>This is the government which is keeping terrabytes of data on everything and wants the ability to snoop and record every packet which goes over the internet.
If they keep track of every packet over the Internet, why do they need cookies?
>What we're talking about here, isn't stupidity or lack of seeing a memo. It's Strategic Stupidity
A cookie is pretty obvious, not exactly the high-end technology secret spy stuff. Erasing/blocking it is easy and done everyday. If you would go through all the trouble of having a "hidden agenda/top-secret", why have something that points directly to yourself, easily detected, well-known and is trival to defended against?
And exactly what would they get out of it? You need to have a motive for doing things.
>The principle being that the U.S. Government does not track or snoop on its citizens.
How does this principle apply to;
Social Security Cards and its hundreds of uses Submission of tax forms Court-approved wiretapping Police manned "speed-traps" Passports Airport travel
Re:Same as last time we discussed it: a CPA
on
Best Tax Programs?
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
Communication is important, but I was commenting on his experience.
You want a CPA/doctor/lawyer/candlestick-maker to have done the hard things before and not use you as a test case.
Re:Same as last time we discussed it: a CPA
on
Best Tax Programs?
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
>Mine says things like "I was laying awake last night trying to figure out how to carry back your dividends from three years ago to count against your liability next year"
I actually don't want my CPA to say this.
I want him to say: "We are going to carry back your dividends to reduce your liabilities. I've done this before so its pretty routine now." You don't want your tax return be the one he learns how do to something.
>then will go on to explain it in the same way I tell my coworkers about new CPU developments.
I agree with the "boss is an idiot, get out" comments but suppose that you want to stay there.
Implement a version control system yourself on your desktop computer. Create/install/implement a bug tracking system for yourself. Use them like a nazi.
At the very least, you can do this at your own pace, get experience in doing it, learn what you like/dislike about your system (extra bonus: partcipate in version-control system flame-wars!) and can fix it as you go without others crying about it. Make proper backups on a regular schedule and learn how to restore them.
Take advantage of the fact that you are a big fish in a small bowl.
I looked at the Four-colour graph and found it.. beautiful.
From an infinate number of maps to 633 maps. The graph its like browsing through freshmeat or Wikipedia and discovering a world of variety and viewpoints. (sorry it reality does not meet some your expectations of a more "beautiful" number such as 0, 1 or 1,000)
Ugly? I find the the simple formulas. Try explaing what these mean to a child without resorting to "Its because its by definition..." (eg. ALEPH ONE) or having to explain some really complex background on the subject (STARBIRTH, what does pi have to do with this? What is with using the Boltzmann constant?).
>Monopolizing refers to the manner of conducting business which hurts other competitors.
Exactly how are you conducting a business and not hurting your competitors? Isn't every sale I make hurting my competitors because its one less sale they get?
>I have no problem with a government computer scanning data from different sources, and flagging communications that could be terrorist planning another attack.
Generally alot of people wouldn't have alot of problems with this.
Its just that it was done in a closed and classified way. Even those very few in Congress that were briefed had no idea exactly what the scope was.
How can you approve something if you have no idea what it involves?
They are interested in patterns in calling to and from certain countries. The actual content analysis wouldn't come up until later.
And wouldn't you think that if you were using encryption, that would raise up even more flags?
I'm not saying that you shouldn't use encryption or that you should lay down and take what ever the government throws at you, but I don't understand how encryption could have protected you from any of this.
>wouldn't it have made sense to create a vaccine for H5N1 itself
One of the only ways to create a vaccine is to use bird eggs and then use the resulting "stuff" (I can't recall if it is the the developed antibodies or weak/dead viruses) and inject that into humans.
The problem with H5N1 is that since its an avian flu, it kills the bird embryo before you can develop/grow anything useful for humans.
This sort of technical reason is why MySQL is still considered toy in my mind.
Just because something is "hard" doesn't mean that its acceptable to not do.
It would be more acceptable to leave out COUNT(*) functionality than to do it wrong. (Yes, if it gives an number other than the number of rows committed to a table it is wrong. "Weird" is what you call LISP.)
>But the problem is that the human doing the evil is rarely held accountable for it because it's done under the cloak of the corporation.
For the Bhopal disaster, I'm not sure if a corporation would have helped or not.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bhopal_Disaster Alot of reasons listed here are cases of enginnering failure or just plain human error. (again the arguement was it intentional evil or was it stupidity?) What human is responsible for for turning off the audiable alarm? What human is responsible for not turning on the MIC refrigeration unit?
Some reasons could be attributed to the orgaization of the corporation, but it still comes down to humans. Why not go after them? (Hint: because they have no money go obtain so it not worth it.)
Regarding the CEO being responsible. I just can't see how this being involved with a corporation prevented him from being extradited. He is not even part of the corporation any more today. He is rich (and can afford high placed friends and good lawyers) but that has nothing to do with Union Carbine being a corporation and doing evil acts. It might have been more of a forign relations matter. I just can't see how he pulled out a "Corporation Immunity" card to not be extradited.
>Corporations have become the shield from behind which evil people act with impunity.
But its not true in all cases.
>If a human made the decision to force software to install on my computer then that human needs to be held personally liable for it.
I don't understand why a human needs to answer for this? Don't you want to just be compensated and make the punishment so harsh to make others think twice before they try something similar? Why do you need to punish a single human?
>Until people are held liable for their actions, evil people will continue to act freely.
Or stupid people need to be taught a lesson. Which then gets downing to arguing "Stupid people = evil". (Is adding MediaMax to CDs an act of stupidity or an act of evil?)
I really don't get this whole "Corporation = evil" argument.
A corporation is just a legal entity. You can even create one, its nothing special. That does not mean that it is evil. Charities are legal entities also, but I don't think you would consider them evil.
A corporation, by itself, does nothing. You can create one and let it sit around for years. Its the people controlling it that set out what it does. Some person, your fellow human, sat down and said "we are going to put MediaMax on our CDs.". There was nothing in a corporate charter or any natural tendancy that corporations will do evil.
Let me repeat: its a human that made the decision to do evil, not the corporation itself.
Even the arguement "Corporations = evil because their sole purpose is to profit." Every human has a need to profit, so would you consider human evil? Is there something about profiting that leads to evil?
It seems to me that the "Corporation = evil" argument is like arguing "stupid people = evil" or "everyone who does not act the way I think they should act = evil".
>We're all connected, and when you reduce the suffering -- or increase the joy -- anywhere in the world, it very well might somehow, somewhere, come back to help you personally.
So why don't I just keep the money myself and help myself directly?
Saying that giving to help a child in Africa and eventually, by some magical means, that will benefit me supports the same argument that if I keep my money and spend it on me will help that same child in Africa some way.
Bill Gates intends to eventually give away all his money. Buffett and him have the same attitude towards their fortune, they will only leave abit for their childern but want to see it put to good use in their lifetime.
Slashdot Mirror
... I'm special and rules don't apply to me.
How can I convince others of this?
But you remember it and associate it with Intel(tm), exactly what they wanted.
"Cos-tan-za!"
>This is the government which is keeping terrabytes of data on everything and wants the ability to snoop and record every packet which goes over the internet.
If they keep track of every packet over the Internet, why do they need cookies?
>What we're talking about here, isn't stupidity or lack of seeing a memo. It's Strategic Stupidity
A cookie is pretty obvious, not exactly the high-end technology secret spy stuff. Erasing/blocking it is easy and done everyday. If you would go through all the trouble of having a "hidden agenda/top-secret", why have something that points directly to yourself, easily detected, well-known and is trival to defended against?
And exactly what would they get out of it? You need to have a motive for doing things.
>The principle being that the U.S. Government does not track or snoop on its citizens.
How does this principle apply to;
Social Security Cards and its hundreds of uses
Submission of tax forms
Court-approved wiretapping
Police manned "speed-traps"
Passports
Airport travel
Communication is important, but I was commenting on his experience.
You want a CPA/doctor/lawyer/candlestick-maker to have done the hard things before and not use you as a test case.
>Mine says things like "I was laying awake last night trying to figure out how to carry back your dividends from three years ago to count against your liability next year"
I actually don't want my CPA to say this.
I want him to say: "We are going to carry back your dividends to reduce your liabilities. I've done this before so its pretty routine now." You don't want your tax return be the one he learns how do to something.
>then will go on to explain it in the same way I tell my coworkers about new CPU developments.
This I agree with.
I agree with the "boss is an idiot, get out" comments but suppose that you want to stay there.
Implement a version control system yourself on your desktop computer. Create/install/implement a bug tracking system for yourself. Use them like a nazi.
At the very least, you can do this at your own pace, get experience in doing it, learn what you like/dislike about your system (extra bonus: partcipate in version-control system flame-wars!) and can fix it as you go without others crying about it. Make proper backups on a regular schedule and learn how to restore them.
Take advantage of the fact that you are a big fish in a small bowl.
Clearly, it would be better if stories started off with the question.
I looked at the Four-colour graph and found it .. beautiful.
From an infinate number of maps to 633 maps. The graph its like browsing through freshmeat or Wikipedia and discovering a world of variety and viewpoints. (sorry it reality does not meet some your expectations of a more "beautiful" number such as 0, 1 or 1,000)
Ugly? I find the the simple formulas. Try explaing what these mean to a child without resorting to "Its because its by definition..." (eg. ALEPH ONE) or having to explain some really complex background on the subject (STARBIRTH, what does pi have to do with this? What is with using the Boltzmann constant?).
>Monopolizing refers to the manner of conducting business which hurts other competitors.
Exactly how are you conducting a business and not hurting your competitors? Isn't every sale I make hurting my competitors because its one less sale they get?
>I have no problem with a government computer scanning data from different sources, and flagging communications that could be terrorist planning another attack.
Generally alot of people wouldn't have alot of problems with this.
Its just that it was done in a closed and classified way. Even those very few in Congress that were briefed had no idea exactly what the scope was.
How can you approve something if you have no idea what it involves?
I don't think this would fully protect you.
They are interested in patterns in calling to and from certain countries. The actual content analysis wouldn't come up until later.
And wouldn't you think that if you were using encryption, that would raise up even more flags?
I'm not saying that you shouldn't use encryption or that you should lay down and take what ever the government throws at you, but I don't understand how encryption could have protected you from any of this.
Thanks for being more informative than my post.
I wasn't going to post because I didn't have enough details as I perhaps should have.
>wouldn't it have made sense to create a vaccine for H5N1 itself
One of the only ways to create a vaccine is to use bird eggs and then use the resulting "stuff" (I can't recall if it is the the developed antibodies or weak/dead viruses) and inject that into humans.
The problem with H5N1 is that since its an avian flu, it kills the bird embryo before you can develop/grow anything useful for humans.
I guess you better sit down before you hear how much support costs. :)
>The table will no longer be in the state it was when you asked.
Yes, everyone who ever uses a database should know this already. Thats the whole purpose of transactions and consistancy.
>Good for you, you just wasted DB cycles because you want 'accurate' data.
vs. using DB cycles for inaccurate data?
"Yes the result is wrong but look how many cycles we saved!"
This sort of technical reason is why MySQL is still considered toy in my mind.
Just because something is "hard" doesn't mean that its acceptable to not do.
It would be more acceptable to leave out COUNT(*) functionality than to do it wrong. (Yes, if it gives an number other than the number of rows committed to a table it is wrong. "Weird" is what you call LISP.)
>But the problem is that the human doing the evil is rarely held accountable for it because it's done under the cloak of the corporation.
For the Bhopal disaster, I'm not sure if a corporation would have helped or not.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bhopal_Disaster
Alot of reasons listed here are cases of enginnering failure or just plain human error. (again the arguement was it intentional evil or was it stupidity?) What human is responsible for for turning off the audiable alarm? What human is responsible for not turning on the MIC refrigeration unit?
Some reasons could be attributed to the orgaization of the corporation, but it still comes down to humans. Why not go after them? (Hint: because they have no money go obtain so it not worth it.)
Regarding the CEO being responsible. I just can't see how this being involved with a corporation prevented him from being extradited. He is not even part of the corporation any more today. He is rich (and can afford high placed friends and good lawyers) but that has nothing to do with Union Carbine being a corporation and doing evil acts. It might have been more of a forign relations matter. I just can't see how he pulled out a "Corporation Immunity" card to not be extradited.
>Corporations have become the shield from behind which evil people act with impunity.
But its not true in all cases.
>If a human made the decision to force software to install on my computer then that human needs to be held personally liable for it.
I don't understand why a human needs to answer for this? Don't you want to just be compensated and make the punishment so harsh to make others think twice before they try something similar? Why do you need to punish a single human?
>Until people are held liable for their actions, evil people will continue to act freely.
Or stupid people need to be taught a lesson. Which then gets downing to arguing "Stupid people = evil". (Is adding MediaMax to CDs an act of stupidity or an act of evil?)
I really don't get this whole "Corporation = evil" argument.
A corporation is just a legal entity. You can even create one, its nothing special. That does not mean that it is evil. Charities are legal entities also, but I don't think you would consider them evil.
A corporation, by itself, does nothing. You can create one and let it sit around for years. Its the people controlling it that set out what it does. Some person, your fellow human, sat down and said "we are going to put MediaMax on our CDs.". There was nothing in a corporate charter or any natural tendancy that corporations will do evil.
Let me repeat: its a human that made the decision to do evil, not the corporation itself.
Even the arguement "Corporations = evil because their sole purpose is to profit." Every human has a need to profit, so would you consider human evil? Is there something about profiting that leads to evil?
It seems to me that the "Corporation = evil" argument is like arguing "stupid people = evil" or "everyone who does not act the way I think they should act = evil".
What is even more sad, is that the 18-30 year olds watching that show will be saying;
"Good thing that we know better than to let that sort of thing happen again."
Just like how we look back 40-60 years ago and say the same thing.
>We're all connected, and when you reduce the suffering -- or increase the joy -- anywhere in the world, it very well might somehow, somewhere, come back to help you personally.
So why don't I just keep the money myself and help myself directly?
Saying that giving to help a child in Africa and eventually, by some magical means, that will benefit me supports the same argument that if I keep my money and spend it on me will help that same child in Africa some way.
>but Carnegie gave away most of his money.
g y/2003-01-12-gates_x.htm
Bill Gates intends to eventually give away all his money. Buffett and him have the same attitude towards their fortune, they will only leave abit for their childern but want to see it put to good use in their lifetime.
http://www.usatoday.com/money/industries/technolo
http://www3.sympatico.ca/truegrowth/gates1.html
Its the next thing you put on your resume claiming that you have 5+ years experience in.