We copy all the best and worse that the US has to offer...
Tom - please note that the following is not directed at you...
Don't go dragging the US into this. This kind of crap goes on in every single government until the citizens of that government do something about it. If you live in a country where you think this doesn't happen, you are either naive or the government doesn't have resort to such tactics because they already have you by the balls. Most government leaders are in office for one of two reason: money or power. Most of them are there for both. Such behavior generally spirals out of control until citizens find a way to harass the perpetrator (maybe through lawsuits) in such a manner that it strikes fear into other politicians, or until there is some sort of uprising that generally results in significant changes to the government that basically reset the situation until it can happen again. Don't believe me? Take a look around at your leaders and their financial situations. How many of them would be considered middle class or lower? How many of them can claim that the greatest portion of their income is from the salary they get as a public servant? Don't get me wrong. There are a few people in politics who really have the citizens in mind, but it's rare.
Actually, this is Darwin's theory hard at work, doing its best to keep the gene pool strong.
I call BS. Darwin's theory of purging the gene pool requires that people lack common sense. Those of us on Slashdot are aware of how microwave ovens work, but your average person does not know and does not care. All they care about is that they can't put metal in the microwave. Since a microwave does a great job of restoring a piece of dried bread to something edible (by heating and expanding what little water is present in it), it is not reasonable for people to assume that whatever they put in the microwave should have some moisture content. Also, since plastic is the container of choice for the microwave, it's not reasonable to think that putting a plastic sponge in the microwave is going to cause a fire.
Sorry, but this is not a case of Darwinism. In fact, it's anti-Darwinism. In this case, you have a group of scientists who ought to have realized what common people would have done with this information, and failed to provide a warning. So, the "smarter" people in this case are the ones who lack common sense and therefore should be purged from society, where instead they may be causing genetic traits to be purged.
This hasn't been "cracked" in any meaningful sense of the word. All they've done is implement a decrypter working from the format specs, and worked out a way to hack decrypted keys out of a software player.
Yes, but this shows how trivial the process would be for true pirates, and ultimately proves that DRM is not about stopping the pirating of media, but rather about reducing the rights of the customers so that those rights can later be sold back to them. The new DRM schemes will do NOTHING to stop the pirates.
The user should have got a simple, understandable message that the printer was out of paper. That's a failure of the OS designer and printer driver developer.
Assuming that you mean it should have come up on their computer, I think you know that in some cases, it is not desirable for the user's PC to monitor the entire print job. However, I agree with you in that there's absolutely no reason why the printer cannot clearly state that on its display screen. "PC LOAD LETTER" is not a message that clearly indicates what the problem is. Something like "OUT OF PAPER -- Check Tray 2" would be better.
The user's email software should have picked up the typo and suggested a correction (in fact, most email clients do). Users are used to ignoring dozens of cryptic error messages daily, because we have to, in order to continue working. Make computers more reliable, and error messages more intelligible, and we'll start paying attention to them.
I actually don't think the email client should do this, as top level domains can change. However, it seems like the rejection message from the SMTP server does have some standard sections. The client COULD pick up the rejection response and present the user with a clear indication that they typed the receiving address incorrectly and some choices of how to proceed (including one that resends the same message to a different recipient).
The user is employed by your company to work. They generate income for the company. You are employed by your company to service the tools they use to generate the money that pays your salary. You are a cost to the company.
They owe you politeness out of common decency, but common sense suggests you should avoid interrupting their work.
While I understand this one, it was coupled with the example that they sent a message to their supervision and the supervision of the IT worker indicating that they had not been helped. That kind of behavior is unacceptable; it's an attitude as arrogant as that of which IT workers have been accused. Having been on both sides of the fence, I think it would be more appropriate to take a brief interruption and let the IT worker know when a better time would be.
Mostly speed cameras? Hmm, well I can't say I have much problem with those. It is really the idea that I am being watched by "big brother" as if I were a suspected criminal everywhere I go that I have a problem with.
The big problem is caused by the new "average speed" cameras, like those in use on the London orbital. They calculate average speed by capturing your vehicle and a time stamp at two different locations. Because of this, they are more or less "always on". It's a great way to catch people who know where the speed cameras are and slow down just before they get to the next camera, but it also opens up whole new avenues of abuse. Using the newer camera system, it becomes possible to track the route and progress of a vehicle, as well as pick up many other things totally unrelated to the speed traffic. I personally think single picture cameras that can frequently change location are a much better compromise between privacy and law enforcement.
There is a slight warmup time, but they are almost at full brightness without any warmup.
The problem is, that warmup time gets longer and longer, and the initial light gets dimmer and dimmer throughout the lifetime of the bulb. I have never had a CF bulb fail on me, but I generally have had to replace them before half of their promised lifetime because I can't wait three or four minutes for the bulb to get bright enough to use. It would, truly, be nice to have some idea which brands were the best.
Because I don't hink I'd consider four drinks every day to be "moderate" drinking.
I don't either, but it wouldn't be too difficult to have four drinks daily without getting drunk. One in the morning, one at lunchtime, one right after work, and one late in the evening just before going to bed. If you don't want the one in the morning, you can have one around 15:00 instead.
Otherwise, we'd have to do it all by hand. *shudders*
And even this is not so difficult, given that each of the mnemonics correspond exactly to a hexadecimal code. All you need to hand-assemble is a table mapping the mnemonics to their hex equivalents. I used to do this frequently for embedded devices.
Anything that is not favored by another is deemed to be "unamerican".
The difference being, of course, that the Dixie Chicks were not put to death for expressing views not in line with those of the government, and the consequences they endured were not handed out by the government, but rather their own fans.
Fluffy the neighborhood kitty has probably never taken down a bald eagle.
Well, the neighborhood kitty I once saw wasn't named fluffy, but I wouldn't be surprised to see it take down a bald eagle. The monster was over forty pounds.
Aquifers in the US are sinking (some with alarming speed).
The aquifers in the US that are sinking the fastest are due to use of water for crop irrigation. I would expect that using alcohol for energy storage would require increasing the number of crops grown, and thus contribute to potable water scarcity. On the other hand, it's not strictly necessary to use potable water for the production of hydrogen. If truth be told, the only way this world will have enough energy to pass around is through conservation and diversification. We should stop wasting energy (for example by building homes that don't require as much energy to properly heat and cool). For places that don't need a portable supply of energy, we should rely on completely renewable energy sources (solar, hydro, wind). For businesses, these sources should be installed on-site; residential areas would need distributed power. And finally, for transportable energy, we should have a mixed basket of fuel choices: flex-fuel vehicles that can burn gasoline, butyl alcohol, ethanol and LPG; hydrogen-powered vehicles; biodiesel vehicles; and, finally, electric vehicles that can be charged via energy obtained from renewable sources. As long as we always try to solve our energy shortages by some "Holy Grail" next big thing, we will fail miserably.
I suspect the problem is that people who see things the same way most of us do are the 20/early-30 something iPod owning executives who do not have that much weight with the companies
I disagree. I suspect that, instead, once today's 20/early-30 somethings move up the management scale and have a taste of the power and money that follows that position, they will become just as greedy as those they are replacing. In fact, you can probably count on them to be worse. Why? Because they are part of the digital music generation and will have a much better idea of exactly how to screw the consumers out of every last cent without endangering their customer base.
Very nice, but I'd rather see a reduction in cost per watt than an increase in efficiency.
By reducing the number of solar collectors needed or the area that needs to be covered, the installation costs are significantly reduced. The article indicates that this new technology could yield systems with installed costs of as little as $3 per watt.
I kept asking my dad whatever happened to "cash is king" philosophy that he's been preaching for years. He told me to shut up.:)
You dad was right, though. Cash is, indeed, king. The problem is that you have to be willing to save until you can afford to buy without credit. This is something that most of us, not even your dad, is willing to do. Credit is an all or nothing deal. You either play the game with all the risks, or you are generally excluded from borrowing money from anywhere except the institution where you do your banking -- unless you want to pay the "risk pool" interest rates. Since there's always a possibility you will need a new car on very short notice, the only way to play the cash game is to make sure you always have enough in reserve at the bank to buy the car. Sounds like your dad got lucky that they even let him finance at all.
Has anyone, ever, in the history of the universe, decided not to pirate a film after seeign a message on it equating it with theft?
This probably isn't the place to ask. Most of us know that pirating a film is a violation of copyright. I suspect those ads are aimed mostly at teenagers who just copy stuff all the time without realizing that it is against the law. Clearly, anybody who is pirating movies and knows it's illegal will just laugh at the ad, and those of us who don't pirate movies are offended by the insult of equating making copies of a movie with stealing a car. As for those who were breaking the law without knowing it, I guess they can now consider themselves educated.
Many companies in China blatantly ignore western IP laws, in some cases getting their rip-off products to market before the originals.
Just to follow up... I meant to use the term "knock-off" instead of "rip-off". The latter implies that the goods are poorly made, which is definitely not what I meant.
Ask yourself: have you ever thought about what you'd do if you were grabbed by a bouncer and pushed toward a door?
It's probably too late to be responding to this, but... The real question is whether I would realize that it was a bouncer grabbing me. If I could clearly identify that it was a bouncer (something that would be no problem for me if it was a police officer), then I would allow myself to be "escorted" out without resisting, and then ask questions afterwards.
This is probably as good an example as any of why the West is probably going to fall. While China is ramping up production and making huge economic strides, we here in the US are arguing over lines of code as our manufacturing base continues to crumble.
If you are implying that China will be the one to cause "The West" to fall, I believe you are mistaken. Many companies in China blatantly ignore western IP laws, in some cases getting their rip-off products to market before the originals. This is frequently accomplished by outright industrial espionage. You cannot expect the same western nations that consume China's products to continue to tolerate this indefinitely. At some point, China will have to crack down on this problem, or risk very damaging WTO sanctions. The only question is in how long western nations will wait before coming to a consensus about how to deal with the problem.
So, he got tazed 5 times because he was being a smart-ass?
Yes, he did.
Talking back is now a crime?
No, it isn't. Anybody who has been around police officers know that even that best are very serious when they are on the job, and if you make them feel like they aren't in control of the situation, they will react. There are two times when you don't "talk back". The first is around the arresting officers, and the second is around the judge.
In your world the only thing that is allowed is silent obedience? You will make a nice sheep. See you at the death camp, fool.
Actually, I'm just a bit wiser than the student in the video. I don't believe in silent obedience, but I do believe in picking the time and place for the battle. Now, if this student was out to prove that the police are out of control, he will probably be successful, and he just endured what was necessary to make his point. Otherwise, he was just being an idiot. What rationale would he have for refusing the leave the first time he was asked (before the police came)? What was he out to prove? What did he hope to achieve by shouting some nonsense about the patriot act? This kind of stuff happened long before the patriot act, except that victims were beat within an inch of their life by the police. All he achieved by shouting that nonsense to was to prove that either he didn't know what the patriot act was all about, or that he is a political dissident and should be watched closely for the rest of his life (and he most likely will). Probably none of this is true, but that is exactly how it would have come across.
He also is a college kid in a friggin' library. Not some derelict in an alley.
He was also being a smart-ass (something you don't do around police), and the beginning of the video makes that pretty clear. I fully support the first use of the tazer. After that, the police appear to have been unwittingly making large contributions to the kid's retirement savings.
The second time they tased him, I would've gotten as many students as I could together, pulled the police off of him and formed a circle around him several layers deep if necessary.
Better think twice about that. Best case, you would have been expelled from the university. Most likely, you would have been arrested yourself, and there's a better than even chance that you or one of the students who helped you would end up being shot. I really don't think you want to turn what was a clear incident involving police brutality into the death of one or more students. The student who filmed the thing on his phone did the right thing. In the end, I'm pretty sure that three police officers will be making a career change and the victim, should he choose to file suit, will be sucking the police department dry.
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Don't go dragging the US into this. This kind of crap goes on in every single government until the citizens of that government do something about it. If you live in a country where you think this doesn't happen, you are either naive or the government doesn't have resort to such tactics because they already have you by the balls. Most government leaders are in office for one of two reason: money or power. Most of them are there for both. Such behavior generally spirals out of control until citizens find a way to harass the perpetrator (maybe through lawsuits) in such a manner that it strikes fear into other politicians, or until there is some sort of uprising that generally results in significant changes to the government that basically reset the situation until it can happen again. Don't believe me? Take a look around at your leaders and their financial situations. How many of them would be considered middle class or lower? How many of them can claim that the greatest portion of their income is from the salary they get as a public servant? Don't get me wrong. There are a few people in politics who really have the citizens in mind, but it's rare.
Sorry, but this is not a case of Darwinism. In fact, it's anti-Darwinism. In this case, you have a group of scientists who ought to have realized what common people would have done with this information, and failed to provide a warning. So, the "smarter" people in this case are the ones who lack common sense and therefore should be purged from society, where instead they may be causing genetic traits to be purged.
It's probably too late to be responding to this, but... The real question is whether I would realize that it was a bouncer grabbing me. If I could clearly identify that it was a bouncer (something that would be no problem for me if it was a police officer), then I would allow myself to be "escorted" out without resisting, and then ask questions afterwards.