my house was built in 1954. it's a relatively new house, compared to many in the US and especially Europe. while many (if not most) of older houses have been renovated, not all have.
my house has had the power 'upgraded' several times. there is still substantial original wiring. if i were to get an EV, i'd have to redo the entire fuse box, put in a larger amperage master breaker, and re-wire the front side of my house in the process.
My grandmother owns several properties, most of which were made before 1930. One she grew up in; one her children grew up in. at least these two do not have 'modern' wiring sufficient for EVs. believe it or not, there are still quite a few properties out there with 30 or 50 amp mains on fuses.
Ironically enough I reskilled from C# and other.NET oddities to PHP a few years ago purely out of personal preference.
Sounds like you're contradicting yourself, here. Clarify?
I highly doubt C# is the only language in the UK that is being sought after. There are decades of projects written in Java, C++, C, and others which still need to be maintained for one reason or another. There's no getting around that.
There are more and more jobs available for skilled.NET coders.
Yes. With the uptick in Sharepoint and Exchange adoption from the more traditional mail servers (at least from what I've seen), there is more and more need for competent developers in this realm due to how many shitty ones are there now, and have been there, for some time.
A good PHP/Perl/C/C++/etc. programmer - or even a mediocre one like me - is able to wipe the floor with the usual mess of.NET developers. They are, seemingly, mostly hacks. Someone who understands concepts like memory management, regular expressions, and efficiency is going to be quite valuable here.
That's a good idea, because having something that someone else wants doesn't require proportionate measures like:
* shutting the fence * locking your doors * locking the gate * security cameras * perimeter guards * armed guards * proactive security to go where you will go * same proactive security at exterior assets
I know that a nuclear weapon the size of a suitcase was possible in the 50s. I also know that there are portable 'trashcan' sized reactors, albeit not in common construction.
While plutonium or uranium may not be an option due to volatility, I've heard there's been talk of using americium in the future as a power source (once they figure out how, of course).
I suspect the first place power armor might be used is on ships - particularly on carriers. Turn the deck into a charging plate and they'd be able to charge whenever they're not doing any direct Work. They'd be great for loading armaments which currently take multiple men, cherry pickers, etc.
Of course, then you face further complications from static buildup and the like. It may not be tenable.
Most smartphones coming out now have >256Mb RAM. Any less is "not enough".
W7 will run on a crusty old 1GHz laptop with a 10GB drive. You can get it to run well in under 512Mb without too much ass-backwards hackery, and still use an application or two at a time. Cost is no object here, though, when 2GB is under $50, a mini-ITX form factor board + CPU is around $60, and common flash memory is somewhere in that same ballpark for 32GB. If they could get the parts from Intel, they could easily build a 1GHz, 1GB RAM, 32GB smartphone based on W7 that has 6 hours of talk time for under $500. The biggest/hardest part would be getting the radio to work properly.
I've been there, done that, and gotten the pink slip. No, not literally - but I've looked into doing things like this in the past.
Consider for a second why you want to do this before you approach it, as well as the added overhead of maintaining multiple, divergent systems.
As for Exchange -> Gmail... why? Seems like a (significant) downgrade to me, and I'm particularly un-fond of Exchange.
If you're considering multiple apps under WINE and completely abandon the existing OS, I suspect you're a bit of a fanatic (or simply inexperienced). You want to do something like this with baby steps. One application at a time!
What's the justification? Licensing costs? Avoiding malware? Reducing management overhead? What is your end goal?
The only conceivable time I can imagine moving common workstations to LInux right now is if you're running on ancient XP machines and/or the necessary applications are either minimal and do not necessarily require Windows, or you plan to move to something like XenApp for important Windows apps. Moving already-licensed W7 machines to Linux "just because" seems stupid unless there's a good time/money management reason for it.
IF you're silly enough to approach this, I suggest you look at user requirements - and then start replacing and/or migrating one thing at a time. If you want to get rid of Exchange, I suggest you look at that first, consider options, and do a migration only once you've figured out that it makes sense after considering all use-case scenarios.
The smartest move Microsoft could've made would've been to push for Windows 7 based phones. No, not Windows Phone 7; Windows 7.
All the individual components are there to make this possible: ULV Atom processors which have the same power footprint as some of these faster ARM CPUs. There have been a handful of such devices out there, already (though marketed as MIDs).
Had MS peared down W7, removing pretty much every unnecessary subsystem (eg. removing file sharing and everything you'd only need on a 'desktop' type computer), they'd have had a ready-to-go platform. They'd also have reaped massive benefits: full office would be possible (and/or they could have built a 'small screen' office with minimal visual elements), allowing for seamless integration with various services. They could run VMs (theoretically). They could use Exchange. They could install actual Windows PC software (which has a larger library than any other platform in existence).
What's more, the W7 UI is quite adaptable. It can be made to look and act like XP. It can be made to look and act like OSX (somewhat) or even Maemo 4 (which I like quite a bit). IMO, it'd be pretty damn useful on a small touchscreen device, assuming they rebuilt some of the control panel applets to handle small resolution screens (and removed the majority of them).
At the rate at which Intel is moving on Atom platforms, I'd not be surprised to see it overtake ARM in the mobile market in the next couple years.
Certainly - this would be a very effective dispersal method, particularly if you're running a VM cluster. Break out of the 'jail' through a Windows driver or bug in the VM management interface API, and you've gained privileged access on a clustered VM host. Depending on which VM it is, and which member of a cluster, it's quite possible you've got open administrative access on the entire cluster.
That's, what, 10, 15, 30 physical servers with gobs of RAM and CPU? That alone is terrifying, but consider that they'd then be able to infect the individual Windows instances on those machines, and you've got a significant problem. Each of those VMs may be on their own 1q VLANs with other facilities, allowing for significant transit and dispersal.
Personally I see Apple's strong point as the user interface, and the design of the cases they put their hardware in. Neither are important for servers.
Strongly disagree on the second part: case design is very important on a server. It's almost as important as the hardware in the machine and the external interfaces (say, SAS, IPMI or Infiniband).
I'm pretty sure the Xserve had none of those interfaces, and the internal RAID controller was somewhat lackluster at that. From what I've seen of them, I'd rather have a modern Dell or HP server - the hardware is better.
There are a couple ways around doing this, but none of them seem to make much sense from a time investment perspective - your's included.
There's something to be said for 'knowing' through GPOs and the like, what's on a system. You can't do this with registry hacks.
As for LVM2... I've avoided it like the plague that it is: slow/inefficient and buggy are good words for it. It's also awkward to manage.
This is what I've done... we've got a Windows domain for our Windows servers (mostly terminal servers), and a domain for our Windows workstations. The Windows servers are all virtualized, and workstations are locked down to a bare minimum - most of what they use now is either online or on the terminal servers. Heavy, non-networked applications, like Office, remain on the workstations.
The virtual hosts, as well as a mess of BSD and OpenSol/Nexenta servers, are all on Kerberos + LDAP. Samba is on systems where it is appropriate to allow one or more domain to access files. Anything important goes on in Unixland, and the ZFS snapshots kick the snot out of VSS. In fact, with the ZFS SAN and XenServer, I'm able to integrate VSS into ZFS to take snapshots at the SAN level transparently. I can ship those over the network to another system for backup using the snapshot mechanisms.
Currently, I'm playing with the idea of Samba 4 on the Unix machines, because it's easier to handle (though the maturity isn't there yet for AD master, and you sort of need to know what you're doing - while having a fairly intimate understanding of krb5 and ldap in the process). I might be able to do away with the use of a handful of pricey CALs for the Windows servers while improving network file transfer performance for the users by doing this: somehow, beta Samba still manages to trump W2k8R2 for CIFS performance.
So, forget their 'improvements'. How about 'fixes' - specifically, NFS (due to nfs-tools?)? All throughout 5.x, NFS performance has been atrocious - despite any attempts to tune it. We're talking a 5th of the throughput that should be realizable.
Regardless of the facts, if they use the same "math" they use to figure out the ecological footprint of things like commercial biofuel production, hybrid and electric vehicles, and other green technologies, it'll undoubtedly be "better".
That's interesting. I wonder why we've got increasing levels of record unemployment right now, at a time when we've got a record level of Democrats in power (House, Senate, Executive). Any ideas?
Similarly, Carter's Presidency had the same issue.
Clinton did not - but he also didn't get much done, either. Republican-locked House+Senate kinda made that not happen, so government was more-or-less inoperable for a while and minimal damage was done.
BSG gave real characters, all of which with their faults and strengths. Most of them (like most people) were unsavory to one degree or another, but
Saul Tye, I disliked for the first several seasons. By the end, he was one of my favorites. Giaius Baltar was an outrageously unsavory character at the beginning, but by the end I could at least understand him, somewhat (even if I didn't "like" him, I could understand him.) The Chief is a 'constant' throughout the show, but he grows on your like a close friend; Adm. Adama, like a father. The opposite can be said for Kara Thrace.
That's certainly how it started! And what nice boobs they were.
One episode in and I was hooked, though.
I didn't watch BSG, Firefly, Dollhouse, and hell, even Stargate, until they were almost done showing/were done showing (BSG - started watching S1 when S6 was showing; SG1, started @ season 1 when S9 or so was on TV). Why? Because I'd avoided them, thinking they were in the same class of shlock as B5 and Andromeda: horrible acting, worse props and races, and abhorent writing which focused on things which were so detached from anything relateable or real to throw it firmly into "fantasy" (eg. alien races, which look like us, talk like us, and generally behave much as we do).
I strongly disagree on the 'philosophical stuff not belonging in scifi' point. Strongly - and so did Isaac Asimov, who arguably helped create Science Fiction. Philosophy, and the meaning of life, is an important emphasis within all (good, true) scifi. The "science" is merely a plot device, and to get hung up on it for the telling of the story is, IMO, as shortsighted as going into a strip club to drink. (Sure, they've got liquor there, but that's not why you go to the strip club. Not that I do, or anything.)
BSG is horribly slow and dull if you overlook the 'human' and philosophical elements of BSG, though. I'll grant you that.
BSG has a number. They're not perfect, but it's a far cry better than anything else out there that's worth watching.
For instance, the Raptor ships have lateral burn thrusters for turning/maneuvering. (You can see this throughout the show if you're paying attention.) There are a couple 'ring ships' in the fleet. Weapons are mass drivers (guns), not stupid "energy pulse weapons". "Faster than light" space travel is plausible per the laws of physics. There are very real 'space' requirements, like air, material supply, etc. which play an integral part in the show.
Compare this to the re-imagined BSG, where the Cylons might have had a plan, but it became very evident they weren't letting the writers in on it. After what was the lamest and literally the most deux ex machina ending ever that was the final episode I didn't think I could ever be as infuriated after watching a show (well, Lost proved me wrong, but I digress).
What? That makes no sense at all, unless you're speaking literally, "the god from the machine". But you said that. However...
There was constant forward-reference to the eventual ending, starting with the very first episode of the miniseries. It becomes apparent when you watch the first episode a second time. There was nothing abrupt about any of it (though the 'selection' of the 'final 5' was seemingly not entirely planned out). "What will happen has happened before" with constant references to God ("the Cylon God") not being the same as the Gods, but being superior - and so on. If the ending was abrupt or out of place to you, you weren't paying attention to half the show.
(G'kar and Londo make totally up for it though in my opinion)
Egads. They were the least believable characters! What's next: a gurgling puddle of slime in the staring role?
Right wing conservative politicians are far, far more in bed with corporations than left wing politicians.
Oh, really? Would you care to look at corporate candidate funding before spouting off like that? Which companies are you talking about, exactly? Ford? Dominoes Pizza? Outback Steakhouse? Office Depot? Maybe that's why pizza delivery is so goddamn expensive, or why it's 2010 and we're unable to get 'paperless' still, seeing more fucking printers being bought than ever before.
Hint: It's complete bullshit, almost a polar opposite of how things actually are.
http://www.goodguide.com/contributions
The reality is that more money tends to move towards corporations when Democrats are in power. Corporations, particularly technology corps, are much more heavily Democrat in their contributions, by far.
Basically the WiFi standards bunch screwed up. So I actually blame them for a lot of the problems. So many years and they still haven't got WiFi to the level of TLS/HTTPS.
To be fair, TLS/SSL has been around for a lot longer - 15 or so years. Additionally, the Wifi 'standards' have largely been spear-headed by commercial interests, not a standards body (though they've been involved, too). In reality, there's no reason why TLS/SSL couldn't have been implemented as the security mechanism for wireless - except it wasn't for various political and financial reasons. I doubt it has anything to do with technical prowess.
Had greed, politics and myopia had not taken its destructive toll, the potential of Stargate could have set a new standard for the genre.
I can't speak to the "greed and greed", but Stargate did set a "new standard" for the genre, to some degree. The show ran for a decade with (mostly) the same cast throughout. They were able to sustain essentially the same format for that entire time, without degrading the quality too substantially, and introduce new content throughout.
Granted, this only really works with episodic fiction, but they still managed to maintain a degree of continuity and character progression from season to season (and episode to episode). Contrast that to ST:TNG, where by the 3rd or so season, things were starting to get a bit dull and repetitive.
How do you justify stating that BSG was a lesser scifi contribution than B5?
The re-imaged BSG was largely unique in the quality it portrayed. The acting was good, the characters were good, and the story was complex and interwoven. As all good science fiction does, current events and the human condition were examined, placing the characters in moral quandaries throughout the show. Religion, origins, etc. were explored while maintaining a reasonable level of scientific realism. Significantly, B5 had none of these things.
I will give you this, though: B5 had characters which surpassed all but the original Star Trek for cheesy costumes and personas. Nobody before or since (except in Star Trek) has achieved such a 2D feel. The plots, likewise, were quite similar, often seemingly of a sitcom nature.
Did I mention how bad the acting, characters, and plots were in B5? They might as well have disclosed "we wanted to make a Star Trek show but couldn't get licensing, so we changed Cardasians and the other races a bit and obscured things enough to not fetch the lawyers". Thanks, but I'd rather watch DS9.
Slashdot Mirror
Every outlet is a potential "gas station."
nice in concept, and all, but that's unrealistic.
my house was built in 1954. it's a relatively new house, compared to many in the US and especially Europe. while many (if not most) of older houses have been renovated, not all have.
my house has had the power 'upgraded' several times. there is still substantial original wiring. if i were to get an EV, i'd have to redo the entire fuse box, put in a larger amperage master breaker, and re-wire the front side of my house in the process.
My grandmother owns several properties, most of which were made before 1930. One she grew up in; one her children grew up in. at least these two do not have 'modern' wiring sufficient for EVs. believe it or not, there are still quite a few properties out there with 30 or 50 amp mains on fuses.
Ironically enough I reskilled from C# and other .NET oddities to PHP a few years ago purely out of personal preference.
Sounds like you're contradicting yourself, here. Clarify?
I highly doubt C# is the only language in the UK that is being sought after. There are decades of projects written in Java, C++, C, and others which still need to be maintained for one reason or another. There's no getting around that.
There are more and more jobs available for skilled .NET coders.
Yes. With the uptick in Sharepoint and Exchange adoption from the more traditional mail servers (at least from what I've seen), there is more and more need for competent developers in this realm due to how many shitty ones are there now, and have been there, for some time.
A good PHP/Perl/C/C++/etc. programmer - or even a mediocre one like me - is able to wipe the floor with the usual mess of .NET developers. They are, seemingly, mostly hacks. Someone who understands concepts like memory management, regular expressions, and efficiency is going to be quite valuable here.
Don't be silly. After 25 years of inflation, it's actually a slight discount.
That's a good idea, because having something that someone else wants doesn't require proportionate measures like:
* shutting the fence
* locking your doors
* locking the gate
* security cameras
* perimeter guards
* armed guards
* proactive security to go where you will go
* same proactive security at exterior assets
I know that a nuclear weapon the size of a suitcase was possible in the 50s. I also know that there are portable 'trashcan' sized reactors, albeit not in common construction.
While plutonium or uranium may not be an option due to volatility, I've heard there's been talk of using americium in the future as a power source (once they figure out how, of course).
I suspect the first place power armor might be used is on ships - particularly on carriers. Turn the deck into a charging plate and they'd be able to charge whenever they're not doing any direct Work. They'd be great for loading armaments which currently take multiple men, cherry pickers, etc.
Of course, then you face further complications from static buildup and the like. It may not be tenable.
Eh? So what?
Most smartphones coming out now have >256Mb RAM. Any less is "not enough".
W7 will run on a crusty old 1GHz laptop with a 10GB drive. You can get it to run well in under 512Mb without too much ass-backwards hackery, and still use an application or two at a time. Cost is no object here, though, when 2GB is under $50, a mini-ITX form factor board + CPU is around $60, and common flash memory is somewhere in that same ballpark for 32GB. If they could get the parts from Intel, they could easily build a 1GHz, 1GB RAM, 32GB smartphone based on W7 that has 6 hours of talk time for under $500. The biggest/hardest part would be getting the radio to work properly.
Obviously, it was guerrilla advertising for the upcoming MGM remake production, Red Dawn, where we're invaded by Red China.
I've been there, done that, and gotten the pink slip. No, not literally - but I've looked into doing things like this in the past.
Consider for a second why you want to do this before you approach it, as well as the added overhead of maintaining multiple, divergent systems.
As for Exchange -> Gmail... why? Seems like a (significant) downgrade to me, and I'm particularly un-fond of Exchange.
If you're considering multiple apps under WINE and completely abandon the existing OS, I suspect you're a bit of a fanatic (or simply inexperienced). You want to do something like this with baby steps. One application at a time!
What's the justification? Licensing costs? Avoiding malware? Reducing management overhead? What is your end goal?
The only conceivable time I can imagine moving common workstations to LInux right now is if you're running on ancient XP machines and/or the necessary applications are either minimal and do not necessarily require Windows, or you plan to move to something like XenApp for important Windows apps. Moving already-licensed W7 machines to Linux "just because" seems stupid unless there's a good time/money management reason for it.
IF you're silly enough to approach this, I suggest you look at user requirements - and then start replacing and/or migrating one thing at a time. If you want to get rid of Exchange, I suggest you look at that first, consider options, and do a migration only once you've figured out that it makes sense after considering all use-case scenarios.
The smartest move Microsoft could've made would've been to push for Windows 7 based phones. No, not Windows Phone 7; Windows 7.
All the individual components are there to make this possible: ULV Atom processors which have the same power footprint as some of these faster ARM CPUs. There have been a handful of such devices out there, already (though marketed as MIDs).
Had MS peared down W7, removing pretty much every unnecessary subsystem (eg. removing file sharing and everything you'd only need on a 'desktop' type computer), they'd have had a ready-to-go platform. They'd also have reaped massive benefits: full office would be possible (and/or they could have built a 'small screen' office with minimal visual elements), allowing for seamless integration with various services. They could run VMs (theoretically). They could use Exchange. They could install actual Windows PC software (which has a larger library than any other platform in existence).
What's more, the W7 UI is quite adaptable. It can be made to look and act like XP. It can be made to look and act like OSX (somewhat) or even Maemo 4 (which I like quite a bit). IMO, it'd be pretty damn useful on a small touchscreen device, assuming they rebuilt some of the control panel applets to handle small resolution screens (and removed the majority of them).
At the rate at which Intel is moving on Atom platforms, I'd not be surprised to see it overtake ARM in the mobile market in the next couple years.
Certainly - this would be a very effective dispersal method, particularly if you're running a VM cluster. Break out of the 'jail' through a Windows driver or bug in the VM management interface API, and you've gained privileged access on a clustered VM host. Depending on which VM it is, and which member of a cluster, it's quite possible you've got open administrative access on the entire cluster.
That's, what, 10, 15, 30 physical servers with gobs of RAM and CPU? That alone is terrifying, but consider that they'd then be able to infect the individual Windows instances on those machines, and you've got a significant problem. Each of those VMs may be on their own 1q VLANs with other facilities, allowing for significant transit and dispersal.
Personally I see Apple's strong point as the user interface, and the design of the cases they put their hardware in. Neither are important for servers.
Strongly disagree on the second part: case design is very important on a server. It's almost as important as the hardware in the machine and the external interfaces (say, SAS, IPMI or Infiniband).
I'm pretty sure the Xserve had none of those interfaces, and the internal RAID controller was somewhat lackluster at that. From what I've seen of them, I'd rather have a modern Dell or HP server - the hardware is better.
There are a couple ways around doing this, but none of them seem to make much sense from a time investment perspective - your's included.
There's something to be said for 'knowing' through GPOs and the like, what's on a system. You can't do this with registry hacks.
As for LVM2... I've avoided it like the plague that it is: slow/inefficient and buggy are good words for it. It's also awkward to manage.
This is what I've done... we've got a Windows domain for our Windows servers (mostly terminal servers), and a domain for our Windows workstations. The Windows servers are all virtualized, and workstations are locked down to a bare minimum - most of what they use now is either online or on the terminal servers. Heavy, non-networked applications, like Office, remain on the workstations.
The virtual hosts, as well as a mess of BSD and OpenSol/Nexenta servers, are all on Kerberos + LDAP. Samba is on systems where it is appropriate to allow one or more domain to access files. Anything important goes on in Unixland, and the ZFS snapshots kick the snot out of VSS. In fact, with the ZFS SAN and XenServer, I'm able to integrate VSS into ZFS to take snapshots at the SAN level transparently. I can ship those over the network to another system for backup using the snapshot mechanisms.
Currently, I'm playing with the idea of Samba 4 on the Unix machines, because it's easier to handle (though the maturity isn't there yet for AD master, and you sort of need to know what you're doing - while having a fairly intimate understanding of krb5 and ldap in the process). I might be able to do away with the use of a handful of pricey CALs for the Windows servers while improving network file transfer performance for the users by doing this: somehow, beta Samba still manages to trump W2k8R2 for CIFS performance.
So, forget their 'improvements'. How about 'fixes' - specifically, NFS (due to nfs-tools?)? All throughout 5.x, NFS performance has been atrocious - despite any attempts to tune it. We're talking a 5th of the throughput that should be realizable.
Regardless of the facts, if they use the same "math" they use to figure out the ecological footprint of things like commercial biofuel production, hybrid and electric vehicles, and other green technologies, it'll undoubtedly be "better".
They've crossed corn with jelly fish. I don't see how this would be any different, fundamentally.
That's interesting. I wonder why we've got increasing levels of record unemployment right now, at a time when we've got a record level of Democrats in power (House, Senate, Executive). Any ideas?
Similarly, Carter's Presidency had the same issue.
Clinton did not - but he also didn't get much done, either. Republican-locked House+Senate kinda made that not happen, so government was more-or-less inoperable for a while and minimal damage was done.
B5 gave you characters who you wanted to be.
BSG gave real characters, all of which with their faults and strengths. Most of them (like most people) were unsavory to one degree or another, but
Saul Tye, I disliked for the first several seasons. By the end, he was one of my favorites. Giaius Baltar was an outrageously unsavory character at the beginning, but by the end I could at least understand him, somewhat (even if I didn't "like" him, I could understand him.) The Chief is a 'constant' throughout the show, but he grows on your like a close friend; Adm. Adama, like a father. The opposite can be said for Kara Thrace.
That's certainly how it started! And what nice boobs they were.
One episode in and I was hooked, though.
I didn't watch BSG, Firefly, Dollhouse, and hell, even Stargate, until they were almost done showing/were done showing (BSG - started watching S1 when S6 was showing; SG1, started @ season 1 when S9 or so was on TV). Why? Because I'd avoided them, thinking they were in the same class of shlock as B5 and Andromeda: horrible acting, worse props and races, and abhorent writing which focused on things which were so detached from anything relateable or real to throw it firmly into "fantasy" (eg. alien races, which look like us, talk like us, and generally behave much as we do).
I strongly disagree on the 'philosophical stuff not belonging in scifi' point. Strongly - and so did Isaac Asimov, who arguably helped create Science Fiction. Philosophy, and the meaning of life, is an important emphasis within all (good, true) scifi. The "science" is merely a plot device, and to get hung up on it for the telling of the story is, IMO, as shortsighted as going into a strip club to drink. (Sure, they've got liquor there, but that's not why you go to the strip club. Not that I do, or anything.)
BSG is horribly slow and dull if you overlook the 'human' and philosophical elements of BSG, though. I'll grant you that.
BSG has a number. They're not perfect, but it's a far cry better than anything else out there that's worth watching.
For instance, the Raptor ships have lateral burn thrusters for turning/maneuvering. (You can see this throughout the show if you're paying attention.) There are a couple 'ring ships' in the fleet. Weapons are mass drivers (guns), not stupid "energy pulse weapons". "Faster than light" space travel is plausible per the laws of physics. There are very real 'space' requirements, like air, material supply, etc. which play an integral part in the show.
Compare this to the re-imagined BSG, where the Cylons might have had a plan, but it became very evident they weren't letting the writers in on it. After what was the lamest and literally the most deux ex machina ending ever that was the final episode I didn't think I could ever be as infuriated after watching a show (well, Lost proved me wrong, but I digress).
What? That makes no sense at all, unless you're speaking literally, "the god from the machine". But you said that. However...
There was constant forward-reference to the eventual ending, starting with the very first episode of the miniseries. It becomes apparent when you watch the first episode a second time. There was nothing abrupt about any of it (though the 'selection' of the 'final 5' was seemingly not entirely planned out). "What will happen has happened before" with constant references to God ("the Cylon God") not being the same as the Gods, but being superior - and so on. If the ending was abrupt or out of place to you, you weren't paying attention to half the show.
(G'kar and Londo make totally up for it though in my opinion)
Egads. They were the least believable characters! What's next: a gurgling puddle of slime in the staring role?
Right wing conservative politicians are far, far more in bed with corporations than left wing politicians.
Oh, really? Would you care to look at corporate candidate funding before spouting off like that? Which companies are you talking about, exactly? Ford? Dominoes Pizza? Outback Steakhouse? Office Depot? Maybe that's why pizza delivery is so goddamn expensive, or why it's 2010 and we're unable to get 'paperless' still, seeing more fucking printers being bought than ever before.
Hint: It's complete bullshit, almost a polar opposite of how things actually are.
http://www.goodguide.com/contributions
The reality is that more money tends to move towards corporations when Democrats are in power. Corporations, particularly technology corps, are much more heavily Democrat in their contributions, by far.
Basically the WiFi standards bunch screwed up. So I actually blame them for a lot of the problems. So many years and they still haven't got WiFi to the level of TLS/HTTPS.
To be fair, TLS/SSL has been around for a lot longer - 15 or so years. Additionally, the Wifi 'standards' have largely been spear-headed by commercial interests, not a standards body (though they've been involved, too). In reality, there's no reason why TLS/SSL couldn't have been implemented as the security mechanism for wireless - except it wasn't for various political and financial reasons. I doubt it has anything to do with technical prowess.
Had greed, politics and myopia had not taken its destructive toll, the potential of Stargate could have set a new standard for the genre.
I can't speak to the "greed and greed", but Stargate did set a "new standard" for the genre, to some degree. The show ran for a decade with (mostly) the same cast throughout. They were able to sustain essentially the same format for that entire time, without degrading the quality too substantially, and introduce new content throughout.
Granted, this only really works with episodic fiction, but they still managed to maintain a degree of continuity and character progression from season to season (and episode to episode). Contrast that to ST:TNG, where by the 3rd or so season, things were starting to get a bit dull and repetitive.
Battle Star Galactica -> Babylon5
How do you justify stating that BSG was a lesser scifi contribution than B5?
The re-imaged BSG was largely unique in the quality it portrayed. The acting was good, the characters were good, and the story was complex and interwoven. As all good science fiction does, current events and the human condition were examined, placing the characters in moral quandaries throughout the show. Religion, origins, etc. were explored while maintaining a reasonable level of scientific realism. Significantly, B5 had none of these things.
I will give you this, though: B5 had characters which surpassed all but the original Star Trek for cheesy costumes and personas. Nobody before or since (except in Star Trek) has achieved such a 2D feel. The plots, likewise, were quite similar, often seemingly of a sitcom nature.
Did I mention how bad the acting, characters, and plots were in B5? They might as well have disclosed "we wanted to make a Star Trek show but couldn't get licensing, so we changed Cardasians and the other races a bit and obscured things enough to not fetch the lawyers". Thanks, but I'd rather watch DS9.