The review at CNN has to be one of the worst pieces of movie criticism I've ever read. Not only is it little more than a plot summary, but it's an incorrect plot summary (apparently, Gollum is leading Frodo and Sam to the evil wizard Saruman, and they penetrate the fortress of Barad-Dur, in the dark forests of Mordor.)
After 100 or so years of reckless optimism, we're finally starting to realize that the future can suck, even when great technology comes along. Compare the view that science fiction has of our future NOW to the view expressed in 1930, 1940, 1950.
It's not so much that the future sucks (unless you've had silicone breast implants or gotten cancer from hormone replacement therapy), but that it's so awfully boring. In fact, when the "future" finally arrives, as it did in 1984 (thanks to Orwell) and 2001 (Kubrick), it seems an awful lot like the past. Where are my anti-gravity boots?!
Our problem is that we expect to find ourselves in orgasmic awe over how unbelievably unbelievable the future will be when it arrives, but in fact we just absorb change like sponges and only notice progress when we think back to how things were before touch-tone dialing and pay-per-view porn. God, how did we survive?!
That's funny. I'm a sympatico customer, but I never *ever* use my sympatico email address. I've never posted it, sold it, used it as a return address, nothing. Yet somehow, I receive about 30 spams a month to that address. I wonder if selling my address is somewhere in my contract or if they're just making a quick buck and assuming that their customers won't notice.
I've spent a lot of time in the Toronto and Montreal train stations and airports and as far as I can tell, those are all lounges for first class or preferred customers. I wonder what the range is.. if it's line of sight or shorter than a few dozen metres, then these are hardly 'public' access points.
True, I come from a country that doesn't have a history of being scared all the time (Indians, Blacks and Terrorists oh-my)
Let's not be too self-satisfied. I agree that Canada is almost infinitely safer, but we certainly do have our own history of atrocities and we're still paying for them in terms of the disproportionate numbers of visible minorities who are incarcerated. Of course, the American prison population exceeds the population of most Canadian provinces.
All the replies I've read to this post say: what does it matter- a kid is dead. But I think that's the wrong argument to take-- a more interesting question is: How many so-called gang bangers are killed relative to the number of kids who are shot that don't "deserve it", whatever that means? I suspect that the "deserving" deaths are a relatively small fraction of the whole.
My sense is that gun control has little correlation (positive or negative) with gun violence, but rather economic disparity, particularly race-motivated disparity is the driving force, both in the US and Britain. I'll say tongue in cheek that Canadians are all equally poor, and hence less prone to violent crime. (Note also that while the rates are lower overall in Canada, race still plays an unfortunate role), whereas the Swiss are all equally rich.;-)
I should also point out that while there might be more guns per cap in Canada, the vast majority are hunting rifles that require permits. Unlike Americans, we can't just walk in to the local Guns'R'Us and buy a handgun.
It's MY responsibility for my and my family's safety...
Is your neighbourhood really that dangerous? How many times have you felt obligated to brandish your weapon to protect your family? What are you so afraid of? That someone else with a gun will randomly try to kill your loved ones? Or do you love your property so much that you would be willing to kill for it, rather than file an insurance claim? These are honest questions because I really don't understand your mentality.
Given your past need to fend off attackers with your gun, what is the greater probability: that at some point in the future you will successfully save the lives of your loved ones with your gun, or that someone you love will be killed with it while they're goofing around?
It's MY responsibility for my and my family's safety...
Is your neighbourhood really that dangerous? How many times have you felt obligated to brandish your weapon to protect your family? What are you so afraid of? That someone else with a gun will randomly try to kill your loved ones? Or do you love your property so much that you would be willing to kill for it, rather than file an insurance claim? These are honest questions because I really don't understand your mentality.
Given your past need to fend off attackers with your gun, what is the greater probability: that at some point in the future you will successfully save the lives of your loved ones with your gun, or that someone you love will be killed with it while they're goofing around?
Do you wear a watch on your right hand? Does it glow in the dark? My physics teacher in HS had an old wrist watch that made the geiger counter go nuts because the glow-in-the-dark face was made of a radioactive material. I suspect that they don't use that material to make wrist watches any more, but you never know.
yes indeed, the reviews have a lot of spoilers that people who've read the book would be well-advised to avoid. The lightsoutentertainment review in particular is not recommended if you have read the book- I'm very disappointed that I read it because it makes the movie sound *too* different from the canon, and I'd prefer to go in without any significant expectations, either way.
In any case, it looks like TTT rocks and I can't wait to see it!
What, in your opinion, is the most common complaint concerning accessibility and web sites? In other words, if in the interests of accessibility you could encourage site owners to change only one thing about how they operate, what would it be?
It's nice to talk about alternative fuels, but I have yet to see a gas station selling one of them.
Why would you want gas stations to sell you alternative fuels? With biodiesel, every fast food outlet becomes a potential gas station. I'd rather just see the regular gas stations put out of business.
Interesting that this is a story today, because yesterday a group of Canadian elk ranchers announced a class action suit against the Canadian gov't for failing to take action against the spread of CWD. More details are here.
We have the source for the driver-- we just don't want to commit the resources to porting it. We have more important things to do than make sure we've got the latest kernel. As long as it's stable, and our code runs on it, we're happy. We've had the robot since '95. I'd say seven years is pretty good for a robot, especially from a company that sold itself to 3com for its wireless products. We're running 2.0.29.
And you're close- we're a university lab, so there's no concern about making money.;-)
The main problem is our Nomad 200, by Nomadics. It has a driver called robotd which intefaces with the robot controller. We also have some Super Scouts, which can be upgraded in theory but it's a pain because they don't have floppy disks.
I work in a robotics lab and several of our robots are running 2.0. Why? The company that built them wrote drivers that run in 2.0 and they've since gone out of business. As long as the kernel is stable, which it is, it's not worth the development effort for us to write new 2.2 or 2.4 drivers. Given that the robot cost about $60K, we're also not eager to run out and buy a new one.
I find it remarkable (and alarming) that nearly every person who felt they'd been mis-profiled responded first by altering their viewing habits, and second by *buying more*. It's as if the profiler encourages the viewer to increase their consumption by playing off their insecurities-- I wonder if this is by design, or just a happy accident for the people in marketing.
Then again, come to think of it, I suppose the entire advertising industry operates this way- alter people's behaviour (and boost their inclination to consume) by exploiting their insecurities. The moral of the story- turn off your TV!
Do you want to give control of an entire gTLD to one organization?
Hmm.. trolling for ICANN haters? I see no particular security problem with a central authority managing a TLD, provided that their backup servers are distributed widely in both the geographical and topological senses. We shouldn't confuse this particular issue with that of whether a central authority like ICANN should have the right to control who can and cannot create new TLD's.
All the baddies start bad, proceed badly, and end bad. Everyone else plays a fixed part. ... you can make a good Old Testament biblical epic but you can't really make an epic out of the New Testament. As soon as characters start to get complex, you cannot have an epic.
Hmm, I can think of lots of "good" characters in epic mythology, Tolkien's included, who engage in all kinds of dubious behaviour (certain of the Valar, the sons of Feanor, many of the OT Patriarchs, the Greek gods, to name a few). Maybe it's unfortunate that the few characters from Tolkien's mythology that survive to the Third Age (Galadriel, Elrond, for example) have relatively unsullied histories. Even though she's a Noldo, Galadriel was conveniently slow to arrive at the Kinslaying, wasn't she?
Of course you can make a NT epic-- haven't you seen Jesus Christ, Superstar?;)
You do have a (weak) point, though, about Tolkien's characterization (although, *cough* I find it laughable that you'd suggest that Rowling does anything other than caricatures). I would argue that the richness of Tolkien's world is not in the characters but in their vast history, which is only barely hinted at in LOTR. Not to mention, Tolkien's work is fundamentally preoccupied with heavy theological issues, like good and evil, whereas the charactizations are of secondary importance.
Linux is my main os at home and work. I develop in linux (gcc,gtkmm,opengl,perl) I play games in linux (nethack, baby!) I write in linux (latex, tks) I do my accounting in linux (gnucash) I read my mail in linux (evolution,pine) I watch my DVD's in linux (xine+dvdnav) and I browse the net in linux (mozilla, pan)
Quicken was the last thing I was using regularly in windows, but when they moved to a $10/mo subscription model for their next release, I said bye-bye.
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What happens when it loads a page bigger than 64K?
The review at CNN has to be one of the worst pieces of movie criticism I've ever read. Not only is it little more than a plot summary, but it's an incorrect plot summary (apparently, Gollum is leading Frodo and Sam to the evil wizard Saruman, and they penetrate the fortress of Barad-Dur, in the dark forests of Mordor.)
After 100 or so years of reckless optimism, we're finally starting to realize that the future can suck, even when great technology comes along. Compare the view that science fiction has of our future NOW to the view expressed in 1930, 1940, 1950.
It's not so much that the future sucks (unless you've had silicone breast implants or gotten cancer from hormone replacement therapy), but that it's so awfully boring. In fact, when the "future" finally arrives, as it did in 1984 (thanks to Orwell) and 2001 (Kubrick), it seems an awful lot like the past. Where are my anti-gravity boots?!
Our problem is that we expect to find ourselves in orgasmic awe over how unbelievably unbelievable the future will be when it arrives, but in fact we just absorb change like sponges and only notice progress when we think back to how things were before touch-tone dialing and pay-per-view porn. God, how did we survive?!
That's funny. I'm a sympatico customer, but I never *ever* use my sympatico email address. I've never posted it, sold it, used it as a return address, nothing. Yet somehow, I receive about 30 spams a month to that address. I wonder if selling my address is somewhere in my contract or if they're just making a quick buck and assuming that their customers won't notice.
I've spent a lot of time in the Toronto and Montreal train stations and airports and as far as I can tell, those are all lounges for first class or preferred customers. I wonder what the range is.. if it's line of sight or shorter than a few dozen metres, then these are hardly 'public' access points.
True, I come from a country that doesn't have a history of being scared all the time (Indians, Blacks and Terrorists oh-my)
Let's not be too self-satisfied. I agree that Canada is almost infinitely safer, but we certainly do have our own history of atrocities and we're still paying for them in terms of the disproportionate numbers of visible minorities who are incarcerated. Of course, the American prison population exceeds the population of most Canadian provinces.
All the replies I've read to this post say: what does it matter- a kid is dead. But I think that's the wrong argument to take-- a more interesting question is: How many so-called gang bangers are killed relative to the number of kids who are shot that don't "deserve it", whatever that means? I suspect that the "deserving" deaths are a relatively small fraction of the whole.
My sense is that gun control has little correlation (positive or negative) with gun violence, but rather economic disparity, particularly race-motivated disparity is the driving force, both in the US and Britain. I'll say tongue in cheek that Canadians are all equally poor, and hence less prone to violent crime. (Note also that while the rates are lower overall in Canada, race still plays an unfortunate role), whereas the Swiss are all equally rich. ;-)
I should also point out that while there might be more guns per cap in Canada, the vast majority are hunting rifles that require permits. Unlike Americans, we can't just walk in to the local Guns'R'Us and buy a handgun.
Isn't Mike Moore an NRA member? Doesn't he own several guns? I would hardly call him unbiased, but I think BfC does its best to aim for the truth.
repost, because I hit the wrong reply button..
It's MY responsibility for my and my family's safety...
Is your neighbourhood really that dangerous? How many times have you felt obligated to brandish your weapon to protect your family? What are you so afraid of? That someone else with a gun will randomly try to kill your loved ones? Or do you love your property so much that you would be willing to kill for it, rather than file an insurance claim? These are honest questions because I really don't understand your mentality.
Given your past need to fend off attackers with your gun, what is the greater probability: that at some point in the future you will successfully save the lives of your loved ones with your gun, or that someone you love will be killed with it while they're goofing around?
It's MY responsibility for my and my family's safety...
Is your neighbourhood really that dangerous? How many times have you felt obligated to brandish your weapon to protect your family? What are you so afraid of? That someone else with a gun will randomly try to kill your loved ones? Or do you love your property so much that you would be willing to kill for it, rather than file an insurance claim? These are honest questions because I really don't understand your mentality.
Given your past need to fend off attackers with your gun, what is the greater probability: that at some point in the future you will successfully save the lives of your loved ones with your gun, or that someone you love will be killed with it while they're goofing around?
I'm unsure as to the specific rules, but political TV ads are relatively rare, (though not unheard of) in the Canadian electoral system.
Do you wear a watch on your right hand? Does it glow in the dark? My physics teacher in HS had an old wrist watch that made the geiger counter go nuts because the glow-in-the-dark face was made of a radioactive material. I suspect that they don't use that material to make wrist watches any more, but you never know.
yes indeed, the reviews have a lot of spoilers that people who've read the book would be well-advised to avoid. The lightsoutentertainment review in particular is not recommended if you have read the book- I'm very disappointed that I read it because it makes the movie sound *too* different from the canon, and I'd prefer to go in without any significant expectations, either way.
In any case, it looks like TTT rocks and I can't wait to see it!
What, in your opinion, is the most common complaint concerning accessibility and web sites? In other words, if in the interests of accessibility you could encourage site owners to change only one thing about how they operate, what would it be?
It's nice to talk about alternative fuels, but I have yet to see a gas station selling one of them.
Why would you want gas stations to sell you alternative fuels? With biodiesel, every fast food outlet becomes a potential gas station. I'd rather just see the regular gas stations put out of business.
Interesting that this is a story today, because yesterday a group of Canadian elk ranchers announced a class action suit against the Canadian gov't for failing to take action against the spread of CWD. More details are here.
We have the source for the driver-- we just don't want to commit the resources to porting it. We have more important things to do than make sure we've got the latest kernel. As long as it's stable, and our code runs on it, we're happy. We've had the robot since '95. I'd say seven years is pretty good for a robot, especially from a company that sold itself to 3com for its wireless products. We're running 2.0.29. ;-)
And you're close- we're a university lab, so there's no concern about making money.
The main problem is our Nomad 200, by Nomadics. It has a driver called robotd which intefaces with the robot controller. We also have some Super Scouts, which can be upgraded in theory but it's a pain because they don't have floppy disks.
I work in a robotics lab and several of our robots are running 2.0. Why? The company that built them wrote drivers that run in 2.0 and they've since gone out of business. As long as the kernel is stable, which it is, it's not worth the development effort for us to write new 2.2 or 2.4 drivers. Given that the robot cost about $60K, we're also not eager to run out and buy a new one.
I find it remarkable (and alarming) that nearly every person who felt they'd been mis-profiled responded first by altering their viewing habits, and second by *buying more*. It's as if the profiler encourages the viewer to increase their consumption by playing off their insecurities-- I wonder if this is by design, or just a happy accident for the people in marketing.
Then again, come to think of it, I suppose the entire advertising industry operates this way- alter people's behaviour (and boost their inclination to consume) by exploiting their insecurities. The moral of the story- turn off your TV!
Do you want to give control of an entire gTLD to one organization?
Hmm.. trolling for ICANN haters? I see no particular security problem with a central authority managing a TLD, provided that their backup servers are distributed widely in both the geographical and topological senses. We shouldn't confuse this particular issue with that of whether a central authority like ICANN should have the right to control who can and cannot create new TLD's.
All the baddies start bad, proceed badly, and end bad. Everyone else plays a fixed part.
...
;)
you can make a good Old Testament biblical epic but you can't really make an epic out of the New Testament. As soon as characters start to get complex, you cannot have an epic.
Hmm, I can think of lots of "good" characters in epic mythology, Tolkien's included, who engage in all kinds of dubious behaviour (certain of the Valar, the sons of Feanor, many of the OT Patriarchs, the Greek gods, to name a few). Maybe it's unfortunate that the few characters from Tolkien's mythology that survive to the Third Age (Galadriel, Elrond, for example) have relatively unsullied histories. Even though she's a Noldo, Galadriel was conveniently slow to arrive at the Kinslaying, wasn't she?
Of course you can make a NT epic-- haven't you seen Jesus Christ, Superstar?
Wow, nice troll. And it's scoring 5, Insightful.
You do have a (weak) point, though, about Tolkien's characterization (although, *cough* I find it laughable that you'd suggest that Rowling does anything other than caricatures). I would argue that the richness of Tolkien's world is not in the characters but in their vast history, which is only barely hinted at in LOTR. Not to mention, Tolkien's work is fundamentally preoccupied with heavy theological issues, like good and evil, whereas the charactizations are of secondary importance.
Linux is my main os at home and work.
I develop in linux (gcc,gtkmm,opengl,perl)
I play games in linux (nethack, baby!)
I write in linux (latex, tks)
I do my accounting in linux (gnucash)
I read my mail in linux (evolution,pine)
I watch my DVD's in linux (xine+dvdnav)
and I browse the net in linux (mozilla, pan)
Quicken was the last thing I was using regularly in windows, but when they moved to a $10/mo subscription model for their next release, I said bye-bye.