If I'm expecting emails from my bank, I'll be putting them on my safelist anyway!
When someone registers an account for Orb, we send him an automatic email to welcome him. The "from" field contains a valid email address. I am one of the recipient to that email.
And I can tell you that everyday we receive dozens of automated emails asking us to click a link to verify that we are human beings and not a spam bot.
So good for you if you manually manage your safelist, but other people don't bother with it.
That said, the idea of certified email to fight spam to some level is not a bad idea, afterall, that what other people have been trying to do and they were welcomed (spf). However, I'm not too hot on them charging for it because those who can't afford to pay may become second class citizens.
Mine was an Oric Atmos that my sister won in a school contest.
Fond memories. My first programs in BASIC, used only to draw pictures, a few lines for a sail boat, a few circles for Mickey Mouse,...:p
the value of spam has decreased majorly in the last year [...] through the end user finding ways to avoid even seeing spam. I think by next year spam will decrease greatly and in the next 5 years we'll have forgotten it entirely.
Spyware is now on that last phase, as well. With firewalls and spyware-detecting software, the power of spyware is decreased majorly.
I could have said the same thing about viruses 10 years ago thanks to antivirus software, yet they are still there and more thriving than ever. I don't see why spam and spyware would be any different.
I know that I, personally, have spent *way* too much money on Baen books over the last two or three years. If there are others like me, and I'm sure there are, it's no wonder Baen is doing well.
Same here. I first read their free books, then I started to buy. I currently have 160+ books from them, 75 of which were bought. They are nearly my sole source of leisure reading material.
Well, considering their margin is pretty much always 10%, I don't see what the problem is. Do you expect a producer of a good to squeeze their profit margin when their costs rise?
If the cost increases and the profit percentage stays the same, it means the profit increased too. So they passed more than the cost to consumer.
most of your comment makes clear that you really don't care about facts, you've already made up your mind that oil company executives are evil
It's not that I don't care about facts, it's that I don't have the time to do the research.
And please, don't put words in my mouth, I never said that the executives were evil. I actually explicitely stated that I was not in position to make such a judgment. All I said is that, given what I heard about them so far, they are more likely to be evil than do-gooders.
What about 'em? First, read this. [washingtonpost.com] Then consider the following breakdown of profit margin of companies mentioned in that article:
* Altria, maker of Marlboro Cigarrettes...22c per $
* Merck...25.3c per $
* Exxon Mobile...9.8c per $
Cigarettes are a luxury product. I would expect them to make a huge profit.
Merck is a pharmaceutical company. They are known to make huge profit because of the monopolistic market they have thanks to patents.
9.8c per $, that's a 10% profit, which is not bad when a lot of companies are actually losing money.
10% profit is huge when the market is supposedly bad because of the war in Iraq, Katrina and the unstability of Afghanistan.
9 billions dollars, whatever the ratio of profit over dollars, is huge.
Your article started with saying that Exxon was trying to down play the profit while most companies would brag about it. Is it really because it's "No Big Deal" as the title says or because they are not trying to bring the light on shady business practices? I'm in no position to actually judge, but I can make educated guess knowing the oil companies have never been known to be honest nor ethical.
So Google makes two and a half times as much as Exxon-Mobile on every dollar earned, and Yahoo makes a staggering three times as much (ten times as much as Wal-Mart, the pinacle of retail evil). Yeah, those evil oil companies, gotta watch out for them.
And how many high-tech companies go under? What is the average profit there? I seriously doubt it's very high if it's even positive.
When you have tons of companies, probablities are that some will make a huge margin. But never all of them. And so far, from what I've heard, all the oil companies showed a profit recently.
In any case, I've quite a few stories about them being bad. Little to none about them being good. So, maybe I am talking out of my ass, I am probably a cynical too, I certainly didn't do any real research and using more my gut feeling than actual known fact. But between the choice of them being honest to god company with honest to god officers and them being snakes, I would go with the latter and will not trust my retirement money to them.
The most salient features of incorporation include:
1. Limited Liability. Unlike in a partnership or sole proprietorship, stockholders of a corporation hold no liability for the corporation's debts and obligations
What about the meaning of "LLC"? Limited Liability Company
So yes, one of the role of a corporation is to limit the responsability of an individual. Sure this doesn't completely shield the individual. "I killed this guy for the benefit of the company" is not a good excuse. But people do get away with things that the average joe would not.
Did anything actually happen after California's energy crisis?
What about the billions of profit gas company are reporting for last year after increasing gas prices because of "shortage"?
And the price fixing from the RIAA?
Or even more mundane things like the CEO getting a salary increase while firing people so that the company doesn't go bankrupt?
Or the CEO being fired for his poor job with millions of indemnity, like in Vivendi Universal's case?
Some are illegal and nothing happens. Some may be technically legal but would not happen to employes who are not at the top of the chain.
A corporation doesn't fully protect individuals but it doesn't some, and sometimes too much.
If it always requires maintenance, then we can be sure we'll always have a job.
Now tell me, do you think most sysadmins enjoy maintaining the filters? Personnally, I don't. Or do they do it because they have to to stay sane? Personnaly, I do. Don't you think the money used to maintain those filters couldn't be used for better things? Or that the money saved on paying those sysadmin could reduce the cost of your Internet connection?
You are either selfish or you fell for the broken window fallacy: hire half the population to be spammers and hire the other half to be sysadmins. Result: no more unemployement in the world.
There is always a cost at fixing something bad. If it was good by itself, it would be done even without the bad thing happening
The whole "identity theft" terminology is screwed up; it's not your "identity" you're protecting--you're still you after someone else manages to clear out your checking account
Yes, it's really "identity infringement". The "thieves" are only making copies of you. Those bastards, you makes a backup of yourself on your computer just in case, and before you know it, you're on every peer-2-peer networks.
I'd like to add that Sprint has a partnership with Orb Networks too, which does something in the same category.
With Orb, which is free by the way, you can streaming your music directly from your home computer to your cellphone if it can handle 3GP, Real or Windows Media format. And as an "added bonus", you get free video streaming. And if your home computer has a TV tuner, free TV streaming. And you can view your photos that are on your home computer on your cell too (nice to show your latest family pictures to your parents).
And yes, it also works on non-Sprint cellphones... and on PDA... and on desktop computers:)
To be fully honest, I have to say that I work for Orb Networks but it's really a nifty product worth checking, especially since it's free.
here's really no need for the controversy when the stinking refresh rate is well above the pixel response time.
Except that the response time shown is the best response time. For other gradient of colors, the response time is worse, a lot worse (like 20ms or more). That's also why this "reponse time" indicator is pure marketing shit.
Re:OK, that's obvious on the surface...
on
The H-1B Swindle
·
· Score: 1
You really are trying to limit your Knowledge then aren't you? The article that started this thread is a survey of exactly that and an approximation of how much less H1-B workers are getting.
Enlighten me then: where did you see that H1-Bs were underpaid? Paid less yes but that doesn't mean underpaid.
I could go to the UK, where the exchange rate hovers around double the Australian dollar, and slum it for 2-3 years and earn enough to have a good housing deposit over here.
Please do if you want. It's your choice. And then take responsability for it. If you don't go to UK but your neighbor does, don't complain when 10 years later he has a bigger house than yours.
To me, that's what this whole H1-B thing is about: americans complaining that other countries provide better and/or cheaper labor and whining that it's unfair. Well, tough, but Life is unfair.
Re:OK, that's obvious on the surface...
on
The H-1B Swindle
·
· Score: 1
Many of these mexican guys who were born south of the border live more efficiently than the typical american.
Maybe, but that doesn't detract my point. It just prove that you are living at a higher cost that you really need to. And so the problem is you, not H1-B guy who is cheaper than you.
Where are you living? At home or sharing rent with housemates? I know what rent is like in that area. You'll never be able to buy a house on $50K/yr in the bay area.
Sharing an appartment at $800/month. But I have some coworkers renting alone for the same price in the Berkeley area. As for the house, no, I couldn't buy one with the salary I had but it's not a necessity in life either.
Nothing to do with overpaid people. Get that idea out of your head. Have you looked at the Bay Area? It's packed. There's not much left to build and yet more people keep coming into the area, driving primarily the cost of housing up.
If there was a real demand for cheap housing, you would see more complexes and less one-story house. But until recently, people could still pay higher rents so there was no driving force to make those complex. Quite the contrary
Re:OK, that's obvious on the surface...
on
The H-1B Swindle
·
· Score: 1
Now wages plummet because employers can establish below-cost-of-living jobs and H-1B visa holders will snap them up, as many are only in the US for the short haul and could care less about Social Security, schools, infrastructure, etc.
What reference of cost-of-living, yours? Because if they don't need it Social Security, schools, etc, it's not below theirs. And then I doubt yours is higher than the mexican guy next door and it 6 children working at McDonalds paid a $8/h.
Unless you can't find a job paid well enough that you can buy food and shelter (and I don't mean caviar and 6 bedrooms house in the hills with a Mercedes), you're just complaining you can't be as rich as before.
And I know what I'm talking about. After I left school, I was hired at $50,000 to work at Menlo Park, right in the middle of the Silicon Valley. I could still live.
What's more, it's not so much that IT people are now underpaid rather than the cost-of-living being too high, which is actually due to overpaid people.
Re:OK, that's obvious on the surface...
on
The H-1B Swindle
·
· Score: 1
What's beneath it is probably some hideous unethical, if not illegal, practice of hiring only H-1B people into jobs.
I fail to see what is unethical about it. I find it unethical to force companies to hire expensive and bad american IT people instead of cheap and good foreign ones.
I would agree with you if the H1-B hire were underpaid (like the outsourcing of some clothes/shoes factories) but AFAIK that's not the case.
Slashdot Mirror
Ah' 'us' wan'ed 'o 'as'e 'hi' ne' g'ue 'u' 'ow ah'm 'huck! he'' me, p'ea'e!
And I can tell you that everyday we receive dozens of automated emails asking us to click a link to verify that we are human beings and not a spam bot.
So good for you if you manually manage your safelist, but other people don't bother with it.
That said, the idea of certified email to fight spam to some level is not a bad idea, afterall, that what other people have been trying to do and they were welcomed (spf). However, I'm not too hot on them charging for it because those who can't afford to pay may become second class citizens.
Not if he doesn't know how to read the speed limit sign, that was the remark of the GGP post.
It depends: were you or were you not driving over the speed limit?
Fond memories. My first programs in BASIC, used only to draw pictures, a few lines for a sail boat, a few circles for Mickey Mouse,
Later, my grand-father gave me his even older Tandy TRS 80 Model 4 computer.
Nope, Alan only answered to the question about being in favor of GPL v3 for Linux. The other questions were answered by Anonymous Cowards.
I could have said the same thing about viruses 10 years ago thanks to antivirus software, yet they are still there and more thriving than ever. I don't see why spam and spyware would be any different.
Same here. I first read their free books, then I started to buy. I currently have 160+ books from them, 75 of which were bought. They are nearly my sole source of leisure reading material.
I could the same thing against an OS for which you can't see the source code.
You do realize that Firefox runs on Linux too, don't you? ;)
Some part are Windows specific so some bugs could affect Windows only. But some other bug affect only Linux too, or any other OS that can run Firefox.
If the cost increases and the profit percentage stays the same, it means the profit increased too. So they passed more than the cost to consumer. most of your comment makes clear that you really don't care about facts, you've already made up your mind that oil company executives are evil
It's not that I don't care about facts, it's that I don't have the time to do the research.
And please, don't put words in my mouth, I never said that the executives were evil. I actually explicitely stated that I was not in position to make such a judgment. All I said is that, given what I heard about them so far, they are more likely to be evil than do-gooders.
* Altria, maker of Marlboro Cigarrettes...22c per $
* Merck...25.3c per $
* Exxon Mobile...9.8c per $
Cigarettes are a luxury product. I would expect them to make a huge profit.
Merck is a pharmaceutical company. They are known to make huge profit because of the monopolistic market they have thanks to patents.
9.8c per $, that's a 10% profit, which is not bad when a lot of companies are actually losing money. 10% profit is huge when the market is supposedly bad because of the war in Iraq, Katrina and the unstability of Afghanistan.
9 billions dollars, whatever the ratio of profit over dollars, is huge.
Your article started with saying that Exxon was trying to down play the profit while most companies would brag about it. Is it really because it's "No Big Deal" as the title says or because they are not trying to bring the light on shady business practices? I'm in no position to actually judge, but I can make educated guess knowing the oil companies have never been known to be honest nor ethical.
So Google makes two and a half times as much as Exxon-Mobile on every dollar earned, and Yahoo makes a staggering three times as much (ten times as much as Wal-Mart, the pinacle of retail evil). Yeah, those evil oil companies, gotta watch out for them.
And how many high-tech companies go under? What is the average profit there? I seriously doubt it's very high if it's even positive.
When you have tons of companies, probablities are that some will make a huge margin. But never all of them. And so far, from what I've heard, all the oil companies showed a profit recently.
In any case, I've quite a few stories about them being bad. Little to none about them being good. So, maybe I am talking out of my ass, I am probably a cynical too, I certainly didn't do any real research and using more my gut feeling than actual known fact. But between the choice of them being honest to god company with honest to god officers and them being snakes, I would go with the latter and will not trust my retirement money to them.
Which shows you how important it is to brush your teeth after each meal so you don't get cavities in the first place
Now tell me, do you think most sysadmins enjoy maintaining the filters? Personnally, I don't. Or do they do it because they have to to stay sane? Personnaly, I do. Don't you think the money used to maintain those filters couldn't be used for better things? Or that the money saved on paying those sysadmin could reduce the cost of your Internet connection?
You are either selfish or you fell for the broken window fallacy: hire half the population to be spammers and hire the other half to be sysadmins. Result: no more unemployement in the world.
There is always a cost at fixing something bad. If it was good by itself, it would be done even without the bad thing happening
The whole "identity theft" terminology is screwed up; it's not your "identity" you're protecting--you're still you after someone else manages to clear out your checking account
Yes, it's really "identity infringement". The "thieves" are only making copies of you.
Those bastards, you makes a backup of yourself on your computer just in case, and before you know it, you're on every peer-2-peer networks.
emerge world
You need -D if you want to actually update everything.
And if you want to upgrade you need -u
I'd like to add that Sprint has a partnership with Orb Networks too, which does something in the same category.
:)
With Orb, which is free by the way, you can streaming your music directly from your home computer to your cellphone if it can handle 3GP, Real or Windows Media format.
And as an "added bonus", you get free video streaming. And if your home computer has a TV tuner, free TV streaming.
And you can view your photos that are on your home computer on your cell too (nice to show your latest family pictures to your parents).
And yes, it also works on non-Sprint cellphones... and on PDA... and on desktop computers
To be fully honest, I have to say that I work for Orb Networks but it's really a nifty product worth checking, especially since it's free.
here's really no need for the controversy when the stinking refresh rate is well above the pixel response time.
Except that the response time shown is the best response time. For other gradient of colors, the response time is worse, a lot worse (like 20ms or more).
That's also why this "reponse time" indicator is pure marketing shit.
Enlighten me then: where did you see that H1-Bs were underpaid? Paid less yes but that doesn't mean underpaid.
Please do if you want. It's your choice. And then take responsability for it. If you don't go to UK but your neighbor does, don't complain when 10 years later he has a bigger house than yours.
To me, that's what this whole H1-B thing is about: americans complaining that other countries provide better and/or cheaper labor and whining that it's unfair. Well, tough, but Life is unfair.
Maybe, but that doesn't detract my point. It just prove that you are living at a higher cost that you really need to. And so the problem is you, not H1-B guy who is cheaper than you.
Sharing an appartment at $800/month. But I have some coworkers renting alone for the same price in the Berkeley area.
As for the house, no, I couldn't buy one with the salary I had but it's not a necessity in life either.
If there was a real demand for cheap housing, you would see more complexes and less one-story house. But until recently, people could still pay higher rents so there was no driving force to make those complex. Quite the contrary
What reference of cost-of-living, yours? Because if they don't need it Social Security, schools, etc, it's not below theirs. And then I doubt yours is higher than the mexican guy next door and it 6 children working at McDonalds paid a $8/h.
Unless you can't find a job paid well enough that you can buy food and shelter (and I don't mean caviar and 6 bedrooms house in the hills with a Mercedes), you're just complaining you can't be as rich as before.
And I know what I'm talking about. After I left school, I was hired at $50,000 to work at Menlo Park, right in the middle of the Silicon Valley. I could still live.
What's more, it's not so much that IT people are now underpaid rather than the cost-of-living being too high, which is actually due to overpaid people.
I fail to see what is unethical about it. I find it unethical to force companies to hire expensive and bad american IT people instead of cheap and good foreign ones.
I would agree with you if the H1-B hire were underpaid (like the outsourcing of some clothes/shoes factories) but AFAIK that's not the case.