it delineates the difference between bottom up and top down organization, specifically in regards to software development models like linux versus gnu
obviously, this overlaps thematically with wikipedia in that wikipedia was once a bazaar, and is now becoming a cathedral
regardless of which model is better for wikipedia, the pluses and minuses of the cathedral versus the bazaar models of software development should be instructive for what exactly wikipedia is winning, and losing, in its trade off between bazaar and cathedral
The school custodian really cleaned house, officials say.
The Manhattan man is accused of stealing nearly $30,000 from the city to pay his sons' private school tuition and other personal expenses, city investigators said Wednesday.
Edwin Hendricks, 42, worked for nearly five years at Manhattan's Thurgood Marshall Academy before investigators discovered he was cutting checks from his custodial account.
And Hendricks did himself no favors when confronted by investigators.
He told them he "normally only stole money around the end of the year" when they asked about $4,000 in checks he'd written to employees - including his sister - and cashed himself around Christmas 2008.
Hendricks also compared himself favorably with a custodian who stole $100,000 from the city. "At least I'm not as bad," he told investigators.
The custodian claimed he intended to reimburse the city for the $1,400 made out to Solebury School in Pennsylvania, as well as for a $150 political donation to the Committee to Reelect Congressman Ed Towns.
Hendricks said he was willing to reimburse the city for the money and ultimately admitted to taking $14,000, though investigators think he collected $15,000 more.
Hendricks, who makes $86,000 a year, has been reassigned to a borough office and did not return a call seeking comment.
"We will seek his termination," said city Education Department spokeswoman Margie Feinberg.
do me a favor: feel your teeth for me for a moment
feel between your front teeth, your incisors, and your back teeth, your molars
what do you feel?
jagged teeth known as CANINES
designed by evolution, god, whatever you believe in, for the sole purpose of ripping and tearing flesh
you are a carnivore, you eat meat
understand the truth of what you are
understand the truth of the world you live in
right now, in the siberian taiga, or the african serengeti, or the brazilian rainforest, there are hundreds of herbivores, crying out in sheer terror, having their throats ripped out, their lungs suffcated, or simply being disemboweled and fed upon while still drawing breath, all the while in horrible excruciating pain, terror, and slow miserable death
furthermore, it has been this way, every day, multiple times every second, day and night, for HUNDREDS OF MILLIONS OF YEARS
this is the reality you live in. this is the natural order of things, designed by god or evolution or whatever. it is simply the truth of existence
are you exempt from this reality?
it is not i who believe in human exceptionalism, it is you
"You may still argue that other people's cultures are objectively inferior or underdeveloped,"
1. why do you confuse judgment of a government with judgment of a culture?
2. why do you confuse judgment of a government with judgment of a people?
you understand why i can't take anything you say seriously if you can't understand the different between these simple concepts, right? if you can't see the difference in those concepts, and say that i am attacking someone's culture when i am only attacking their illegitimate government, i can only conclude you are incredibly stupid or massively deluded
you do understand that to equate a people or a culture with the government that lords over them is complete intellectual failure on your part, right?
this is what i am saying, please listen very carefully to the extremely basic logic in these words:
a north korean, or a cuban, or a brazilian, or a vanuatuan, or anyone, who is a human being, is my equal, and deserves the same as i do. because they are MY EQUAL. because they are a HUMAN BEING. i say this as a HUMAN BEING. not an america, or a westerner
meanwhile, ANY GOVERNMENTAL ENTITY, that does not offer its citizens the same rights as i do, is illegitimate. illegitimate in the most strict sense of the word: if it is not a representative of the will of the people it lords over, it represents only a narrow ruling class
a government is ONLY legitimate if it represents the will of the people it governs. do you understand why? not in terms of any propaganda, but in terms of a simple ability to function coherently for a sustained period of time
finally, i don't know of any human culture that exists that says the people in that culture are happy being slaves. if there are slave holding SOCIETIES, i am certain those who own the slaves will defend that practice as an aspect of their "culture", but this is of course a a confusion of culture and government, like you fail to see the difference. and the slaves won't speak up, out of fear
you have to understand that there are universal truths about what it means to be human, that no culture can abrogate, out of simple logic: no human culture can exist that defies simple human psychology. do you see that? and self-determination, unless you are a pack animal, is a simple human desire, not a western desire, not an american desire
if any of this gets pass your current wall of massive blindness, then you may begin your trip out of this delusion that currently defines your ignorant words
the usa's government constantly consults the will of the people, and so it is constantly realigned with the people's will. so you can criticize democracy all you want, but this simple truth about democracy makes it better than all other governments because it makes democracy much more stable than other government types. its legitimacy is constantly being refreshed
meanwhile, in nondemocracies, the will of the people drifts apart from the will of the ruling class, whether monarch or totalitarian or oligarchy or theocracy or whatever. it may happen slowly, it may happen fast, it may happen in fits and starts, but nondemocracies experience an unstoppable increase in illegitimacy in the eyes of their people. there is no reconciliation between the people and the government built into the structure of the government, so no reconciliation happens. its a drifting apart
therefore, all nondemocracies are doomed the day they are born. it is only a matter of time before the agenda of the people and the agenda of the ruling class becomes horribly distant, and society disrupts
so the future of the world is pandemocracy. its simply a matter of time, no effort needed: its the only fix we know of to a simple, organic problem that no society can escape in any other way except adherence to democracy. people living in nondemocracies may have no experience or knowledge of democracy. if so, they are doomed to cycling between periods of revolution and tension: build up, release, build up, release, until such time they understand and finally adapt democracy. when they do that, they've just installed a pressure release valve in their society, and so there is no need for revolution anymore. it is perhaps distant for some countries, but if that society is composed of human beings, democracy is inevitable
tell me of another way to unify the will of the government and the will of the people than democracy (which is simply directly consulting their will, can't get simpler than that) and democracy will become a secondary governmental choice. until such time, democracy is the only valid, legitimate, and ideal form of government possible, over any population of human beings
simply judging by the hyper-british name of "nigel molesworth" (is there possibly a more british name?), i have to accept that i am way over my head here in terms of obscure british esoterica
anyway, the joke works across the pond, if for completely different reasons
"While you believe that your position is justified and other people are "wrong", it's clearly not universal, both have cultures behind them, not some kind of constant government control that forces people to pretend that they disagree with you."
this is the highest form of patronizing idiocy there is
1. that you confuse my opposition to tyrannical governments with the some sort of opposition to the people living under those tyrannical governments. my opinion is in solidarity with people suffering under totalitarian governments. their totalitarian governments are illegitimate, they do not represent the wills of their people. in a democracy, the government is composed of the will of the people. do you understand the fucking basics here?
2. that these tyrannical governments are part of the "culture" of someone else. as if ancient korean or cuban culture supports hardcore communism, which, if you will recall, was imported from extremely traditional cuban and korean places like marx's germany and stalin's russia/ georgia. tyrannical governments do not defend the culture of their lands, do not defend their people. they are illegitimate parasites off of the people, because the people have no voice in the structure which rules them BECAUSE THEY AREN'T DEMOCRACIES. duh
3. there is constant government control of the media in totalitarian societies. are you denying this out of complete ignorance or blind foolish stupidity?
my position is 100% correct: every person on the face of the planet deserves democracy. this is no extension of some sort of western or american imperialism onto others, because what i am asking for is nonwesterners to rule themselves. how is this imperialism? the only thing i am defying is the governments which are not composed of the will of the people they rule over
my words in fact are not western or american, they are HUMAN. my opinion is simply acceptance of a HUMAN standard and an opposition to illegitimate forces that would DENY people their rights. are north koreans or cubans slaves? is this what their culture teaches them? this is what you are telling me is true. which makes you a patronizing and condescending asshole and ethnocentric to boot, as your opinion is derived on a foreign reading of someone else's culture, while my reading simply appeals to human standards of decency and rights. so i speak in solidarity with north koreans and cubans, while you speak in haughty distant judgment of their "culture" (ie, their parasitical governments)
the only entities that would deny people their own SELF-DETERMINATION is the entrenched power in that country that stands to lose, and completely deluded WESTERN morons like yourself
"Essentially, according to their explanation, you've got your regular old Periodic Table of elements, which no doubt we all recall at least dimly from skool, which is based on the number of protons (Z) in an atom's nucleus."
lol "skool"
in any other publication, this is an embarassing typo. in the register, its simply a sly joke about education
carry on, uh, topflight british word-scurvy boffins!
i would like you to appreciate that the term "democracy" is not so narrow as you understand
the usa is a democracy, it is called a democracy by many people in the usa and abroad, both common and influential, since it was founded. for every practical purpose, to call the usa a democracy is perfectly valid, reasonable, appropriate, and correct
at the very best, you are only speaking as some sort of asperger's syndrome sufferer with a mediocre death grip on a completely pointless triviality about technical versus common language
go froth pointlessly over there with the grammar nazis or kindly shut the fuck up
the term democracy is not a technical term, it has a common meaning
the usa is a democracy. it is also a constitutional republic. there is no conflict between those two statements if you understand that words are not technical specifications
i'm not interested in your retarded religion of orwell
he was a good writer. he wrote good stories. i especially enjoyed animal farm
i also read the bible. it had some good stories, also a lot of violence. that is the beginning and ending of my intersection of christianity
what i do is i accumulate wisdom from many different sources of enthusiasm and enlightenment in the world. what i don't do is latch onto one particular work or another as the end all be all story of everything
i honestly believe if more people thought this way about their literary heritage, this world would be a far better place. in the world of fundamentalists, the orwellian clan is only a small nagging one, and i am not really worried about it to the extent of say, the christian and muslim fundamentalist assholes. but i am entirely entitled to call people out on their obsession with orwell as intellectually unhealthy
"One possible weakness in Attributor's business plan, unless they intend to violate the robots.txt convention: they find violators by crawling the Web."
and democracy is obviously not the same as mob rule
and democracy is obviously superior to totalitarianism, autocracy, military juntas, theocracies, monarchies, etc. democracy is not perfect. its simply BETTER than all other alternatives
everyone in the world deserves the rights and freedoms and self-determination of living in a democracy
every single story remotely concerning social trends or government policy like this story, some moron has to cite orwell
and look at the top level comment we are posting under: this little brother style of vigiliantism here is obviously the OPPOSITE of what orwell imagined, but the idiot still has to cite orwell AND he gets modded up as insightful
so its obviously not the majority as you say, but this 1984 derivative stupidity does have a lot of resonance nonetheless
but it is clearly ideologically superior to societies that are not democratic, at least according to me, not you apparently
there are limits on my freedom in a democracy. some are stupid, and i fight them, some limits are natural and i accept them. but i would like to know why these limits are in any way comparable to the limits on someone's freedom living in north korea or cuba
i call them totalitarian societies. you say there are no totalitarian socities. i would like you to tell me how the rulers of cuba, iran, north korea, or china came to power. i would like you to tell me how barack obama or gordon brown came to power. and finally i would like to know according to what amazing logic you equivocate these two (very different) paths to power
xenophobia is an interesting topic. i would like to know what the hell that has to do with totalitarianism in your mind. all societies are xenophobic to some degree or another. and it seems to me, that the more totalitarian a society, the more the xenophobia. you apparently see nothing but the same totalitarianism and xenophobia everywhere
as religious fundamentalist documents that color your every impression of what happens in your society and are you obsessed with cramming every development in society into the mold of what happens in those stories?
if no, then you completely understand my point, and your sarcasm is off target
because there really are people posting here, and that you meet in real life, who think of orwell as some sort of religious prophet about the coming armageddeon. that every sign and signal and portent of news from real life is merely evidence of the coming state of big brother and 1984 as reality. the same as any other idiotic apocalyptic cult
and don't even get me started on the ayn rand libertarian morons
look, along with l ron hubbard, these 3 writers from the 20th century have become posthumous cult leaders of a sort of pseudoreligious fan boy delusional confusion of reality and fantasy. if you understand why bible thumping christian fundamentalists and quran thumping muslim fundamentalists are retarded and dangerous, then you also understand why those who have to cram in and see every bit of the human condition as a twist on orwell, as the same sort of cretinous fundamentalist thinking
its perfectly normal and useful to use the iliad and the odyssey, or the bible, or the quran, or orwell, or rand, or even l ron hubbard, as useful commentary and insight and stories about humanity. its NOT useful to be so obsessed with one particular tale that it colors your every perception of reality
so if the iliad and the odyssey is the prism from which you view all of human condition, does that make you a homerian fundamentalist?;-P
what's impressive to me is that even in china, where they pretty much eat anything "everything with 4 legs except the table" they are repulsed by simple cruelty
in other words, animal rights activists: there is a code, understandable by all meat eaters, that eating meat is not cruelty, its simple sustenance. meanwhile, the divide between that understanding, and the simple understanding that needless cruelty to animals is disgusting is stark, clear, and universally understood. common chinese repulsion to that video, the same people famous for eating dogs, civet cats, whatever, they are equally repulsed at that video as your average morrisey listening mopey animal rights activist in the west
animal rights activists: people are repulsed by cruelty, universally and fundamentally, and they understand the difference between the need for sustenance and unnecessary vile behavior. and they genuinely are two different things. sorry: meat is not murder
and frankly, hound that fucking bitch and the cameraman too
if you've seen that video, even the most law and order obsessed amongst us would be grabbing the pitchfork and letting out a throaty cry for some mob vigilante justice on that bitch
i know the moronic big brother meme is popular here, but when you are confusing top down control with bottom up vigiliantism, you've truly destroyed all sense of credibility with this completely intellectually bankrupt idea
the 1984 meme has gotten to the point where "something bad happened in society" (--insert creative reasoning--) "therefore, we are becoming orwellian"
folks: orwell wrote a pleasant fiction a long time ago. it was good criticism of totalitarian societies at the time. like: ussr. not democracies (you know, governments accountable to voters?) like the uk or the usa. (also reference "animal farm")
so it made its way into a lot of high school reading curricula as a tool, ostensibly, about the dangers of totalitarian states. but in some amazing turn around, according to some sort of high school stoner logic, mixed with a lot of pink floyd i suppose, it became a critique in people's minds of the democracies they lived in
whu?
1984 bears no relation to reality in modern democracies. repeat: 1984, orwell, big brother bearsa NO RELATION to reality unless you live in an autocracy. please stop confusing science fiction with reality in western societies
if anything, this sort of vigilantism in this story is proof of LITTLE brother: for example, rodney king. that you are "oppressed" by your fellow citizens with cell phone cameras. and in fact, the STATE is hemmed in and hamstrung by citizens with cameras (a la rodney king). how does that fact jive with orwell's fiction?
1984, orwell, big brother: it would all make sense if the state had a monopoly on technological advance. it doesn't. as such, 1984, orwell, big brother: failed, dead meme, useless way of thinking about your world. please get over your fanboy reasoning. your braindead. stop citing orwell and 1984. it is NOT instructive as to the real world you live in unless you are in a GENUINELY authoritarian state. and even then, such as this story, its not even totally the case! just look at iran and twitter too
Slashdot Mirror
insomnia is a mark of depression or anxiety or a number of physical problems
if you are an insomniac, you have a problem that will eat into your ability to carry on with your jobs or your relationships
additionally, your health will suffer: many normal physical processes are tied into circadian rhythms, such as cholesterol production, and fat burning
insomnia is not a mark of subculture pride, it is a danger warning
treat your insomnia, it is not in any way cool
when surgery was first performed, anyone could and did do it
to much suffering, yes
but you can't expect the regimented laws and well-established protocols of long experience with a brand new technology
and yes, the internet is STILL brand new technology
we are only beginning to see standards and laws and social changes from its appearance
as well as further technological change
you can't expect the standards you are asking for
there was a book called the cathedral and the bazaar
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Cathedral_and_the_Bazaar
it delineates the difference between bottom up and top down organization, specifically in regards to software development models like linux versus gnu
obviously, this overlaps thematically with wikipedia in that wikipedia was once a bazaar, and is now becoming a cathedral
regardless of which model is better for wikipedia, the pluses and minuses of the cathedral versus the bazaar models of software development should be instructive for what exactly wikipedia is winning, and losing, in its trade off between bazaar and cathedral
is only a fallacy when it concerns observations about how humans behave to each other
the naturalistic fallacy is not a fallacy when it governs your relationship with NATURE
duh
i was kind of disgusted by a recent story i read in the new york daily news
it was a story of a public school janitor who bilked his school's petty cash fund for janitorial services to the tune of $30K
to, among other frivolties, send his kid to private school (irony meter off the charts)
but that's not the real story in this story. the real story here is that this janitor made $86K a year?!
some sort of 40 year tenure you say? no, he was there for only 5 years
how does it make sense that a janitor is making $86K a year considering the average new york city school teacher's salary?
i don't understand how this makes sense to anyone in the new york city school system
http://www.nydailynews.com/ny_local/education/2010/03/04/2010-03-04_custodians_rap_cleaned_city_out_of_30g.html
i believe in the existence of carnivores
do me a favor: feel your teeth for me for a moment
feel between your front teeth, your incisors, and your back teeth, your molars
what do you feel?
jagged teeth known as CANINES
designed by evolution, god, whatever you believe in, for the sole purpose of ripping and tearing flesh
you are a carnivore, you eat meat
understand the truth of what you are
understand the truth of the world you live in
right now, in the siberian taiga, or the african serengeti, or the brazilian rainforest, there are hundreds of herbivores, crying out in sheer terror, having their throats ripped out, their lungs suffcated, or simply being disemboweled and fed upon while still drawing breath, all the while in horrible excruciating pain, terror, and slow miserable death
furthermore, it has been this way, every day, multiple times every second, day and night, for HUNDREDS OF MILLIONS OF YEARS
this is the reality you live in. this is the natural order of things, designed by god or evolution or whatever. it is simply the truth of existence
are you exempt from this reality?
it is not i who believe in human exceptionalism, it is you
i simply believe in the existence of carnivores
"You may still argue that other people's cultures are objectively inferior or underdeveloped,"
1. why do you confuse judgment of a government with judgment of a culture?
2. why do you confuse judgment of a government with judgment of a people?
you understand why i can't take anything you say seriously if you can't understand the different between these simple concepts, right? if you can't see the difference in those concepts, and say that i am attacking someone's culture when i am only attacking their illegitimate government, i can only conclude you are incredibly stupid or massively deluded
you do understand that to equate a people or a culture with the government that lords over them is complete intellectual failure on your part, right?
this is what i am saying, please listen very carefully to the extremely basic logic in these words:
a north korean, or a cuban, or a brazilian, or a vanuatuan, or anyone, who is a human being, is my equal, and deserves the same as i do. because they are MY EQUAL. because they are a HUMAN BEING. i say this as a HUMAN BEING. not an america, or a westerner
meanwhile, ANY GOVERNMENTAL ENTITY, that does not offer its citizens the same rights as i do, is illegitimate. illegitimate in the most strict sense of the word: if it is not a representative of the will of the people it lords over, it represents only a narrow ruling class
a government is ONLY legitimate if it represents the will of the people it governs. do you understand why? not in terms of any propaganda, but in terms of a simple ability to function coherently for a sustained period of time
finally, i don't know of any human culture that exists that says the people in that culture are happy being slaves. if there are slave holding SOCIETIES, i am certain those who own the slaves will defend that practice as an aspect of their "culture", but this is of course a a confusion of culture and government, like you fail to see the difference. and the slaves won't speak up, out of fear
you have to understand that there are universal truths about what it means to be human, that no culture can abrogate, out of simple logic: no human culture can exist that defies simple human psychology. do you see that? and self-determination, unless you are a pack animal, is a simple human desire, not a western desire, not an american desire
if any of this gets pass your current wall of massive blindness, then you may begin your trip out of this delusion that currently defines your ignorant words
google ripped off simon for its chrome icon?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Simon_(game)
whenever i see that chrome icon, i want to start pressing the panels before i forget the sequence
the usa's government constantly consults the will of the people, and so it is constantly realigned with the people's will. so you can criticize democracy all you want, but this simple truth about democracy makes it better than all other governments because it makes democracy much more stable than other government types. its legitimacy is constantly being refreshed
meanwhile, in nondemocracies, the will of the people drifts apart from the will of the ruling class, whether monarch or totalitarian or oligarchy or theocracy or whatever. it may happen slowly, it may happen fast, it may happen in fits and starts, but nondemocracies experience an unstoppable increase in illegitimacy in the eyes of their people. there is no reconciliation between the people and the government built into the structure of the government, so no reconciliation happens. its a drifting apart
therefore, all nondemocracies are doomed the day they are born. it is only a matter of time before the agenda of the people and the agenda of the ruling class becomes horribly distant, and society disrupts
so the future of the world is pandemocracy. its simply a matter of time, no effort needed: its the only fix we know of to a simple, organic problem that no society can escape in any other way except adherence to democracy. people living in nondemocracies may have no experience or knowledge of democracy. if so, they are doomed to cycling between periods of revolution and tension: build up, release, build up, release, until such time they understand and finally adapt democracy. when they do that, they've just installed a pressure release valve in their society, and so there is no need for revolution anymore. it is perhaps distant for some countries, but if that society is composed of human beings, democracy is inevitable
tell me of another way to unify the will of the government and the will of the people than democracy (which is simply directly consulting their will, can't get simpler than that) and democracy will become a secondary governmental choice. until such time, democracy is the only valid, legitimate, and ideal form of government possible, over any population of human beings
simply judging by the hyper-british name of "nigel molesworth" (is there possibly a more british name?), i have to accept that i am way over my head here in terms of obscure british esoterica
anyway, the joke works across the pond, if for completely different reasons
"While you believe that your position is justified and other people are "wrong", it's clearly not universal, both have cultures behind them, not some kind of constant government control that forces people to pretend that they disagree with you."
this is the highest form of patronizing idiocy there is
1. that you confuse my opposition to tyrannical governments with the some sort of opposition to the people living under those tyrannical governments. my opinion is in solidarity with people suffering under totalitarian governments. their totalitarian governments are illegitimate, they do not represent the wills of their people. in a democracy, the government is composed of the will of the people. do you understand the fucking basics here?
2. that these tyrannical governments are part of the "culture" of someone else. as if ancient korean or cuban culture supports hardcore communism, which, if you will recall, was imported from extremely traditional cuban and korean places like marx's germany and stalin's russia/ georgia. tyrannical governments do not defend the culture of their lands, do not defend their people. they are illegitimate parasites off of the people, because the people have no voice in the structure which rules them BECAUSE THEY AREN'T DEMOCRACIES. duh
3. there is constant government control of the media in totalitarian societies. are you denying this out of complete ignorance or blind foolish stupidity?
my position is 100% correct: every person on the face of the planet deserves democracy. this is no extension of some sort of western or american imperialism onto others, because what i am asking for is nonwesterners to rule themselves. how is this imperialism? the only thing i am defying is the governments which are not composed of the will of the people they rule over
my words in fact are not western or american, they are HUMAN. my opinion is simply acceptance of a HUMAN standard and an opposition to illegitimate forces that would DENY people their rights. are north koreans or cubans slaves? is this what their culture teaches them? this is what you are telling me is true. which makes you a patronizing and condescending asshole and ethnocentric to boot, as your opinion is derived on a foreign reading of someone else's culture, while my reading simply appeals to human standards of decency and rights. so i speak in solidarity with north koreans and cubans, while you speak in haughty distant judgment of their "culture" (ie, their parasitical governments)
the only entities that would deny people their own SELF-DETERMINATION is the entrenched power in that country that stands to lose, and completely deluded WESTERN morons like yourself
"Essentially, according to their explanation, you've got your regular old Periodic Table of elements, which no doubt we all recall at least dimly from skool, which is based on the number of protons (Z) in an atom's nucleus."
lol "skool"
in any other publication, this is an embarassing typo. in the register, its simply a sly joke about education
carry on, uh, topflight british word-scurvy boffins!
"Atomsmash boffins' reverse alchemy bizarro-stuff triumph"
"Sometimes there is more strangeness than none at all. Or less."
the article is complete with a "Bootnote"
so i'm under the impression of having advanced quantum physics described to me by a drunk with a cockney accent. i guess that's helpful...
i would like you to appreciate that the term "democracy" is not so narrow as you understand
the usa is a democracy, it is called a democracy by many people in the usa and abroad, both common and influential, since it was founded. for every practical purpose, to call the usa a democracy is perfectly valid, reasonable, appropriate, and correct
at the very best, you are only speaking as some sort of asperger's syndrome sufferer with a mediocre death grip on a completely pointless triviality about technical versus common language
go froth pointlessly over there with the grammar nazis or kindly shut the fuck up
the term democracy is not a technical term, it has a common meaning
the usa is a democracy. it is also a constitutional republic. there is no conflict between those two statements if you understand that words are not technical specifications
any other religious evangelist
i'm not interested in your retarded religion of orwell
he was a good writer. he wrote good stories. i especially enjoyed animal farm
i also read the bible. it had some good stories, also a lot of violence. that is the beginning and ending of my intersection of christianity
what i do is i accumulate wisdom from many different sources of enthusiasm and enlightenment in the world. what i don't do is latch onto one particular work or another as the end all be all story of everything
i honestly believe if more people thought this way about their literary heritage, this world would be a far better place. in the world of fundamentalists, the orwellian clan is only a small nagging one, and i am not really worried about it to the extent of say, the christian and muslim fundamentalist assholes. but i am entirely entitled to call people out on their obsession with orwell as intellectually unhealthy
this is the beginning of an arms race
"One possible weakness in Attributor's business plan, unless they intend to violate the robots.txt convention: they find violators by crawling the Web."
what convention is Attributor the violating?
and democracy is obviously not the same as mob rule
and democracy is obviously superior to totalitarianism, autocracy, military juntas, theocracies, monarchies, etc. democracy is not perfect. its simply BETTER than all other alternatives
everyone in the world deserves the rights and freedoms and self-determination of living in a democracy
do you not agree with that?
as often as i have
every single story remotely concerning social trends or government policy like this story, some moron has to cite orwell
and look at the top level comment we are posting under: this little brother style of vigiliantism here is obviously the OPPOSITE of what orwell imagined, but the idiot still has to cite orwell AND he gets modded up as insightful
so its obviously not the majority as you say, but this 1984 derivative stupidity does have a lot of resonance nonetheless
it is imperfect
but it is clearly ideologically superior to societies that are not democratic, at least according to me, not you apparently
there are limits on my freedom in a democracy. some are stupid, and i fight them, some limits are natural and i accept them. but i would like to know why these limits are in any way comparable to the limits on someone's freedom living in north korea or cuba
i call them totalitarian societies. you say there are no totalitarian socities. i would like you to tell me how the rulers of cuba, iran, north korea, or china came to power. i would like you to tell me how barack obama or gordon brown came to power. and finally i would like to know according to what amazing logic you equivocate these two (very different) paths to power
xenophobia is an interesting topic. i would like to know what the hell that has to do with totalitarianism in your mind. all societies are xenophobic to some degree or another. and it seems to me, that the more totalitarian a society, the more the xenophobia. you apparently see nothing but the same totalitarianism and xenophobia everywhere
frankly, you're a fucking moron
as religious fundamentalist documents that color your every impression of what happens in your society and are you obsessed with cramming every development in society into the mold of what happens in those stories?
if no, then you completely understand my point, and your sarcasm is off target
because there really are people posting here, and that you meet in real life, who think of orwell as some sort of religious prophet about the coming armageddeon. that every sign and signal and portent of news from real life is merely evidence of the coming state of big brother and 1984 as reality. the same as any other idiotic apocalyptic cult
and don't even get me started on the ayn rand libertarian morons
look, along with l ron hubbard, these 3 writers from the 20th century have become posthumous cult leaders of a sort of pseudoreligious fan boy delusional confusion of reality and fantasy. if you understand why bible thumping christian fundamentalists and quran thumping muslim fundamentalists are retarded and dangerous, then you also understand why those who have to cram in and see every bit of the human condition as a twist on orwell, as the same sort of cretinous fundamentalist thinking
its perfectly normal and useful to use the iliad and the odyssey, or the bible, or the quran, or orwell, or rand, or even l ron hubbard, as useful commentary and insight and stories about humanity. its NOT useful to be so obsessed with one particular tale that it colors your every perception of reality
so if the iliad and the odyssey is the prism from which you view all of human condition, does that make you a homerian fundamentalist? ;-P
what's impressive to me is that even in china, where they pretty much eat anything "everything with 4 legs except the table" they are repulsed by simple cruelty
in other words, animal rights activists: there is a code, understandable by all meat eaters, that eating meat is not cruelty, its simple sustenance. meanwhile, the divide between that understanding, and the simple understanding that needless cruelty to animals is disgusting is stark, clear, and universally understood. common chinese repulsion to that video, the same people famous for eating dogs, civet cats, whatever, they are equally repulsed at that video as your average morrisey listening mopey animal rights activist in the west
animal rights activists: people are repulsed by cruelty, universally and fundamentally, and they understand the difference between the need for sustenance and unnecessary vile behavior. and they genuinely are two different things. sorry: meat is not murder
and frankly, hound that fucking bitch and the cameraman too
if you've seen that video, even the most law and order obsessed amongst us would be grabbing the pitchfork and letting out a throaty cry for some mob vigilante justice on that bitch
i know the moronic big brother meme is popular here, but when you are confusing top down control with bottom up vigiliantism, you've truly destroyed all sense of credibility with this completely intellectually bankrupt idea
the 1984 meme has gotten to the point where "something bad happened in society" (--insert creative reasoning--) "therefore, we are becoming orwellian"
folks: orwell wrote a pleasant fiction a long time ago. it was good criticism of totalitarian societies at the time. like: ussr. not democracies (you know, governments accountable to voters?) like the uk or the usa. (also reference "animal farm")
so it made its way into a lot of high school reading curricula as a tool, ostensibly, about the dangers of totalitarian states. but in some amazing turn around, according to some sort of high school stoner logic, mixed with a lot of pink floyd i suppose, it became a critique in people's minds of the democracies they lived in
whu?
1984 bears no relation to reality in modern democracies. repeat: 1984, orwell, big brother bearsa NO RELATION to reality unless you live in an autocracy. please stop confusing science fiction with reality in western societies
if anything, this sort of vigilantism in this story is proof of LITTLE brother: for example, rodney king. that you are "oppressed" by your fellow citizens with cell phone cameras. and in fact, the STATE is hemmed in and hamstrung by citizens with cameras (a la rodney king). how does that fact jive with orwell's fiction?
1984, orwell, big brother: it would all make sense if the state had a monopoly on technological advance. it doesn't. as such, 1984, orwell, big brother: failed, dead meme, useless way of thinking about your world. please get over your fanboy reasoning. your braindead. stop citing orwell and 1984. it is NOT instructive as to the real world you live in unless you are in a GENUINELY authoritarian state. and even then, such as this story, its not even totally the case! just look at iran and twitter too
STOP CITING ORWELL PEOPLE PLEASE. IT FAILS
thanks
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Teledildonics
and if you think that's an unfair pornographic twist on this completely serious subject, then i would like to say
1. what the heck did you expect with it called "skinput"?
2. maybe having fleshy contact with our computers IS sexual