change."
Where to start...
You assert that the people of the US want cultural change, specifically in sexual matters, meaning more liberalization of sexual matierial, and a normalization of sexual attitudes and activities previously considered vulgar and obscene, and thus repressed or even banned outright by law.
I would argue that the people of the US, at least a majority, want exactly the opposite.
We HAD a great liberalizing of sex in the 60's and 70's. We had such a great liberalizing that we also had wretched excesses in sexuality at those times, especially in the 70's. Free love and easy sex were followed by the rapid rise of Herpes in the 70's. The newly open culture of male gay sex of the 70's was followed by the AIDS epidemic in the 80's. There are ways other than sex to get these diseases, but can we be honest enough to admit that they primarily spread so rapidly because of mass unprotected sex amongst multiple partners?
Joe and Jane Middle America noticed these things too, and were horrified, even if they took part in them for a time. They started thinking "Hmmm, maybe there's something to those old stuffy rules". And along with other cultural concerns, they starting voting conservatively. There are exceptions, certainly; areas where there are cultural holdouts. But they're in the minority.
Only the most foolish would deny that there's been a political realignment toward the right in this country since 1980. America briefly experimented with looser sexual rules, and didn't like the aftertaste.
So I would argue to you that for 25 years, we've been moving BACK towards the right, not away from it, including on sexual matters. Pornography has always been the dirty little guilty pleasure of civilization, but it's been repressed in most of them, especially in Western Societies. The Greeks are a notable exception, but please, no reminders of Roman orgies. Rome at it's height was one of the most stoic and conservative of all civilizations, with an emperor that banned a daughter to an island existence for her sexual promiscuity. The orgies and decadence came when Roman was in decline. Conservatives have noted this, and so you have an argument on whether decadence is a cause or effect of a dying civilization...but that debate is for another day.
There will always be a demand for the forbidden. But civilizations also have an interest in repressing at least the most extremes of the forbidden, for society's own good. And THAT is why we still have obscenity laws. Now, if you disagree with them, then work to change that. BUT...simply bitching about the laws won't accomplish anything. What you'll have to do is convince the people that elect governments, and that means you'll have to convince Joe and Jane of that.
"...pedophilia etc are all the same, a sexual orientation you are born with."
Pedophilia is not a "sexual orientation". It's a crime, a horribly immoral and destructive act, and maybe even a disease, but it's not a sexual preference. In sex, it takes at least two to tango (or on Slashdot, one and an Adultcheck password and a towel), but in pediophila, one of those two are unwilling or innocent victims, with little or no say over the activity. So if you're going to dignify pedophiles with the "It's natural 'cause i was born with it" thing, then just go ahead and say that rape is just a "sexual preference" too; yet another situation where one of the "participants" is a victim. If a rapist says that he's wanted to rape all of his life, does that make it a sexual orientation? You have to draw the line somewhere and declare some behaviors deviant or even psychotic.
I see this quote thrown around quite a bit, so I looked it up on Snopes. Guess what? They've talked about it quite a bit, and no one can substantiate it. The only source for the quote comes from an atheist website. Boy, that's a shock, eh? Bush denies he said it, and the only semi-credible website that referenced it (MSN Encarta) has now removed it. If you've got REAL proof Bush 41 said this, post it.
Can we go ahead and just stick a big "L" on the collective Slashdot forehead now? You guys are redefining the words "sore losers".
"Bush's inauguration costs too much! Rich people are paying for it! The money should go to Tsunami relief! The money should go to the poor! There shouldn't be an inauguration!!!"
Fuckin' Waaaaaahhhhhh...
Let's see...when Clinton was inaugurated, half of hollywood was there pouring in millions of dollars, and the party lasted a whole week. And yet a civil war was going on in Angola that killed thousands of people, with bodies literally piling up in the streets, with numerous recent natural disasters still plaguing the third world.
Funny how no one wanted to cancel the inauguration then, eh? I recall ThunderCunt Numero Uno Maureen Dowd saying that it was so much fun that she wished it could've lasted forever.
So take the hypocrisy over the inauguration and shove it straight up your assholes. So Michael Dell is shelling out big bucks...so fucking what? If Kerry had won, Larry Ellison or a host of other people would be doing the same thing.
Star Wars made Ford a star, but ever since then he's acted like he's too good for the series or the fans, at times acting like his involvment in the movies was an embarrassment. Not exactly a lot of gratitude for the vehicle that launched him to stardom...
That picture is pathetic. Poor Gillian...I'll never understand why Hollywood and New York demand that women look like heroin addicts to be beautiful. Nicole Kidman is the same way now. Getting fat is one thing, but Christ Almighty, let's have some reasonable meat on the bones, ladies. Some of these actresses and models look like Auschwitz survivors.
...because I think the old government conspiracy format wouldn't work today. One of the reasons that the X-Files thrived in the pre-911 era, IMHO, is that we USians had no constant enemy threat, so we started to look within for our boogeymen, and we found black helicopters over Waco. It was the perfect time for the X-Files secret government conspiracy plotlines.
I just don't think they'd work well in today's climate. 911 changed too much, and whether or not you support the Iraq war, nobody questions whether we have real terrorist enemies out there somewhere that want to kill us on a grand scale. After 911, even George Freakin' Carlin said he was willing to live with the US Government if it meant getting Osama and the gang. Unless you're an absolute government hating tin-foil type, the "alien-govt-conspiracy" plotline just wouldn't resonate with most US viewers anymore.
Of course, it'd be a smash hit on Slashdot.
I always liked the supernatural-monster episodes better anyway...the werewolf, the leech man,and Bruce Campbell's Demon episode. The Vampire episode was kind of dissapointing, though. So I'm glad that, in David's words, "It has to do with supernatural stuff".
Duchovny never pulled a Harrison Ford on us. He liked the series; he just wanted a chance to do something DIFFERENT after doing X-Files for years. What's the harm in that?
He's said in past interviews that he just wanted a break, and for producers to "give me a chance to miss it" before coming back to the franchise. Looks like that's exactly what they're doing. While he's stated that he got tired of doing X-Files on TV, he liked the idea of feature films, and was very happy with the first one.
Until Sci-Fi can show that they won't cancel their best shows during the prime of their lives, I don't want them going anywhere NEAR an original star trek series. Farscape was one of the best shows on TV, and they killed it despite solid fan support. Now they've got me hooked on a much-better-than-expected Battlestar Galactica. I haven't looked forward to friday night sci-fi in a long time, but I keep expecting to see a cancelation notice for BG, just out of this sense that Sci-Fi likes to go "gotcha!" to their own fans.
"...if the concept was developed in 1980 and it was founded in 1985?"
Touche; I got a date wrong, but the Lab's heyday was undoubtedly the Go-Go Internet 90's. That's when the Lab as we know it got it's reputation.
"MIT has had no need to "polish its reputation" for anything..."
Of course they do. They, like all universities, are in constant competition for students and dollars. If you're not in the front of the curve, you'll be left behind. They're CONSTANTLY polishing their reputation, as are Cal Tech, Duke, Princeton, etc.
"MIT doesn't need publicity stunts either".
That's news to other MIT professors, who have long criticized the Media Lab as a trendy research lightweight that thrives on farfetched projects (such as the infamous radio-in-the-tooth). Some of the Lab's own professors (especially in the hard sciences) have tried to break their individual groups off from the Lab to keep their reputations from suffering.
"And it's not like it has been a total waste: a lot of nice stuff has come out of there."
Other than the MPEG standard, what has the lab done of lasting value? What other creations have they come up with? They like to toss around fantastical, though general, ideas, and then take credit when someone else realizes them (Nick Negroponte likes to take some credit for Apple's Quicktime, saying that it was ideas from the Media Lab that spawned the product...I'd like to know what Apple has to say about that), but very seldom do they actually come up with a product or advance that is actually useful.
"companies like Motorola, Swatch, Lego, and HP need wacky ideas for making new products."
This attitude perfectly describes what is wrong with the Media Lab as we know it; companies don't need "wacky ideas" for products. Such products usually go straight to the bargain aisle, and then dissapear. What companies need is solid basic and applied research, and innovative ideas for products that solve specific problems and fit specific needs. That's why companies like Apple make good products. What people need to realize is that innovative does not neccessarily equal silly. And expensive silliness is EXACTLY what's coming out of the Labs. That kind of silliness is why the Media Lab thrived in the dot com era, and why it's quickly dying now. There is definitely a need to meld science, technology, and art for the benefit of humanity. After all, we're creative beings that like useful, attractive, natural-to-use things (hello, Ipod). But radio recievers in the teeth and washing machines with Internet connectivity are not such things.
...and put the money to far more useful IT teaching and research.
The media lab concept was born of the 90's "ooh aah!" fascination with the Internet. It was a way to try and continue the glory of MIT's Project Athena days in the 80's (which DID produce brilliant, useful work that we all benefit from to this day), but it was poorly concieved, yielded little real benefit, and wasted a lot of money. It should have been strangled in it's crib, but dot com dollars kept it afloat while MIT polished it's reputation as a hip place to go to school. In stark contrast to the serious work at MIT and Berkeley in the 80's, the Media Lab took on more of a chic aura, kind of a Studio 54 for geeks.
Thankfully, like disco itself, these kinds of places are dying out. It's just a shame that individuals, families, and corporations that shelled out millions of dollars have watched it all dissapear into a black hole, into what was essentially a university sponsored dot com scheme.
The Board of Education, backed overwhelmingly by the parents of the children in the school system.
I know this is Slashdot, and that religious faith causes readers to foam at the mouth and go into convulsions, but you DO realize most of the country is deeply religious, don't you?
...but you should probably make those air travel reservations to Europe, because this country has always been, and will likely always will be, deeply religious. You can lament that all you want, but it's the truth. "Jesusland" isn't going away. If you want a "Deweyist" education for your children, I'd suggest France, with all of their hostility towards faith. No danger of those wackey Christians there. Of course, you've got hundreds of thousands of MUSLIM fanatics to deal with there...
"Apparently not you, since you can't distinguish science from religion."
What's the difference?
Oh, I don't mean in the strict sense. Science is a method for describing cosmic fact. Religion is a method for expressing cosmic meaning. I mean in the practical sense. All people need something to believe in, and frankly, for many people, science has BECOME their religion, a source of both fact AND meaning. Because of the fallibility of man, science (the religion, not the method) even has it's own dogmas now. Evolution has become one of those dogmas, but it's not the only one. I'm not saying that evolution is false, but it's not held to the same standard as other hard sciences. If cold fusion were held to the same standard, it'd be scientific canon by now.
...the inevitable Vast Right Wing Conspiracy posts; "Murdoch just wants to turn gaming right like he turned the news right", or something along those lines. Someone will find some reason to complain, and toss in both Fox News and Bill O'Reilly's name into this somehow.
More likely, it's that Fox has such a vast entertainment holdings that Murdoch simply wants to capitalize on them through the game market. The potential is vast if he does so. Everything from the Predator and Alien franchises, to perhaps a GTA-type game based on the cop series The Shield.
This is just business opportunity; nothing more, nothing less.
Visa's doing one of their check card commercials featuring Marvel superheroes...sounds like they're putting some money into the costumes, so I'm hoping it's good (and funny). There are details for the ad here.You know the script already...
"The Avengers can't worry about cash when they're fighting Ultron, so under his shield, Captain America carries the Visa Check Card. Because when Thor wants warm mead, the Broom Street Bar will take reservations, but they won't take American Express".
I'm cribbing from Jonah Goldberg here, but he nailed it this morning at NR...
"First, the CBS report was supposed to do many things, two of them were: 1) Authenticate/explain the origin of those documents and, 2) address the issue that the Memo story was politically motivated. The report punts on both. They can tell us that the blogs were politically motivated from a conservative perspective, but on the biases that caused this entire scandal, we get silence."
While CBS is doing the right thing in at least admitting that the whole mess is their fault, they're still trying to stonewall on the all important issue of bias. As the note above said, they didn't hesitate to ascribe a political motive to the bloggers that called foul on Rather's report, but refuse to shine the same harsh light on themselves. One of the four execs that were chopped was closely involved with the Kerry Campaign throughout the whole story, and the source of the forged documents themselves was desperately trying to GET into the Kerry Campaign. So this wasn't a simple case of a mistake in the haste to break a story. Long after a long line of experts testified that the docs looked faked (and badly faked, at that), Dan Rather and his team stonewalled and held fast to the position that the story was true, the documents were real, their source was, in Rather's words, "unimpeachable", and that complaints were simply right wing anger, nothing more. That's not a simple matter of "haste"; that's partisan warfare, sorry Dan, but calling it like it is here.
Rather, because of his star status, was allowed to gracefully step down from the anchor position. But his team got sacked. Sounds to me like they took one for the boss...
"Then Apple can sue those individuals....NOT thinksecret. And how is reporting the specs of a coming product "trade secrets". It's not like Apple's technical drawings were stolen...
"now you can resume watching your master Bill Gates and his crashing demos of stuff that people only get because they are forced to (Okay, I'll admit that any true slavery regime attracts a few volunteer Uncle Toms like you)"
Behold the mind of an Ipod Person. Uncle Tom? Jeez, what a fucktard. And you call ME a slave? One, I'm buying an Apple, you incredible dumbass, two, I use Slackware mostly, and three, if I wanted to use XP (or anything else I want, for that matter), that doesn't mean I can't criticize "Master". I'll be the first to say Apple makes good stuff. That doesn't mean their leadership is without fault, you stupid twit.
You, and LOTS of people here are defending communism. For people that supposedly love freedom so much, how the hell can you all defend communism? And you ARE defending it, when you say "Oh, the USSR wasn't really communist. Real communism is better". Have any of you people actually read the manifesto? Christ Almighty, Marx advocates horrible things. He brags about how communism will demolish the family, as it's just another device to create free labor. He advocates violent bloodshed on a massive scale. He disavows any kind of property rights. Communism, wherever it is, has failed, and always WILL fail eventually, because it's EVIL. Mankind will not forever tolerate it, no matter where it is. It can only take root and hold on by force of arms and oppression. Communism, whether under Russian, East German, or Chinese rule is a dictarship, and any attempt to start a communist government, no matter how pure in intent, will always BECOME a dictatorship. Because individual choice will always end at the tip of a bullet in the back of those that decide to no longer participate. Lenin knew communism was unworkable any other way.
Throw Godwin's Law around all you want, but Communism of any form is just as evil as Nazism ever was. Put aside your intellectual arrogance and you'll see that. You shame yourselves when you say "communism isn't that bad". Tell that to the people of Eastern Europe, tell that to the citizens of Taiwan, tell that to the Cubans that risk their lives to escape Castro.
Slashdot Mirror
"AFAIK it was assembled decades or centuries (parts earlier, parts later) after the date where Jesus lived according to the church/bible."
True, but the most of the books of the New Testament are still attributed to the disciples; they just wrote them decades after the fact. The only real dispute over who wrote what concerns Revelations. Purists say it was written by the disciple John, while some historians say that this is impossible, and that it was written by a a Greek (also named John) at a later date.
MS Word is pretty much backwards compatible through Word 97. Word's format WAS changed in the transistion from 95 to 97 (needing import filters when opening old documents), but since then, the output has been of the same type. I jump between Word XP, 2000, and 97 all the time with nary a problem. And some of these documents are pretty complex, as far as Word goes. Most of the differences in 2000 and XP are just feature creep, nothing more. That's why so many shops dragged thier feet on upgrading office suites. They really didn't need to, and they knew it.
" It's not about sexual repression. It's about maintaining a culture by force when it wants to change."
Where to start...
You assert that the people of the US want cultural change, specifically in sexual matters, meaning more liberalization of sexual matierial, and a normalization of sexual attitudes and activities previously considered vulgar and obscene, and thus repressed or even banned outright by law.
I would argue that the people of the US, at least a majority, want exactly the opposite.
We HAD a great liberalizing of sex in the 60's and 70's. We had such a great liberalizing that we also had wretched excesses in sexuality at those times, especially in the 70's. Free love and easy sex were followed by the rapid rise of Herpes in the 70's. The newly open culture of male gay sex of the 70's was followed by the AIDS epidemic in the 80's. There are ways other than sex to get these diseases, but can we be honest enough to admit that they primarily spread so rapidly because of mass unprotected sex amongst multiple partners?
Joe and Jane Middle America noticed these things too, and were horrified, even if they took part in them for a time. They started thinking "Hmmm, maybe there's something to those old stuffy rules". And along with other cultural concerns, they starting voting conservatively. There are exceptions, certainly; areas where there are cultural holdouts. But they're in the minority.
Only the most foolish would deny that there's been a political realignment toward the right in this country since 1980. America briefly experimented with looser sexual rules, and didn't like the aftertaste.
So I would argue to you that for 25 years, we've been moving BACK towards the right, not away from it, including on sexual matters. Pornography has always been the dirty little guilty pleasure of civilization, but it's been repressed in most of them, especially in Western Societies. The Greeks are a notable exception, but please, no reminders of Roman orgies. Rome at it's height was one of the most stoic and conservative of all civilizations, with an emperor that banned a daughter to an island existence for her sexual promiscuity. The orgies and decadence came when Roman was in decline. Conservatives have noted this, and so you have an argument on whether decadence is a cause or effect of a dying civilization...but that debate is for another day.
There will always be a demand for the forbidden. But civilizations also have an interest in repressing at least the most extremes of the forbidden, for society's own good. And THAT is why we still have obscenity laws. Now, if you disagree with them, then work to change that. BUT...simply bitching about the laws won't accomplish anything. What you'll have to do is convince the people that elect governments, and that means you'll have to convince Joe and Jane of that.
"...pedophilia etc are all the same, a sexual orientation you are born with."
Pedophilia is not a "sexual orientation". It's a crime, a horribly immoral and destructive act, and maybe even a disease, but it's not a sexual preference. In sex, it takes at least two to tango (or on Slashdot, one and an Adultcheck password and a towel), but in pediophila, one of those two are unwilling or innocent victims, with little or no say over the activity. So if you're going to dignify pedophiles with the "It's natural 'cause i was born with it" thing, then just go ahead and say that rape is just a "sexual preference" too; yet another situation where one of the "participants" is a victim. If a rapist says that he's wanted to rape all of his life, does that make it a sexual orientation? You have to draw the line somewhere and declare some behaviors deviant or even psychotic.
...does Balmer in this ad remind anyone else of this guy?
I see this quote thrown around quite a bit, so I looked it up on Snopes. Guess what? They've talked about it quite a bit, and no one can substantiate it. The only source for the quote comes from an atheist website. Boy, that's a shock, eh? Bush denies he said it, and the only semi-credible website that referenced it (MSN Encarta) has now removed it. If you've got REAL proof Bush 41 said this, post it.
Can we go ahead and just stick a big "L" on the collective Slashdot forehead now? You guys are redefining the words "sore losers".
"Bush's inauguration costs too much! Rich people are paying for it! The money should go to Tsunami relief! The money should go to the poor! There shouldn't be an inauguration!!!"
Fuckin' Waaaaaahhhhhh...
Let's see...when Clinton was inaugurated, half of hollywood was there pouring in millions of dollars, and the party lasted a whole week. And yet a civil war was going on in Angola that killed thousands of people, with bodies literally piling up in the streets, with numerous recent natural disasters still plaguing the third world.
Funny how no one wanted to cancel the inauguration then, eh? I recall ThunderCunt Numero Uno Maureen Dowd saying that it was so much fun that she wished it could've lasted forever.
So take the hypocrisy over the inauguration and shove it straight up your assholes. So Michael Dell is shelling out big bucks...so fucking what? If Kerry had won, Larry Ellison or a host of other people would be doing the same thing.
Star Wars made Ford a star, but ever since then he's acted like he's too good for the series or the fans, at times acting like his involvment in the movies was an embarrassment. Not exactly a lot of gratitude for the vehicle that launched him to stardom...
That picture is pathetic. Poor Gillian...I'll never understand why Hollywood and New York demand that women look like heroin addicts to be beautiful. Nicole Kidman is the same way now. Getting fat is one thing, but Christ Almighty, let's have some reasonable meat on the bones, ladies. Some of these actresses and models look like Auschwitz survivors.
...because I think the old government conspiracy format wouldn't work today. One of the reasons that the X-Files thrived in the pre-911 era, IMHO, is that we USians had no constant enemy threat, so we started to look within for our boogeymen, and we found black helicopters over Waco. It was the perfect time for the X-Files secret government conspiracy plotlines.
I just don't think they'd work well in today's climate. 911 changed too much, and whether or not you support the Iraq war, nobody questions whether we have real terrorist enemies out there somewhere that want to kill us on a grand scale. After 911, even George Freakin' Carlin said he was willing to live with the US Government if it meant getting Osama and the gang. Unless you're an absolute government hating tin-foil type, the "alien-govt-conspiracy" plotline just wouldn't resonate with most US viewers anymore.
Of course, it'd be a smash hit on Slashdot.
I always liked the supernatural-monster episodes better anyway...the werewolf, the leech man,and Bruce Campbell's Demon episode. The Vampire episode was kind of dissapointing, though. So I'm glad that, in David's words, "It has to do with supernatural stuff".
Duchovny never pulled a Harrison Ford on us. He liked the series; he just wanted a chance to do something DIFFERENT after doing X-Files for years. What's the harm in that?
He's said in past interviews that he just wanted a break, and for producers to "give me a chance to miss it" before coming back to the franchise. Looks like that's exactly what they're doing. While he's stated that he got tired of doing X-Files on TV, he liked the idea of feature films, and was very happy with the first one.
Until Sci-Fi can show that they won't cancel their best shows during the prime of their lives, I don't want them going anywhere NEAR an original star trek series. Farscape was one of the best shows on TV, and they killed it despite solid fan support. Now they've got me hooked on a much-better-than-expected Battlestar Galactica. I haven't looked forward to friday night sci-fi in a long time, but I keep expecting to see a cancelation notice for BG, just out of this sense that Sci-Fi likes to go "gotcha!" to their own fans.
"...if the concept was developed in 1980 and it was founded in 1985?"
Touche; I got a date wrong, but the Lab's heyday was undoubtedly the Go-Go Internet 90's. That's when the Lab as we know it got it's reputation.
"MIT has had no need to "polish its reputation" for anything..."
Of course they do. They, like all universities, are in constant competition for students and dollars. If you're not in the front of the curve, you'll be left behind. They're CONSTANTLY polishing their reputation, as are Cal Tech, Duke, Princeton, etc.
"MIT doesn't need publicity stunts either".
That's news to other MIT professors, who have long criticized the Media Lab as a trendy research lightweight that thrives on farfetched projects (such as the infamous radio-in-the-tooth). Some of the Lab's own professors (especially in the hard sciences) have tried to break their individual groups off from the Lab to keep their reputations from suffering.
"And it's not like it has been a total waste: a lot of nice stuff has come out of there."
Other than the MPEG standard, what has the lab done of lasting value? What other creations have they come up with? They like to toss around fantastical, though general, ideas, and then take credit when someone else realizes them (Nick Negroponte likes to take some credit for Apple's Quicktime, saying that it was ideas from the Media Lab that spawned the product...I'd like to know what Apple has to say about that), but very seldom do they actually come up with a product or advance that is actually useful.
"companies like Motorola, Swatch, Lego, and HP need wacky ideas for making new products."
This attitude perfectly describes what is wrong with the Media Lab as we know it; companies don't need "wacky ideas" for products. Such products usually go straight to the bargain aisle, and then dissapear. What companies need is solid basic and applied research, and innovative ideas for products that solve specific problems and fit specific needs. That's why companies like Apple make good products. What people need to realize is that innovative does not neccessarily equal silly. And expensive silliness is EXACTLY what's coming out of the Labs. That kind of silliness is why the Media Lab thrived in the dot com era, and why it's quickly dying now. There is definitely a need to meld science, technology, and art for the benefit of humanity. After all, we're creative beings that like useful, attractive, natural-to-use things (hello, Ipod). But radio recievers in the teeth and washing machines with Internet connectivity are not such things.
Look up Wired Magazine's piece about why the Media Lab is dying.
...and put the money to far more useful IT teaching and research.
The media lab concept was born of the 90's "ooh aah!" fascination with the Internet. It was a way to try and continue the glory of MIT's Project Athena days in the 80's (which DID produce brilliant, useful work that we all benefit from to this day), but it was poorly concieved, yielded little real benefit, and wasted a lot of money. It should have been strangled in it's crib, but dot com dollars kept it afloat while MIT polished it's reputation as a hip place to go to school. In stark contrast to the serious work at MIT and Berkeley in the 80's, the Media Lab took on more of a chic aura, kind of a Studio 54 for geeks.
Thankfully, like disco itself, these kinds of places are dying out. It's just a shame that individuals, families, and corporations that shelled out millions of dollars have watched it all dissapear into a black hole, into what was essentially a university sponsored dot com scheme.
The Board of Education, backed overwhelmingly by the parents of the children in the school system.
I know this is Slashdot, and that religious faith causes readers to foam at the mouth and go into convulsions, but you DO realize most of the country is deeply religious, don't you?
...but you should probably make those air travel reservations to Europe, because this country has always been, and will likely always will be, deeply religious. You can lament that all you want, but it's the truth. "Jesusland" isn't going away. If you want a "Deweyist" education for your children, I'd suggest France, with all of their hostility towards faith. No danger of those wackey Christians there. Of course, you've got hundreds of thousands of MUSLIM fanatics to deal with there...
"Apparently not you, since you can't distinguish science from religion."
What's the difference?
Oh, I don't mean in the strict sense. Science is a method for describing cosmic fact. Religion is a method for expressing cosmic meaning. I mean in the practical sense. All people need something to believe in, and frankly, for many people, science has BECOME their religion, a source of both fact AND meaning. Because of the fallibility of man, science (the religion, not the method) even has it's own dogmas now. Evolution has become one of those dogmas, but it's not the only one. I'm not saying that evolution is false, but it's not held to the same standard as other hard sciences. If cold fusion were held to the same standard, it'd be scientific canon by now.
Mammals have been eating dinosaurs for years.
...the inevitable Vast Right Wing Conspiracy posts; "Murdoch just wants to turn gaming right like he turned the news right", or something along those lines. Someone will find some reason to complain, and toss in both Fox News and Bill O'Reilly's name into this somehow.
More likely, it's that Fox has such a vast entertainment holdings that Murdoch simply wants to capitalize on them through the game market. The potential is vast if he does so. Everything from the Predator and Alien franchises, to perhaps a GTA-type game based on the cop series The Shield.
This is just business opportunity; nothing more, nothing less.
Visa's doing one of their check card commercials featuring Marvel superheroes...sounds like they're putting some money into the costumes, so I'm hoping it's good (and funny). There are details for the ad here.You know the script already...
"The Avengers can't worry about cash when they're fighting Ultron, so under his shield, Captain America carries the Visa Check Card. Because when Thor wants warm mead, the Broom Street Bar will take reservations, but they won't take American Express".
I'm cribbing from Jonah Goldberg here, but he nailed it this morning at NR...
"First, the CBS report was supposed to do many things, two of them were: 1) Authenticate/explain the origin of those documents and, 2) address the issue that the Memo story was politically motivated. The report punts on both. They can tell us that the blogs were politically motivated from a conservative perspective, but on the biases that caused this entire scandal, we get silence."
While CBS is doing the right thing in at least admitting that the whole mess is their fault, they're still trying to stonewall on the all important issue of bias. As the note above said, they didn't hesitate to ascribe a political motive to the bloggers that called foul on Rather's report, but refuse to shine the same harsh light on themselves. One of the four execs that were chopped was closely involved with the Kerry Campaign throughout the whole story, and the source of the forged documents themselves was desperately trying to GET into the Kerry Campaign. So this wasn't a simple case of a mistake in the haste to break a story. Long after a long line of experts testified that the docs looked faked (and badly faked, at that), Dan Rather and his team stonewalled and held fast to the position that the story was true, the documents were real, their source was, in Rather's words, "unimpeachable", and that complaints were simply right wing anger, nothing more. That's not a simple matter of "haste"; that's partisan warfare, sorry Dan, but calling it like it is here.
Rather, because of his star status, was allowed to gracefully step down from the anchor position. But his team got sacked. Sounds to me like they took one for the boss...
Roland Piquepaille, modded -1 Troll, simply for criticizing market spin...
The I-pod People are taking over Slashdot.
"Then Apple can sue those individuals....NOT thinksecret. And how is reporting the specs of a coming product "trade secrets". It's not like Apple's technical drawings were stolen...
"now you can resume watching your master Bill Gates and his crashing demos of stuff that people only get because they are forced to (Okay, I'll admit that any true slavery regime attracts a few volunteer Uncle Toms like you)"
Behold the mind of an Ipod Person. Uncle Tom? Jeez, what a fucktard. And you call ME a slave? One, I'm buying an Apple, you incredible dumbass, two, I use Slackware mostly, and three, if I wanted to use XP (or anything else I want, for that matter), that doesn't mean I can't criticize "Master". I'll be the first to say Apple makes good stuff. That doesn't mean their leadership is without fault, you stupid twit.
Like I said... Ipod Person
You, and LOTS of people here are defending communism. For people that supposedly love freedom so much, how the hell can you all defend communism? And you ARE defending it, when you say "Oh, the USSR wasn't really communist. Real communism is better". Have any of you people actually read the manifesto? Christ Almighty, Marx advocates horrible things. He brags about how communism will demolish the family, as it's just another device to create free labor. He advocates violent bloodshed on a massive scale. He disavows any kind of property rights. Communism, wherever it is, has failed, and always WILL fail eventually, because it's EVIL. Mankind will not forever tolerate it, no matter where it is. It can only take root and hold on by force of arms and oppression. Communism, whether under Russian, East German, or Chinese rule is a dictarship, and any attempt to start a communist government, no matter how pure in intent, will always BECOME a dictatorship. Because individual choice will always end at the tip of a bullet in the back of those that decide to no longer participate. Lenin knew communism was unworkable any other way.
Throw Godwin's Law around all you want, but Communism of any form is just as evil as Nazism ever was. Put aside your intellectual arrogance and you'll see that. You shame yourselves when you say "communism isn't that bad". Tell that to the people of Eastern Europe, tell that to the citizens of Taiwan, tell that to the Cubans that risk their lives to escape Castro.