In addition to MartinG's point about the "due process" (or lack thereof) under UK anti-terrorism laws, the government in the UK is also trying its best to collect personally idenifiable data on any "troublemakers" whenever it can. Even if you're just arrested and formally cautioned for something -- without ever seeing a courtroom, never mind being found guilty of a crime -- your fingerprints, DNA, etc. will be taken. If you choose to accept the caution, it will disappear from your record after a few years, but would anybody like to bet on where the fingerprint and DNA data goes and for how long?
Using inappropriate legislation to gain this sort of personal information, which historically has been liable to abuse at a later date, is simply wrong. There is no pontification here, it's just the cold, hard truth.
The yes, the US government does and will abuse personal freedoms and due process in a similar way if it can. Remember how many people are still being held in the camp at Gitmo, and that's from the last war. How long exactly is processing them and charging them with some crime supposed to take?
A more interesting question might be how many offers have gone to someone who's consistently done well two or three times but never won. By my count, there is at least one such person, looking at the most recent contests.
This year's contest was an interesting problem, and no doubt the winning entry was well done, but there's also an element of brute force involved; look at the hardware Andrew had available. You could make a reasonable argument that this year's winner wasn't decided purely on programming skill, and an even more reasonable argument that doing well in one such contest doesn't say nearly as much as doing well in multiple consecutive ones with different problems to solve.
If the federal government persists in the behaviours that it has been engaging in lately, all that they'll do is force people who care to either leave the U.S., or to engage in rebellion.
Or, without the overblown dramatics, you could just vote for another candidate...
Ironically, much the same story has been relevant to the UK this week. At a high-profile arms fair (ahem... sorry... trade conference) where there were extensive (non-violent) protests, police used our recently-enacted anti-terrorism legislation under dubious circumstances. Our Home Secretary has demanded a full inquiry from the police -- interesting, since he's supposed to authorise any use of it in the first place. Apparently that may have happened on a technicality, because there was some sort of generic authorisation because of the anniversary of September 11. A slippery slope indeed...
And the Transport Secretary's Alastair Darling, isn't it? Seems to be shutting up which, after the foot-in-mouth tendencies of his predecessors, is probably for the best.
That council officer can now obtain a complete record of everyone I've phoned or emailed in the last year, plus the fact that I recently visited www.howtoreportcorruptcouncilofficials.co.uk.
On the one hand, only if he's a suitably senior person as defined by the statutory instrument, and only if he gets suitable authority. I haven't checked all the details yet, but it sounds as though a court order of some sort would still be required.
On the flip side, I have recently had some debate on a public forum with a number of local councillors. Some are quite scary: willing to completely overlook public opinion demonstrated in official consultations, and overlook facts anyone familiar with the relevant facilities could have told them, and instead push through unpopular and abusive changes that suit their own personal agendas. The fact that they happened to acknowledge those agendas apparently makes this OK, in their view.
Guess I'll just have to exercise my right to vote in a different direction next election, won't I?
The interesting thing is that there are two reasons people will vote against the incumbent government: either they prefer the advertised policies of an alternative, or the current government has become so unacceptable that they will vote for anyone as an alternative, and the most convincing "anyone" gets the vote.
Labour may have finally lost it over the past month or so. Hoon and Straw are in trouble over Iraq. Blunkett is in trouble for just about everything. I can't even remember who the current transport secretary is. Brown's legendary financial prudence is pricing first-time buyers out of the market and putting students against a wall. Blair himself is up against it on several sides, and with the departure of Alistair Campbell, he has next to no-one left in a supporting position who really cares.
At the same time, long-silent spokespeople for the other major parties seem to have remembered how to speak -- I think I've heard more Tory soundbites in the past week than I have in the previous six months, and the Lib Dems are lining up right behind them to take the next shots. And did someone mention party conference season coming up?
If I were a Labour government, controversial legislation is the last thing that would be on my mind right now.
(For non-UK readers, the Lib Dems are the third-largest national party here, and seem to get roughly about 20% of the vote in recent times - nowhere near enough to challenge the two main parties in terms of the number of seats they win at parliament).
Also for the non-UK readers, we don't have proportional representation, we have "first past the post". That means winning votes from 20% of the voters doesn't guarantee you 20% of the seats in parliament. In fact, you'd be lucky to get half that, and currently the Lib Dems have just 53 MPs in the House of Commons. Don't even mention the way the Lords are formed...
The big problems we have at present mostly stem from having a government which has a huge majority of parliamentary votes, effectively putting it beyond challenge short of a rebellion within their own party, in spite of attracting supporting votes from only a small fraction of the entire population at the election that put them there. This has led to a lack of accountability, with which we will have to suffer until the next general election.
People are hyping the rollover problems of SUVs because they don't like SUVs not because it is a big problem.
A UK TV driving programme sorted fact from fiction on this one -- and the safety record of SUV-type vehicles generally -- not so long ago.
They filmed a well-known SUV brand being driven at 30mph around a fairly easy driving course. It was "lucky" they kitted it out with safety gear, because the stunt driver rolled it with no trouble at all. Without the safety gear, there's no way in hell anyone in that vehicle would have walked away from the resulting mess.
The presenters proceeded to note that similar behaviour was possible with all the other major brand SUVs they were trying out, too. Then they showed a range of cars on the course, taking it at considerably higher speed with no apparent instability at all.
No, I'm afraid the rollover problem with high CoG vehicles is all too real. Denying that this problem exists if you're driving such a vehicle is just asking for it.
My driving instructor -- a former traffic police officer -- used to have a theory that the roads would be safer if everyone had a Side Impact Crushing System, a spike on the steering wheel instead of the airbag, underpowered steering and always-locking brakes. That way, the driver would have to understand how to avoid an accident in the first place, instead of relying on their tank to protect them when the "inevitable" happens.
Some days, after watching a particularly absurd manoeuvre by a SUV, Volvo or executive car driver, I wonder if I was the only one who thought she was joking.
The top UK universities (eg. Cambridge) use a totally different system altogether...
That's not entirely true. You still get a BA after three years, and in subjects like sciences or engineering, a four-year version gets you a Masters.
NB: Masters degrees in the UK tend to come in two forms: taught and research. A taught Masters -- usually called MSci, MEng, MMath, etc. -- typically means an extra year of higher study on the end of a Bachelors degree, but still doing the same sort of lectures, practical work, etc. A research masters -- an MSc from most places, an MA from some, or possibly an MPhil, usually for arts subjects -- implies real research resulting in a thesis, and usually takes either one or two years. It's not uncommon to continue this research and turn the Masters into a PhD, something you couldn't normally do with a taught Masters.
As for Cambridge being weird, you just have to remember that a MA from Cambridge is basically an honourary degree awarded a few years after graduation, not necessarily implying any further study. Other Masters degrees from Cambridge imply much the same as anywhere else, though, and do reflect genuine accomplishments in higher studies.
At Cambridge University in the UK, it's not uncommon for foreign students to come and visit for a year, at least in the science-side subjects. Those who spend their second year of studies here would typically join our own second-year students, IME, and while the background might be somewhat different, the overal standards seem to be comparable.
However, if anyone told me that four years of study at Cambridge was equal to just two years in the US, I'd laugh. Then I'd suggest that they look up what the Certificate of Advanced Study in Mathematics is. Then I'd challenge them to find me an Ivy League course that got anyone to that standard in four years, never mind two.:-) Your head of PR may be following standard practice, I don't know, but either way he's certainly ill-informed from my experience. Of course, it's quite possible that he was talking about a particular specialist area and not degrees in general, so maybe in his field he's got a a point.
Getting back to geekdom, the Computer Lab at Cambridge is very strong on functional programming. Robin Milner used to be the head of department, IIRC, and several of the other "big names" in the functional world are, or have been, based there. When I studied for a Diploma in CS there, the "Introduction to Functional Programming" course was (IMHO, YMMV) probably the most interesting and well-presented course I took. They still have an active research group working in that area.
Assuming that's a serious post, no, the unary negation operator in C is -. The ~ operator is a "bit flip", whichever complement that is (darn, I can never remember which is which).
We already have most of that in the UK. Students pay thousands in university tuition fees (but without the sort of support after university that the US student-funded system has). A lot of people have private health insurance, dental care, etc. We know there's a pension crisis brewing, but it's still far enough away to do something about it, and while a few unfortunate souls will be caught out, it won't be devastating. You get the picture.
We still get a legally required minimum four weeks off annually, with all but the most stingy employers offering more, plus maternity/paternity leave, paid sick leave, and various other statutory allowances for time off under reasonable circumstances. Even our big business leaders, although they'd obviously prefer not to pay any of this stuff given a choice, mostly accept that it's a fair deal and don't complain much.
In this country, if you're working an 80 hour week and it's not because you're investing in your own business, you're probably being screwed. If you're smart you'll get out, to a different employer or even a completely different field. Anyone who doesn't is ill-informed, in denial or simply not bothered enough by the hours to make the effort to change them.
And the great thing is, as screwed up as certain areas of the employment market are right now, this has been relatively stable for decades, and there are few signs of an impending change. Sorry to our friends in the US, but at 80hrs/wk and poor compensation, you're being screwed, plain and simple.
So around 1/4 of people took a hit, and just over 1/2 got a rise up to 30%. That leaves a lotta people taking a rise of over 30% to get the average figures quoted...
big cash is indicative of a bad work atmosphere, high turnover, or terrible products/tools/requirements.
Or of a successful company with a good work ethic, healthy office environment and smart management. You take on good people, do well as a result, and consequently can afford to pay a good wage and take on more good people as you grow. However, I suspect that the "smart management" thing makes these a minority of the companies advertising high salaries...
Problem #2: You'd be hurting the retailer, not the RIAA. Frankly, I still have sympathy for those guys. I'd be disgusted if they became the victim instead of the RIAA.
Would those be the same retailers who make anything up to 50% the sale cost of a CD from their mark-up?
(Aren't interviews with record company execs fascinating things?:-))
>A second-rate developer may only make 90% of what a first-rate developer does, but produces about half the results and lots more bugs
This sentence is fine.
Five years ago, perhaps. Back then, a second-rate developer might have taken home 90% as much as a first-rate one. Today, half the second-raters are lucky to have jobs at all, and those who do are unlikely to get anywhere near what a good guy with a proven track record will command. It's an employer's market now.
A third-rate developer might make 80% as much, and produce 1/5 the amount of code and vastly more bugs for the others to fix.
This unfortunatly seems to be re-itterating the stupid notion that it is about the no of lines of code you right.
It is about the number of lines of code you write, in part. I suspect your point is that it's not just about that, it's also about what you can do with those lines. Obviously one clear and maintainable line of code might be worth more than two lines of spaghetti that achieve the same end result.
Both volume and quality increase with developer skill, and the latter (though not the former) tends to increase with more powerful programming languages.
He he, I love silly trolling conversations like this at the end of the day. Thanks for the entertainment, guys.:-)
On a brief serious note, however...
Don't you realise that the US force in Iraq was there to liberate the Iraqi people, not conquer them?
Damn, I thought Blair and Bush were going in after the WMDs they could launch in 45mins, which posed a clear and present threat to the national security of the US and the UK. Because otherwise, y'know, the leaders of both states lied to their public, just committed a string of completely illegal acts under international law, and should be tried for war crimes. Except that of course the US doesn't recognise the ICC either.
Great post, although your point about good AI being unrealistic isn't entirely true. Several years ago, a game called Creatures was released that was quite remarkable in its use of AI. There's quite an interesting story behind the game and how it came to be as well, which you might find of interest. More recently, Black and White has been praised for the depth of its artificial world, and of course games like The Sims are only so fiendishly addictive because of this stuff. So sometimes games do have good AI, but as you say, in things like RTS or FPS games other aspects often get priority.
I'm just fed up with the general attitude that the first reaction to a tragic event must be a law suit.
I agree with your entire argument: the concept that someone is always to blame seems to be a very American one, and one the US legal system recognises all too clearly. I'm very glad that here in the UK we don't have the same litigious approach to accidents (though sadly various changes in recent years have moved us much closer to it).
I'm simply observing that the reaction is understandable, and that it's better if anyone can bring a case by default (and then have it thrown out the first time it gets heard) than if people are denied the opportunity to make their case.
This is why we have courts and legal advisers. I rather suspect that when more objective people get hold of this, it won't go much further, and I'll be amazed if, even in the US, this results in any sort of damages against the game company. (Of course, if it turns out that the game company really was pushing a rated game to underage players, the court might take a different view.)
You have to let people take something to court if they feel they have a grievance against another party. Without that right, the whole justice system breaks down. Remember that taking something to court is a means to get a dispute resolved, not a guarantee of a telephone number in compensation.
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In addition to MartinG's point about the "due process" (or lack thereof) under UK anti-terrorism laws, the government in the UK is also trying its best to collect personally idenifiable data on any "troublemakers" whenever it can. Even if you're just arrested and formally cautioned for something -- without ever seeing a courtroom, never mind being found guilty of a crime -- your fingerprints, DNA, etc. will be taken. If you choose to accept the caution, it will disappear from your record after a few years, but would anybody like to bet on where the fingerprint and DNA data goes and for how long?
Using inappropriate legislation to gain this sort of personal information, which historically has been liable to abuse at a later date, is simply wrong. There is no pontification here, it's just the cold, hard truth.
The yes, the US government does and will abuse personal freedoms and due process in a similar way if it can. Remember how many people are still being held in the camp at Gitmo, and that's from the last war. How long exactly is processing them and charging them with some crime supposed to take?
A more interesting question might be how many offers have gone to someone who's consistently done well two or three times but never won. By my count, there is at least one such person, looking at the most recent contests.
This year's contest was an interesting problem, and no doubt the winning entry was well done, but there's also an element of brute force involved; look at the hardware Andrew had available. You could make a reasonable argument that this year's winner wasn't decided purely on programming skill, and an even more reasonable argument that doing well in one such contest doesn't say nearly as much as doing well in multiple consecutive ones with different problems to solve.
Or, without the overblown dramatics, you could just vote for another candidate...
Ironically, much the same story has been relevant to the UK this week. At a high-profile arms fair (ahem... sorry... trade conference) where there were extensive (non-violent) protests, police used our recently-enacted anti-terrorism legislation under dubious circumstances. Our Home Secretary has demanded a full inquiry from the police -- interesting, since he's supposed to authorise any use of it in the first place. Apparently that may have happened on a technicality, because there was some sort of generic authorisation because of the anniversary of September 11. A slippery slope indeed...
My point exactly. :-)
On the one hand, only if he's a suitably senior person as defined by the statutory instrument, and only if he gets suitable authority. I haven't checked all the details yet, but it sounds as though a court order of some sort would still be required.
On the flip side, I have recently had some debate on a public forum with a number of local councillors. Some are quite scary: willing to completely overlook public opinion demonstrated in official consultations, and overlook facts anyone familiar with the relevant facilities could have told them, and instead push through unpopular and abusive changes that suit their own personal agendas. The fact that they happened to acknowledge those agendas apparently makes this OK, in their view.
Guess I'll just have to exercise my right to vote in a different direction next election, won't I?
The interesting thing is that there are two reasons people will vote against the incumbent government: either they prefer the advertised policies of an alternative, or the current government has become so unacceptable that they will vote for anyone as an alternative, and the most convincing "anyone" gets the vote.
Labour may have finally lost it over the past month or so. Hoon and Straw are in trouble over Iraq. Blunkett is in trouble for just about everything. I can't even remember who the current transport secretary is. Brown's legendary financial prudence is pricing first-time buyers out of the market and putting students against a wall. Blair himself is up against it on several sides, and with the departure of Alistair Campbell, he has next to no-one left in a supporting position who really cares.
At the same time, long-silent spokespeople for the other major parties seem to have remembered how to speak -- I think I've heard more Tory soundbites in the past week than I have in the previous six months, and the Lib Dems are lining up right behind them to take the next shots. And did someone mention party conference season coming up?
If I were a Labour government, controversial legislation is the last thing that would be on my mind right now.
Also for the non-UK readers, we don't have proportional representation, we have "first past the post". That means winning votes from 20% of the voters doesn't guarantee you 20% of the seats in parliament. In fact, you'd be lucky to get half that, and currently the Lib Dems have just 53 MPs in the House of Commons. Don't even mention the way the Lords are formed...
The big problems we have at present mostly stem from having a government which has a huge majority of parliamentary votes, effectively putting it beyond challenge short of a rebellion within their own party, in spite of attracting supporting votes from only a small fraction of the entire population at the election that put them there. This has led to a lack of accountability, with which we will have to suffer until the next general election.
A UK TV driving programme sorted fact from fiction on this one -- and the safety record of SUV-type vehicles generally -- not so long ago.
They filmed a well-known SUV brand being driven at 30mph around a fairly easy driving course. It was "lucky" they kitted it out with safety gear, because the stunt driver rolled it with no trouble at all. Without the safety gear, there's no way in hell anyone in that vehicle would have walked away from the resulting mess.
The presenters proceeded to note that similar behaviour was possible with all the other major brand SUVs they were trying out, too. Then they showed a range of cars on the course, taking it at considerably higher speed with no apparent instability at all.
No, I'm afraid the rollover problem with high CoG vehicles is all too real. Denying that this problem exists if you're driving such a vehicle is just asking for it.
My driving instructor -- a former traffic police officer -- used to have a theory that the roads would be safer if everyone had a Side Impact Crushing System, a spike on the steering wheel instead of the airbag, underpowered steering and always-locking brakes. That way, the driver would have to understand how to avoid an accident in the first place, instead of relying on their tank to protect them when the "inevitable" happens.
Some days, after watching a particularly absurd manoeuvre by a SUV, Volvo or executive car driver, I wonder if I was the only one who thought she was joking.
That's not entirely true. You still get a BA after three years, and in subjects like sciences or engineering, a four-year version gets you a Masters.
NB: Masters degrees in the UK tend to come in two forms: taught and research. A taught Masters -- usually called MSci, MEng, MMath, etc. -- typically means an extra year of higher study on the end of a Bachelors degree, but still doing the same sort of lectures, practical work, etc. A research masters -- an MSc from most places, an MA from some, or possibly an MPhil, usually for arts subjects -- implies real research resulting in a thesis, and usually takes either one or two years. It's not uncommon to continue this research and turn the Masters into a PhD, something you couldn't normally do with a taught Masters.
As for Cambridge being weird, you just have to remember that a MA from Cambridge is basically an honourary degree awarded a few years after graduation, not necessarily implying any further study. Other Masters degrees from Cambridge imply much the same as anywhere else, though, and do reflect genuine accomplishments in higher studies.
At Cambridge University in the UK, it's not uncommon for foreign students to come and visit for a year, at least in the science-side subjects. Those who spend their second year of studies here would typically join our own second-year students, IME, and while the background might be somewhat different, the overal standards seem to be comparable.
However, if anyone told me that four years of study at Cambridge was equal to just two years in the US, I'd laugh. Then I'd suggest that they look up what the Certificate of Advanced Study in Mathematics is. Then I'd challenge them to find me an Ivy League course that got anyone to that standard in four years, never mind two. :-) Your head of PR may be following standard practice, I don't know, but either way he's certainly ill-informed from my experience. Of course, it's quite possible that he was talking about a particular specialist area and not degrees in general, so maybe in his field he's got a a point.
Getting back to geekdom, the Computer Lab at Cambridge is very strong on functional programming. Robin Milner used to be the head of department, IIRC, and several of the other "big names" in the functional world are, or have been, based there. When I studied for a Diploma in CS there, the "Introduction to Functional Programming" course was (IMHO, YMMV) probably the most interesting and well-presented course I took. They still have an active research group working in that area.
Assuming that's a serious post, no, the unary negation operator in C is -. The ~ operator is a "bit flip", whichever complement that is (darn, I can never remember which is which).
That's nothing. The engineering students parked a car on top of ours -- and that was about eight floors up. :-)
We already have most of that in the UK. Students pay thousands in university tuition fees (but without the sort of support after university that the US student-funded system has). A lot of people have private health insurance, dental care, etc. We know there's a pension crisis brewing, but it's still far enough away to do something about it, and while a few unfortunate souls will be caught out, it won't be devastating. You get the picture.
We still get a legally required minimum four weeks off annually, with all but the most stingy employers offering more, plus maternity/paternity leave, paid sick leave, and various other statutory allowances for time off under reasonable circumstances. Even our big business leaders, although they'd obviously prefer not to pay any of this stuff given a choice, mostly accept that it's a fair deal and don't complain much.
In this country, if you're working an 80 hour week and it's not because you're investing in your own business, you're probably being screwed. If you're smart you'll get out, to a different employer or even a completely different field. Anyone who doesn't is ill-informed, in denial or simply not bothered enough by the hours to make the effort to change them.
And the great thing is, as screwed up as certain areas of the employment market are right now, this has been relatively stable for decades, and there are few signs of an impending change. Sorry to our friends in the US, but at 80hrs/wk and poor compensation, you're being screwed, plain and simple.
So around 1/4 of people took a hit, and just over 1/2 got a rise up to 30%. That leaves a lotta people taking a rise of over 30% to get the average figures quoted...
Or of a successful company with a good work ethic, healthy office environment and smart management. You take on good people, do well as a result, and consequently can afford to pay a good wage and take on more good people as you grow. However, I suspect that the "smart management" thing makes these a minority of the companies advertising high salaries...
Would those be the same retailers who make anything up to 50% the sale cost of a CD from their mark-up?
(Aren't interviews with record company execs fascinating things? :-))
But you watched them on video or DVD, though, right?
Five years ago, perhaps. Back then, a second-rate developer might have taken home 90% as much as a first-rate one. Today, half the second-raters are lucky to have jobs at all, and those who do are unlikely to get anywhere near what a good guy with a proven track record will command. It's an employer's market now.
It is about the number of lines of code you write, in part. I suspect your point is that it's not just about that, it's also about what you can do with those lines. Obviously one clear and maintainable line of code might be worth more than two lines of spaghetti that achieve the same end result.
Both volume and quality increase with developer skill, and the latter (though not the former) tends to increase with more powerful programming languages.
He he, I love silly trolling conversations like this at the end of the day. Thanks for the entertainment, guys. :-)
On a brief serious note, however...
Damn, I thought Blair and Bush were going in after the WMDs they could launch in 45mins, which posed a clear and present threat to the national security of the US and the UK. Because otherwise, y'know, the leaders of both states lied to their public, just committed a string of completely illegal acts under international law, and should be tried for war crimes. Except that of course the US doesn't recognise the ICC either.
Great post, although your point about good AI being unrealistic isn't entirely true. Several years ago, a game called Creatures was released that was quite remarkable in its use of AI. There's quite an interesting story behind the game and how it came to be as well, which you might find of interest. More recently, Black and White has been praised for the depth of its artificial world, and of course games like The Sims are only so fiendishly addictive because of this stuff. So sometimes games do have good AI, but as you say, in things like RTS or FPS games other aspects often get priority.
I agree with your entire argument: the concept that someone is always to blame seems to be a very American one, and one the US legal system recognises all too clearly. I'm very glad that here in the UK we don't have the same litigious approach to accidents (though sadly various changes in recent years have moved us much closer to it).
I'm simply observing that the reaction is understandable, and that it's better if anyone can bring a case by default (and then have it thrown out the first time it gets heard) than if people are denied the opportunity to make their case.
But the scientist concerned wore a real lab coat, so it must work...
This is why we have courts and legal advisers. I rather suspect that when more objective people get hold of this, it won't go much further, and I'll be amazed if, even in the US, this results in any sort of damages against the game company. (Of course, if it turns out that the game company really was pushing a rated game to underage players, the court might take a different view.)
You have to let people take something to court if they feel they have a grievance against another party. Without that right, the whole justice system breaks down. Remember that taking something to court is a means to get a dispute resolved, not a guarantee of a telephone number in compensation.