In this discussion about the shuttle, what has not been mentioned (OK, I haven't read everything here) is the improvements to the Shuttle Design. Since the shuttle was launched, there have been numerous improvements. I look at the X-33 and it's use of an inverted Delta-V exhaust. The pressure from the atmosphere shapes the outgoing exhaust into the right shape -- straight down for low earth and spread out for space. You can get rid of that very complicated piece of equipment that shapes the exhaust at the edge of failure and replace it with a solid piece of ceramic.
The idea of a space plane never took advantage of the main advantage of a Plane -- that is, using aerodynamics and a lifting body to get you up in the air where there is atmosphere. Some shuttle designs have been tethered to 747s. Or you could use a "lifting platform" and launch from a heli-blimp (invented to move large trees by loggers in Canada). But if you can fly the Shuttle up to about 8,000 feet -- you lose the need for about 1/3 to a 1/2 of the fuel. Thus making the payload bigger, or the weight smaller (which would reduce the fuel needs). Single-use rockets are cheaper, because you don't have to carry stuff that has to be re-used. If the re-usable parts (like wings) can help lift it -- it's a win-win.
Or we could just mount an expedition into India and find those ancient records of magnetic propulsion that was lost about the time Atlantis fell into the sea. Anti-gravity would beat out both shuttles and rockets.;-)
It seems our current government, and many of our people, have forgotten that this whole experiment in Democracy called the USA was designed to give Live, Liberty and Happiness to the people. There isn't anything in their about the RIGHTs of corporations, or even of such a thing called a "multinational." You make a product and you sell it -- once you sell it, you no longer have any control over that thing you sold -- none.
The loophole has been to "lease" the seat -- not sell the ticket. So, the ticket is reserving the right to lease the seat at a given time, and is an agreement between the company and the first lean holder.
OK, then why don't you fucking pay for all the State funds that built that park, and pony up the real market value for the real estate? What, are you going to move the team somewhere a state can give you a better deal? Is every team going to play for Delaware? Why don't the Cities own the team names in the first place? Oh, I get it -- it's like all the oil and mineral rights that states give up because the companies cut a "donation" to a given candidate. It's a lot cheaper for companies to buy politicians than pay for what they take from the people.
Sounds like a Corporate version of what governments have been doing for years; A mutual defense treaty.
You sign up with NATO, and rubber-stamp what we want at the UN, and we will defend you if Costa Rica decides to invade. I'd look for some 'feedback' agreement wherein IBM gets some security from the group buying in as well. Anyone trying to sue a member, has to look at EVERY patent in the arsenal, to see if it remotely resembles what they are trying to sue for -- that alone would make suing the IBM patent alliance very daunting.
I think this is a good thing -- only in that it will make it almost impossible to conduct patent trolling -- at least if you are a company with enough funds to "buy in." It also illuminates that patents have been more of a protection and extortion racket for the big boys, and doesn't reward innovation. IBM seems to be fighting the good fight in general.
The down-side I see, is that this furthers the trend of protection for the Haves. Small companies and individuals are going to be even more the low-hanging-fruit. We have FREE trade in the US, if you are a large corporation -- but not for small companies and individuals. No freedom of movement for people, but freedom of business and trucks passing from Mexico to Canada. You have freedom of speech, if you can afford to buy it on the TV and media and it doesn't offend the owners of those outlets -- but forget trying to say anything you want in the park.
I only bring that up, because this is just another step where Corporations are acting like governments. I'm sure the fascade of who is running this joint is going to quickly rear its head.
The real question is; What percentage of the people who paid nothing, would have bought this album if they had no free option? If the answer is MOST -- then you've lost nothing. RadioHead will probably get more people to their concerts - it appears most bands make nothing on their music sales anyway.
I understand the Libertarian -- anti-regulation bent here. Perhaps there is an assumption, since most people here are reasonably well educated, that we can actually just let people "make up their minds." I'm sure that, if it's only a small minority of folks who have chosen to shut out the real world and only watch what Pat Robertson wants them to watch -- it's all personal choice.
But we are fast approaching a test-taking, brain dead society. Sure there are smart enough people to hire and do work -- but how can you function as a Democracy when someone is influenced by some titillating news story about a candidate wearing a Push-up bra?
It's great that people can choose what magazine they read, what group the affiliate with, and what program they want to watch. Perhaps they want to listen to the music on iTunes, that their favorite hero wants to listen to. You eventually get into a situation where it is more work to choose -- and easier just to passively subscribe.
This may not be THE issue, or THE problem -- but when do we draw the line? The whole point of public school, was that parents didn't have the right to Opt their children out of the shared experience of education. There is a curriculum on history, economics, math and reading, so that we can all have a way of communicating, and a vocabulary of what the issues are. I don't think MOST people know what the real issues are, or can do much beyond Grunt that something is Socialist or Fascist.
I'm sure that Mob bosses will ignore this law. Only the powerful will be allowed to commit crimes, and then have well-healed publicists who explain how things "accidentally' went wrong.
With RFID, it should be easier to scan who the protestors are -- but not who throws the rocks.
RFID won't be perfect, it will fail whenever it is plausible and might disagree with the propaganda.
Tracking the numerous laptops left with huge databases of personal information out of various government agencies,... one is left to wonder why anyone is surprised by all this data theft. Didn't someone send out a memo?
Could it be, that the Total Information Awareness project (TIMA), run by federal criminal John Poindexter, just went privatized? Could it be that he and other people are doing an end-run around spying on citizens, and creating a massive database for this purpose and subsidizing the costs with taxpayer money and sales of information to private companies?
Is there anything in the current law to stop them -- other than catching them red handed with grabbing the laptops out of someone's car?
To the people who think this is up to debate, I'd say that from now on we need to determine if Bank Robbers are committing crimes or just Liberating money.
You can't determine at the NSA that domestic spying is illegal? This is your job to know. Maybe people need it tattooed on their foreheads.
If people can't determine what is domestic spying, and what is torture, and what is a conflict of interest, and what is an unjust war -- then I might as well find a cave somewhere, because the decision making abilities of people in charge of nuclear rockets is going to be sorely taxed.
"What is launching a missile?" Is it me pushing this big red button here, while my buddy turns the key saying; "authorized use only, at peril of summary execution" or is it the actual rocket taking off? I'm not sure. "Launch" is so vague./end rant.
Sorry to get so "vitriolic" but I'm really sick of this. Getting pissed about the daily abuses of this fascist government, does not mean someone is "piling on" for no good reason. More evidence of abuses of power do not mean "more conspiracy theories" they mean more f'ing evidence. This is not a debate, this is not a theoretical discussion. How can people be so brain-dead as to justify this crap.
Plane and simple, if you can't figure out some things in life, then you shouldn't be around sharp objects. Stop apologizing and finding a reason why Bush can break the constitution, and fail at securing borders, ports and sanity, while he gets to play with all these cool new powers. If they wanted to secure our country -- they'd kick this guy out. Because some enemy doesn't need to invade -- just keep supporting bush if they want to see our Democracy fail.
The Domestic spying was to get dirt on his political opponents, and it started BEFORE 9/11 -- if it didn't guarantee magical security, by looking at random people instead of following the "SCREAMING LEADS" like; "Bin Laden determined to attack" and 72 urgent messages from an FBI man following an Al Qaeda agent. It obviously had nothing to do with security. It was Hoover's extortion campaign all over again. And it obviously worked on some Democrats.
And note, Democrats don't have a blindly loyal base -- so it's actually a GOOD THING that they can get an approval rating of 3% but Bush can't get below 25%. Obviously, Satan and Stalin couldn't get below 25% in this country either, as long as they seemed like "take charge" dudes.
I'm not a physicist, but I still have to apply a bit of my own horse sense here.
What bothers me is the treating of the Heisenberg uncertainty principle as if it were a force of nature -- that it was information of place and speed that is somehow sacrosanct. I contend that is not what is going on. Since all particles are really waves, that interact in discrete energy levels and only at a very specific point (hence, as particles, in a quantum manner), that the uncertainty is a byproduct of not being able to measure something so small and interactive without influencing it. Like not being able to look at a flame, but discovering it's position or speed by blowing on it -- you could imagine that using such a technique would also make flames uncertain. Any field interacting with the observed particle will collapse it, or move it -- so you can only measure one aspect at a time. By pushing on it, and measuring the energy of what is given off, you know it's speed, because you knew what you threw at it, and can assume the mass of both objects from previous knowledge. Likewise, you could discern position, if you throw more objects at it and see where it isn't -- kind of like looking at the scatter patterns of BBs from a shotgun. Something was in-between the BBs and the target. With may tries, you can use many BBs to find the location of one BB. So, in practical terms -- such techniques will always make you choose between what you want to measure. But this is not inherent to what is being measured.
I think a lot of this mental spaghetti, is hindering quantum physics. I know, bold statement little man.
So this is just me saying, that Casimir Effect has a lot to do with the "quantum" expression of the particles. I visualize this as a "focal length" on a camera, where there is one ideal range of two lenses. Anything NOT in focus of the input and output of fields in the space time fold we like to call particle waves, is cancelled out. So by being an exact "quanta" of distance -- basically, the ideal energy expression distance of the particle away, means that the energy is re-absorbed as it is expressed and doesn't travel. This is like the wheel on a car -- it's circumference is fixed. Or the magnetic field on a bar magnet -- again, there is an ideal distance for the field as the poles connect with each other.
A lot of quantum physics sounds like the blind describing an elephant. The models only define consistent properties. Though, they know very detailed and exact things about what elephants do, without knowing what the elephant looks like. It's made overly complex, because people get caught up on the models that describe the behavior as if the model of physics were the actual thing. The "uncertainty principle" is probably due to our technique of launching the equivalent of large mountains at the elephants in order to try to figure them out, we destroy the elephants, who in the time we leviathans can get another mountain ready to throw, have had babies and replaced the crushed Elephant with new ones, and we might assume that they were boiling up out of nothing. The Universe IS, and physics tries to figure it out. I could even describe the space/time of the Universe, as an infinitely dense and energetic substance, and the matter and energy we experience, is all a vacuum of resonant flaws that move emptiness through the infinitely dense mass. Some of these particle interactions, might make more sense if we inverted them anyway. As long as you have consistent properties of the Elephants, or the inverted spaces and it is consistent -- then you could use that just as well to understand the Universe. And in a Universe this big -- some one else besides me probably does.
So, I'm just trying to pick a nit, and say that particles aren't exerting a special force because they don't want us to know both their speed and location. This probably has a lot more to do with a resonant distance that the fields resolve their energies as their "quantum distance." But we don't know the whole story. Some property that keeps
Wait. I thought I'd read that it wasn't based upon "zero point energy" but on a Perfect reflecting surface.
Apparently, photons reflecting each other in close proximity cause the two surfaces to pull towards each other. They use a special material, that has an inverse refraction, which causes the plates to push outwards (and so, apparently this causes a repelling effect on the outside of the two surfaces).
This would be an interesting property of light then, if this is true.
I agree it is probably not levitation -- perhaps more of a "resonance" created by the interaction of photons and it probably has a very specific range. Levitation is a different property than something like this -- more like a "ground effect" air car, but using instead photons.
My guess is that the distance, has a lot to do with the frequency of light reflected, so if they "charged it" with a tiny laser, they might get more consistent distances and a stronger resonance effect. I'm guessing that there is a distance where photons are re-absorbed by their originating atom as soon as they are released -- thus the surfaces cannot touch because it creates a sort of pressure.
It may be the same properties as described of the Quantum Effects here; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kashmir_effect Photons or electromagnetic forces -- may be the same thing here.
I was listening to I think the TWIT show -- it was a pro who used to work with Government hacking work. He mentioned that Skype is encrypted and still a headache for the Government--about the only phone system that is right now. Everything else though, can be considered tapped. Cell Phones and home phones, can be listened to, without you "picking up" the line, and of course, all cell phones since 2005 have a GPS in them -- whether or not YOU are taking advantage of it.
All these military development factories are privatized right now.... all this technology is arming our oppressors.
And the tech is going to Carylse Group, headquartered in Dubai. The logic of "being at least on the winning side" doesn't make sense -- we are not the good guys anymore. My allegiance is with the principles that made America great, not with evil bastards no matter which country they are in.
Bush hides behind a flag that means nothing to him besides cover. He is using all our institutions against Democracies. Right now, we are supporting war crimes by using Depleted Uranium in Iraq. Evil.
The vote for Domestic spying allows the little Bush fascists to contine spying on the "opposition" and basically makes Democracy impossible.
Really, it's not YOUR guilt that matters -- it's that certain Democrats who voted FOR THIS, are probably guilty of something like Mark Foley. So, just like the Mob, when they've got dirt on you, they can trust you.
Call these your "compromised" representatives. There is no other issue when the Constitution is in jeapordy. We will be really lucky to vote in 2008.
A consumer buys tooth paste and can use it to brush their teeth or polish a CD. Eventually, there is no toothpaste left -- you can't return it.
If I buy clothing -- I can get on my sewing machine, and cut fabric and make copies all day long. I just can't re-sell any of these "copyrighted" designs.
LEASING a product that I purchase, is by-passing the sovereignty of the Consumer, which is an important detail in the Bill of Rights. You keep pointing to "but they made an agreement to lease this product" as if that meant anything. The REALITY that we have people arrested based on laws supporting the lease model -- doesn't mean it is Constitutional. We have a lot of Bogus corporate crap right now that goes against the whole purpose of Commerce in America.
NOTHING has support in our Constitution unless it the profit of it, benefits the public. Again, this reverse logic is no accident. Just as fixing elections results in America having Republican leaders who front for the Wealthy Elite.
You do not own the software. It is not yours to do with as you please. Just like the stripper. >> Dude, how can you string together a sentence and not see that it is self-contradicting? The software is a "defined" product. You can "own" it or not -- but it's kind of like information. The PERSON is neither a product nor information -- so that's where the analogy ends. Apples and Oranges. The PERSON is protected by the Constitution, while PRODUCTS are not. Information, gets a lot more nebulous. If people had perfect memories -- companies will have to one day "own" part of you, to remove unlicensed memories.
OWNING or COPYRIGHTING information is the wrong path to go down.
If I had time, I could explain a working system. But the most important bit is to push to get this country back on track with the Constitution.
You know, I realized the same thing too... in about one minute of looking at the thing.
And I thought for about 30 seconds more and realized I should keep my big mouth shut.
It's a good thing that the Pentagon gets the low hanging fruit of gear heads who build contraptions like this.
SlashDot has a lot of big brains,.. and it is really great that a lot of them are involved in making Open Source software -- not finding new weapons for Psychopaths at the Pentagon, to create shiny new toys. Realize that these are going to be used one day, to make sure that we don't have body bags of our troops (that are already not photographed), so that the bothersome American public doesn't have to get upset.
The only thing worse than troops dying -- is no troops dying. If you don't have skin in the game, then wars for Oil could go on forever. Someone at Haliburton can eat a ham sandwich and a Biggie-sized coke, and be mowing down families with these things.
That's why people in the army come back and force people to look at the tragedy, and flyboys in the Airforce come back and talk about the glory of big flashy bombs.
Grow up and realize that life and the struggle of nations is about coming to terms with people and not about Kewl Robots.
If you have any other lethal ideas for better weapons -- keep them to yourself. I could come up with a 100 ways to better wipe out our troops or their troops, and you know what? I make presentations for a living -- because creativity shouldn't be used for such infantile, emotionally retarded evil.
Pretend you are a stripper. Someone pays you $40 to give them a lap dance.
Um, I can pretend it -- but you wouldn't pay anyway.
1st) if you cannot tell the difference between a video game and a stripper -- you've been playing too long with the wrong things. 2nd) A DVD is not a person -- therefore, not a service. 3rd) You don't have to pay the stripper -- you can get kicked out, but it is an honor system. Maybe a "donation" to here breast implant fund.
Please learn these important distinctions, before you support a system whereby people can purchase things, but never own them. With this analogy, I could be renting my damn tooth paste.
>> That's not to say that maybe people shouldn't be modding the games to pirate. It's just that saying you have no ownership is bogus and leads to more rights for business than people -- always wrong. This country is for citizens, not profits. You can run a business respecting citizens, but you cannot have a Democracy, where business isn't compelled to respect citizens.
The Consumer is Sovereign, and this trendy gimmick of "licensing you something" that you paid money for is an end-run.
I buy a disc and I own that disc. The corruption of our marketplace to benefit a particular business has got to stop.
It is not by any means a service and everyone involved knows that. If they don't allow for backup copies -- then they should allow for an inexpensive replacement system that is very easy to use. If they can't do that, then maybe they shouldn't get the privilege of having a business in these United States.
I'm sick to death of companies who think their right to profit means putting people in jail. Solve your own method of getting money, or shut up. The courts and police are not yours to get your CEO a bonus, or even to employ your workers -- the are their to protect the life, liberty and peace of mind of citizens -- NOT BUSINESS.
If you think otherwise, please read the Constitution of the United States -- you've been brainwashed.
What if their corporate policy was to club people like fur seals?
A "corporate policy" means nothing -- but THIS is stuff that controls the courts?
Fascist much?
Slap her with a nuisance fine for her not asking permission ($9 for the cost of admission) and let her go. It was clearly not the intent to capture the video... the pirates probably had that for Transformers as soon as it came out with high quality. They can't get the pirates, so they beat this poor woman in proxy. Is this going to deter the REAL pirates? No.
OK, I use PICO too -- because VI scares the heck out of me because you can hit a key and start doing a command to the OS -- and like, since I'm only editing some properties in PICO anyway, I don't need to learn all the arcane escape commands in VI.
My Kung Fu sucks.
We need a support group for UNIX dabblers who use PICO. I know I should feel ashamed but I don't. I suppose the first part of dealing with a problem is recognizing you have one -- but I'm not even THERE yet.
I also think Paris Hilton is attractive, if only that dating her would probably shut her up because I'd keep saying; "Hey, a sock in your mouth -- that's hot!" There, I said it.
I'm pretty sure that Vista has all this tracking software built in and there is no way for you to remove it. I think there are two things going on with all the Domestic spying; 1) Since Corporations actually write bills now, there is a lot of tit-for-tat going on with government. The Companies like AT&T and Microsoft, do what the government wants, and in exchange the government doesn't pursue it's obligations towards monopoly oversight. AT&T is buying up more telecom companies again -- including baby bell BellSouth, and we haven't heard a peep about Microsoft forcing computer manufacturers to pay for Windows regardless of what they ship (or they retaliate by not giving them OEM discounts).
2) Companies may also be getting inside information about competitors. The thing about fascism, is that there are winners and losers -- and so if you aren't already a company in bed with the Gov -- you may be on the menu.
This virus is probably meant for systems that don't already have "Investigation Inside" -- which is actually a good sign. The FBI wouldn't bother making such a thing for Windows XP if they already had a built in; "tell me everything" system in the OS.
Looking at our current government, acting pretty much like Hoover's FBI -- I wouldn't be surprised if this FBI tracking virus weren't in place but not turned on in as many computers as possible -- you know, just in case they needed it. They wouldn't get a subpoena to infect your PC -- they'd get the subpoena perhaps to turn it on.
I only have issue with THREE things: 1) As far as I know, the "eco-pundits" have not been saying the decrease in the dollar is "a good thing" -- they might be saying that decreasing imports is a good thing. What we want is to have energy independence technology support, and to lead the world in Green Technologies to export in place of weapons. Scaring the world, and then having them buy more weapons as "security insurance" seems to do well for some companies -- but they realize their profits in Dubai, so this isn't helping our economy either.
2) When the hell did Dvorak ever be a good source for anything? I mean, he promoted Apple moving to INTEL -- which was against the common wisdom, but for all the wrong reasons. He basically thought anything Apple did sucked, and this was a way for them to value the company to sell off the OS and throw out 90% of their profit which is hardware and gadgets. Everyone told him he was baked -- and they were right. He just got lucky that Jobs had been running on INTEL in stealth for years.
3) If we stopped pumping worthless paper -- it would be like trying to brake too fast. China is stuck in 5th gear with a 11% growth rate -- if they could have jumped off the fast train, and ruined our economy without messing up their own -- they probably would have. With our over-stretched military, it isn't the "super power" aspect that keeps countries trading in oil -- its a game of chicken investment -- they have so much surplus dollars that they aren't good for anything else, and if they stop buying dollars -- everything economically collapses. So they support the Washington happy talk and hope that somewhere in the future, we get a sane government that fixes things. So instead, foreign government backed businesses are buying up US toll roads and infrastructure in place of pieces of paper. Of course, this means that we may never be able to pay it off, because all the profits from a recovery would be going to these businesses -- not to paying off the foreign debt. Make sense?
The real solution, would be to have a real leader, who would pump everything into a manhattan project for alternative energy, and to throw this printed money at companies that had cutting edge and exportable technology. Instead of waiting 5 years for the genetic engineering guys to grow gasoline from bacteria -- we should be throwing money at every one of them to get it done as fast as they can. We have to grow our way out of this and the best bang for the buck has always been education and an infrastructure that allows America to create real things. We've been spending all our legal efforts protecting DVDs and Patents -- but hey, did you notice that all those intellectual property companies are foreign owned? Have you heard of Sony Pictures? Nobody likes these patent barons, and we have no way to really enforce it except good will.
If we don't change course, we hit the Great Depression 2.0, as the derivatives market, leveraged buyouts (again), and junk housing loans come crashing down in a $2 Trillion+ anchor, to totally end credit for a while. You can't undo the stupidity of Reaganomics 2.0 (Bush version) by turning off the money spigot -- because we have no means to pay any of this off -- we don't even own the Weapons manufacturing in this country anymore. I think it is likely already too late, so get out of stocks and into something like Plows and a mule.
Progress isn't going to happen with this administration, because the Saudis, Israel, and China are invested in them -- and they pull the strings. Otherwise we wouldn't be in Iraq, we wouldn't be building an oil pipeline to Israel, and we would have done something about Darfur (China's oil war) long before now.
>> There is nothing that can be done, unless we change our government. The people in charge are avoiding prison and cannot be concerned with the welfare of the public. Sorry to be a "one topic" pony, but if the Constitution of America is in jeopardy -- NOTHING else is important. The ship of state has a hole at the water line -- and it can't float until we patch the hole. We need to impeach -- otherwise utter ruin is in the future.
Where did Monsanto get their seeds from? Plants. So there is already an existing item they derived their work from.
If they can patent a natural item that grows -- who did they pay to get the seeds? We would have all starved off long ago, if someone prior to Monsanto had been able to ride this gravy train.
And I'd say, that being able to sue someone for replanting their seeds or not signing a technology agreement would mean that people HARMED by their food -- would be able to place Monsanto with sole liability. Food allergies are going up -- could it be that bio-engineering in nuerotoxins into tomatos might be involved? Or what about a peanut gene finding its way into a potato -- aren't there a lot of people who may be bothered by peanuts?
So now in Amerika, the business questions Science? I mean, the business buys a lobbyist, who then buys a congress critter, who then asks the scientist with 3 kids to feed; "Tell me why I shouldn't fire you right now for this paper you wrote about Nicotine being linked to cancer -- don't you know that there is still controversy on this topic?"
Without research to prove the need of research, a business will have to be proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, of not accurately doing research that could effect their own profit margin.... really, I can't see where such an idea could go wrong. Sounds efficient.
[/Rated MPAA "S" for Sarcasm -- reading comprehension tags courtesy of the Association for Concerned Readers, a subsidiary of Association for Ending Concern, a subsidiary of the Heritage think tank]
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In this discussion about the shuttle, what has not been mentioned (OK, I haven't read everything here) is the improvements to the Shuttle Design.
;-)
Since the shuttle was launched, there have been numerous improvements. I look at the X-33 and it's use of an inverted Delta-V exhaust. The pressure from the atmosphere shapes the outgoing exhaust into the right shape -- straight down for low earth and spread out for space. You can get rid of that very complicated piece of equipment that shapes the exhaust at the edge of failure and replace it with a solid piece of ceramic.
The idea of a space plane never took advantage of the main advantage of a Plane -- that is, using aerodynamics and a lifting body to get you up in the air where there is atmosphere. Some shuttle designs have been tethered to 747s. Or you could use a "lifting platform" and launch from a heli-blimp (invented to move large trees by loggers in Canada). But if you can fly the Shuttle up to about 8,000 feet -- you lose the need for about 1/3 to a 1/2 of the fuel. Thus making the payload bigger, or the weight smaller (which would reduce the fuel needs). Single-use rockets are cheaper, because you don't have to carry stuff that has to be re-used. If the re-usable parts (like wings) can help lift it -- it's a win-win.
Or we could just mount an expedition into India and find those ancient records of magnetic propulsion that was lost about the time Atlantis fell into the sea. Anti-gravity would beat out both shuttles and rockets.
Absolutely.
"The consumer is sovereign."
It seems our current government, and many of our people, have forgotten that this whole experiment in Democracy called the USA was designed to give Live, Liberty and Happiness to the people. There isn't anything in their about the RIGHTs of corporations, or even of such a thing called a "multinational." You make a product and you sell it -- once you sell it, you no longer have any control over that thing you sold -- none.
The loophole has been to "lease" the seat -- not sell the ticket. So, the ticket is reserving the right to lease the seat at a given time, and is an agreement between the company and the first lean holder.
OK, then why don't you fucking pay for all the State funds that built that park, and pony up the real market value for the real estate? What, are you going to move the team somewhere a state can give you a better deal? Is every team going to play for Delaware? Why don't the Cities own the team names in the first place? Oh, I get it -- it's like all the oil and mineral rights that states give up because the companies cut a "donation" to a given candidate. It's a lot cheaper for companies to buy politicians than pay for what they take from the people.
Sounds like a Corporate version of what governments have been doing for years;
A mutual defense treaty.
You sign up with NATO, and rubber-stamp what we want at the UN, and we will defend you if Costa Rica decides to invade. I'd look for some 'feedback' agreement wherein IBM gets some security from the group buying in as well. Anyone trying to sue a member, has to look at EVERY patent in the arsenal, to see if it remotely resembles what they are trying to sue for -- that alone would make suing the IBM patent alliance very daunting.
I think this is a good thing -- only in that it will make it almost impossible to conduct patent trolling -- at least if you are a company with enough funds to "buy in." It also illuminates that patents have been more of a protection and extortion racket for the big boys, and doesn't reward innovation. IBM seems to be fighting the good fight in general.
The down-side I see, is that this furthers the trend of protection for the Haves. Small companies and individuals are going to be even more the low-hanging-fruit. We have FREE trade in the US, if you are a large corporation -- but not for small companies and individuals. No freedom of movement for people, but freedom of business and trucks passing from Mexico to Canada. You have freedom of speech, if you can afford to buy it on the TV and media and it doesn't offend the owners of those outlets -- but forget trying to say anything you want in the park.
I only bring that up, because this is just another step where Corporations are acting like governments. I'm sure the fascade of who is running this joint is going to quickly rear its head.
For a marketing program -- this was a success.
The real question is; What percentage of the people who paid nothing, would have bought this album if they had no free option? If the answer is MOST -- then you've lost nothing. RadioHead will probably get more people to their concerts - it appears most bands make nothing on their music sales anyway.
I understand the Libertarian -- anti-regulation bent here. Perhaps there is an assumption, since most people here are reasonably well educated, that we can actually just let people "make up their minds." I'm sure that, if it's only a small minority of folks who have chosen to shut out the real world and only watch what Pat Robertson wants them to watch -- it's all personal choice.
But we are fast approaching a test-taking, brain dead society. Sure there are smart enough people to hire and do work -- but how can you function as a Democracy when someone is influenced by some titillating news story about a candidate wearing a Push-up bra?
It's great that people can choose what magazine they read, what group the affiliate with, and what program they want to watch. Perhaps they want to listen to the music on iTunes, that their favorite hero wants to listen to. You eventually get into a situation where it is more work to choose -- and easier just to passively subscribe.
This may not be THE issue, or THE problem -- but when do we draw the line? The whole point of public school, was that parents didn't have the right to Opt their children out of the shared experience of education. There is a curriculum on history, economics, math and reading, so that we can all have a way of communicating, and a vocabulary of what the issues are. I don't think MOST people know what the real issues are, or can do much beyond Grunt that something is Socialist or Fascist.
I'm sure that Mob bosses will ignore this law.
Only the powerful will be allowed to commit crimes, and then have well-healed publicists who explain how things "accidentally' went wrong.
With RFID, it should be easier to scan who the protestors are -- but not who throws the rocks.
RFID won't be perfect, it will fail whenever it is plausible and might disagree with the propaganda.
Tracking the numerous laptops left with huge databases of personal information out of various government agencies,... one is left to wonder why anyone is surprised by all this data theft. Didn't someone send out a memo?
Could it be, that the Total Information Awareness project (TIMA), run by federal criminal John Poindexter, just went privatized? Could it be that he and other people are doing an end-run around spying on citizens, and creating a massive database for this purpose and subsidizing the costs with taxpayer money and sales of information to private companies?
Is there anything in the current law to stop them -- other than catching them red handed with grabbing the laptops out of someone's car?
Great post Tony.
To the people who think this is up to debate, I'd say that from now on we need to determine if Bank Robbers are committing crimes or just Liberating money.
Wow. I mean, just wow.
/end rant.
You can't determine at the NSA that domestic spying is illegal? This is your job to know. Maybe people need it tattooed on their foreheads.
If people can't determine what is domestic spying, and what is torture, and what is a conflict of interest, and what is an unjust war -- then I might as well find a cave somewhere, because the decision making abilities of people in charge of nuclear rockets is going to be sorely taxed.
"What is launching a missile?" Is it me pushing this big red button here, while my buddy turns the key saying; "authorized use only, at peril of summary execution" or is it the actual rocket taking off? I'm not sure. "Launch" is so vague.
Sorry to get so "vitriolic" but I'm really sick of this. Getting pissed about the daily abuses of this fascist government, does not mean someone is "piling on" for no good reason. More evidence of abuses of power do not mean "more conspiracy theories" they mean more f'ing evidence. This is not a debate, this is not a theoretical discussion. How can people be so brain-dead as to justify this crap.
Plane and simple, if you can't figure out some things in life, then you shouldn't be around sharp objects. Stop apologizing and finding a reason why Bush can break the constitution, and fail at securing borders, ports and sanity, while he gets to play with all these cool new powers. If they wanted to secure our country -- they'd kick this guy out. Because some enemy doesn't need to invade -- just keep supporting bush if they want to see our Democracy fail.
The Domestic spying was to get dirt on his political opponents, and it started BEFORE 9/11 -- if it didn't guarantee magical security, by looking at random people instead of following the "SCREAMING LEADS" like; "Bin Laden determined to attack" and 72 urgent messages from an FBI man following an Al Qaeda agent. It obviously had nothing to do with security. It was Hoover's extortion campaign all over again. And it obviously worked on some Democrats.
And note, Democrats don't have a blindly loyal base -- so it's actually a GOOD THING that they can get an approval rating of 3% but Bush can't get below 25%. Obviously, Satan and Stalin couldn't get below 25% in this country either, as long as they seemed like "take charge" dudes.
I'm not a physicist, but I still have to apply a bit of my own horse sense here.
What bothers me is the treating of the Heisenberg uncertainty principle as if it were a force of nature -- that it was information of place and speed that is somehow sacrosanct. I contend that is not what is going on. Since all particles are really waves, that interact in discrete energy levels and only at a very specific point (hence, as particles, in a quantum manner), that the uncertainty is a byproduct of not being able to measure something so small and interactive without influencing it. Like not being able to look at a flame, but discovering it's position or speed by blowing on it -- you could imagine that using such a technique would also make flames uncertain. Any field interacting with the observed particle will collapse it, or move it -- so you can only measure one aspect at a time. By pushing on it, and measuring the energy of what is given off, you know it's speed, because you knew what you threw at it, and can assume the mass of both objects from previous knowledge. Likewise, you could discern position, if you throw more objects at it and see where it isn't -- kind of like looking at the scatter patterns of BBs from a shotgun. Something was in-between the BBs and the target. With may tries, you can use many BBs to find the location of one BB. So, in practical terms -- such techniques will always make you choose between what you want to measure. But this is not inherent to what is being measured.
I think a lot of this mental spaghetti, is hindering quantum physics. I know, bold statement little man.
So this is just me saying, that Casimir Effect has a lot to do with the "quantum" expression of the particles. I visualize this as a "focal length" on a camera, where there is one ideal range of two lenses. Anything NOT in focus of the input and output of fields in the space time fold we like to call particle waves, is cancelled out. So by being an exact "quanta" of distance -- basically, the ideal energy expression distance of the particle away, means that the energy is re-absorbed as it is expressed and doesn't travel. This is like the wheel on a car -- it's circumference is fixed. Or the magnetic field on a bar magnet -- again, there is an ideal distance for the field as the poles connect with each other.
A lot of quantum physics sounds like the blind describing an elephant. The models only define consistent properties. Though, they know very detailed and exact things about what elephants do, without knowing what the elephant looks like. It's made overly complex, because people get caught up on the models that describe the behavior as if the model of physics were the actual thing. The "uncertainty principle" is probably due to our technique of launching the equivalent of large mountains at the elephants in order to try to figure them out, we destroy the elephants, who in the time we leviathans can get another mountain ready to throw, have had babies and replaced the crushed Elephant with new ones, and we might assume that they were boiling up out of nothing. The Universe IS, and physics tries to figure it out. I could even describe the space/time of the Universe, as an infinitely dense and energetic substance, and the matter and energy we experience, is all a vacuum of resonant flaws that move emptiness through the infinitely dense mass. Some of these particle interactions, might make more sense if we inverted them anyway. As long as you have consistent properties of the Elephants, or the inverted spaces and it is consistent -- then you could use that just as well to understand the Universe. And in a Universe this big -- some one else besides me probably does.
So, I'm just trying to pick a nit, and say that particles aren't exerting a special force because they don't want us to know both their speed and location. This probably has a lot more to do with a resonant distance that the fields resolve their energies as their "quantum distance." But we don't know the whole story. Some property that keeps
Wait. I thought I'd read that it wasn't based upon "zero point energy" but on a Perfect reflecting surface.
Apparently, photons reflecting each other in close proximity cause the two surfaces to pull towards each other. They use a special material, that has an inverse refraction, which causes the plates to push outwards (and so, apparently this causes a repelling effect on the outside of the two surfaces).
This would be an interesting property of light then, if this is true.
I agree it is probably not levitation -- perhaps more of a "resonance" created by the interaction of photons and it probably has a very specific range. Levitation is a different property than something like this -- more like a "ground effect" air car, but using instead photons.
My guess is that the distance, has a lot to do with the frequency of light reflected, so if they "charged it" with a tiny laser, they might get more consistent distances and a stronger resonance effect. I'm guessing that there is a distance where photons are re-absorbed by their originating atom as soon as they are released -- thus the surfaces cannot touch because it creates a sort of pressure.
It may be the same properties as described of the Quantum Effects here; http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kashmir_effect
Photons or electromagnetic forces -- may be the same thing here.
I was listening to I think the TWIT show -- it was a pro who used to work with Government hacking work. He mentioned that Skype is encrypted and still a headache for the Government--about the only phone system that is right now. Everything else though, can be considered tapped. Cell Phones and home phones, can be listened to, without you "picking up" the line, and of course, all cell phones since 2005 have a GPS in them -- whether or not YOU are taking advantage of it.
All these military development factories are privatized right now.... all this technology is arming our oppressors.
And the tech is going to Carylse Group, headquartered in Dubai. The logic of "being at least on the winning side" doesn't make sense -- we are not the good guys anymore. My allegiance is with the principles that made America great, not with evil bastards no matter which country they are in.
Bush hides behind a flag that means nothing to him besides cover. He is using all our institutions against Democracies. Right now, we are supporting war crimes by using Depleted Uranium in Iraq. Evil.
A-fucking-men.
The vote for Domestic spying allows the little Bush fascists to contine spying on the "opposition" and basically makes Democracy impossible.
Really, it's not YOUR guilt that matters -- it's that certain Democrats who voted FOR THIS, are probably guilty of something like Mark Foley. So, just like the Mob, when they've got dirt on you, they can trust you.
Call these your "compromised" representatives. There is no other issue when the Constitution is in jeapordy. We will be really lucky to vote in 2008.
Seems that you didn't get the point at all.
A consumer buys tooth paste and can use it to brush their teeth or polish a CD. Eventually, there is no toothpaste left -- you can't return it.
If I buy clothing -- I can get on my sewing machine, and cut fabric and make copies all day long. I just can't re-sell any of these "copyrighted" designs.
LEASING a product that I purchase, is by-passing the sovereignty of the Consumer, which is an important detail in the Bill of Rights. You keep pointing to "but they made an agreement to lease this product" as if that meant anything. The REALITY that we have people arrested based on laws supporting the lease model -- doesn't mean it is Constitutional. We have a lot of Bogus corporate crap right now that goes against the whole purpose of Commerce in America.
NOTHING has support in our Constitution unless it the profit of it, benefits the public. Again, this reverse logic is no accident. Just as fixing elections results in America having Republican leaders who front for the Wealthy Elite.
You do not own the software. It is not yours to do with as you please. Just like the stripper.
>> Dude, how can you string together a sentence and not see that it is self-contradicting? The software is a "defined" product. You can "own" it or not -- but it's kind of like information. The PERSON is neither a product nor information -- so that's where the analogy ends. Apples and Oranges. The PERSON is protected by the Constitution, while PRODUCTS are not. Information, gets a lot more nebulous. If people had perfect memories -- companies will have to one day "own" part of you, to remove unlicensed memories.
OWNING or COPYRIGHTING information is the wrong path to go down.
If I had time, I could explain a working system. But the most important bit is to push to get this country back on track with the Constitution.
You know, I realized the same thing too... in about one minute of looking at the thing.
And I thought for about 30 seconds more and realized I should keep my big mouth shut.
It's a good thing that the Pentagon gets the low hanging fruit of gear heads who build contraptions like this.
SlashDot has a lot of big brains,.. and it is really great that a lot of them are involved in making Open Source software -- not finding new weapons for Psychopaths at the Pentagon, to create shiny new toys. Realize that these are going to be used one day, to make sure that we don't have body bags of our troops (that are already not photographed), so that the bothersome American public doesn't have to get upset.
The only thing worse than troops dying -- is no troops dying. If you don't have skin in the game, then wars for Oil could go on forever. Someone at Haliburton can eat a ham sandwich and a Biggie-sized coke, and be mowing down families with these things.
That's why people in the army come back and force people to look at the tragedy, and flyboys in the Airforce come back and talk about the glory of big flashy bombs.
Grow up and realize that life and the struggle of nations is about coming to terms with people and not about Kewl Robots.
If you have any other lethal ideas for better weapons -- keep them to yourself. I could come up with a 100 ways to better wipe out our troops or their troops, and you know what? I make presentations for a living -- because creativity shouldn't be used for such infantile, emotionally retarded evil.
Pretend you are a stripper. Someone pays you $40 to give them a lap dance.
Um, I can pretend it -- but you wouldn't pay anyway.
1st) if you cannot tell the difference between a video game and a stripper -- you've been playing too long with the wrong things.
2nd) A DVD is not a person -- therefore, not a service.
3rd) You don't have to pay the stripper -- you can get kicked out, but it is an honor system. Maybe a "donation" to here breast implant fund.
Please learn these important distinctions, before you support a system whereby people can purchase things, but never own them. With this analogy, I could be renting my damn tooth paste.
>> That's not to say that maybe people shouldn't be modding the games to pirate. It's just that saying you have no ownership is bogus and leads to more rights for business than people -- always wrong. This country is for citizens, not profits. You can run a business respecting citizens, but you cannot have a Democracy, where business isn't compelled to respect citizens.
Well, then this law is unconstitutional.
The Consumer is Sovereign, and this trendy gimmick of "licensing you something" that you paid money for is an end-run.
I buy a disc and I own that disc. The corruption of our marketplace to benefit a particular business has got to stop.
It is not by any means a service and everyone involved knows that. If they don't allow for backup copies -- then they should allow for an inexpensive replacement system that is very easy to use. If they can't do that, then maybe they shouldn't get the privilege of having a business in these United States.
I'm sick to death of companies who think their right to profit means putting people in jail. Solve your own method of getting money, or shut up. The courts and police are not yours to get your CEO a bonus, or even to employ your workers -- the are their to protect the life, liberty and peace of mind of citizens -- NOT BUSINESS.
If you think otherwise, please read the Constitution of the United States -- you've been brainwashed.
What if their corporate policy was to club people like fur seals?
A "corporate policy" means nothing -- but THIS is stuff that controls the courts?
Fascist much?
Slap her with a nuisance fine for her not asking permission ($9 for the cost of admission) and let her go. It was clearly not the intent to capture the video... the pirates probably had that for Transformers as soon as it came out with high quality. They can't get the pirates, so they beat this poor woman in proxy. Is this going to deter the REAL pirates? No.
OK, I use PICO too -- because VI scares the heck out of me because you can hit a key and start doing a command to the OS -- and like, since I'm only editing some properties in PICO anyway, I don't need to learn all the arcane escape commands in VI.
My Kung Fu sucks.
We need a support group for UNIX dabblers who use PICO. I know I should feel ashamed but I don't. I suppose the first part of dealing with a problem is recognizing you have one -- but I'm not even THERE yet.
I also think Paris Hilton is attractive, if only that dating her would probably shut her up because I'd keep saying; "Hey, a sock in your mouth -- that's hot!" There, I said it.
YARTGAM
(Yet Another Reason To Get A Mac)
I'm pretty sure that Vista has all this tracking software built in and there is no way for you to remove it. I think there are two things going on with all the Domestic spying;
1) Since Corporations actually write bills now, there is a lot of tit-for-tat going on with government. The Companies like AT&T and Microsoft, do what the government wants, and in exchange the government doesn't pursue it's obligations towards monopoly oversight. AT&T is buying up more telecom companies again -- including baby bell BellSouth, and we haven't heard a peep about Microsoft forcing computer manufacturers to pay for Windows regardless of what they ship (or they retaliate by not giving them OEM discounts).
2) Companies may also be getting inside information about competitors. The thing about fascism, is that there are winners and losers -- and so if you aren't already a company in bed with the Gov -- you may be on the menu.
This virus is probably meant for systems that don't already have "Investigation Inside" -- which is actually a good sign. The FBI wouldn't bother making such a thing for Windows XP if they already had a built in; "tell me everything" system in the OS.
Looking at our current government, acting pretty much like Hoover's FBI -- I wouldn't be surprised if this FBI tracking virus weren't in place but not turned on in as many computers as possible -- you know, just in case they needed it. They wouldn't get a subpoena to infect your PC -- they'd get the subpoena perhaps to turn it on.
I agree with 90% of what Maltheus just said.
I only have issue with THREE things:
1) As far as I know, the "eco-pundits" have not been saying the decrease in the dollar is "a good thing" -- they might be saying that decreasing imports is a good thing. What we want is to have energy independence technology support, and to lead the world in Green Technologies to export in place of weapons. Scaring the world, and then having them buy more weapons as "security insurance" seems to do well for some companies -- but they realize their profits in Dubai, so this isn't helping our economy either.
2) When the hell did Dvorak ever be a good source for anything? I mean, he promoted Apple moving to INTEL -- which was against the common wisdom, but for all the wrong reasons. He basically thought anything Apple did sucked, and this was a way for them to value the company to sell off the OS and throw out 90% of their profit which is hardware and gadgets. Everyone told him he was baked -- and they were right. He just got lucky that Jobs had been running on INTEL in stealth for years.
3) If we stopped pumping worthless paper -- it would be like trying to brake too fast.
China is stuck in 5th gear with a 11% growth rate -- if they could have jumped off the fast train, and ruined our economy without messing up their own -- they probably would have. With our over-stretched military, it isn't the "super power" aspect that keeps countries trading in oil -- its a game of chicken investment -- they have so much surplus dollars that they aren't good for anything else, and if they stop buying dollars -- everything economically collapses. So they support the Washington happy talk and hope that somewhere in the future, we get a sane government that fixes things. So instead, foreign government backed businesses are buying up US toll roads and infrastructure in place of pieces of paper. Of course, this means that we may never be able to pay it off, because all the profits from a recovery would be going to these businesses -- not to paying off the foreign debt. Make sense?
The real solution, would be to have a real leader, who would pump everything into a manhattan project for alternative energy, and to throw this printed money at companies that had cutting edge and exportable technology. Instead of waiting 5 years for the genetic engineering guys to grow gasoline from bacteria -- we should be throwing money at every one of them to get it done as fast as they can. We have to grow our way out of this and the best bang for the buck has always been education and an infrastructure that allows America to create real things. We've been spending all our legal efforts protecting DVDs and Patents -- but hey, did you notice that all those intellectual property companies are foreign owned? Have you heard of Sony Pictures? Nobody likes these patent barons, and we have no way to really enforce it except good will.
If we don't change course, we hit the Great Depression 2.0, as the derivatives market, leveraged buyouts (again), and junk housing loans come crashing down in a $2 Trillion+ anchor, to totally end credit for a while. You can't undo the stupidity of Reaganomics 2.0 (Bush version) by turning off the money spigot -- because we have no means to pay any of this off -- we don't even own the Weapons manufacturing in this country anymore. I think it is likely already too late, so get out of stocks and into something like Plows and a mule.
Progress isn't going to happen with this administration, because the Saudis, Israel, and China are invested in them -- and they pull the strings. Otherwise we wouldn't be in Iraq, we wouldn't be building an oil pipeline to Israel, and we would have done something about Darfur (China's oil war) long before now.
>> There is nothing that can be done, unless we change our government. The people in charge are avoiding prison and cannot be concerned with the welfare of the public. Sorry to be a "one topic" pony, but if the Constitution of America is in jeopardy -- NOTHING else is important. The ship of state has a hole at the water line -- and it can't float until we patch the hole. We need to impeach -- otherwise utter ruin is in the future.
Yes but this "rip off" of CP/M as you call it exchanged the A and the C drive letters -- so it was completely different.
This is insane even on its face.
Where did Monsanto get their seeds from? Plants. So there is already an existing item they derived their work from.
If they can patent a natural item that grows -- who did they pay to get the seeds? We would have all starved off long ago, if someone prior to Monsanto had been able to ride this gravy train.
And I'd say, that being able to sue someone for replanting their seeds or not signing a technology agreement would mean that people HARMED by their food -- would be able to place Monsanto with sole liability. Food allergies are going up -- could it be that bio-engineering in nuerotoxins into tomatos might be involved? Or what about a peanut gene finding its way into a potato -- aren't there a lot of people who may be bothered by peanuts?
So now in Amerika, the business questions Science? I mean, the business buys a lobbyist, who then buys a congress critter, who then asks the scientist with 3 kids to feed; "Tell me why I shouldn't fire you right now for this paper you wrote about Nicotine being linked to cancer -- don't you know that there is still controversy on this topic?"
... really, I can't see where such an idea could go wrong. Sounds efficient.
Without research to prove the need of research, a business will have to be proven guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, of not accurately doing research that could effect their own profit margin.
[/Rated MPAA "S" for Sarcasm -- reading comprehension tags courtesy of the Association for Concerned Readers, a subsidiary of Association for Ending Concern, a subsidiary of the Heritage think tank]