In 2006, if the analog signals are turned off, there's going to be a millions of people who can't afford the tuners and probably would find a pay for view model difficult. There will still be millions of functional TV sets that won't be getting any signal. It's not politically possible to shut these sets off - aside from the anger and protest from those who are used to getting their entertainment for at most, the price of a TV and possibly a few bucks a month for cable service, there's going to be another problem - if these people aren't kept quiet in their homes in front of glowing boxes, hypnotized by fantasy worlds, and entertained into willing submission, what are they going to be doing instead?
They're not shutting analog down in 2006. Consumers don't really want digital, and the people who most "need" to be pacified and brainwashed by our media system are the ones who can't afford it.
I'd find it very amusing if one of the side effects of this would be a less docile, more awake populace.
The real problem with April Fools stories
on
April Fools Wrap Up
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· Score: 5, Insightful
The world's gotten so flakey these days, it's getting increasingly hard to tell the difference. Or to say much of anything except "so it goes". Let's face it, the digital protection legislation would have been an April Fools joke 3 years ago. You guys are getting too much competition from the real world.
They need to apply this to windows ...
on
Stopping Light
·
· Score: 2
... on New Year's Day. Millions of hungover people will thank them for stopping that godawful light...
... if it only costs 100 bucks to eliminate 99.5% of the problem, my suggestion would be that the people who are constantly fighting the spam problem just do that, instead of the years-long futile battle they've been fighting. That and blackholing of the worst domains should take care of it.
It's clear that the benefits of the current system outweigh the problems (spam). Thanks for proving my idea wrong in a rational manner.
... they're just paying for a service they use heavily. After all, commercial news servers charge for extra gigs downloaded - is that punishment?
You say that a one-cent tax wouldn't stop spam or slow it - perhaps not, but it would pay for it, wouldn't it? Under the current system, nothing's stopping or slowing it and nothing's likely to. At least it would be paid for.
Something like this is the only realistic solution that I can see. Otherwise, the spammers will continue to freeload off the system and all the anti-spam activism in the world won't stop it as if it could have been stopped by these methods, it would have been. We can either redesign the system or resign ourselves to drowning in spam the senders aren't paying for. As for myself, I guess I can live with the status quo; if you can too, than fine. But for those who really want it to change, something like my idea is the only chance.
Just remember - you're already being punished with extra bandwidth used and extra ISP cost for managing spam.
You get billed once and when your host sends out the daily digest, he gets billed once. That would be no more than 31 emails a month, so with the first 1,000 free, he wouldn't be paying anyway.
Well, actually with a mailing list of 100 people, say, he would be sending 3100 emails a month and would pay. Still, there are other ways things like this could be done.
I think a rate where 1,000 emails a month would be free and then 1c an email would be good. One could quibble about the price, I guess, but the principle is a sound one.
I get my phone and internet bill through email -- so I can pay online from work instead of trying to weasel time in at home.
It'd still be less than what they'd pay the US mail.
I am on several mailing lists that go out to hundreds of people -- if I send an email that goes to hundreds, is that one cent, or hundreds of cents?
If you're sending it to a central server, it's one cent.
Who gets billed? Me, my ISP, the host of the list?
You get billed once and when your host sends out the daily digest, he gets billed once. That would be no more than 31 emails a month, so with the first 1,000 free, he wouldn't be paying anyway.
There -ARE- legimate email-marketing businesses. Who do opt-in, double-subscribe, instant unsubscribe lists.
It would be part of the cost of doing business. It's cheaper than snail mail or phone calls.
Why should we penalize EVERYONE for the actions of some assholes who can't remember how to get permission first?
It's not a penalization of everyone - most people don't send 1,000 emails a month. And it's not penalizing those who do - it's asking them to pay for a service they're using heavily. It would have the added benefit of making spam expensive and unprofitable.
Who cares about linking to Usenet posts? Just being able to link to web sites would be an advantage.
As someone said to me, "There is NOTHING about the web that guarantees a page "is there"."
The point is that it's a convenience, which is just as convenient in a Usenet post.
Some newsreaders actually change plain text urls to clickable links. Without inconveniencing the majority of Usenet readers by presenting a bunch of bracketed crap.
You know, you old school HTML people need to get with the program... Why post HTML when you can post DIVX files of you talking and people can see you talk and stuff... 90% of communication is nonverbal. You're making us miss so much!!
The point is that he recognizes the advantages of HTML on the web and on Slashdot, yet is unwilling to consider those advantages for Usenet.
What's the major advantage to HTML on the web? You can link to other pages on the web, knowing they're there.
Now how would one use HTML to link to other posts on Usenet and be sure they're there? Could you write a post linking to several later posts you were planning?
No. The only thing you can really do with HTML on Usenet, seeing as binaries such as images are prohibited on text groups, is to present text. (Unless you're running malicious scripts.) And guess what? You don't need HTML to do that - you don't even need it to post web links, as one can just copy and paste them into a browser.
I turned the argument around -- if ASCII is so great for Usenet, then why not all ASCII for the web?
Because, dumbass, it couldn't be a web, then, could it? Maybe, before telling us how Usenet should work, you ought to learn how the web works first.
So should the web return to the days of pure ASCII?
And when was that? You do know that HTML is an intregal part of the WWW, don't you?
How can you possible be in favor of HTML on the web, yet not in favor of HTML in Usenet?
Because the newsreader I use doesn't know what to do with it and the way a lot of the people who use HTML on Usenet do it, it doubles the length of the post.
Put it this way: If Usenet were invented today and they included HTML, could you honestly say it would occur to you to say, "you know what would make this better? ASCII only!"
For a medium that outside of the binaries newsgroups was designed to post text messages? Why wouldn't ASCII only be better for plain text? I actually think a lot of web pages have gone overboard and have worsened the bandwidth/content ratio considerably. There's nothing wrong with lean and mean.
If you're using a Windows newsreader, it typically uses the IE COM component to display the HTML.
While allowing other possibly malicious components to wreak havoc with your system - a problem that never happens with plain text messages, does it?
Go ahead. Post HTML on Usenet. But you should know if I read it, it's going to look like a hard to read text message with a lot of bracketed garbage and I'll be more likely to skip over your posts in the future.
Sensible enough, but when I worked in BC, we had a heck of a time finding people.
Kalamazoo and Grand Rapids are much more desirable places to live. The school systems in Battle Creek are mediocre at best, and the people, for the most part are depressing drones, and the employers, for the most part, treat them as such. There's little culture to speak of - I don't call the BC Symphony Orchestra great culture, not to mention all those nice little fetuses in jars in the Kingman Museum... There's something wrong with a town where the hottest spot on Friday night is Green's Tavern... (country & western bar).
I understand that Kellogg's has nothing to do with the stupidity of the city,
HAH!! I grew up in the town! You have NO idea how wrong you are about that. They ran the town so effectively that they blackmailed a surrounding township to merge with the city and then had the city tear down several blocks of downtown for a research center and a high class hotel that wouldn't make visiting VIPs feel like they were in No-Tell Motel Hell. Millions in taxpayer money went to this while the surrounding neighborhoods turned into run down rat infested crack houses. Eventually, Kellogg's laid off so many people that they've lost some of their influence.
but they're the biggest taxpayer/employer in Battle Creek, and that's close enough for me.
Actually, Nippondenso and Battle Creek Health Systems are bigger nowadays. Also, you should know that Post and Ralston Purina have factories there.
As far as a boycott goes, I've been doing that ever since the day I saw how corn flakes were actually made... And you've no idea what it's like when the sickly sweet smell of Sugar Frosted Flakes or Sugar Pops floats over the city like the sugar hangover from hell. Sour, sweet and totally nauseating.
The Battle Creek Police would be ill equipped to investigate a case like this. They have more trouble than they can handle in that town as it is.
Don't be too tough on BC - hell, they JUST got cable modem service two months ago and the geek population is just about zero as the few who grew up there either moved out or got buried under a football field somewhere by the team...
Do you know how pathetic the place is? They have an army base named after Gen. Custer. Need I say more?
The reach of the petition is widespread, affecting industries as relatively small as the fixed wireless industry to everyday industries whose existence is almost ubiquitous in American households -- digital TVs and microwave ovens.
"We're from the FCC and we have an order forcing you to leave your microwave on thaw."
Can they require allowing other ISPs access to lines as part of a contract allowing a cable company franchise rights, or would FCC rules supercede that clause?
No one likes us I don't know why. We may not be perfect But heaven knows we try. But all around even our old friends put us down. Let's drop the big one and see what happens.
We give them money But are they grateful? No they're spiteful And they're hateful. They don't respect us so let's surprise them; We'll drop the big one and pulverize them.
Now Asia's crowded And Europe's too old. Africa's far too hot, And Canada's too cold. And South America stole our name. Let's drop the big one; there'll be no one left to blame us.
Bridge: We'll save Australia; Don't wanna hurt no kangaroo. We'll build an all-American amusement park there; They've got surfing, too.
Well, boom goes London, And boom Paris. More room for you And more room for me. And every city the whole world round Will just be another American town. Oh, how peaceful it'll be; We'll set everybody free; You'll have Japanese kimonos, baby, There'll be Italian shoes for me. They all hate us anyhow, So let's drop the big one now. Let's drop the big one now.
This says more about this disgusting subject than I ever could.
For fuck's sake wake up and smell the truth. The world is not , has never been, nor probably ever will be a nice place. Peace is purchased with superior firepower.
I'm sure that an radioactive, lifeless Earth would be very peaceful.
Until the Record Industry has made it illegal to sing and play your own original songs, and banned the manufacture, sale, and distribution of musical instruments, they don't have a monopoly over music.
A computer that can record multitrack audio and synthesize without propriatery hardware protection that makes it impossible to copy the music without a licensed watermark in the file allowing copying IS a musical instrument, and yes, that, and the network a computer musician would use to distribute his work without copy protection is exactly what they're trying to outlaw. If I wanted to webcast my own music I would still have to pay the fee. That's wrong.
Slashdot Mirror
... with these!
-- anyone I disagree with who won't shut up.
In 2006, if the analog signals are turned off, there's going to be a millions of people who can't afford the tuners and probably would find a pay for view model difficult. There will still be millions of functional TV sets that won't be getting any signal. It's not politically possible to shut these sets off - aside from the anger and protest from those who are used to getting their entertainment for at most, the price of a TV and possibly a few bucks a month for cable service, there's going to be another problem - if these people aren't kept quiet in their homes in front of glowing boxes, hypnotized by fantasy worlds, and entertained into willing submission, what are they going to be doing instead?
They're not shutting analog down in 2006. Consumers don't really want digital, and the people who most "need" to be pacified and brainwashed by our media system are the ones who can't afford it.
I'd find it very amusing if one of the side effects of this would be a less docile, more awake populace.
The world's gotten so flakey these days, it's getting increasingly hard to tell the difference. Or to say much of anything except "so it goes". Let's face it, the digital protection legislation would have been an April Fools joke 3 years ago. You guys are getting too much competition from the real world.
... on New Year's Day. Millions of hungover people will thank them for stopping that godawful light ...
... if it only costs 100 bucks to eliminate 99.5% of the problem, my suggestion would be that the people who are constantly fighting the spam problem just do that, instead of the years-long futile battle they've been fighting. That and blackholing of the worst domains should take care of it.
It's clear that the benefits of the current system outweigh the problems (spam). Thanks for proving my idea wrong in a rational manner.
... they're just paying for a service they use heavily. After all, commercial news servers charge for extra gigs downloaded - is that punishment?
You say that a one-cent tax wouldn't stop spam or slow it - perhaps not, but it would pay for it, wouldn't it? Under the current system, nothing's stopping or slowing it and nothing's likely to. At least it would be paid for.
Something like this is the only realistic solution that I can see. Otherwise, the spammers will continue to freeload off the system and all the anti-spam activism in the world won't stop it as if it could have been stopped by these methods, it would have been. We can either redesign the system or resign ourselves to drowning in spam the senders aren't paying for. As for myself, I guess I can live with the status quo; if you can too, than fine. But for those who really want it to change, something like my idea is the only chance.
Just remember - you're already being punished with extra bandwidth used and extra ISP cost for managing spam.
You get billed once and when your host sends out the daily digest, he gets billed once. That would be no more than 31 emails a month, so with the first 1,000 free, he wouldn't be paying anyway.
Well, actually with a mailing list of 100 people, say, he would be sending 3100 emails a month and would pay. Still, there are other ways things like this could be done.
I think a rate where 1,000 emails a month would be free and then 1c an email would be good. One could quibble about the price, I guess, but the principle is a sound one.
I get my phone and internet bill through email -- so I can pay online from work instead of trying to weasel time in at home.
It'd still be less than what they'd pay the US mail.
I am on several mailing lists that go out to hundreds of people -- if I send an email that goes to hundreds, is that one cent, or hundreds of cents?
If you're sending it to a central server, it's one cent.
Who gets billed? Me, my ISP, the host of the list?
You get billed once and when your host sends out the daily digest, he gets billed once. That would be no more than 31 emails a month, so with the first 1,000 free, he wouldn't be paying anyway.
There -ARE- legimate email-marketing businesses. Who do opt-in, double-subscribe, instant unsubscribe lists.
It would be part of the cost of doing business. It's cheaper than snail mail or phone calls.
Why should we penalize EVERYONE for the actions of some assholes who can't remember how to get permission first?
It's not a penalization of everyone - most people don't send 1,000 emails a month. And it's not penalizing those who do - it's asking them to pay for a service they're using heavily. It would have the added benefit of making spam expensive and unprofitable.
Who cares about linking to Usenet posts? Just being able to link to web sites would be an advantage.
... Why post HTML when you can post DIVX files of you talking and people can see you talk and stuff ... 90% of communication is nonverbal. You're making us miss so much!!
As someone said to me, "There is NOTHING about the web that guarantees a page "is there"."
The point is that it's a convenience, which is just as convenient in a Usenet post.
Some newsreaders actually change plain text urls to clickable links. Without inconveniencing the majority of Usenet readers by presenting a bunch of bracketed crap.
You know, you old school HTML people need to get with the program
The point is that he recognizes the advantages of HTML on the web and on Slashdot, yet is unwilling to consider those advantages for Usenet.
What's the major advantage to HTML on the web? You can link to other pages on the web, knowing they're there.
Now how would one use HTML to link to other posts on Usenet and be sure they're there? Could you write a post linking to several later posts you were planning?
No. The only thing you can really do with HTML on Usenet, seeing as binaries such as images are prohibited on text groups, is to present text. (Unless you're running malicious scripts.) And guess what? You don't need HTML to do that - you don't even need it to post web links, as one can just copy and paste them into a browser.
I turned the argument around -- if ASCII is so great for Usenet, then why not all ASCII for the web?
Because, dumbass, it couldn't be a web, then, could it? Maybe, before telling us how Usenet should work, you ought to learn how the web works first.
So should the web return to the days of pure ASCII?
And when was that? You do know that HTML is an intregal part of the WWW, don't you?
How can you possible be in favor of HTML on the web, yet not in favor of HTML in Usenet?
Because the newsreader I use doesn't know what to do with it and the way a lot of the people who use HTML on Usenet do it, it doubles the length of the post.
Put it this way: If Usenet were invented today and they included HTML, could you honestly say it would occur to you to say, "you know what would make this better? ASCII only!"
For a medium that outside of the binaries newsgroups was designed to post text messages? Why wouldn't ASCII only be better for plain text? I actually think a lot of web pages have gone overboard and have worsened the bandwidth/content ratio considerably. There's nothing wrong with lean and mean.
If you're using a Windows newsreader, it typically uses the IE COM component to display the HTML.
While allowing other possibly malicious components to wreak havoc with your system - a problem that never happens with plain text messages, does it?
Go ahead. Post HTML on Usenet. But you should know if I read it, it's going to look like a hard to read text message with a lot of bracketed garbage and I'll be more likely to skip over your posts in the future.
... for driving by Colors on the Corner on Friday night at 2:30
Sensible enough, but when I worked in BC, we had a heck of a time finding people.
... There's something wrong with a town where the hottest spot on Friday night is Green's Tavern ... (country & western bar).
Kalamazoo and Grand Rapids are much more desirable places to live. The school systems in Battle Creek are mediocre at best, and the people, for the most part are depressing drones, and the employers, for the most part, treat them as such. There's little culture to speak of - I don't call the BC Symphony Orchestra great culture, not to mention all those nice little fetuses in jars in the Kingman Museum
Manager Renews Search for New Police Chief Are the two events possibly related?
...
No, Battle Creek's been looking for a new police chief for quite some time - it's a thankless job
I understand that Kellogg's has nothing to do with the stupidity of the city,
... And you've no idea what it's like when the sickly sweet smell of Sugar Frosted Flakes or Sugar Pops floats over the city like the sugar hangover from hell. Sour, sweet and totally nauseating.
...
...
HAH!! I grew up in the town! You have NO idea how wrong you are about that. They ran the town so effectively that they blackmailed a surrounding township to merge with the city and then had the city tear down several blocks of downtown for a research center and a high class hotel that wouldn't make visiting VIPs feel like they were in No-Tell Motel Hell. Millions in taxpayer money went to this while the surrounding neighborhoods turned into run down rat infested crack houses. Eventually, Kellogg's laid off so many people that they've lost some of their influence.
but they're the biggest taxpayer/employer in Battle Creek, and that's close enough for me.
Actually, Nippondenso and Battle Creek Health Systems are bigger nowadays. Also, you should know that Post and Ralston Purina have factories there.
As far as a boycott goes, I've been doing that ever since the day I saw how corn flakes were actually made
The Battle Creek Police would be ill equipped to investigate a case like this. They have more trouble than they can handle in that town as it is.
Don't be too tough on BC - hell, they JUST got cable modem service two months ago and the geek population is just about zero as the few who grew up there either moved out or got buried under a football field somewhere by the team
Do you know how pathetic the place is? They have an army base named after Gen. Custer. Need I say more?
I love living in Kalamazoo
How about the Mickey Mouse Digital Equipment Act? ... oh, wait ...
... but good luck collecting a judgement if you can't locate assets or the people who own them.
LOL!! Good one!
The reach of the petition is widespread, affecting industries as relatively small as the fixed wireless industry to everyday industries whose existence is almost ubiquitous in American households -- digital TVs and microwave ovens.
"We're from the FCC and we have an order forcing you to leave your microwave on thaw."
daemons? what are those. I don't think they exist on windows. (;-) On windows, they are "services". They give you exciting service.
They service you. Repeatedly and often, painfully.
Can they require allowing other ISPs access to lines as part of a contract allowing a cable company franchise rights, or would FCC rules supercede that clause?
No one likes us
I don't know why.
We may not be perfect
But heaven knows we try.
But all around even our old friends put us down.
Let's drop the big one and see what happens.
We give them money
But are they grateful?
No they're spiteful
And they're hateful.
They don't respect us so let's surprise them;
We'll drop the big one and pulverize them.
Now Asia's crowded
And Europe's too old.
Africa's far too hot,
And Canada's too cold.
And South America stole our name.
Let's drop the big one; there'll be no one left to blame us.
Bridge:
We'll save Australia;
Don't wanna hurt no kangaroo.
We'll build an all-American amusement park there;
They've got surfing, too.
Well, boom goes London,
And boom Paris.
More room for you
And more room for me.
And every city the whole world round
Will just be another American town.
Oh, how peaceful it'll be;
We'll set everybody free;
You'll have Japanese kimonos, baby,
There'll be Italian shoes for me.
They all hate us anyhow,
So let's drop the big one now.
Let's drop the big one now.
This says more about this disgusting subject than I ever could.
For fuck's sake wake up and smell the truth. The world is not , has never been, nor probably ever will be a nice place. Peace is purchased with superior firepower.
I'm sure that an radioactive, lifeless Earth would be very peaceful.
Until the Record Industry has made it illegal to sing and play your own original songs, and banned the manufacture, sale, and distribution of musical instruments, they don't have a monopoly over music.
A computer that can record multitrack audio and synthesize without propriatery hardware protection that makes it impossible to copy the music without a licensed watermark in the file allowing copying IS a musical instrument, and yes, that, and the network a computer musician would use to distribute his work without copy protection is exactly what they're trying to outlaw. If I wanted to webcast my own music I would still have to pay the fee. That's wrong.