The fellow you replied to may have been talking about corn-based ethanol. What you may not know is that those folks at Archer Daniels Midland who make the ethanol in American gasoline 18.9 MJ of energy per kilogram of ethanol produced. See, it costs more (in energy) to farm and distill that ethanol than you get back out of it. It's a black hole. It's a stupid idea.
'Course, this is only because we subsidize corn so much in this country. The Brazilians use sugarcane, which can be farmed much more energy-efficiently, and which is why the Brazilians are now laughing their asses off at the Americans.
(See, Brazil has cut back enormously on the quantity of petroleum it imports. America hasn't. Yeah, this is what we should have had, if we'd responded to the 1970s oil crisis in a more sensible way. Now we're acting surprised and pretending no one could have seen this coming. Pfah.)
My question is---what are the obstacles in the way of an open source-friendly video card that were not in the way of an open source-friendly capture card? Why do we have one and not the other, when clearly more people have video cards than TV tuners? (Probably even not counting onboard video.)
Search for "HALIBUT". I... I've never been the top result for anything before. This is weird.
--grendel drago
What do you call it when Linux apps do it?
on
Office 12 Exposed
·
· Score: 4, Insightful
Wait, when Microsoft apes Apple, it's a "balant ripoff"... so what is it when free Linux apps ape proprietary Windows-only apps like Office, Photoshop, etc.?
Since you were involved, could you let us in on what some of the strategies are/were? There are a lot of people pulling wild guesses out of their asses; it'd be nice to know what they actually came up with.
You're not posting "any anti-social program post". While you may not, in fact, be a Randroid, your post is indistinguishable from one written by a Randroid.
My vote for the funniest part here is where you refer to the Rape of Nanking, along with all the other products of Japanese militarism, as "petty grievances".
My hat's off to you, sir. I just couldn't make this kind of shit up.
I do wonder why we're running power lines across Long Island Sound here in New England, at horrendous cost and against massive opposition from a variety of quarters, while (a) the waterfalls that powered 19th-century industry sit idle, and (b) we decommission nuclear subs, but don't float them offshore to run their reactors with a skeleton crew and ship power to land.
Just seems like we're not using the most elegant solution.
It's a small market, true, but what exactly would S3 lose by opening up its drivers? They'd instantly become the graphics card for anyone running Linux. It's a small but real benefit---and what, then, would be the cost to them?
Apple users are a small market, but they're incredibly loyal. Why wouldn't S3 get in on that action?
You know, name-calling isn't a substitute for making your point. But at least you tried. Good for you!
So far as I can tell, your point is that Christian nuts in the United States blow up abortion clinics, just as Muslim nuts in Europe chop heads and set women on fire, so we can't really judge between them.
Of course we can. The level of popular support among Christians for the actions of, say, Eric Rudolph, is nowhere near the level of popular support among Muslims for the actions of Mohammad Bouyeri. And while the actions of Christian terrorists have caused a shameful chilling effect (on people performing abortions) in this country, it's nothing like the chilling effect against simple speech perpetrated by Bouyeri and his ilk.
Lastly, your entire argument is based on the premise that while the United States has not thoroughly rid itself of its homegrown twits, I, a citizen thereof, cannot point out what I see as the rising tide of a disgusting, backward, medieval culture across the pond. What's up with that?
--grendel drago
Raising the level of debate, are we?
on
Pornified
·
· Score: 1
I'd better duck before I'm slain by your mighty swingin' debate wang. Ayep.
Y'know, my boss at a previous job was Canadian. He spoke glowingly of his homeland, and I mostly concurred---I have nothing but positive memories from my visits to Canada. But then he explained the "hatespeech" laws they have there.
I don't know where you're from, but part of the value of the freedom to speak one's mind is a freedom to criticize, to insult, to offend. "It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg," to cadge a turn of phrase from Jefferson. This new existence of a right not to be offended---bah! The proper response to criticism is not to stick your fingers in your ears, yell "LALALALA" and cry for the force of law to shut me up.
Look, it's a savage and medieval thing they've got going in Pakistan, in Iran, and until recently in Afghanistan. This is a system of religious law that treats women as chattel, punishes homosexuality with death, silences criticism with brute violence, and actually does all the things that the American religious right is accused of trying to do.
Yes, Christianity did this. But at least in the West, it grew out of it. Folks are more than welcome to come here if they're willing to live like civilized people. If they're committed to setting women on fire for the crime of being raped, they can stay where they are until they decide to grow up.
If you're asking when all this savagery came to Europe, I suggest you take it up with Theo van Gogh, who was murdered for insulting Islam. Civilized people do not respond to philosophical insults in this manner. If I go outside wearing my Bad Religion "crossbuster" shirt, I do not expect a Christian lunatic to stab me with the approval of his religious establishment. Or ask Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a vocal critic of Islam who worked with van Gogh. She's the subject of constant death threats, thanks to her criticism.
I'd think anyone interested in free speech would be a hell of a lot more concerned with the chilling effect caused by violence against critics of Islam than with what those critics have to say. After all, Theo van Gogh may have been a damned troll, but at least he never shot anyone and pinned his manifesto to their chest with a knife.
BAMM.com has it for $17.50, which is $1 more than Amazon. If you're on their $10/year affinity program (makes sense if you buy more than about $100 of books a year from them), it's $15.75, cheaper than Amazon.
So ha.
--grendel drago
Funny thing---you're making my point for me.
on
Pornified
·
· Score: 2, Interesting
You know, the author's results look like they've been cribbed straight from the Meese Report. You can read some information about the Meese Commission, about how the results of research were simply thrown out when they didn't fit the commission's prejudices.
There was real science done on this; see the Presidential Commission of 1968 or thereabouts, which was swept under the rug.
If the local porn zealots seem more vigorous than usual, it's only because we recognize the same discredited bullshit we've seen before. Last year it was "erototoxins"---do you remember?
Would Zonk stop posting dupes if they didn't get pointed out to him? Would he be getting hatemail if he were, y'know, doing his fucking job? I think not.
Like David Brin says---CITOKATE! Criticism is the only known antidote to error. Criticize away, fellow Slashdotters.
--grendel drago
Sodomy is quite legal, thank you much.
on
Pornified
·
· Score: 1
(we'll ignore such laws that define sodomy in order to make homosexuality "deviant" as that's an entirely different discussion.)
Huh? Consensual buttsex is entirely constitutional and has been for more than two years. Where've you been? (I'm assuming that you're in the United States, though.)
--grendel drago
I find that ever so slightly hard to believe.
on
Pornified
·
· Score: 1
Given that porn tends to be, y'know, copyrighted, and Bram has worked quite hard to position BitTorrent as a legitimate means of large-file dissemination, I find it hard to believe that one of his initial tests was a flagrant copyright violation.
Do you have, y'know, any sort of source for this?
--grendel drago
Better porn?
on
Pornified
·
· Score: 4, Insightful
Hmm. If boys get their ideas about sex from porn, and porn is awful... well, there are two options here; one, make it so boys don't get their ideas for porn, or make better porn. I suppose it'd be a little difficult to say "I want to make porn that won't give a fourteen year old unrealistic expectations of women!", though.
'Course, women get their strange, sick, twisted ideas---about men on brightly shining horses carrying them off to castles where they'll play dress-up and "... and they were one" every dang night---from romance novels and the like. Girls get some pretty funky ideas about sex and relationships too, y'know.
--grendel drago
Oh, I'd wait on that.
on
Pornified
·
· Score: 1, Troll
Let the invading beardy hordes import some more of their woman-stoning traditions and we'll see just how sexually liberated Europe is in ten or fifteen years.
Slashdot Mirror
The fellow you replied to may have been talking about corn-based ethanol. What you may not know is that those folks at Archer Daniels Midland who make the ethanol in American gasoline 18.9 MJ of energy per kilogram of ethanol produced. See, it costs more (in energy) to farm and distill that ethanol than you get back out of it. It's a black hole. It's a stupid idea.
'Course, this is only because we subsidize corn so much in this country. The Brazilians use sugarcane, which can be farmed much more energy-efficiently, and which is why the Brazilians are now laughing their asses off at the Americans.
(See, Brazil has cut back enormously on the quantity of petroleum it imports. America hasn't. Yeah, this is what we should have had, if we'd responded to the 1970s oil crisis in a more sensible way. Now we're acting surprised and pretending no one could have seen this coming. Pfah.)
--grendel drago
Well, Tim Miller has a plan to do so. People are excited. It's even been covered on Slashdot, after he was interviewed by Kerneltrap.
My question is---what are the obstacles in the way of an open source-friendly video card that were not in the way of an open source-friendly capture card? Why do we have one and not the other, when clearly more people have video cards than TV tuners? (Probably even not counting onboard video.)
--grendel drago
Wait, how can we get Linux-specific video capture cards (a moderately specialty device), and no designed-for-Linux video cards? What the crap is this?
--grendel drago
Search for "HALIBUT". I... I've never been the top result for anything before. This is weird.
--grendel drago
Wait, when Microsoft apes Apple, it's a "balant ripoff"... so what is it when free Linux apps ape proprietary Windows-only apps like Office, Photoshop, etc.?
--grendel drago
Since you were involved, could you let us in on what some of the strategies are/were? There are a lot of people pulling wild guesses out of their asses; it'd be nice to know what they actually came up with.
--grendel drago
You're not posting "any anti-social program post". While you may not, in fact, be a Randroid, your post is indistinguishable from one written by a Randroid.
Happy to help!
--grendel drago
My vote for the funniest part here is where you refer to the Rape of Nanking, along with all the other products of Japanese militarism, as "petty grievances".
My hat's off to you, sir. I just couldn't make this kind of shit up.
--grendel drago
Sure, no one was quite the maladjusted, beardy dork that symbolizes the real hacker, but at least they weren't on fuckin' rollerblades. Sheesh.
--grendel drago
I do wonder why we're running power lines across Long Island Sound here in New England, at horrendous cost and against massive opposition from a variety of quarters, while (a) the waterfalls that powered 19th-century industry sit idle, and (b) we decommission nuclear subs, but don't float them offshore to run their reactors with a skeleton crew and ship power to land.
Just seems like we're not using the most elegant solution.
--grendel drago
The last time I saw an extension to do that, it had to manually save the state. Not terribly useful for crash protection. Thanks!
--grendel drago
Will it crash less? Please?
Failing that, will it remember what I was browsing, like Opera has done for umpteen versions, and restore that when the browser is restarted?
--grendel drago
Could you be a bit more specific on the following items?
5) Breaks well-known and understood UNIX standards.
Which standards are these? Are you talking about the errno fiasco?
6) Security through lack-of-functionality.
What sort of functionality is provided by, say, postfix, that qmail simply won't do?
7) Not really secure despite the claims.
How's that? Do you have $500? If not, what's the security vulnerability that the author refuses to acknowledge?
Which of these problems that you enumerate are not addressed by netqmail?
--grendel drago
It's a small market, true, but what exactly would S3 lose by opening up its drivers? They'd instantly become the graphics card for anyone running Linux. It's a small but real benefit---and what, then, would be the cost to them?
Apple users are a small market, but they're incredibly loyal. Why wouldn't S3 get in on that action?
--grendel drago
You know, name-calling isn't a substitute for making your point. But at least you tried. Good for you!
So far as I can tell, your point is that Christian nuts in the United States blow up abortion clinics, just as Muslim nuts in Europe chop heads and set women on fire, so we can't really judge between them.
Of course we can. The level of popular support among Christians for the actions of, say, Eric Rudolph, is nowhere near the level of popular support among Muslims for the actions of Mohammad Bouyeri. And while the actions of Christian terrorists have caused a shameful chilling effect (on people performing abortions) in this country, it's nothing like the chilling effect against simple speech perpetrated by Bouyeri and his ilk.
Lastly, your entire argument is based on the premise that while the United States has not thoroughly rid itself of its homegrown twits, I, a citizen thereof, cannot point out what I see as the rising tide of a disgusting, backward, medieval culture across the pond. What's up with that?
--grendel drago
I'd better duck before I'm slain by your mighty swingin' debate wang. Ayep.
--grendel drago
That's egg on me. Perhaps I'll remember to Google for it next time. Thanks!
--grendel drago
Y'know, my boss at a previous job was Canadian. He spoke glowingly of his homeland, and I mostly concurred---I have nothing but positive memories from my visits to Canada. But then he explained the "hatespeech" laws they have there.
I don't know where you're from, but part of the value of the freedom to speak one's mind is a freedom to criticize, to insult, to offend. "It neither picks my pocket nor breaks my leg," to cadge a turn of phrase from Jefferson. This new existence of a right not to be offended---bah! The proper response to criticism is not to stick your fingers in your ears, yell "LALALALA" and cry for the force of law to shut me up.
Look, it's a savage and medieval thing they've got going in Pakistan, in Iran, and until recently in Afghanistan. This is a system of religious law that treats women as chattel, punishes homosexuality with death, silences criticism with brute violence, and actually does all the things that the American religious right is accused of trying to do.
Yes, Christianity did this. But at least in the West, it grew out of it. Folks are more than welcome to come here if they're willing to live like civilized people. If they're committed to setting women on fire for the crime of being raped, they can stay where they are until they decide to grow up.
If you're asking when all this savagery came to Europe, I suggest you take it up with Theo van Gogh, who was murdered for insulting Islam. Civilized people do not respond to philosophical insults in this manner. If I go outside wearing my Bad Religion "crossbuster" shirt, I do not expect a Christian lunatic to stab me with the approval of his religious establishment. Or ask Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a vocal critic of Islam who worked with van Gogh. She's the subject of constant death threats, thanks to her criticism.
I'd think anyone interested in free speech would be a hell of a lot more concerned with the chilling effect caused by violence against critics of Islam than with what those critics have to say. After all, Theo van Gogh may have been a damned troll, but at least he never shot anyone and pinned his manifesto to their chest with a knife.
--grendel drago
BAMM.com has it for $17.50, which is $1 more than Amazon. If you're on their $10/year affinity program (makes sense if you buy more than about $100 of books a year from them), it's $15.75, cheaper than Amazon.
So ha.
--grendel drago
You know, the author's results look like they've been cribbed straight from the Meese Report. You can read some information about the Meese Commission, about how the results of research were simply thrown out when they didn't fit the commission's prejudices.
There was real science done on this; see the Presidential Commission of 1968 or thereabouts, which was swept under the rug.
If the local porn zealots seem more vigorous than usual, it's only because we recognize the same discredited bullshit we've seen before. Last year it was "erototoxins"---do you remember?
--grendel drago
Really encourages improvement.
Would Zonk stop posting dupes if they didn't get pointed out to him? Would he be getting hatemail if he were, y'know, doing his fucking job? I think not.
Like David Brin says---CITOKATE! Criticism is the only known antidote to error. Criticize away, fellow Slashdotters.
--grendel drago
(we'll ignore such laws that define sodomy in order to make homosexuality "deviant" as that's an entirely different discussion.)
Huh? Consensual buttsex is entirely constitutional and has been for more than two years. Where've you been? (I'm assuming that you're in the United States, though.)
--grendel drago
Given that porn tends to be, y'know, copyrighted, and Bram has worked quite hard to position BitTorrent as a legitimate means of large-file dissemination, I find it hard to believe that one of his initial tests was a flagrant copyright violation.
Do you have, y'know, any sort of source for this?
--grendel drago
Hmm. If boys get their ideas about sex from porn, and porn is awful... well, there are two options here; one, make it so boys don't get their ideas for porn, or make better porn. I suppose it'd be a little difficult to say "I want to make porn that won't give a fourteen year old unrealistic expectations of women!", though.
'Course, women get their strange, sick, twisted ideas---about men on brightly shining horses carrying them off to castles where they'll play dress-up and "... and they were one" every dang night---from romance novels and the like. Girls get some pretty funky ideas about sex and relationships too, y'know.
--grendel drago
Let the invading beardy hordes import some more of their woman-stoning traditions and we'll see just how sexually liberated Europe is in ten or fifteen years.
--grendel drago