There are plenty of people who are 30 and completely incapable of making reasoned choices. Women, for example.
Seriously though, age does not equate with wisdom. Many people would argue that anyone who uses alcohol is unwise. You can argue either way. If people are unable to make reasoned choices at 18, why can they vote? Why can they be charged as an adult in a crime? Why can people under 18 be charged as an adult? Society is overly willing to use age as a useful metric when it serves their interest, but less willing when it clashes with popularity. (Not that this is different than anything else). Old people are a risk on the road, but you'll never see a law to ban people over 70 from driving. If anything, there will be a regualar retest to ensure continued competence.
21 is a semi-arbitrary age limit established by MADD using statistics that argued decreased highway fatalities, which may or may not directly correspond with years-of-experience rather than raw age. You could just as well say that people with 5 years of driving experience as less likely to be involved in an alcohol-related crash.
At some point you have to transfer responsibility to the individual. Proponents of the 21 year age limit argue that it's not worth the cost in human lives. Obviously one person's right to party shouldn't trump another person's right to be alive. That's a fundamental and powerful argument, but it's all based on a shakey correlation between allowing alcohol consumption at 18, and traffic fatalities, and it further assumes that outright banning of alcohol consumption under the age of 21 is the best solution. Any number of other things may have contributed to the documented reduction in highway fatalities in the 18-21 age group; namely education and heightened awareness of the risks and consequences.
I'm of the opinion that the biggest reason the drinking age is 21 is that the largest percentage of the voting population is over 21, and we naturally regard the decision making abilities of people who are younger than us with suspicion. Once we turn 21, we tend to put aside the whole issue of a drinking age, since it doesn't affect us directly. In many cases, people will often assist their friends in aquiring alcohol once they're of age, which hardly demonstrates a capability for reasoned decision-making. Or does it?
Standards are great, and the higher the better. But place them on yourself not others, or you'll live in a very lonely world.
Hardly. I place very high standards on the people I choose to associate with. Negative and unethical people have a negative influence and create a drain by the constant need to combat their thinking and behavior. I'm not saying MS employees are any worse than anyone else, but certainly you should have standards on the people you allow in your life. The higher, the better.
NASA didn't spend any money to design these. [spacepen.com]
You mean the pens that spew out a gooey mess of ink that's so cohesive it often leaves a melted-cheese-like string from letter to letter? Well, at least that's one less screwup that can be blamed on NASA. Maybe they work better in outer space though. Any astronauts, cosmonauts, or alien abductees care to comment?
Not to mention, there's no reason to believe you'd actually need to fake biometrics, although that might turn out to be the easiest solution in most cases.
But let's suppose for a minute that someone sets up a fake ATM machine. First you insert your card, providing them with your account information. Next you authenticate yourself with your fingerprint, retinal scan, DNA sample, or whatever else you choose. Assuming they've installed the same biometric reading equipment as our theoretically real ATM machine, they now have your biometric data in digital form and there's no need for them to recreate the original.
Biometric identification is an extremely bad idea that will hopefully die the silent death it deserves.
Did you mean authentication? Biometric identification isn't a bad idea -- it's certainly more reliable than a simple picture ID -- but biometric authentication has all the drawbacks you mentioned.
Machines that can predict the future! This could be incredibly useful for people, unless you want to know what's going to happen. Just be aware that a shift in the regularity of pseudorandom number generators means SOMETHING is about to happen.. which is significant, because things aren't always happening all around us. I, for one, think they should sent out global alerts whenever the patterns deviate from the norm. For example, they could say, "QUICK! EVERYBODY STOP WHAT YOU'RE DOING AND STAND STILL, OR RUN AWAY, OR CONTINUE WHAT YOU'RE DOING, BUT DON'T SAY WE DIDN'T WARN YOU."
A new era of global peace and prosperity is upon us.
----- Technologies Quantum Cryptography solutions, consulting, and evaluations. www.-----.com
Quantum Dots Article in BusinessWeek Read it online. Free Trial! www.-----.com
You Like Quantum Physics? Have The Extreme Wealth and Success You Desire In Six Easy Steps! -----.com
Now somebody's obviously banking on the idea that quantum physicists are most likely to fall for the six step scheme. Perhaps they'll get stuck on "Step 5: ???" and spend the rest of their natural lives trying to solve for ???.
Steve isn't stupid. He knows something the rest of us don't. For example, he may be angling for a better deal from Sirius or XM. Or he may just be a realist who gets that the iPod would have to become the iBrick to accommodate the battery life needed to mix in radio.
This is why people who don't understand technology shouldn't speculate about it. Increased battery drain from an XM/Sirius tuner? A tuner would be 100% solid state, as opposed to the hard drive that currently has to be spun up to read MP3s. And what, exactly, would they need to add?
LO - Check DSP - Check Audio Amplifier - Check User Interface - Check
Most of the main parts of a receiver are already existant in the current iPod. All they really need to add is a low noise RF amp, program the digital decoding method, and slap an antenna on that sucker. It takes a minimal amount of power to drive most of the circuitry -- the biggest power drain is the audio amp. If anything, the satellite radio enabled iPod would get better battery life when used as a reciever.
I don't know how any of that fits into any given legal ssytem but I do think that it's inappropriate in the sense that the user is probably not interested in seeing it.
I would venture to say that most people would claim to be uninterested in seeing any ads, so by your logic, any advertising is inappropriate. When I go to a baseball game, I want to see baseball, not Budweiser signs. (Although research has disproven that claim.. specifically, people love hearing about new products).
Aside from that, there have been times when I've searched for brands SPECIFICALLY to see related advertising, or to click the "Related," link to find out about products I might not otherwise be aware of.
well, that just about covers my first week at google. now i'll have to spend the weekend looking for a new bed and other matching bedroom furniture. oh boy, lucky me:/
I KNOW, I totally hate buying things. I so envy those people who can't afford to buy anything, let alone furniture from Ikea. And OMG, trying to pick out a color for my new Porsche!?!? I couldn't decide!! I just had to buy one of each. -- I know everybody complains about unimportant things, like the steak that wasn't medium rare while other people would kill for some food, but really.. Complaints that are thinly veiled attempts to brag make you seem like a wuss. Either be proud of your place, or be ashamed and keep quiet, but don't be passively apologetic by making your situation out to be crap. Although personally, if I got canned in 3 weeks, I'd be keeping awfully quiet.
It's almost as if the political climate on this forum supports the recognition of someone's feats only if they're considered an underdog?
That's not this forum, that's human nature. We naturally resent those in power, those with more money than us, etc. Why are movies always about the underdog winning, never about the current champion kicking ass? It's the same thing. Nietzsche called it the "Will to Power," and he makes an interesting case.
Well, sure, but they only resent it if they know about it. Obviously if software had started out as a subscription, it would be easier for people to accept that business model (although it's hard to imagine other companies wouldn't compete by coming up with the idea of buying the software once and -- dare I say it? -- owning it). But I don't think you can really compare software and a TV. A computer and a TV would be a little more analogous, and it's obvious that people spend $3000 for a top of the line computer that they won't be using in 3 years.
However, for the sake of argument, I think the biggest difference here is that software is not a status symbol, whereas something like a plasma TV is, and status symbols are all about being impractical. If and when plasma TVs are sold at a price where everyone can afford them, people will be paying 5 grand for something else (note I didn't say something better, just something else).
This is inconsistant, either Gartner is good at analysis or not
Since when is it all or nothing? Analysis is essentially pattern recognition. While you might recognize this pattern immediately: 1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 12, 20
You might never figure this one out: 5, _, 12, __, 18, 24, 30
Does that make you bad at pattern recognition? Perhaps. Or you might not have enough data to work with and not realize it. Regardless, being right once doesn't mean you'll never be wrong, and vice versa.
Some form of light is still an advantage in storms where GPS is either un available or too hard to compare to a chart of the area. Lighthoses and buoies are still the best way to go for the smaller boats.
You're assuming anyone cares about small sailboats crashing on the shore, or running aground. By your logic, we should cover national parks with floodlights so the random hiker has a safer journey. If a tanker crashes into the coast or runs aground, that's a big deal. If a small sailboat is lost, that's a personal tragedy. At some point people have to take personal responsibility for their actions and the situations they place themselves in. Am I an insensitive clod? Yes. Yes I am.
There have been concerns over the increasing trend to use cars instead of horses. Critics worry that these automatic mobiles might be far more dangerous than a traditional thoroughbred. Also of growing concern -- unreliable electric lamps seem to be replacing candles. Now we have one single point of failure for our nighttime safety. And what's worse: the telephone, the most vile of all creations, has degraded all sense of decency. A woman can hear a man's voice on the pillow next to her as she lays in bed. And let's not forget the zipper! Allowing men quick and unfettered access to sin!
(10 points if you know where that last bit was paraphased from).
Slashdot Mirror
There are plenty of people who are 30 and completely incapable of making reasoned choices. Women, for example.
Seriously though, age does not equate with wisdom. Many people would argue that anyone who uses alcohol is unwise. You can argue either way. If people are unable to make reasoned choices at 18, why can they vote? Why can they be charged as an adult in a crime? Why can people under 18 be charged as an adult? Society is overly willing to use age as a useful metric when it serves their interest, but less willing when it clashes with popularity. (Not that this is different than anything else). Old people are a risk on the road, but you'll never see a law to ban people over 70 from driving. If anything, there will be a regualar retest to ensure continued competence.
21 is a semi-arbitrary age limit established by MADD using statistics that argued decreased highway fatalities, which may or may not directly correspond with years-of-experience rather than raw age. You could just as well say that people with 5 years of driving experience as less likely to be involved in an alcohol-related crash.
At some point you have to transfer responsibility to the individual. Proponents of the 21 year age limit argue that it's not worth the cost in human lives. Obviously one person's right to party shouldn't trump another person's right to be alive. That's a fundamental and powerful argument, but it's all based on a shakey correlation between allowing alcohol consumption at 18, and traffic fatalities, and it further assumes that outright banning of alcohol consumption under the age of 21 is the best solution. Any number of other things may have contributed to the documented reduction in highway fatalities in the 18-21 age group; namely education and heightened awareness of the risks and consequences.
I'm of the opinion that the biggest reason the drinking age is 21 is that the largest percentage of the voting population is over 21, and we naturally regard the decision making abilities of people who are younger than us with suspicion. Once we turn 21, we tend to put aside the whole issue of a drinking age, since it doesn't affect us directly. In many cases, people will often assist their friends in aquiring alcohol once they're of age, which hardly demonstrates a capability for reasoned decision-making. Or does it?
Standards are great, and the higher the better. But place them on yourself not others, or you'll live in a very lonely world.
Hardly. I place very high standards on the people I choose to associate with. Negative and unethical people have a negative influence and create a drain by the constant need to combat their thinking and behavior. I'm not saying MS employees are any worse than anyone else, but certainly you should have standards on the people you allow in your life. The higher, the better.
NASA didn't spend any money to design these. [spacepen.com]
You mean the pens that spew out a gooey mess of ink that's so cohesive it often leaves a melted-cheese-like string from letter to letter? Well, at least that's one less screwup that can be blamed on NASA. Maybe they work better in outer space though. Any astronauts, cosmonauts, or alien abductees care to comment?
Make sure the hot chicks in accounting are informed.
The hot chicks in accounting? Might as well tell Santa and The Easter Bunny while you're at it. And don't forget about all the smart natural blondes.
And "All your passphrases are belong to us."
Not to mention, there's no reason to believe you'd actually need to fake biometrics, although that might turn out to be the easiest solution in most cases.
a sp
But let's suppose for a minute that someone sets up a fake ATM machine. First you insert your card, providing them with your account information. Next you authenticate yourself with your fingerprint, retinal scan, DNA sample, or whatever else you choose. Assuming they've installed the same biometric reading equipment as our theoretically real ATM machine, they now have your biometric data in digital form and there's no need for them to recreate the original.
http://www.snopes.com/crime/warnings/atmcamera.
Even assuming that you didn't fall for that scam, it's not hard to think of multiple alternative methods of harvesting biometric data.
Biometric identification is an extremely bad idea that will hopefully die the silent death it deserves.
Did you mean authentication? Biometric identification isn't a bad idea -- it's certainly more reliable than a simple picture ID -- but biometric authentication has all the drawbacks you mentioned.
Machines that can predict the future! This could be incredibly useful for people, unless you want to know what's going to happen. Just be aware that a shift in the regularity of pseudorandom number generators means SOMETHING is about to happen.. which is significant, because things aren't always happening all around us. I, for one, think they should sent out global alerts whenever the patterns deviate from the norm. For example, they could say, "QUICK! EVERYBODY STOP WHAT YOU'RE DOING AND STAND STILL, OR RUN AWAY, OR CONTINUE WHAT YOU'RE DOING, BUT DON'T SAY WE DIDN'T WARN YOU."
A new era of global peace and prosperity is upon us.
Ads by Goooooogle
----- Technologies
Quantum Cryptography solutions, consulting, and evaluations.
www.-----.com
Quantum Dots
Article in BusinessWeek Read it online. Free Trial!
www.-----.com
You Like Quantum Physics?
Have The Extreme Wealth and Success You Desire In Six Easy Steps!
-----.com
Now somebody's obviously banking on the idea that quantum physicists are most likely to fall for the six step scheme. Perhaps they'll get stuck on "Step 5: ???" and spend the rest of their natural lives trying to solve for ???.
Interesting.. so their business model is basically exactly the opposite of Microsoft with their X-Box.
Steve isn't stupid. He knows something the rest of us don't. For example, he may be angling for a better deal from Sirius or XM. Or he may just be a realist who gets that the iPod would have to become the iBrick to accommodate the battery life needed to mix in radio.
This is why people who don't understand technology shouldn't speculate about it. Increased battery drain from an XM/Sirius tuner? A tuner would be 100% solid state, as opposed to the hard drive that currently has to be spun up to read MP3s. And what, exactly, would they need to add?
LO - Check
DSP - Check
Audio Amplifier - Check
User Interface - Check
Most of the main parts of a receiver are already existant in the current iPod. All they really need to add is a low noise RF amp, program the digital decoding method, and slap an antenna on that sucker. It takes a minimal amount of power to drive most of the circuitry -- the biggest power drain is the audio amp. If anything, the satellite radio enabled iPod would get better battery life when used as a reciever.
Wait, what? Broadcast? Is that some sort of farming term?
In the words of Richard Jeni, "The whole war over religion thing is basically about who has the better imaginary friend."
Sorry, cultural memory only lasts 7 days.
Tsunami? What tsunami?
I don't know how any of that fits into any given legal ssytem but I do think that it's inappropriate in the sense that the user is probably not interested in seeing it.
I would venture to say that most people would claim to be uninterested in seeing any ads, so by your logic, any advertising is inappropriate. When I go to a baseball game, I want to see baseball, not Budweiser signs. (Although research has disproven that claim.. specifically, people love hearing about new products).
Aside from that, there have been times when I've searched for brands SPECIFICALLY to see related advertising, or to click the "Related," link to find out about products I might not otherwise be aware of.
From the blog:
:/
well, that just about covers my first week at google. now i'll have to spend the weekend looking for a new bed and other matching bedroom furniture. oh boy, lucky me
I KNOW, I totally hate buying things. I so envy those people who can't afford to buy anything, let alone furniture from Ikea. And OMG, trying to pick out a color for my new Porsche!?!? I couldn't decide!! I just had to buy one of each.
--
I know everybody complains about unimportant things, like the steak that wasn't medium rare while other people would kill for some food, but really.. Complaints that are thinly veiled attempts to brag make you seem like a wuss. Either be proud of your place, or be ashamed and keep quiet, but don't be passively apologetic by making your situation out to be crap. Although personally, if I got canned in 3 weeks, I'd be keeping awfully quiet.
It's almost as if the political climate on this forum supports the recognition of someone's feats only if they're considered an underdog?
That's not this forum, that's human nature. We naturally resent those in power, those with more money than us, etc. Why are movies always about the underdog winning, never about the current champion kicking ass? It's the same thing. Nietzsche called it the "Will to Power," and he makes an interesting case.
People resent being treated that way.
Well, sure, but they only resent it if they know about it. Obviously if software had started out as a subscription, it would be easier for people to accept that business model (although it's hard to imagine other companies wouldn't compete by coming up with the idea of buying the software once and -- dare I say it? -- owning it). But I don't think you can really compare software and a TV. A computer and a TV would be a little more analogous, and it's obvious that people spend $3000 for a top of the line computer that they won't be using in 3 years.
However, for the sake of argument, I think the biggest difference here is that software is not a status symbol, whereas something like a plasma TV is, and status symbols are all about being impractical. If and when plasma TVs are sold at a price where everyone can afford them, people will be paying 5 grand for something else (note I didn't say something better, just something else).
This is inconsistant, either Gartner is good at analysis or not
Since when is it all or nothing? Analysis is essentially pattern recognition. While you might recognize this pattern immediately:
1, 1, 2, 3, 5, 8, 12, 20
You might never figure this one out:
5, _, 12, __, 18, 24, 30
Does that make you bad at pattern recognition? Perhaps. Or you might not have enough data to work with and not realize it. Regardless, being right once doesn't mean you'll never be wrong, and vice versa.
Good people do not need laws to tell them to act responsibly, while bad people will find a way around the laws." - Plato
Plato fell into the old trap of equating right and wrong with legal and illegal.
Some form of light is still an advantage in storms where GPS is either un available or too hard to compare to a chart of the area. Lighthoses and buoies are still the best way to go for the smaller boats.
You're assuming anyone cares about small sailboats crashing on the shore, or running aground. By your logic, we should cover national parks with floodlights so the random hiker has a safer journey. If a tanker crashes into the coast or runs aground, that's a big deal. If a small sailboat is lost, that's a personal tragedy. At some point people have to take personal responsibility for their actions and the situations they place themselves in. Am I an insensitive clod? Yes. Yes I am.
There have been concerns over the increasing trend to use cars instead of horses. Critics worry that these automatic mobiles might be far more dangerous than a traditional thoroughbred. Also of growing concern -- unreliable electric lamps seem to be replacing candles. Now we have one single point of failure for our nighttime safety. And what's worse: the telephone, the most vile of all creations, has degraded all sense of decency. A woman can hear a man's voice on the pillow next to her as she lays in bed. And let's not forget the zipper! Allowing men quick and unfettered access to sin!
(10 points if you know where that last bit was paraphased from).
That's amazing! It looks so... powerful. So realistic. What will they think of next?
No, *I* get the cameo walk on role...
Fanatic1: My super wizard powers protect me from your phasers!
Fanatic2: You jackass, we're playing space explorers, not dungeons and demons.
Fanatic1: Suck my black hole then!
Fanatic2: You can's suck a black hole you dumbass.. once you cross the event horizon, your atoms become..
Fanatic1: Just shut up..
Fanatic2: ripped apart and.. hey, you shut up!
Also some punctuation.. even putting each expression on a new line would be nice.